The New Way

 

According to God's Law you could not partake of the Passover Feast (Seder) if you were “unclean” or had touched anything that was “unclean”.      

 

Isn't it amazing that the Pharisees were attempting to murder an innocent man by lying and bringing false accusations, but they were most concerned about being able to eat the upcoming Seder meal?

 

They didn't enter the Praetorium, they just sent word to Pilate to come out to them so that they would not become “unclean".

 

Jesus taught that He came to fulfill or complete the Law and to establish a NEW WAY.  Because of Jesus' death, He can cleanse us deep down inside - something that ceremonial Laws can't do. 

 

Paul taught that God's Laws were designed to teach the Israelites that it was impossible to stay "clean" without God's help (Day 74).  God's Law was supposed to teach the Jews how hopelessly sinful and lost they were and that they needed a Messiah, a Savior to remove their uncleanness.

 

Instead, the Pharisees took God's Laws and expanded them and turned them into burdensome and frustrating rules.    Instead of the rules pointing them to God, they had become a "religion" of their own.  In Jesus' day, the Jewish people were living under this expanded version of Jewish Laws called the Talmud and were trying to earn their way to God instead of looking for a Messiah.

 

I cannot find a Law in Leviticus (the book with most of God's Laws in it) that prohibited a person from entering a Gentile house.   So, I assume that this was one of the expanded laws created by the Pharisees and written in their Talmud.  

 

When we create a man-made religion, it causes us to reject the free gift of salvation that Jesus came to give.

 

So, here we have the Jewish leaders refusing to come into a Gentile house (a law that I can't find in God's rules (please correct me if you can find it!) yet they were willing to lie in order to get a man killed.

 

When you are empty, Satan can be at the controls of your life, and your mind can become totally out of balance! 

 

We're going to stop here but continue this discussion tomorrow.

 

In His service, dale

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