Providing a tenable, problem-free answer to this question is not as simple as it may appear. Some simplistic answers, too often given, have resulted in chaos, the rejection of precious truths, and false teaching, in general. For instance, some say all teaching before Acts 2 is the Law of Moses and is, therefore, inapplicable to present-day Christians. Others maintain that the Gospels are part of the Covenant of Christ and consequently, are binding on Christians. Both of these positions are extreme and untenable.

We live under the Last Will and Testament of Jesus Christ, not the Law of Moses. There is no mistaking the fact that the "handwriting of ordinances" was "nailed to the (Christ's, dm) cross." (Colossians 2:14) God did not design the Law of Moses to be a universal law for all nations (Deuteronomy 5:1-3). Moreover, as a theocratic law, it would have no practical application to any nation other than Israel. (I am not saying that the moral laws, as such, are irrelevant). However, Isaiah (Isaiah 2:2,3) prophesied of a system that would be for all nations.

With regard to the inauguration of His Law and Testament, Jesus said: "Go ye therefore, and teach all nations..." (Matthew 28:19, cpo Mark 16:15,16) The shedding of Jesus' own efficacious blood ratified His Testament. That Testament began to be officially binding on the Day of Pentecost (Acts 2) when it was proclaimed and announced. (See Hebrews 9:15.) Moreover, Paul said that those who seek justification under Moses' Law (the Law of circumcision) are: "fallen from grace." (Galatians 5:1-4) A law (the Law of Moses) that withholds pardon from those who do not keep it perfectly and the Law of Grace, the "perfect law of liberty," are mutually exclusive (John 1:17; James 1:25). In other words, the Law of Moses and the "perfect law of liberty" cannot coexist (Romans 11:6). Jesus' Testament is a system of law, but, unlike the Mosaic Law, Jesus' Law provides grace (Galatians 6:2; 1 Corinthians 9:21; John 1:17; Ephesians 2:8-10).

The Gospels and the Law of Moses. Jesus was born, lived, and died while the Law of Moses was still in effect (Galatians 4:4). The law that Jesus sin1essly kept was the Law of Moses (Hebrews 4:15, Galatians 4:4). (The phrases "Law of Christ" and "Law of Moses," appear in Galatians 6:2 and Luke 2:22.) Therefore, all of the personal teaching that Jesus did while He was on earth fell under the canopy of the system that God, through Moses, gave to the Jews.

Not only did Jesus keep the Law of Moses perfectly, He also instructed the Jews whom He taught to follow that law. Hear him:

Jesus also exposed those who, by their oral traditions (Matthew 5:20-48), perverted the Law's teachings. Scorching condemnation proceeded from His lips regarding the teachers who did not live according to the Decalogue (Matthew 23:13 ff.). Additionally, Jesus provided others with instructions that were in agreement with the statutes, such as physical sacrifice or offerings, peculiar to the Law (Matthew 5:23-25). Notwithstanding, these biblical facts do not mean that everything anterior to Acts 2 pertained to the Law of Moses and the Jews, and everything subsequent to Acts 2 is binding today. It just isn't that simple.

Much of Jesus' personal teaching (the Gospels) was anticipatory of His Law. John the Baptist, just like Jesus, lived and died under the system of Moses. However, John preached: "Repent ye, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." (Matthew 3:1) John, while under the Old Law, "baptized in the wilderness, and preached the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins." (Mark 1:4). Many were baptized of John (Mark 1:5). While John's birth and life were prophesied in the Hebrew scriptures, his teaching and baptism were anticipatory; that is, they looked beyond God's arrangement with physical Israel.

John's baptism was not only a "baptism of repentance" (baptisma metanoias), it was also a "baptism unto repentance" (baptizo eis metanoian; see Mark 1:4, Matthew 3:11). John's baptism, then, was what resulted when people repented, and it also produced repentance. I submit that the produced repentance, was that repentance to be associated with Jesus' baptism that fully begun in Acts 2 (see vs.38). In this same vein, we read: "Jesus made and baptized more disciples than John." (John 4:1) Both baptisms (John's and Jesus') were under the Law, but not part of the Law, as such. They were preparatory and anticipatory of the approaching New Era, the Age of the Son of God. (I'll return to this thought later.)

