Spir Dynamics 1335-80 10/4/98

Doctrine of The Royal Law

A. Definition and Description.

1. The royal law is found in three dispensations: the Old Testament dispensation of Israel, the dispensation of the Hypostatic union and the dispensation of the Church Age, and in each case it is something different. The royal law cannot be executed by believers in the Old Testament on the same high echelon as you in the Church Age.

2. The royal law was not called “the royal law” until the Church Age, but it is mentioned first in Lev 19:18, “Do not seek revenge, or bear a grudge against the sons of your own people [Jewish citizens], but you shall love your neighbor as you love yourself; I [am] the Lord.”

a. The phrase “you shall love your neighbor as you love yourself” is called the royal law in the New Testament, but was not known by this title in the age of Israel. Loving yourself has to do with spiritual growth. Their neighbor was every Jew in Israel.

b. This is a command to use the fourth stage of the faith-rest drill. Old Testament believers were to use their faith and put the matter before the supreme court of heaven rather than seek revenge. They were not to meet a sin with a sin. Job is a good illustration of this principle. It is a statement of impersonal love which cannot be fulfilled by the believers of the Old Testament as it can be fulfilled by you.

c. They could only go as far with this as their spiritual life would allow, and their spiritual life was the faith-rest drill. They could only put the matter before the supreme court of heaven and leave the outcome to the integrity of God, which is the perfect function of divine justice.

d. In the dispensation of Israel, the Jewish believers did not have the filling of the Holy Spirit, nor did they have the doctrine related to the prototype spiritual life, but they did have the faith-rest drill. Only a few had the enduement of the Holy Spirit. There was no filling of the Holy Spirit until the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ.

e. Therefore, the royal law in the Old Testament is strictly a matter of trusting the righteousness, the justice, and the love of God. It is a matter of having faith in a doctrine. The complete fulfillment of this royal law could not occur until the dispensation of the hypostatic union.

f. Impersonal love meets a sin with a divine solution. The integrity of the subject must be greater than the obnoxiousness of the object.

g. Application.

(1) Very few people are loved or treated the way they want to be loved or treated.

(2) Because believers are not loved the way they want to be loved or treated the way they want to be treated they become frustrated, loaded down with reaction, bitterness, self-pity, grudges, spite, malice. This leads to revenge motivation and revenge modus operandi. It also leads to the function of the arrogance skills: self-justification, self-deception, and self-absorption.

(3) Unrealistic expectation plus ignorance of the doctrine of true love of the soul destroys the focus of the unique spiritual life and is distracted by a life of perpetual carnality. Perpetual carnality means no rebound and a series of increased intensities of divine discipline, Phil 3:18-19.

(4) If you put a person on a pedestal, you surrender your happiness to that person. If you give your love to another and that person disappoints you so that you become disillusioned, you are in danger of losing your spiritual life.

(5) In the spiritual life wealth is measured in terms of Bible doctrine as the thinking currency of your soul.

(6) Reaction to someone you love is like being trapped in a mine field, any one of which could fragment your spiritual life, and the danger comes from the three arrogance skills.

(7) Reaction always includes self-justification. Whether you are right or wrong, you are right when you react. Reaction sometimes includes self-deception. Self-deception always says you are right even when you are wrong. Reaction includes self-absorption. Now you have made you an issue as you continue to completely fail in the spiritual life.

(8) Between unrealistic expectation, role model arrogance and iconoclastic arrogance you can completely destroy your spiritual life. There are three reactions that can destroy your spiritual life.

(a) A reaction from unrealistic expectation which makes you vulnerable to disillusion and disenchantment.

(b) A reaction related to role model arrogance makes you vulnerable to the feet of clay syndrome. When anyone departs from the role model society has set up for them, that person is condemned, rejected, maligned, slandered, and ostracized. People have a standard for the role model they have created and a different standard for self. Role model arrogance occurs when an individual excuses himself for sins and failures, but turns around in hypocrisy and condemns the role model for identical sins and failures.

