Fully Filling

Day 4

Fully Filling

 

It is not just what happens to us in life, but the story through which we interpret what happens to us that matters. The story we live (often subconsciously) manifests itself in our behaviour and choices.

Jesus, on this mountainside was giving His people a new story to live, which was really the old story made new again. This story that boldly declared that despite everything, there is hope, because God’s Kingdom is here. Today.

But there is more going on. So much more than Jesus first hearers could have imagined as the hillside breeze tussled their hair and the sun glinted silver on  the distant northwestern shores of the Sea of Galilee. 

Jesus Introduced the Sermon on the Mount first with the Beatitudes (turning our worldly Idea of blessing on its head), then with a call to be salt and light in the world. Now, with His third and final introduction Jesus says…

‘Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfil them. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished.

Therefore anyone who sets aside one of the least of these commands and teaches others accordingly will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practises and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven.’

Matthew 5:17-20

This might sound like lofty and unattainable language, especially when He challenges His hearers by saying “For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven.” How impossible that must have sounded! Especially if we viewed the Law as a bunch of rules that must be followed. But there is something much deeper going on here. 

When Jesus speaks these words He is not talking about a bunch of ancient Levitical Laws and Jewish regulations that He has ardently kept like a very good boy. He’s talking about something much bigger. 

The Jewish Law wasn’t laws as we understand the word (rules and regulations). We need to hear the word ‘Law’ as ancient Israel heard it…

“The “law”, given through Moses, plays a vital role in the old Testament. It is uniformly presented as an object of delight and admiration (e.g. psalm 119), because it is a gift from a loving and gracious God. The Law is never presented in the Old Testament as a list of rules that one must obey in order to be right with God; rather, it is God’s Fatherly instruction, given to shape the  people he has loved and saved into a community of faith, holiness and love, bound together by mutual support and care.” * John C Collins

The Law is a gift given by a loving God as a treasure to be loved and revered.

The Torah, or the Law (also possibly translated as ‘teachings’ or ‘instructions’) is the first five books of the Bible and though it contains some laws and some teachings, it is largely a narrative with episodes of law-giving interspersed. The Jewish Law assumes that the stories are a part of the instruction as much as the rules and regulations are. In fact they often give extra layers of meaning to the commandments. 

God didn’t simply give His people a list of rules to follow in order to be “good citizens”. It was never strictly about good behaviour. He gave them a story. An unfolding story with Himself folded into every line, beginning with “In the beginning God…”. A treasured story to live in and live out. A story to make themselves at home in, forming their identity and informing their actions.

‘The Old Testament is thus the story of the one true Creator God, who called the family of Abraham to be his remedy for the defilement that came into the world through the sin of Adam and Eve. God rescued Israel from slavery in Egypt in fulfilment of this plan, and established them as a theocracy for the sake of displaying his existence and character to the rest of the world… 

…This overarching story serves as a grand narrative worldview story for Israel: each member of the people was to see himself or herself as an heir of this story, with all its glory and shame; as a steward of the story, responsible to pass it on to the next generation; and as a participant , whose faithfulness could play a role, by God’s mysterious wisdom, in the story’s progress.” John C Collins*

From the very first lines in his gospel (the genealogy of Jesus) the author, Matthew placed Jesus’ life in the pulsing circulatory system of Israel’s ancient story, in the beating heart centre of all the expectations, narratives and prophecies of this ancient people. 

Matthew points to Jesus as the fulfilment of both Israel’s story and the prophecy’s within it. Twelve times throughout his Gospel Matthew writes that the events of Jesus’ fulfil Israel’s story, either through specific fulfillments of prophecies or through the fulfilment of the story of Scripture (foreshadowing) Matthew quotes old testament scripture close to 50 times throughout his gospel. 

Jesus came into an old and long story that had been holding its breath in anticipation for a King and Messiah, a Saviour and a ruler. Every story, every song, every prophecy and every event in the life of this people had been pointing to this person.

“Jesus wasn’t intending to abandon the Law and the Prophets. Israel’s whole story, commands, promises and all, was going to come true in him.” NT Wright*

Jesus came to fulfil the story of the Law and the promises of the Prophets.

When Jesus says “I came to fulfil the Law”, He is saying He came to fully inhabit the story of Israel, to bring it to it’s culminating moment where the promise made by God in Jeremiah (and many other promises) comes true…

‘“The days are coming,” declares the Lord, “when I will fulfil the good promise I made to the people of Israel and Judah.

‘“In those days and at that time
I will make a righteous Branch sprout from David’s line;
he will do what is just and right in the land.”

Jeremiah 33:14-15

But Jesus words are deeper still. 

Not only did Jesus fulfil the story of the Law, but He also fulfilled the practice of the Law, demonstrating by His life what the commandments and teachings in the Law look like when lived by a heart beating in tune to God’s own heart. 

Jesus fulfilled the practice of the Law in His life of obedience, trust in God and complete faithfulness to the commandments. 

But this work of ‘fulfilling’ didn’t end when He finally ascended into Heaven. In many ways it had just begun. 

Jesus daily fulfils the story and practice of the Law within every human heart who (through His redeeming Life) walks in the light of the new covenant once promised by the prophet Jeremiah…

 ‘This is the covenant that I will make with the people of Israel
after that time,’ declares the Lord.
‘I will put my law in their minds
and write it on their hearts.
I will be their God,
and they will be my people.

No longer will they teach their neighbour,
or say to one another, “Know the Lord,”
because they will all know me,
from the least of them to the greatest,’
declares the Lord.
‘For I will forgive their wickedness
and will remember their sins no more.’

Jeremiah 31:33-34

Jesus fulfils the Law in us!  Through His Holy Spirit Jesus puts His law (His treasured story) in our minds and writes it on our hearts, daily inspiring, exhorting and empowering us to grow in our own practice of this living Law. He calls us to partner with Him in rewriting the broken story of this world in the light of His long story of grace.

By grafting us into the Long Story of the ‘Law’ our lives become part of the continuation of that story, the continuing story of God’s Kingdom coming on earth as it is in Heaven.

Gregory Mobeley wrote “The task of theology is the linking of our individual story to the biggest story we can imagine”*

And this is the story we now get to inhabit… this story that is older, vaster, wider and more generous than any of us can imagine. Fulfilled and fully filled by Him. 

 

 

 

Journaling the Journey 

For Jewish people the Law of God was a prized treasure and following it was viewed as a joy. How does this perspective differ from yours?

For Jewish people, the law was not just the commandments, but the whole story of God as written in the Torah and the prophets. Jesus came to fulfil this story and this law and invite us to live within it.

What stops you from living within the larger story of God? What parts of God’s story are you most likely to want to ‘set aside’?

Todays Mountainside photograph is taken near Ben Nevis in the Scottish Highlands, UK

References

*C. John Collins, Wayne Grudem, Thomas R. Schreiner, ‘Understanding the Big Picture Of The Bible’ 2012, Crossway

*Tom Wright, ‘The For Everyone Series: Matthew’  SPCK Publishing 2002

*Gregory Mobley, “The Return of the Chaos Monsters: And Other Backstories of the Bible” Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2012, 7.