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Grace, Not Torah, 550 Landa Street, New Braunfels, TX (2026)

08/30/2026

2 Peter 3

When the Warning Warns the Wrong Person

There is a strange irony in many Torah-observant arguments against salvation by grace apart from the Mosaic Law. Certain verses get pulled out like theological emergency brakes. Instead of actually dealing with Paul’s argument, the response becomes, “Remember 2 Peter 3:16. People twist Paul!” Or, “James says faith without works is dead!” The assumption seems to be that merely quoting a warning automatically proves that anyone teaching freedom from the Law must be twisting Scripture.

It does not.

Second Peter 3:15–16 is perhaps the clearest example. Peter acknowledges that Paul wrote some things that were difficult to understand and that “ignorant and unstable people” twisted his letters, “just as they do with other parts of Scripture.” But notice what Peter does not say. He does not say Paul taught Torah observance. He does not say Paul’s statements about freedom from the Law should be interpreted to mean continued submission to Moses. And he certainly does not say, “Whenever somebody quotes Paul against Torah observance, accuse him of twisting Paul.”

Peter’s warning is about distorting Paul, not believing what Paul plainly wrote.

And what did Paul plainly write? Christians “are not under the law” (Romans 6:14). Believers “died to the law” through Christ (Romans 7:4). We have been “released from the law” (Romans 7:6). The Law was our guardian “until Christ came,” but now that faith has come, “we are no longer under a guardian” (Galatians 3:24–25). If you are led by the Spirit, “you are not under obligation to the law of Moses” (Galatians 5:18 NLT). Christ canceled the record of charges against us and therefore Paul says not to let anyone condemn believers concerning food, drink, festivals, new moons, or Sabbaths (Colossians 2:14–17).

So who is twisting Paul? The person allowing those statements to mean what they actually say, or the person insisting that after reading all of them we must somehow conclude that Christians remain under Torah?

That is what makes the constant appeal to 2 Peter 3 so ironic. The warning cannot function as a magical eraser for everything Paul wrote.

James 2 gets used similarly. “Faith without works is dead!” is frequently treated as though James wrote, “Therefore you must keep the Mosaic Covenant to remain saved.” Except James never says that. James is discussing the usefulness and demonstration of faith through action. Abraham’s faith was demonstrated by what he did. James is addressing a barren profession that produces nothing, not overturning Paul’s explicit teaching that justification before God is apart from works: “people are made right with God by faith and not by obeying the law” (Romans 3:28 NLT). Paul goes even further: “people are counted as righteous, not because of their work, but because of their faith in God who forgives sinners” (Romans 4:5 NLT).

Then there is Matthew 5:17–18: “I did not come to abolish the law…but to fulfill.” Torah advocates frequently quote “until heaven and earth disappear” and practically stop reading there. But Jesus also says, “until its purpose is achieved.” The very passage supposedly proving that nothing could ever change explicitly contains fulfillment as the goal.

Another favorite is Romans 3:31: “Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid.” That supposedly settles everything. Except Paul had just spent the chapter explaining that the Law speaks to those “under the law,” that nobody is justified by its works, and that righteousness comes through faith apart from the Law (Romans 3:19–28). Paul is not placing Christians back under Moses in verse 31 after spending the previous twelve verses taking justification completely outside that system.

Then comes the word “lawlessness.” Jesus condemns lawlessness, therefore, supposedly, Christians must observe Torah. But that argument simply assumes its conclusion. Sin and wickedness existed before Sinai. Cain murdered Abel before Moses existed. S***m was wicked before Torah was given. Joseph called adultery a sin against God centuries before the Mosaic Covenant. Morality did not originate at Mount Sinai, and morality did not die when the Mosaic Covenant became obsolete.

That is the recurring problem. Second Peter 3, James 2, Matthew 5, Romans 3:31, and warnings about lawlessness become slogans designed to shut down the discussion before the surrounding context can speak.

But Scripture cannot be defeated by Scripture.

