This is part 8 of a series; Common Sense Miracles — Not Magic is part 1.

As Jesus plainly said in Matthew 5, laws like “thou shalt not kill” were not abolished, they were just moved. Under the terms of the New Covenant (Hebrews 8:10-13), God is writing those ten commandments on our hearts, not just on the stones Moses brought down from Sinai (2 Corinthians 3:3).

They are now laws which apply to our hearts and spirits, not just to our flesh. Internally, as well as externally. But you’ll be shocked to learn this happened to all of the Old Covenant laws – even ones you may feel certain were abolished!

Let’s start with an easy one.

Genesis 17:13 He who is born in your house… must be circumcised. My covenant will be in your flesh for an everlasting covenant.

Circumcision was a symbol of entering into the Old Covenant, a permanent reminder of a contract you signed – kind of like a wedding ring. Now every Christian knows that circumcision was done away with… but was it really?

Romans 2:28-29 (WEB) For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly, neither is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh; but he is a Jew who is one inwardly, and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit not in the letter; whose praise is not from men, but from God.

So circumcision wasn’t abolished – it was MOVED! From the flesh, to the heart! You’re doing the exact same thing as before, having a symbol to witness to your covenant with God… but since it’s an internal covenant, so likewise it must be an internal symbol!

THE TEMPLE

Now we all know the temple was destroyed, and that Jesus made the need for the temple to cease. But was it abolished, in the sense most Christians use the term? Or did it, like circumcision, simply… move?

1 Corinthians 3:16-17 (WEB) Don’t you know that you are a temple of God, and that God’s Spirit lives in you? If anyone destroys the temple of God, God will destroy him; for God’s temple is holy, which you are.

So the temple wasn’t abolished either – it was REPLACED when God moved! And when the better temple (a true Christian) exists, there is no reason for a lesser temple anymore!

In the Old Testament, God dwelt inside the tent of Moses, later within the stones of Solomon’s temple. But not in the people, as a rule. He was among them, in the midst of their camp, but not within them, in their bodies (Numbers 35:34).

But Jesus said in John 14:17 (WEB) of the spirit of truth, that “you know him, for he lives with you, and will be in you”. Note carefully the words Jesus used – the spirit lived with them, but in the future, after Jesus died, it would be IN THEM.

2 Corinthians 6:16 (WEB) …For you are a temple of the living God. Even as God said, “I will dwell IN them, and walk IN them; and I will be their God, and they will be my people."

If a person was under the Old Covenant, God did not live IN them. He lived NEAR them, in another building. And since God was not in them, what that person is like on the inside doesn’t matter to Him; what that person thinks in their heart is their business!

But in the New Covenant, God promised to dwell in us, making US in every way a temple of God! And when God lives IN someone, He expects them to be as beautiful inside as they pretend to be on the outside!

Doesn’t that make perfect sense? Don’t you feel that way about your own house? Then you’ve been #goldenruled!

So if you’re OK with just being God’s neighbor, then do whatever you feel like inside – just keep your lawn mowed. But if you want to be the house of God, you’d better take out the trash! Metaphorically speaking.

SACRIFICES

But surely, the sacrifices are done away. We can be absolutely certain that at least they didn’t survive the change in the covenant. No beasts are killed today!

Romans 12:1 Therefore I urge you, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service.

Apparently, the sacrifices continue – and just like everything else, they were moved internally, just like everything else! So what beasts are sacrificed today in the temple which is the body of every New Covenant Christian?

Romans 8:12-13 (WEB) So then, brothers, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh. For if you live after the flesh, you must die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.

Note that the deeds of the body must be put to death; Jesus said those evil deeds “come forth from the heart” (Mark 7:21), which is why Paul tells us to “put to death therefore your members which are on the earth (Colossians 3:5).

Because remember: killing the deeds does no good, if the heart that causes them remains alive!

Jeremiah tells us that “the heart is deceitful above all things, and it is exceedingly corrupt” (Jeremiah 17:9). David said of His own nature “As for me, I was foolish, and without knowledge; I was like a beast before you” (Psalms 73:22).

Note that last part! When we act selfishly, foolishly, when we break the golden rule we are acting like animals – like beasts! And it is that “beast nature” which we must sacrifice to God; killing the animal part of us which caused our sins!

Ecclesiastes 3:18 (BBE) I said in my heart, It is because of the sons of men, so that God may put them to the test and that they may see themselves as beasts.

Like beasts, humans are selfish. Like beasts, we are not by nature evil – just selfish. It is selfish to want to eat; yet obviously, that’s not wrong. But a beast will take his brother’s food – and that IS wrong. It’s not wrong to be selfish provided that selfishness is in submission to the golden rule!