© A reaction related to iconoclastic arrogance makes you vulnerable to the power and approbation lust of the Lucifer syndrome. You create the icon and then condemn the icon for the same sins and failures as the one who created the icon. It is a reaction where you have locked in your belief that you are completely right, but you have so deceived yourself that even if you are terribly wrong, you do not think so because of self- deception.

(9) Iconoclastic arrogance always seeks to blame the object of your retaliation for everything that is going wrong in your life, and then attempts to destroy the icon which it has created. You have tried to meet a sin with a sin and will destroy your spiritual life. The royal law resolves iconoclastic sins.

(10) Reaction turns love into hatred, admiration into malice. Malice is the lust to destroy someone who has disappointed you. You never solve a sin against yourself by revenge or a grudge. Disillusion becomes malice, antagonism, lust for retaliation. Disillusion becomes reaction based on unrealistic expectation.

(11) Reaction based on unrealistic expectation, role model arrogance, the feet of clay syndrome, and iconoclastic arrogance results in the rate of forgetting exceeding the rate of learning Bible doctrine, so that the seven compartments of your stream of consciousness are covered with scar tissue. This destroys marriage unless one spouse rebounds and refuses to let it be a destructive thing.

(12) Principles.

(a) Role model arrogance manufactures hypocrisy in the clergy and legalism in the congregation.

(b) Role model arrogance ignores the basic doctrine that all believers continue to have a sin nature and continue a rate of personal sinning which is compatible with either their ignorance of doctrine or their compulsive function of the lust pattern of the sin nature.

© In role model arrogance and the feet of clay syndrome, you cannot impose impossible personal standards on others. We have to remember that 1 Jn 1:8 and 1 Jn 1:10 clearly state that after salvation all believers possess a sin nature and continue to sin. Under role model arrogance both pastors and congregations are distracted from what is important—cognition of the mystery doctrine of the Church Age and execution of the protocol plan for the Church.

(d) Iconoclastic arrogance is divorced from reality in human relationships. Iconoclastic arrogance is subjective pre-occupation with other people (because you are pre-occupied with yourself), resulting in the creation of a role model of that person or persons.

(e) The arrogance of idolizing and rejecting your very own icon is tantamount to the vanity of transferring the blame for your own failure to an innocent person—a direct violation of the royal law.

(f) The feet of clay syndrome is the arrogant irrationality of rearranging the doctrine of hamartiology (the doctrine of sin) to be compatible with your own self-righteous arrogance and your self- centered attitude.

(g) It is very rare for a believer to see their own sinfulness and evil while functioning in role model arrogance or unrealistic expectation or the feet of clay syndrome or iconoclastic arrogance.

(h) There are three problem solving devices which are absolutely necessary to bring the believer back from all this arrogance: personal love for God the Father, impersonal love for all mankind, and occupation with Christ.

(i) You cannot think the worst of someone and receive their best response.

(j) Rom 12:2-3 states the problem and mandates the solution, “Stop being conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renovation of your thinking, that you may prove what the will of God is— good of intrinsic value production [which is harmonious rapport with God], acceptable to God [being in the will of God], the completion [of the spiritual life]. For I say through the grace which is given to me to everyone who is among you, stop thinking of self in terms of arrogance beyond what you ought to think, but think in terms of sanity, as God has assigned to each one of us a standard of thinking from doctrine.”

3. The royal law is named after the royal person of our Lord Jesus Christ. It was God’s intent that the royal law be revealed in the dispensation of Israel, but not be completely understood until Jesus Christ went to the Cross and received the imputation of every sin. The royal law is named after the royalty of the Lord Jesus Christ.

4. The royal law is a part of the spiritual childhood of the Church Age believer, so that the complete fulfillment of the royal law could not occur during the age of Israel. It could not be fulfilled until Jesus Christ came and fulfilled it in His human nature.