Grace does not need protection from Paul. Faith does not need rescuing from James. And Christ does not need Moses standing beside Him to finish what He supposedly left incomplete.

The Law had its purpose. Christ fulfilled that purpose. The old covenant became obsolete (Hebrews 8:13). Believers died to the Law (Romans 7:4). We serve God through the Spirit rather than the old written code (Romans 7:6). We are under the Law of Christ (1 Corinthians 9:21; Galatians 6:2).

So before throwing 2 Peter 3:16 at Christians who take Paul seriously, there is a rather uncomfortable possibility worth considering:

The warning about twisting Paul might apply most directly to the person twisting Paul’s repeated declarations of freedom from the Law into an obligation to remain under it.

The Irony Writes Itself

The irony is almost impressive. Quote Paul saying we are not under the Law, and suddenly someone throws 2 Peter 3:16 at you: “You’re twisting Paul!” Apparently, the solution to twisting Paul is to explain away everything Paul actually said. Then comes James: “Faith without works is dead!” Great. James still never said, “Therefore, get under the Mosaic Covenant.” Matthew 5? Ignore “until its purpose is achieved” and camp out on “heaven and earth.” Romans 3:31? Quote that while conveniently stepping over Paul’s entire argument that justification is apart from the Law.

It’s the same routine: grab a verse, detach it from its argument, shout “Torah!” and declare victory.

And the funniest part? The warning about twisting Scripture keeps boomeranging right back at the people using it.

Maybe 2 Peter 3:16 deserves another reading after all.

08/28/2026

Why Would You Place Yourself Under the Law?

During Jesus’ earthly ministry, the Mosaic Covenant was still in force. The cross had not yet occurred, the New Covenant had not yet been inaugurated through His blood, and Jesus was ministering primarily among Israel. So when Jesus instructed someone to obey a Mosaic command, that does not automatically establish that command as a requirement for Christians after the cross.

Jesus Himself was “born under the law” (Galatians 4:4). He told a healed l***r to present the offering “Moses commanded” (Matthew 8:4). Of course He did. The Mosaic Covenant was still operative. But Christians do not therefore travel to Jerusalem and offer Mosaic sacrifices today.

Why not?

Because something changed at the cross.

Through Christ’s death, believers have “died to the law through the body of Christ” (Romans 7:4), have been “released from the law” (Romans 7:6), and are “not under law but under grace” (Romans 6:14). Galatians 3:24–25 explains that the Law served as a guardian until Christ came, but “now that the way of faith has come, we no longer need the law as our guardian.” Hebrews teaches that the change of priesthood necessitated “a change in the law” (Hebrews 7:12), that Christ established a better covenant (Hebrews 8:6), and that by calling it a New Covenant, God “made the first covenant obsolete” (Hebrews 8:13).

So why would any Christian who understands what Christ accomplished deliberately place himself back under a covenant that Scripture declares obsolete?

Paul asked essentially the same question: “So why are you now turning back and becoming slaves once more to the weak and useless spiritual principles of this world?” (Galatians 4:9). He warned those seeking justification through the Law that they were abandoning the principle of grace (Galatians 5:4).

That does not mean Christians are lawless. It means our relationship with God is no longer governed by the Mosaic Covenant. Paul explicitly distinguishes being under Moses’ Law from being under the Law of Christ: “I do not ignore the law of God; I obey the law of Christ” (1 Corinthians 9:21). See also Galatians 6:2.

Christians obey Christ because we belong to Christ, not because we have placed ourselves back under Sinai.

Therefore, Jesus commanding Torah observance before the cross proves that people living under the Mosaic Covenant were obligated to obey it. It does not prove that Christians living after the cross remain under Torah.

If someone wants to establish that Christians must keep the Mosaic Law, pointing to Jesus telling a Jew under the Mosaic Covenant to obey Moses does not accomplish that. They must demonstrate that after Christ died, rose again, inaugurated the New Covenant, and rendered the former covenant obsolete, the apostles subsequently placed Christians back under Sinai.

