Young People Ask Good Questions

 

            I feel honored to be able to work with the good people at the Walnut Street church of Christ.  We have a spiritually strong church family to lean on, and the young people here are truly a blessing.  Often, the youth ask me some good questions.  This is great evidence that they are honestly interested in digging deeper into God’s word.  I want to share a few such questions with you, and discuss their Biblical answers.

            Question #1 – “If God is perfect, & He made the OT Law, how could it have “faults” (Heb. 8:7)?  Passage after passage in Scripture deals with the imperfection in the Old Law.  But were the problems in the law itself?  The Bible says the Old Law was a “yoke that we were not able to bear…” (Acts 15:10); “He finds fault with themthey did not continue in my covenant…” (Heb 8:7-9); “the law, weakened by the flesh” (Rom 8:1-3).  Never does the Bible say the fault was with God’s law, for He is perfect and could not make an imperfect law.  Rather, the law’s weakness was in the weakness of mankind.

Question #2 – “Could Jews who died under the Old Law have forgiveness of sins?”  There was no forgiveness of sins under the Old Covenant.  “For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins…11 And every priest stands daily at his service, offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins” (Heb 10:4; 11).  Christ’s death provided the necessary sacrifice for our sins (Heb 9:11-12).  But is it possible that His redeeming blood reaches back to those who died under OT Law? 

“Therefore he is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance, since a death has occurred that redeems them from the transgressions committed under the first covenant” (Heb 9:15).  Christ’s blood reaches back to the beginning of time to cleanse the sins of the righteous…and it reaches forward until He returns.  We can be saved by grace, just as “they” (our faithful fathers) will be (Acts 15:10-11).

            May we all be true Bible students, always seeking God’s truth in His holy and divine word. 

----Darrell Powell

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