God spoke through His Son. The Hebrews writer affirmed that God, in past times, spoke to man in "divers manners." (Hebrews 1:1) The King James version renders verse 2 thusly: "Hath in these last days spoken unto us by His Son." The proponents of the view that everything before Acts 2 is the Law of Moses and does not apply today say, "Hebrews 1:2 is proof that in the last days (the time after Acts 2), God speaks through His Son." The Greek for Hebrews 1:2 is "ep eschatou ton emeron touton" (Interlinear Greek-English New Testament, Nestle/ Marshall). Literally translated, the verse says that the Father spoke to man at the end of these last days, or toward the termination of the Law of Moses. The American Standard version reads, "Hath at the end of these days spoken unto us in his Son..." (Hebrews 1:2) What is the point? Hebrews 1:2 shows that Jesus' teaching, at least some of it, while He was on earth and under the Law of Moses (before Acts 2), is binding and authoritative in this final era.

Some indicators that Jesus' personal teaching was part of His Last Will and Testament. Shortly after Matthew mentioned the preparatory work of John the Baptist, we read regarding Christ, "Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." (Matthew 3:2; 4:17)

Six verses later we read this statement: "And Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the gospel of the kingdom..." (Matthew 4:23) While on earth, was Jesus simply and only preaching about matters peculiar to the Law of Moses? Nay, verily, Jesus was announcing Kingdom truths. Remember that He told His apostles the Holy Spirit would, "...bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you." (John 14:26) These matters about which Jesus had taught them (before Acts 2), when brought to their remembrance, helped constitute the teaching for the Kingdom. They were not limited to endemic truths concerning the Law of Moses.

In addition to the Holy Spirit's miraculous assistance, Jesus said to his disciples, "Remember the word that I said unto you..." (John 15:20) In the Gospels, there are about 15 references to "the gospel" or "the gospel of the kingdom." Jesus said, "The poor have the gospel preached to them." (Matthew 11:5) Notice that this is before Acts 2. With regard to the woman who anointed Him, Jesus said, "Verily I say unto you, wheresoever this gospel shall be preached in the whole world, there shall also this, that this woman hath done, be told for a memorial of her." (Matthew 26:13) The "whole world" meant Jews and Gentiles. Hence, "the gospel," as here referred to by Jesus, was not the Law of Moses. Notice, however, that Jesus said "this gospel." It was then being preached, at least in prospect.

In His Great Commission, Jesus said "Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you..." (past tense, Matthew 28:20) Relative to kingdom truths being spoken during the three-and-one-half-year period of His ministry, please consider Jesus' statement: "The law and the prophets were until John; since that time the kingdom of God is preached, and every man presseth into it." (Luke 16:16)

Present-tense teachings issued in the Gospels while the Law of Moses was stilI binding. The Gospel of John contains Jesus' famous "I am" (ego eimi) statements. He said, "I am the resurrection, and the life..." (John 11:25) When Jesus spoke, He was not, in a technical sense, actually the resurrection. He had yet to die and be raised (1 Corinthians 15:20). However, it was certain that He would be raised (the figure of prolepsis, cpo Romans 4:17, "calling those things which be not as though they were"). Anterior to Acts 2, Jesus spoke to the Jews in the present tense regarding "eating His flesh and drinking His blood." (John 6:53) He continued by saying that whosoever eats "hath eternal life..." (vs.54) All of these teachings, and more, Jesus enunciated before Acts 2. We understand, though, that these statements, while spoken in the present tense, looked forward to Jesus' resurrection, coronation, and glorification.

Jesus taught in the present tense when he emphatically told Nicodemus, "Do not marvel that I said to you, 'You must be born again.' The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit." (John 3:7,8 see vs. 4-8) Even though Jesus spoke in the present tense, we know His teaching was anticipatory (John 3:14 ff.).