They did not.

They taught precisely the opposite.

We died to the Law.
We were released from the Law.
We are not under the Law.
The former covenant became obsolete.
We belong to Christ.

Why abandon the freedom Christ purchased in order to crawl back underneath a covenant that Scripture itself says has passed away?

08/25/2026

Until Heaven and Earth Pass Away: What Did Jesus Mean?

One of the most frequently quoted passages in arguments for continued Torah observance is Matthew 5:17–18:

“Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. 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.”
Matthew 5:17–18 KJV

The mistake is assuming Jesus said, “The Law will remain binding until heaven and earth pass away.” That is not the entire sentence. Jesus gives two “until” statements, and the second one is crucial: “till all be fulfilled.”

Jesus is emphasizing the absolute authority and reliability of Scripture. As long as heaven and earth stand, not even the smallest stroke of what God had revealed could simply disappear until its purpose had been accomplished. Jesus had just explained what He came to do: “I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil.”

That distinction matters. Jesus did not come as someone rejecting Moses, contradicting the prophets, or declaring God’s previous revelation erroneous. He came as the One toward whom the Law and Prophets were pointing and in whom their purpose would reach its intended goal.

This interpretation becomes unavoidable when the rest of the New Testament is considered. Jesus did not wait for the physical universe to disappear before accomplishing His mission. On the night before His death He said:

“This cup is the new testament in my blood, which is shed for you.”
Luke 22:20 KJV

Hebrews likewise explains that Christ’s death inaugurated the New Covenant (Hebrews 9:15–17). Paul says believers have “become dead to the law by the body of Christ” (Romans 7:4), that Christians have been “delivered from the law” (Romans 7:6), and that Christ is “the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth” (Romans 10:4).

Galatians makes the timeline especially obvious:

“Wherefore then serveth the law? It was added because of transgressions, till the seed should come to whom the promise was made.”
Galatians 3:19 KJV

The Law had an appointed purpose and an appointed destination: Christ.

Hebrews goes even further. A change in priesthood necessarily produces “a change also of the law” (Hebrews 7:12). The first covenant became “old” (Hebrews 8:13). Christ “taketh away the first, that he may establish the second” (Hebrews 10:9).

Yet heaven and earth are obviously still here.

Therefore, if Matthew 5:18 means absolutely nothing in the Mosaic Law can cease functioning until the literal destruction of the present cosmos, we have an enormous contradiction. Jesus would effectively teach that the Mosaic Covenant remains completely intact while His apostles later teach that believers died to it, were released from it, that its priesthood changed, that the first covenant became obsolete, and that Christ established the second.

Worse, Christ Himself announced the New Covenant before heaven and earth passed away.

The problem disappears when Jesus’ entire statement is allowed to speak:

Nothing passes from the Law UNTIL everything it was intended to accomplish is fulfilled.

And who came specifically to fulfill it?

Jesus Christ.

This also explains why “fulfill” cannot merely mean “continue practicing Torah exactly as before.” If Christ’s mission merely renewed Sinai indefinitely, what exactly did His coming accomplish covenantally? Israel already possessed Torah. They already had the commandments, Sabbath, dietary laws, festivals, circumcision, sacrifices, and Levitical priesthood. Giving humanity “Sinai 2.0” would not solve the problem that the New Testament repeatedly identifies: sinful humanity could not achieve righteousness through that covenant.

And the claim that Jeremiah’s promise to write God’s law upon the heart simply means downloading the entire Mosaic legal code into human intuition creates additional problems. If the Sabbath commandment were literally programmed into everyone’s consciousness, Christians should intuitively know which calendar day is the seventh day without historical calculation, calendars, teachers, or arguments. If the complete Torah were supernaturally implanted as innate knowledge, believers should intuitively know the rules concerning sacrifices, ritual purity, priesthood, festivals, agricultural regulations, and countless other Mosaic ordinances.

Clearly, that is not what happened.

