Luke 16:16-17

Luke 16:16-17 “The Law and the Prophets were proclaimed until John. Since that time, the good news of the kingdom of God is being preached, and everyone is forcing his way into it. It is easier for heaven and earth to disappear than for the least stroke of a pen to drop out of the Law.

Roman 13:8-10 Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for he who loves his fellowman has fulfilled the law. The commandments, “Do not commit adultery,” “Do not murder,” “Do not steal,” “Do not covet,” and whatever other commandment there may be, are summed up in this one rule: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Love does no harm to its neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.

1 John 4:7-12 Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.

Jesus is the personification of God's love toward us. While we were yet sinners, God loved us and sent his Son for our redemption. In the above passage, Jesus says the Law and the Prophets were taught for centuries to reveal God and his righteousness to the Jewish people, but since that time, the good news of the kingdom of God is being preached, and everyone, the multitudes, are pressing into this kingdom. They are eager to accept the "good news," redemption through Jesus Christ the Messiah, the one who heals. However, Jesus said the Law of God will be fulfilled: it is easier for heaven and earth to disappear than for the least stroke of a pen to drop out of the Law. All of the Law was fulfilled, completed, satisfied in and through Jesus Christ and his works. He alone lived a perfect life, and his life was sacrificed for humans because of the love of God. Jesus was the love sacrifice, fulfilling all the sacrifices and feasts of the Old Testament, the demands of God. He completed God's love towards mankind by paying the price for sinful man. The Bible says, God is love and Love is the fulfillment of the law.

Therefore, we who are in Christ are in love: we have fulfilled, completed, satisfied the Law because of him. Does this bring sanctification of the flesh, making the flesh holy. No, the flesh has been contaminated by sin. Our walk has a tinge of death about it, for we are but flesh. To know that is to know that we will all die. The flesh will die, that is a fact. God does not deal with the flesh except to quicken it, to encourage it to do better, the work of the Holy Spirit within us. But God does deal completely and finally with our souls or spirits. He makes us righteous, for we are in him. Because of that we are sanctified and made holy through Christ's blood, and we are acceptable to God. We become pleasing to God because of the mighty work of Christ, his love towards us. We are "SAVED!" Praise God we are saved from destruction, from hellfire; we are saved from ourselves to enter into the holy of holies, to be present with God forever. WHAT A PERFECT REDEMPTION! WHAT A GLORIOUS HOPE!

We see in these scriptures that because of this wonderful deliverance, we should portray God's nature of love towards others. We also ought to love one another. We ought to love one another as Christ loved us, not sit around and judge one another. We ought to let God judge whether someone is in the kingdom or not, whether someone is pleasing or acceptable to God. We should encourage each other to clothe ourselves with Christ, to put away the sins that so easily beset us. We should encourage each other to enter into the kingdom of God with joy, to live our lives as Christ would want us to live them. Yes, we are to press into the kingdom of God by accepting the "goodness of Jesus Christ and his righteousness, the complete fulfillment of the Law. As we do this, the things of Earth grow strangely dim and the love of God is shed abroad into the hearts of others.