Jesus Christ – the Same Yesterday, Today and Forever

Steve Corley

Given in Kingsport and Roanoke on Sabbath, May 7, 2022

Given in Knoxville on Sabbath, July 23, 2022

Given in London/Corbin on Sabbath, June 17, 2023

The so-called “Christianity” of the world typically looks on the God of the Old Testament, the One who interacted with Israel at that time, as a stern, harsh God and tends to contrast Him with the gentle Jesus Christ who dealt with humans when He walked the earth in New Testament times.  (Many of the churches of the world seem to think that the One who gave the Law to Moses and to Israel was God the Father – but that belief is a heresy as I showed in a previous sermon.  The God Being who dealt with Israel in the Old Testament was the One who later entered human form to become Jesus Christ.)  This Being gave Israel three types of laws.  The most important – and the one which endures into the New Covenant – is the spiritual law (Romans 7:14), codified in the Ten Commandments (and the two great commandments which in turn summarize the ten) and also containing a large number of principles and rules on how we as individuals should behave toward God and toward our fellow human beings.  The second part was the ceremonial and sacrificial law (Hebrews 9:9-10) – including the physical circumcision sign of the Old Covenant and dealing with ceremonies and rituals which were to be performed (primarily by the priesthood) reminding the people of sin and pointing toward the sacrifice of Christ.  The third part was the civil law which God ordained for the nation of Israel – what physical penalties were to be levied for different specified sins, generally after conviction by some type of criminal court (we are not talking about private revenge – remember that Lev. 19:18 forbids us to avenge ourselves).  Since the civil law was to be enforced by the government of Israel it no longer applied after there were no independent nations of Israel and Judah.  But it is on this civil law that I would like to concentrate in this sermon.  A number of the penalties prescribed for different sins indeed sound harsh to our ears (in Leviticus 20, for example).  Under the civil law a man was executed – at the direct command of the One who became Jesus Christ – for gathering sticks on the Sabbath (Num. 15:32-36).  Achan was executed for taking a garment from Jericho which the One who became Jesus Christ had commanded to be devoted to destruction (Joshua 7).  And these seemingly harsh civil laws were given to Moses by the same Jesus Christ who later fed the five thousand and the four thousand, who healed many of the sick, who forgave the woman taken in adultery, and who raised Lazarus from the dead.  How could this same Being be so gentle and yet so seemingly harsh?  God says that He does not change (Malachi 3:6).  In this sermon I would like to show how both types of behavior are totally consistent with the same character of Jesus Christ – the character we are supposed to be developing and internalizing (Romans 13:13-14, Ephesians 4:20).  We might title this sermon from Hebrews 13:8: “Jesus Christ – the Same Yesterday, Today and Forever.”

We can resolve the seeming contradiction between the behavior of the God of the Old Testament (the preincarnate Christ) and the Jesus Christ of the New Testament if we realize one basic principle.  God the Father and Jesus Christ love human beings and hate sin – which is the violation of the overarching spiritual law (Romans 7:14, 1 John 3:4).  And in particular they hate the spread of sin (as happened in the pre-Flood world (Gen. 6:5, 11-12) and to the Amorites during the time while Israel was in Egypt (Gen. 15:16).  The ceremonial law was designed to remind the people that the penalty of sin is death – the animal sacrifices foreshadowed the sacrifice of Jesus Christ which would ultimately pay the penalty.  Likewise, the civil law was designed to discourage violations of the spiritual law by establishing civil penalties which were to be administered by the civil government. 

One of the first applications of the civil law was the command to expel all of the Amorites from the land in Canaan which was to be occupied by Israel, and to execute any who fought to remain in the land (e.g., Numbers 33:51-52, 55-56).  Such would seem a very harsh sentence upon the Amorites at first glance.  But the One who became Christ had a very good reason for issuing this command.  Now that Jacob had a large number of descendants (having multiplied in Egypt), God was going to use this nation for starting His plan for mankind.  In the first stage, however, He was not going to offer them the Holy Spirit (except for a very few of them).  In order for Israel to fulfill God’s plan, an environment had to be maintained which was highly conducive to following God’s Laws (so that people would obey without the benefit of the Holy Spirit).  Paganism had to be strictly kept out of the nation of Israel because, if it were allowed, people without the Holy Spirit would be drawn to engage in the pagan practices and would forget God.  If the Amorites were allowed to remain in the land and mix freely with the Israelites, the Israelites would be tempted to adopt their paganism – and this is indeed what subsequently happened in the future when Israel failed to drive out the Amorites.  God did not want the sins of the Amorites to spread to Israel.  Hence the One who became Christ had to give this “harsh” directive for the sake of His nation Israel.  God had not forgotten the Amorites.  God is the One who can resurrect the dead when He chooses and it is not His will that any should perish (2 Peter 3:9).  The Amorites who were expelled or executed at God’s command for the sake of His nation Israel will in turn have their opportunity to become God’s people also – and spiritual Israelites – in the second resurrection, the Great White Throne judgment (cf. Ezekiel 37, Rev. 20:11-12).