5. The Lord Jesus Christ is the highest form of royalty that has ever existed or ever will exist in all of human history. The royal law was for His royalty. Our Lord was born in the greatest royal line in all of history, the Son of David. The royal law was waiting for a perfect royal to come along and execute that command, and Jesus Christ fulfilled that command on the Cross.

a. Impersonal love for all mankind became a part of the spiritual dynamics by which Jesus Christ received the imputation of every sin in human history on the Cross.

b. Jesus Christ is the ultimate in royalty in His humanity. The greatest royal line in all of human history is the only royal line that will survive human history, and it is the royal line of our Lord Jesus Christ. His royalty not only includes Israel, but in the future, the entire human race. c. The mandate of Lev 19:18 is called the royal law because the perfect humanity of Christ, who had committed no sin, had received the imputation and judgment of all sins as the highest royalty in all history. He is King of kings and Lord of lords. At birth, He was descended from the royal line of Israel, David plus Bathsheba.

d. 1 Pet 3:18, “For Christ also once for all suffered as a substitute for our sins, the Righteous One as a substitute for the unrighteous ones, in order that He might bring us to God, on the one hand having been put to death in the flesh, but on the other hand having been made alive by the Spirit.” The royal law was fulfilled to the maximum by our Lord Jesus Christ on the Cross. He is the only person in history who could fulfill the royal law perfectly. Every sin against our Lord was injustice and unfair because He had sinned against no one. Our Lord brought us to God through fulfillment of the royal law. 2 Cor 5:21, “He [God the Father] made Him [our Lord] who knew no sin to be sin as a substitute for us, in order that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.”

6. The royal law is named for the greatest human royalty in history, and Jesus was born into the royal family of Israel under an eternal unconditional covenant, called the Davidic covenant found in 2 Sam 7:8-16; Ps 89:20-37; 2 Chr 21:7. Jesus Christ is descended through David and Bathsheba through Nathan, the forefather of Mary in the genealogy of Lk 3:31. Joseph, the foster-father of Jesus, is descended through Solomon, but this line is cut off by the virgin birth of Jesus Christ.

7. Because of the great eschatological victories, Jesus Christ has additional royal titles.

a. King of kings and Lord of lords, Rev 17:14; 19:16.

b. The Bright Morning Star, Rev 22:16. 8. Principles.

a. When facing injustice, the danger is meeting a sin with a sin rather than seeking the divine solution.

b. Impersonal love meets a sin with a divine solution.

c. The integrity of the subject must be greater than the obnoxiousness of the object.

d. The major issue is the status of the believer’s soul in relationship to the spiritual life when the victim of unjust treatment.

e. Impersonal love as a solution is not usable unless the believer has personal love for God as an integral part his spiritual life.

f. When an innocent person meets a sin by reacting with a sin, the sin of the innocent person is greater than the one who was unfair.

9. The royal law was fulfilled in three dispensations. It was fulfilled by every Jew who used the fourth stage of the faith-rest drill and became a plaintiff before the supreme court of heaven. It was fulfilled by the Lord Jesus Christ during the hypostatic union. It is fulfilled by every Church Age believer who using impersonal love as a problem solving device.

10. 2 Cor 5:14, “For the love of Christ motivates us, having reached this conclusion, namely that one died as a substitute for all, therefore all died [spiritual death at birth]; in fact He died a substitute for everyone, that they who live should no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died as a substitute for them and rose again.”

a. The love of Christ is the highest motivation that can exist. It is personal love for God the Father that gave our Lord His staying power on the Cross. It is that same personal love for God the Father which we have as we enter into this spiritual life and on a daily basis we fulfill the principle of being filled with the Spirit.

b. The staying power that kept Jesus Christ on the Cross is now available to us. This staying power is the combination of personal love for God the Father and impersonal love for all mankind. Suffering plus this staying power equals sharing the happiness of God. The greatest happiness in life comes to us through suffering. You do not get the suffering test that produces this happiness until you have a personal sense of destiny.

B. The Royal Law in the Dispensation of the Hypostatic Union.

1. Jesus quoted the royal law in the dispensation of the hypostatic union in Mt 19:19, “Honor your father and your mother and love your neighbor as yourself.”