The New Covenant produces an inward relationship with God through His Spirit, not a supernatural mental download of 613 Mosaic regulations.

Matthew 5:17–20 therefore does not imprison humanity under Sinai until the universe disappears. Jesus was declaring that God’s previous revelation would not fail. Every jot and tittle would accomplish its appointed purpose before passing from its covenantal role.

Christ did not abolish the Law because it was defective or meaningless.

He fulfilled what it was pointing toward.

The Law anticipated Him.
The prophets announced Him.
The sacrifices pictured Him.
The priesthood foreshadowed Him.
The covenant prepared for Him.

And when Christ accomplished His work, He did not leave God’s plan unfinished.

As He declared from the cross:

“It is finished.”
John 19:30 KJV

08/24/2026

He Came to Accomplish Its Purpose

Matthew 5:17 and Romans 10:4 could almost be placed side by side because they fit together so perfectly. One records what Jesus said He came to do; the other explains what He ultimately accomplished.

Jesus said:

“I came to accomplish their purpose.”
Matthew 5:17 NLT

Then Paul explains the result:

“For Christ has already accomplished the purpose for which the law was given. As a result, all who believe in him are made right with God.”
Romans 10:4 NLT

The connection is remarkable. In Matthew, Jesus announces His mission. In Romans, Paul looks back at the completed work of Christ and declares that the mission has been accomplished.

Jesus did not come to destroy the Scriptures as though they were mistaken or meaningless. He came to bring them to their intended fulfillment. The Law pointed forward to something greater than itself. Its sacrifices demonstrated the seriousness of sin. Its priesthood emphasized humanity’s need for mediation. Its commandments exposed sin and demonstrated mankind’s inability to achieve righteousness before God through law keeping. Its ceremonies, sacrifices, and shadows anticipated the work of the Messiah.

Then Christ came.

This is why the cross is essential to understanding Matthew 5:17. Jesus did not merely come to teach people how to keep the Mosaic Law better. He came to accomplish what the Law was ultimately pointing toward. His death on the cross was central to that accomplishment.

The Law revealed sin, but it could not ultimately remove sin. It pronounced the sinner guilty, but it could not provide righteousness through human obedience. As Paul explains elsewhere, “No one can ever be made right with God by doing what the law commands. The law simply shows us how sinful we are” (Romans 3:20 NLT).

Christ accomplished what sinners could never accomplish for themselves.

He lived without sin. He willingly offered Himself for sinners. He bore sin’s penalty upon the cross, died, was buried, and rose again. What the sacrifices anticipated, Christ accomplished once for all. What the Law exposed, Christ provided the remedy for.

That makes the final statement of Romans 10:4 especially powerful:

“As a result, all who believe in him are made right with God.”

Notice where righteousness is now found. Paul does not say that people are made right with God by returning to Moses and keeping the Law successfully. He points directly to Christ and faith in Him.

Matthew 5:17 is the declaration: I came to accomplish their purpose.

Romans 10:4 is the fulfillment: Christ has accomplished the purpose for which the Law was given.

And the cross stands between those statements.

Jesus came to fulfill. Jesus died to accomplish. Jesus rose in victory. Therefore, righteousness before God is not achieved by sinners attempting to accomplish the Law’s purpose themselves. Christ already accomplished it.

That is why the Gospel does not tell us to finish what Jesus started.

It tells us to believe in what Jesus finished.

08/23/2026

Covenants Change, Morality Remains

One of the most common concerns raised when Christians say that the Mosaic Covenant has ended is that morality must therefore have ended with it. But that conclusion assumes something Scripture never teaches: that morality originated at Mount Sinai.

It did not.

Human beings were morally accountable to God long before Moses received the Torah. Cain was condemned for murdering Abel. The generation before the Flood was judged for widespread wickedness and violence. Joseph recognized adultery as a serious sin against God centuries before the commandment against adultery was written on stone. S***m was judged before Sinai existed.

Clearly, people did not have to possess the Mosaic Law before they could understand that certain things were morally wrong.

