Fulfilled!

“Think not that I am come to destroy (katalyō) the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil (plēroō). For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled (ginomai).” Matt 5:17-18

Katalyō: to dissolve, disunite

Plēroō:  To make full, to complete

Ginoma: to become, to bring to pass

We learn in metaphor.  We learn by moving from what we know to what we do not know, by making comparisons and connections that move us from ignorance to understanding.  When a child holds a ball in their hands and learns that it is a “ball” they do not have the words sphere or orb, but they have an understanding of the volume and space a “ball” takes up; which is different than a “circle” we might point to or draw.  When we then point to the moon and say, “it is like a ball” the child comes to understand that, though from our vantage point it looks like a circle, it must take up volume and space to be a ball.  I remember when I was about 12 years old and I was in watching my younger brothers and a small child of about 2 years old.  We were in the street and the moon was clear in the sky.  This child loved to play with bouncing balls.  When I pointed to the moon and said, “Ball” she began running down the street with her arms open crying “ball, ball”.  While I see that it was a cruel joke now it also supports the idea that until that time- the time when she made the connection that the big circle in the sky was like a ball- she only saw it as a round light.  As soon as she made a connection with “ball” she expected it to fall into her arms, so she ran toward it.

And so it is with the law and its fulfillment.  So many Christians are stuck beneath the law.  Not by His will, but by theirs.  We will speak of this law as a contract (the known) and how it has been fulfilled.  Consider a mortgage on a house.  It is a legal contract with debt associated with it.  Until the last payment is made, the house is legal collateral for the debt.  However, when the final payment is made, the house is no longer collateral for the mortgage, the bank has no legal right to it, and it is now completely owned by the one in whose name the mortgage was held.  In a sense a contract or mortgage is “open” until that final payment is made.  Once the contract is “closed” it is a matter of history, but still on record, lest the mortgage company comes and claims any further right to the property.

And so it is with Christ.  He did not come to (Katalyō) “dissolve” the contract or to “disunite” it.  He came to strengthen it and to unite all of His people – both Jew and Gentile – by it.  He made the final payment on our debt; the debt of the law: for the wages of sin is death.  Under the law, a debt we could never pay,  we are dead.  But in Christ we are alive.  And we need to live in that liberty. 

But has the law passed away?  No.  Christ Himself declared in Matt 5:18 that “not one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.” 

But I thought He fulfilled the law?  Now I am confused.  But I need not be.  For when Christ came to fulfill (Plēroō) the law He was “completing it”, “making it full”.  There was something lacking in the law.  It was not complete.  And that which was lacking was a means to pay, a means to “fill in” the gap.  The book of the law was not yet closed.  It was not finished.  It was not complete.  The contract, the mortgage, the debt, were still open.  The cross of Christ completed it.  And so, when Jesus hung upon the cross He proclaimed, “It is finished.”  So much can be said about these three words.  Everything was finished.  Every debt was paid.  Everything was completed under the old covenant.

And now, just as the house would become the property of the one in whose name the mortgage was (regardless of who actually sent the payment!), so the law is now ours.  For Christ said, “If you love Me, you will keep My law.”  Lest we insult the One Who gave His life that it might be ours, and all the promises of it, we should understand what we are now to do with it!

The law (the contract, the mortgage of our souls) is now completed and the legal “note” is ours.  The entire house, from the foundation (the old covenant, the Adamic covenant, the Mosaic covenant) to the steeple (the new covenant, the promise and work of the Cross) is completely under our possession!  We are no longer a slave to the law (working every day to earn the money to pay the debt) but the owners of it.  For the law was not solely a list of things we must do, but with them, the promises attached to the “keeping” of it.  And so, when Christ gave Himself for us, He also signified the blessing of the law, for it was by the sprinkling of blood of the Passover Lamb (commandment) that the blessing of life (that death would not enter in) has come.  The law is now ours to use, just as Christ Himself had done with His “it is written” statements.  No longer can the devil use the law to overpower us, but we him!

And we will have that law and its promises as ours to defeat the adversary, to remind him that the note is ours, and that the case is closed until all things are fulfilled (Ginoma), or brought in existence once the “now” heavens and earth pass away and are replaced with the “new” heavens and earth.

Thank God that He did not dissolve the contract!  If He did, we would have no legal right to the property as ours.  We would be evicted.  But we are not!  He is the cornerstone of the temple in which we dwell along with the Holy Spirit!  The “Note” of the law is ours.  It is both the proof that He paid it and the promise that He would.  Keeping the law now is a matter of love (for if you love Me…) not a matter of obligation.  It is no longer a list of the “must do’s” but rather a list of the little things that Our Father in heaven are pleased by.  And under the new covenant He has been so gracious to shorten that list to two: Love Him, love others (for on these hang all the law…) and empowered us through the Holy Spirit to do them!  The new covenant says this, “I love you.  You are under Grace! (Yes! My only obligation is to receive what He desires to willingly give me {for Grace is God giving me the good that I do not deserve, while Mercy is His withholding the punishment I do} and when I fail to do something that pleases Him, it is not counted against me, for Grace is the contract now… it is in His hands… it is His “obligation” to give. ) But oh how we love to show our gratitude.  Loving Him, sharing the love He has given us with others!

SDG