And God commands us to recognize that selfish nature in ourselves, restrain it, and kill the part of us that leads to evil actions. And if you’re doing it right, a little piece of that beast dies daily! So you are, in a very real sense, sacrificing a beast inside your body every day!

Which is why Paul said “I die daily”(1 Corinthians 15:31). He told us “those who belong to Christ have crucified the flesh with its passions and lusts” (Galatians 5:24). How is that not a sacrifice? Crucifying our fleshly nature, as Jesus crucified His, so that you may be purified as He was! (Romans 6:4-6).

If you can do that, the death of a literal animal on an altar of stone or brass is meaningless – for God doesn’t dwell in other beasts, he dwells inside YOUR beast!

And the symbolic death of your internal beast is worth more than the death of all your external beasts put together!

So once again… far from being abolished, sacrifices are even more important, even more vital, and offered EVEN MORE OFTEN than they EVER were under the Old Covenant!

BETTER THAN SACRIFICE

God never did like sacrifices of animals; not even in the Old Testament.

Hosea 6:6 For I desire mercy, and not sacrifice; and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings.

Proverbs 21:3 To do righteousness and justice is more acceptable to Yahweh than sacrifice.

Note how the Bible contrasts something people think God wanted – sacrifices and burnt offerings – with what God clearly said He actually wanted – righteousness and mercy. Which means these things are types of each other! That mercy is a type of sacrifice; and knowing God is a type of burnt offering!

Not also that there were two different things mentioned – sacrifices for sin and burnt offering. God does not stutter, these are different things with different purposes.

Sacrifices, also called sin offerings, were payments for sin – hence the name. If you sin, you owe a death to the law (Romans 6:23). But if you died for every sin, no one could learn; and yet if it cost you nothing, you likewise would never learn to avoid sin!

So in the OC, God permitted you to substitute the death of an animal for your own life, to avoid your own death but simultaneously to make you realize that sin had consequences – expensive ones (cows were never cheap!).

In the NC, God similarly permits us to substitute the death of Jesus for our own death, and thus to escape the punishment of the law. But in either case it would be far better to have simply obeyed in the first place – thus, obedience is better than sacrifice. For if you have obedience, you will never NEED sacrifice!

BURNT OFFERINGS

But a sacrifice just lifts the death penalty. It doesn’t give you a medal. It merely makes you neutral again; if you don’t do good – if you neither kill nor make alive, neither lie nor tell the truth – God is neither angry, nor happy.

You have kept the negative side of the law, so He has no reason to kill you; but you haven’t kept the positive side, so he has no reason to bless you either! You are… neutral. His feelings about you are… Meh.

Which is where burnt offerings come in. Since you haven’t done good by practicing the positive side of the law, you can begin to make it up to Him by offering Him something else He likes instead – a sweet-smelling burnt offering. Because even God loves the smell of good barbeque!

Burnt offerings were not meant to pay for sin; they were often offered with sin offerings, but they were for a different purpose; to offer “for a sweet smell” to God. To take you from neutral to good! Just as a sin offering is a payment to cover a debt to the unkept negative law, so a burnt offering is a gift to replace obedience to the unkept positive law!

And yet God much prefers you to do good instead of offering a burnt offering! Still, if you WON’T do good, it’s better than nothing. Because it’s expensive, it helped selfish people realize they weren’t doing enough, weren’t trying hard enough to keep the whole law. But it would have been much better, and easier, and usually CHEAPER, to just keep the positive law!

Hebrews 10:5-6 Therefore when he comes into the world, he says, “Sacrifice and offering you didn’t desire, but you prepared a body for me; You had no pleasure in whole burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin. …

This is why obedience is better than sacrifice, and doing good is better than burnt offerings! Because if you obey (keep the negative law), you don’t attract God’s attention in a bad way; and if you do good (keep the positive law) you attract God’s attention in a good way.

If you break the negative law, you can redeem yourself with death; yours, a lamb’s, THE Lamb’s; and if you fail to keep the positive law, you can make God think fondly of you through your crazy BBQ skills. But why not just KEEP THE WHOLE GOLDEN RULE?

A NEW SACRIFICE

Yet while we are meant to sacrifice of our own beast, those sacrifices alone are not sufficient to take away all of our sins; which is why the sacrifice of the Passover Lamb, the greatest sacrifice of all, likewise had to move inside!

Matthew 26:26-28 As they were eating, Jesus took bread, gave thanks for it, and broke it. He gave to the disciples, and said, “Take, eat; this is my body." He took the cup, gave thanks, and gave to them, saying, “All of you drink it, for this is my blood of the new covenant, which is poured out for many for the remission of sins.