Paul explains why. Romans 1 teaches that humanity has been accountable to God since creation because God has revealed enough about Himself through what He has made to leave humanity without excuse. Romans 2 develops the point further. Paul explains that Gentiles who did not possess the Mosaic Law could nevertheless recognize moral obligations. Their consciences could accuse or defend their behavior.

In other words, human beings possessed moral awareness without possessing Torah.

The Mosaic Law therefore did not create morality. Rather, one of its important functions was to identify, define, and expose sin within God’s covenant relationship with Israel. Paul explains that the Law gives people knowledge of sin in Romans 3:20. In Romans 7:7, he explains that the Law made particular sins unmistakably identifiable. The Law illuminated the problem; it was not the original source of everything that makes something morally right or wrong.

Think about murder. Murder did not become immoral when God gave the commandment against murder at Sinai. It was already wrong when Cain killed Abel. Adultery did not suddenly become immoral when it appeared in the Ten Commandments. Joseph already understood it as sin. Sinai formally codified moral truths that existed before Sinai.

This distinction matters enormously when discussing the New Covenant.

If morality existed before the Mosaic Covenant, morality can certainly continue after the Mosaic Covenant.

Ending the Mosaic Covenant no more eliminates morality than beginning the Mosaic Covenant created morality.

Covenants can change while God’s moral character remains unchanged.

That is exactly what Scripture presents. Jeremiah predicted a New Covenant that would explicitly “not be like” the covenant God made with Israel when He brought them from Egypt (Jeremiah 31:31–32). Jesus established that New Covenant through His blood. Hebrews describes Christ as mediator of a better covenant founded upon better promises (Hebrews 8:6). Hebrews 8:13 then explains that the arrival of the New Covenant rendered the former covenant obsolete.

The New Covenant is therefore not simply Sinai with a new label. It has a different mediator, a different priesthood, a different sacrifice, a different sanctuary, better promises, and an inward ministry of the Holy Spirit. Christ’s sacrifice is final rather than repeatedly offered. His priesthood is permanent rather than Levitical. Access to God is through Christ rather than through Israel’s earthly sanctuary and sacrificial system.

Yet none of this makes Christians morally lawless.

Christians are still commanded to reject murder, adultery, theft, idolatry, hatred, greed, dishonesty, sexual immorality, and countless other sins. The difference is covenantal authority. Christians belong to Christ under the New Covenant rather than to Moses under the Sinai Covenant. Paul could therefore distinguish being under the Mosaic Law from being accountable to the “law of Christ” in 1 Corinthians 9:20–21.

So there is no reason to fear that acknowledging the end of the Mosaic Covenant somehow eliminates right and wrong.

Morality existed before Moses.

Morality existed under Moses.

Morality remains after Moses.

The Mosaic Law exposed and defined sin within Israel’s covenant, but it did not invent morality. Likewise, the New Testament does not suddenly create morality that previously did not exist. It reveals God’s will for those who now belong to Christ and explains how believers are to live under the New Covenant.

Covenants serve particular purposes within God’s redemptive plan. They can be introduced, fulfilled, superseded, and replaced according to that plan.

God’s moral character does not come and go with them.

Covenants change. Morality remains. And under the New Covenant, our covenantal authority is not Sinai, but Christ.

08/23/2026

Christ Canceled the First Covenant

Torah is CANCELED!

Hebrews 10:9–10 contains one of the clearest statements in the New Testament concerning the relationship between the first covenant and the New Covenant:

“Then he said, ‘Look, I have come to do your will.’ He cancels the first covenant in order to put the second into effect. For God’s will was for us to be made holy by the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ, once for all time.”
Hebrews 10:9–10 NLT

The importance of this passage is difficult to overstate. Hebrews does not describe Christianity as the Mosaic covenant with a few modifications. It presents Christ as bringing the first covenant to its intended conclusion so that the second covenant could be established.

Notice the sequence: He cancels the first in order to put the second into effect.

