Interested parties in this discussion should definitely listen to Stanley’s 3 sermons on unhitching from the Old Testament. I will let Vance post links to the 3 sermons. You should listen to them first.
,You should also listen to this response from a Messianic Jewish perspective found here.
The talks are related to his later book called Irrestible, which you can find on amazon.com. It’s quite fascinating (as Mr. Spock would say) to read the comments, both positive and negative Most of the reviewers give this book 5 stars. And one of the 5-star reviews included the following:
“He [Stanley] builds a convincing case using teachings from Christian Bible writers–Paul, Luke, James, Peter, John, and the unknown writer of the Book of Hebrews–that the Hebrew Bible does not apply to Christians. He affirms that the writers of the Hebrew Bible were inspired by God but it’s obsolete as far as Christians are concerned. “Old” is not “bad”. He likens it to the smart phone that we trade in for the newer model. The moment we activate the new one, the traded in one is obsolete. It’s still a good phone but no longer applicable.”
So I thought, Oh my…the Old Testament is obsolete? I must check this out…see what else is going on.
So anyway, I’m trying to listen to the book via an audiobook, which my library provides.
Start at the beginning. It is the very first thing that God sanctified and declared holy. It hasn’t gone away, and the day that God truly rested was the first day of the week. That is why it is the Christian Sabbath.
I think she has been fairly clear. She, like I do and many others, recognizes that the moral OT law, the laws of love, have not been abrogated. It really is not that difficult a concept. What do you think “the least of these” refers to?
You are (I think) assuming that the Sabbath is a creation ordinance. I don’t think it is, as I wrote about here.
And I know of no scripture that supports your claim that the Christian Sabbath is on the first day because that was “the day that God truly rested”. That may be a very good reason for maintaining the tradition of a 1st -day Christian Sabbath, but there is no command in scripture. There is only the history that the day after many in the apostolic church went to the temple or synagogue [1] on Friday night and Saturday, and then met the next day for a Christian “meal.”
[1] God, in his providence, did not have the earliest Christians claim “we are something different, not Jews, but another religion altogether” This kept the nascent church relatively safe for a while. In fact, the first two men, in my opinion, who recognized that Christianity was not just an outlying sect of Judaism were Saul of Tarsus and often overlooked Stephen, who was so much more than one of the first deacons, and who rarely gets the credit for the theology of his sermon when he was stoned.
I stated clearly that the review I quoted was given 5 stars by the reviewer. That’s as high as it gets. So no, I didn’t try to discredit it based on one review. The fact that this favorable review came from a fan speaks for itself. Do you want me to quote some unfavorable reviews?
And I also explained that I’m listening to the book “Irrestible.” Are you reading it?
And you don’t think that love for God and love for man speaks to either of those? Who were among the foremost abolitionists in both the U.S. and the U.K.? Christians. Christians who used the whole Bible.
There are legitimate reasons for divorce. And illegitimate ones. Sometimes marrying a divorced person is adultery. But last I checked, adultery was a forgivable sin. Watch out for cheap grace, though, because there is no such thing.
Great, beaglelady. You believe believers of Gentile origin are not under the dietary and body art laws of the OT. I agree.
What about these:
Are the laws on slave ownership and treatment moral laws? Are they the go-to instructions for such matters? How about divorce? Is the OT the go-to set of instructions for divorce?
Dale said you believed the moral laws of the OT applies to us. He wrote: “I think she has been fairly clear. She, like I do and many others, recognizes that the moral OT law, the laws of love, have not been abrogated.”
I thought he misrepresented your views, as divorce and treatment of slaves certainly appear to be moral laws. I doubt you believe in slave ownership or that beating slaves, as long as they don’t die, is moral.
But if you believe as he said you did, I will be interested to know.
Andy Stanley said the OT was not going to be the go-to source for any behavior in the church. And I showed with numerous quotes that it was often the go-to source for some behavior in the church, both during NT times and later. Do you know what I said?