For the worst sins (such as murder) the civil penalty was to be execution (Num. 35:16-18, Lev. 20:2, 9-16, 27).  The execution was not to be carried out hidden in some prison death chamber (as is so often done today) but rather publicly (Deut. 17:7) – and very shortly after the crime was committed.  The public nature of the execution was to serve as a warning to anyone who might consider committing a similar sin – it was designed to stop the spread of sin.  Those who committed property crimes were to be required to reimburse the victims with money or property worth much more than that which they had actually stolen or damaged (Exodus 22:1-15).  In doing this – working off the debt as necessary – they were to learn not to steal again.  Others could learn to avoid stealing by seeing how hard the thief had to work to pay off the debt.  The sin of theft – or of disregard for one’s neighbor’s property – would not spread.  Those who committed certain other spiritual violations – not serious enough to deserve execution – were to be “cut off from Israel” – expelled from the community (e.g., Lev. 20:17-18).  They were to be treated as foreigners – not to be imitated (if indeed they were not to be actually kicked out of the land).  In either case, they were no longer to have day-to-day contact with the other Israelites.  With these “cut off” people driven out of the community – others would not learn their sin from them and the sin would not spread.  [The Hebrew word translated “cut off” (“karath,” Strong’s #3772) can sometimes, according to the Hebrew dictionary in Strong’s, also refer to being destroyed.  However, there are two reasons for believing that being “cut off from Israel” refers to a lesser penalty than execution.  First, the sins for which a person could be “cut off” are less severe than those for which execution was prescribed as the civil penalty.  Second, if “cut off” referred to execution, why was the Hebrew expression translated “put to death” not used in these cases, as it was used for sins such as murder and rape?]

[Note also that in the case of serious crimes which were punishable by execution, no one could be put to death except by the testimony of two or more witnesses to the crime (Deut. 17:6).  Indeed, this principle was designed to prevent the execution of innocent persons – which it undoubtedly did.  However, we should also note one other aspect of this principle.   A totally private sin – with no witnesses – would incur no civil penalty.  Remember that a sin without witnesses was not going to spread (unless bragged about: note the application of this principle in 2 Sam. 1:1-16 (especially verse 16) and the misapplication in Matthew 26:63-66).  The purpose of the civil penalties was to keep sin from spreading – and a sin which could not spread would not fall under the civil penalty.]

Also, let’s skip from the [incomplete] conquest of Canaan following the Exodus to the return of the Jews from Babylon.  Large sections of the books of Ezra and Nehemiah (e.g., Ezra 4) deal with the opposition to the returning Jews by the people who were already living in the land.  They were basically people of Mesopotamian origin whom the Assyrians had brought in to replace the northern Israelites who had been deported (2 Kings 17:24-41).  They most likely largely became the ancestors of the group called the “Samaritans” in the New Testament (although the New Testament does not absolutely state such).  They were not total pagans as the Amorites had been, but rather practiced a blended religion – a form of Judaism which nevertheless incorporated a number of pagan practices (verses 32-34 and 41).  Remember similarly that Simon of Samaria was a “sorcerer” who apparently had been highly regarded in that city (Acts 8:9-11).  Remember also what Jesus told the Samaritan woman about her religion – “you worship what you do not know” (John 4:22).  True Christians are the spiritual counterpart of Jews (Romans 2:28-29), the “Israel of God” (Galatians 6:16).  But much of what the world calls “Christianity” is the spiritual counterpart of Samaritanism – a blended religion with some of the truth from God’s Word but mixed with rejection of much of the Law and with a number of practices of pagan origin.

So how do we reconcile Christ’s implied endorsement of the rejection of the Samaritans by the Jews returning from the exile (e.g., Ezra 4:2-3) with His later use of the “Good Samaritan” as an example in the parable (Luke 25:30-37) and His specific command to the disciples to preach His message in Samaria (Acts 1:8)?  Remember that the people who were already inhabiting the land of Israel at the time of the Jews’ return from the exile were trying to frustrate God’s work. They were attempting to stop the building of both the wall of Jerusalem and the Temple, and they were alternatively demanding to share in the Temple – (apparently to bring in their paganized blended religion?)  God did not want the people in the land to contaminate the returning Jews with paganism again – just as the Amorites had done to the Israelites after the Exodus.

So what about the Good Samaritan?  Christ was not approving or promoting the Samaritan’s blended religion – remember what He had told the woman at the well in the Samaritan town of Sychar.  Rather He was showing the same principle shown in Romans 2:14-15 – when Gentiles who do not understand the principles of God’s Law happen to obey it anyway, better than those of us who do understand better – they put us to shame.  A modern analogy might be a situation when a Methodist, or a Catholic, or a Lutheran, or a Baptist – with an incomplete understanding of the truth – goes out of his way to help his fellow man when we – whom God has blessed with a much better understanding of His truth – do not do likewise.  Then our inaction becomes our shame – we are not showing our faith by our works (James 2:14-18). 