That means the two covenants cannot simply be treated as one continuous covenant administered in slightly different ways. Something genuinely changed through the death of Christ.

The context makes this even clearer. Hebrews 10 begins by discussing the sacrifices required under the Law of Moses. Those sacrifices were repeatedly offered because they could never permanently remove sin. Hebrews 10:1 describes the Law as a “shadow of the good things to come.” The shadow pointed forward to Christ, but once Christ came, believers were no longer dependent upon the shadow.

Jesus accomplished what the Mosaic sacrificial system could never accomplish:

“For God’s will was for us to be made holy by the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ, once for all time.”

That phrase, “once for all time,” is crucial.

Under the first covenant, sacrifices were continually repeated. Under the New Covenant, Christ offered Himself once. Under the first covenant stood priests continually performing their duties. Under the New Covenant stands one perfect High Priest whose sacrifice is sufficient.

This agrees perfectly with Hebrews 8:6, which says that Jesus mediates “a far better covenant” established upon better promises. Hebrews 8:13 goes even further: when God spoke of a New Covenant, He made the first covenant obsolete.

Paul teaches the same basic transition. Believers have been released from the Law so that they may serve God “in the new way of living in the Spirit” (Romans 7:6 NLT). He contrasts the old written covenant with the life-giving ministry of the Spirit in 2 Corinthians 3:6–11. Galatians 3:24–25 likewise explains that the Law functioned as a guardian leading people toward Christ, but “now that the way of faith has come, we no longer need the law as our guardian.”

None of this means that the first covenant was evil or that God made a mistake. The Mosaic covenant accomplished the purpose God intended for it. It revealed sin, governed Israel, demonstrated humanity’s inability to attain righteousness through law, contained shadows pointing toward Christ, and prepared the way for the Messiah.

But a covenant can be good and divinely ordained while still being temporary.

That is precisely why Hebrews 10:9 is so important. Christ did not come merely to repair the Mosaic covenant. He fulfilled what it anticipated and “cancels the first covenant in order to put the second into effect.”

Christians therefore do not need to return to Sinai to complete what they supposedly lack. Our standing before God does not rest upon Mosaic sacrifices, priesthood, ceremonial regulations, or covenant membership through Israel.

It rests upon Jesus Christ.

The first covenant pointed forward.

The second covenant possesses the reality to which it pointed.

The first had repeated sacrifices.

The New Covenant has Christ’s sacrifice once for all time.

The first covenant served its God-given purpose.

Christ fulfilled that purpose, canceled the first, and established something better.

08/22/2026

Hebrews 8:7

Hebrews 8:7 is important because it directly challenges the idea that the Mosaic Covenant remains the covenant governing Christians today.

The writer says:

“If the first covenant had been faultless, there would have been no need for a second covenant to REPLACE it.”
Hebrews 8:7 NLT

Notice the argument: there is a first covenant and a second covenant. The second does not merely supplement the first or provide a better way of keeping it. It replaces it.

The following verses identify the first covenant by quoting Jeremiah 31:31–34. Hebrews 8:9 describes it as the covenant God made with Israel when He “took them by the hand and led them out of the land of Egypt.” That is unmistakably the Mosaic Covenant established at Sinai.

This does not mean God’s Law was sinful or morally defective. Paul explicitly denies that in Romans 7:7. The problem was that the Mosaic Covenant could expose and condemn sin, but it could not provide the final remedy for sin or transform sinful humanity. Hebrews therefore describes Christ as the mediator of a better covenant, established on better promises (Hebrews 8:6).

Then Hebrews makes the conclusion unmistakable:

“When God speaks of a ‘new’ covenant, it means he has made the first one obsolete.”
Hebrews 8:13 NLT

That is why Hebrews 8:7 matters so much. Christians are not living under a repaired Mosaic Covenant. We are living under the New Covenant established through Jesus Christ. The old covenant served its God-given purpose; Christ brought something greater.

Grace, Not Torah

08/30/2026

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