Consider Jesus' teaching regarding personal offences:

"Moreover if thy brother shall trespass against thee, go and tell him his fault between thee and him alone: if he shall hear thee, thou hast gained thy brother. But if he will not hear thee, then take with thee one or two more, that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established. And if he shall neglect to hear them, tell it unto the church: but if he neglect to hear the church, let him be unto thee as an heathen man and a publican." (Matthew 18:15-17).

When Jesus set forth the procedure for matters of personal offence, the church did not yet exist. Hence, His teaching was looking ahead to when His church would become a reality (Acts 2).

Some are heard to say, "None of the teaching before Acts 2 applied to the Kingdom of Christ because that would mean two laws were binding at the same time." The fact that Jesus' teaching in the Gospels contained Kingdom laws does not necessarily mean that two laws were simultaneously binding. His teachings about the new birth, what to do in matters of personal offence, etc., clearly were not teachings from the Law of Moses. They were doctrines that would be peculiar to the final dispensation, which began in Acts 2.

Jesus' teaching regarding divorce and remarriage. Much of the to-do about "everything before Acts 2 being part of the Law of Moses" results from efforts to circumvent Jesus' teaching regarding marriage, divorce, and remarriage (Matthew 5:32;19:9). Jesus' teaching about divorce was not part of the Law of Moses, but of the original moral law given by God in Genesis 2 (compare Matthew 19:4-9 with Genesis 2:23-25). Jesus did not approve the concession in Deuteronomy 24, which Moses granted because of "the hardness of their (Jews) hearts," but the restoration of the original marriage law. Jesus' teaching and the original law were diametrically opposed to the concession.

I repeat, if we say Jesus was only explaining Moses' Law in Matthew 5:32 and 19:9, we must of necessity say that the particular nuance of the Law being explained was the concession provision found in Deuteronomy 24 (see Matthew 19:9, 3-7). Hence, the "uncleanness" (ervah, matter of offense, Hebrew) is fornication (Deuteronomy 24:1).

The position that uncleanness means only fornication is replete with many irreconcilable problems. In the first place, there was no problem regarding what a mate could do with an adulterous spouse (regarding the divorce and remarriage issue). The adulterer was to be put to death (Leviticus 20:10). It is the height of folly to imagine God allowing a concession (divorce for adultery only) when the law demanded that adulterers be put to death! Secondly, God himself divorced (Israel) because of adultery (the spiritual nature of the marriage matters not (Jeremiah 3:8,14). Would God practice something He granted only because of the hardness of the heart of the practitioner (in this case, God, Matthew 19:8)?

Hence, the position that Jesus' teaching regarding divorce and remarriage must be limited to those under Moses' Law not only creates a contradictory situation, it degrades God Himself!

Jesus' teaching in Matthew 5:32 and 19:9, then, applies to God's original, unchanging law regarding divorce and remarriage and is to be understood as part of the final Covenant and Testament of Jesus Christ. We must not loose where God has not loosed, but we certainly do not want to bind where God has not bound. The effort to avoid doing either is constant.

In closing, at the very outset, I suggested that the matter of the Gospels, Moses' Law, or Jesus' Law is not something that can, without consideration, be answered. Either view, simply stated, is simplistic and untenable. We must realize that the Gospels contain teaching that was peculiar to Moses' Law, a restoration of the original moral law, and that was both preparatory and anticipatory for the Kingdom laws (Mark 1:44 Matthew 18:15-17; 19:4-9; John 3:3-12). When we realize and accept this biblical fact, it becomes a matter of careful study to determine if a particular teaching found in one of the Gospels is Mosaic or a Kingdom truth.

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Brother Martin has done a masterful job of explaining the much-discussed topic of Jesus' marriage-and-divorce teaching in the Gospels. Make no mistake about it-brethren come up with "new understandings" because they are seeking to prop up some other unscriptural teaching. If the truth be told, the entire Bible is very consistent about God's design for marriage-one man, one woman, for life. Those who seek aid from the Old Law are unwilling to accept all of its teachings-just those that suit their preconceived conclusions! (KMG)