I live by the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit teaches us how to live.
That often includes doing the practical things found in the Law.
The Jews are under the Mosaic Law, the Gentiles are under the law of conscience, and we, the church of God, are under the law of Christ.
What is this law of Christ? The Bible uses many names to describe it, and it contains only one commandment: to love. This law of Christ, which is the only law that brings liberty!
The love that has been poured out in our hearts obviously wants to live a life pleasing to God. This is why all the requirements that the Old Covenant announced will be fulfilled as we live by the New Covenant love.
So when some people think that we are preaching lawlessness, it is a big misunderstanding. We are preaching a higher law: the law of the New Covenant, the law of love, the perfect law of liberty, the royal law according to the Scripture, which only works when Jesus is living in you!
This perfect law exceeds all the requirements of the Old Covenant, but it all happens in the newness of the Spirit, not in the oldness of the letter. The Pharisees’ business with the letter has been replaced by the wonderful fragrance of life that comes from the new life.
We have moved out from the narrow corridor of letter and into the glorious freedom of the Spirit. Hallelujah!
The New Commandment ( Not Law)
We are new creations; we live in a New Covenant with a new commandment.
In the New Covenant we have one commandment instead of ten.
In the New Covenant we have one commandment instead of ten. This one commandment is not written “on tablets of stone but on tablets of flesh, that is, of the heart” (2 Cor. 3:3).
“A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another” (John 13:34).
“And this is His commandment: that we should believe on the name of His Son Jesus Christ and love one another, as He gave us commandment” (1 John 3:23).
The key to live in this new commandment is that “the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us” (Rom. 5:5).
The new commandment is an impossible “requirement” if we are to produce this love on our own.
But the solution of God is brilliant! He Himself fulfills the requirement in us by pouring out His love in our hearts; He gives us a new nature when we pass from death to life.
The new nature loves the brethren, just like 1 John 3:17 says. And therefore the requirement is fulfilled in us.
If we should be required to make the first initiative—that love should start with our effort—this requirement would be impossible to fulfill. It would be “mission impossible” if we were the ones who were to produce the love to fulfill the commandment about loving the Lord with all our hearts and our neighbor as ourselves.
So without being born-again, this commandment cannot be put into practice. It is when we pass from death to life that we receive the love, and then it is written on fleshly tablets of the heart. Love comes from God. We love because He first loved us. We forgive because He already has forgiven. He died for us while we were still sinners.
The new nature loves the brethren, just like 1 John 3:17 says. And therefore the requirement is fulfilled in us.
Agape love..translated as "love: the highest form of love, especially brotherly love, charity; the love of God for man and of man for God
“We love, because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19, RSV).
The whole miracle is founded on His work in us; our performance and our boasting are excluded!
This is the key to the new commandment. It is not us who loved God – it is He who loved us! We love, because He first loved us.
“Owe no one anything except to love one another, for he who loves another has fulfilled the law. For the commandments, ‘You shall not commit adultery,’ ‘You shall not murder,’ ‘You shall not steal,’ ‘You shall not bear false witness,’ ‘You shall not covet,’ and if there is any other commandment, are all summed up in this saying, namely, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ Love does no harm to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfillment of the law” (Rom. 13:8-10).
By: Åge M. Åleskjær
Kefa