Jesus, our Passover (1 Corinthians 5:7) gave us, in symbol, his blood to drink; the Israelites put the blood of that same symbolic lamb on the doorposts of their houses; OUTSIDE, you’ll notice! But we were given a Passover ceremony which like all laws survived the change between the covenants by moving internally!

And note the two parts of this ceremony…. the blood of the New Covenant for the forgiveness of sins – a “sin offering” – AND the flesh of His body, symbolized as bread which must be baked in fire, thus… a burnt offering!

The wine to replace our missing obedience to the negative law, and the bread to make up our missing obedience to the positive law, so that through His righteousness we can likewise be righteous! And that through His goodness, we likewise can be reckoned good!

Philippians 3:9 and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own, that which is of the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith;

WHY BOTHER?

Still, many Christians, hearing that last verse, say “Exactly! We SHOULDN’T keep the law, we shouldn’t even try to practice the golden rule, because Christ kept it for us!”

But remember! Obedience is BETTER than sacrifice, and righteousness is better than BURNT OFFERING!

Matthew 12:33-34 (WEB) …to love him [God] with all the heart, and with all the understanding, with all the soul, and with all the strength, and to love his neighbour as himself, is more important than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices." When Jesus saw that he answered wisely, he said to him, “You are not far from the Kingdom of God."…

Obedience to the whole golden rule is better than all sacrifices… Which Christ confirmed! Which means that it is better to obey than to NEED the sacrifice of Christ; better to do good than to NEED to obedience of Christ! CHRIST SAID SO!

Surely, it is not realistic to be able to do completely without Christ’s sacrifice – we are human, we’re gonna mess up, that’s part of the point – but Jesus’ sacrifice was given to remove the curse of our occasional failures, not to free us from TRYING to keep the law!

He kept the law perfectly to help us learn to keep the law, which is why your obedience – when you can manage it – is always better than borrowing His obedience! It’s only when you inevitably fail to obey as well as Christ obeyed, that you need His sacrifice!

PRIESTHOOD

I suppose it’s no surprise after all this that the priesthood wasn’t abolished any more than the temple was; that it just moved to where the new temple was! Which is why Paul says in Hebrews 4:14-15 that Jesus is now our high priest because we still have a priesthood!

And why not? The job of the priests was to keep the physical temple and the people around it clean (Leviticus 16:30, 2 Chronicles 29:16); they were effectively the butlers and maids of God’s mansion. So when God moved His temple to the human body, naturally His priesthood had to focus on keeping the new temple clean! (Hebrews 2:14-18).

But, this is an internal covenant. A priesthood that could only make the FLESH clean was useless; to be honest, it always had been! Now God needed a priesthood that could work on keeping the HEART clean as well!

So like absolutely everything else from the Old Covenant, the priesthood simply moved inside! Because if someone can show you a way that you’re hurting your neighbor, and help you to overcome that sin, then they’re helping you to crucify your carnal nature!

1 Peter 2:5 You also, as living stones, are built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.

If I can help you to kill a small piece of your beast, then, like an ancient priest, I’m helping you offer a sacrifice for your sins. A sacrifice of your own fleshly nature, a sacrifice to cleanse your heart before God and receive forgiveness!

How is that any different from what the OC priesthood did – except that they treated the external symptom, and my job is to treat the internal cause?

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION

So again I ask you... was circumcision abolished, or moved inside? Did God quit living in a house forever... or simply MOVE into a new one? Was the priesthood abolished, or did their responsibility simply change from the outside to the inside of the “temple”?

Most importantly of all, were the sacrifices abolished... or merely MOVED to the human temple, and the sacrifices being the beasts that dwelt within that temple?

Micah 6:6-8 How shall I come before Yahweh, and bow myself before the exalted God? Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old? Will Yahweh be pleased with thousands of rams? With tens of thousands of rivers of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for my disobedience? The fruit of my body for the sin of my soul? He has shown you, O man, what is good. What does Yahweh require of you, but to act justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God?

So you see, all the laws, the priests, the temple, even the sacrifices survived the change in the covenants! Granted, they changed – we don’t kill actual animals today, or need to visit a building to find God. But every concept survived, and not one was abolished!

And why shouldn’t they survive? ALL these things are derived from the Great Commandment – Jesus plainly said so! It is love for God to clean your house before He comes to live in you – so how can the temple and its rituals be abolished?

It is love for your fellow man to crucify the selfish deeds of your flesh every day, offering yourself as a living sacrifice so that you do not harm your neighbor! And love for him, to help him see his error so he can sacrifice his own beast as well!

So how can the priesthood or the sacrifices be abolished? They’re both part of the great law! If you can abolish any one of these things, then you can abolish every good thing in the universe!

Continue to Part 9: Why Does God Allow Suffering — The Rule Golden