But let us contrast Christ’s commandments to His people today in this age – either directly from His own mouth (as quoted in His word) or through His inspiration to the New Testament writers.  Contrast the situation now to the one in ancient Israel.  God is no longer working through a single physical nation.  The civil laws which He gave – which were to be administered by a civil government – expired with the end of Israel and Judah as independent nations.  The Old Covenant is obsolete (Hebrews 8:13) along with its physical circumcision symbol (Gal. 5:1-6 – although physical circumcision of male infants is still a good idea as a purely health practice), and its ceremonial laws which pointed toward the sacrifice of Christ are no longer in force – since Christ has already been sacrificed (e.g., Galatians 3:24-25, Hebrews 9:9-10).  The spiritual law remains and is binding upon us.  In ancient Israel, without the Holy Spirit (except for a very few people), an optimum external environment and society – maintained by the civil laws of the Old Covenant – was necessary in order to discourage people from disobeying God’s overarching spiritual law.  However, the situation with New Testament Christians is different.  True Christians are a small minority, called out from many physical nations, living in many different civil societies – ranging from totally non-Christian to those heavily influenced by the world’s versions of so-called “Christianity.”  [And such included those called out of the ancient Samaritans – as Christ had commanded the disciples to preach His gospel in Samaria.]  We are living in the world, among its people, but we realize that we are not to be part of it.  Unlike the ancient Israelites who imitated the neighboring pagan nations, we, as people with God’s Holy Spirit, know that we are not to imitate the people of the world.  We are not to adopt, or take part in, the sins of the people of the world who surround us.  But since we live in the nations of the world, subject to their civil governments (Romans 13), Christ does not give us a set of civil laws similar to those He gave ancient Israel.  And similarly, whereas He told ancient Israel not to seek the prosperity of the Moabites and Ammonites, who wanted to do harm to His nation of Israel (Deut. 23:6), He today tells us to imitate the “good Samaritan,” to do good to all people as we have opportunity – starting with those of the “household of faith” but then extending to the people of the world (Galatians 6:10). 

The civil laws of the Old Covenant had penalties which were to be administered by the government.  And there is one type of analogous “civil” penalty which Christ prescribes for use in the New Testament Church – and it is likewise to be administered by Church authority.  Remember that the overriding purpose of the civil penalties under the Old Covenant was to stop the spread of sin.  In contrast to the situation under the Old Covenant, there is of course no death penalty to be administered within the Church (except in a few cases such as that of Ananias and Sapphira where it was administered publicly by God directly – again to stop the potential spread of sin within the Church).  But I would rather like to focus on one particular Old Covenant civil penalty – where it was specified that those committing certain particular sins were to be “cut off” from Israel, expelled from the nation and from contact with other Israelites.  Those who were “cut off” would not be able to spread their sin to others.  And there is indeed an analogous penalty today.  Let’s turn to Matthew 18:15-17.  Those in the Church who are sinning against their fellow brethren, offending them, and who refuse to repent when repeatedly confronted – can be “cut off” from the Church and sent back out into the world. Further instructions in this regard are given in 1 Corinthians 5:9-11.  Verse 11 says that we should not keep company with a brother in the Church who openly engages in certain sins (2 Thessalonians 3:6, 14-15 is a parallel Scripture).  The two previous verses show that such is not necessary regarding a serious sinner out in the world – we can still keep company to a degree with that person.  The clear indication is that we, as converted Christians, should already know not to imitate the sins of the world – we should know better than to let them spread to us.  However, the key difference is that we do tend to imitate the behavior of fellow members of the Church – as indeed we should if those people are actually following Jesus Christ (1 Cor. 11:1).  A member of the Church who openly and publicly continues in sin would be much more likely to spread the sin to other members than would a person in the world who continues in the same sin.  We know not to imitate the sins of the world but we are much more likely to imitate a sin if we see a brother doing it [“he is doing it, and he is a Christian, so it must be OK”].  That is the reason for disfellowshipment [or excommunication] and an example of the practice is given in 1 Cor. 5:1-5.  Note here, of course, that the hope is that the disfellowshipped member will have time to think about what his sin has done, will repent and will be reinstated into the Church.  We can see that in this case such [happily] actually happened (2 Cor. 2:6-8).

We can see that indeed, Jesus Christ really is the same yesterday, today and forever.  He – and God the Father – do not change.  They have one basic spiritual law which lasts forever.  However, they also have given other regulations – the ceremonial and civil laws of the Old covenant – which were temporary in nature and were tailored to the needs of the time in which they were in force.  The civil laws were given out of love for human beings.  They were designed to maintain an environment conducive to obedience to God’s eternal spiritual law – to stop the spread of sin among a people who had not yet been offered the Holy Spirit.  After Christ’s sacrifice there was no need for the ceremonial law, and for New Testament Christians with the Holy Spirit there is no longer a need for the Old Covenant civil law with its penalties to stop the spread of sin among us.  We are supposed to know not to imitate the sins of the world.  But one “civil” penalty remains – that of expulsion from the Church for a member who continues in flagrant public sin.  Again, this penalty is still given out of love – to keep the sin from spreading to other members within the Church, and to try to motivate the sinner to repent, change his ways and return to the fellowship.  Yesterday, today and forever, God the Father and Jesus Christ comprise a God of love – a God who is not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.  And for this we can be eternally grateful!