2. Mt 22:36-39, “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law? And He replied to him, “’You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, even with all your soul and with all your thinking [or incite].’ This is the great and foremost commandment. “The second is like it, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’” In these two great commandments we have exactly what occurred on the Cross—we have His personal love for God the Father and His impersonal love for all mankind.

3. Our Lord fulfilled the royal law on the Cross as royalty. Because of His personal love for God the Father in His human nature He accepted the judgment of every sin in human history. He made it clear that the royal law is always related to the spiritual life. He made the neighbor every member of the human race.

4. In the case of Jesus Christ on the Cross, the integrity of our Lord was greater than all the sins of the human race. In His royal integrity, Jesus Christ met the imputation of the sins of history with the divine solution—maximum expression of the royal law. The royal law was His divine solution. He did not seek revenge or bear a grudge.

5. The greatest person who ever lived, Jesus Christ, had to receive unfair treatment from the One who loved Him the most because He was not a sinner. There was the greatest love on the part of both the Father and the Son. This was done for us by someone who is infinitely greater than us and perfect royalty. God the Father imputed our sins in perfect love. So when anyone rejects Jesus Christ, they are rejecting the perfect love of God. Rejection of the love of God is rejection of the righteousness of God; therefore, the unbeliever spends eternity in the lake of fire.

C. The doctrine of impersonal love is a royal law for the royal family of God.

1. Gal 5:14, “For the entire Law is fulfilled in one doctrine, `You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’”

a. In this verse, impersonal love for all mankind is related to the believer’s status quo in spiritual self-esteem.

b. The royal law for the royal family of God is mandated.

c. The royal law of impersonal love implies that spiritual self- esteem is necessary; for a part of impersonal love is that you never feel threatened by hostility, by hatred, by enmity, by any form of antagonism, or anything that is done to you unjustly, and this is also a part of spiritual self-esteem.

d. The royal law of impersonal love implies that spiritual self- esteem is necessary and a prerequisite for being consistent in the fulfilling of this divine mandate.

2. Rom 13:8, “Owe nothing to anyone except to love one another; for when he loves the other [personal love for God the Father], he has fulfilled the [royal] law [impersonal love for all mankind].” Fulfilling the royal law is impersonal love for all. Loving the other is personal love for God the Father, the motivation for impersonal love for all.

3. Rom 12:17-21, “Never pay back evil for evil to anyone. Respect what is honorable in the sight of all mankind. If it is possible, as much as depends on you, live in harmony with all mankind. Beloved, stop avenging yourselves, but make a place for the punishment from God, for it stands written, `Punishment belongs to Me, I will repay,’ says the Lord. So if your enemy is hungry, feed him, and if he is thirsty, give him a drink; for by doing this you will pile coals of fire on his head [judgment from the supreme court of heaven]. Stop being conquered by evil, but conquer evil by means of the absolute good [impersonal love].”

4. James describes impersonal love as the royal law of the Church. Jam 2:8, “If, however, you are fulfilling the royal law on the basis of the Scripture, `You shall love your neighbor as yourself,’ you are doing the right thing in the right way.”

a. “Neighbor” applies to the entire human race now that Jesus Christ went to the Cross.

b. Motivated by personal love for God the Father and impersonal love for all mankind the Church Age believer is fulfilling the royal law under the principle of the protocol plan of God—a right thing being done in a right way.

c. Therefore, instead of trying to solve any problem by sin, we solve it through the function of the wonderful spiritual life which has been given to us. Paul recognized this is Gal 5:14 when he wrote, “For the entire Law is fulfilled in one doctrine, `You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’”

D. Principles.

1. Impersonal love of the royal law is a major problem solving device of the spiritual life.

2. When you try to solve a problem with a sin, you end up with a greater sin. You are in for greater discipline than the person who sinned against you.

3. Instead of meeting a sin with a sin contrary to the royal law, impersonal love meets a sin with a divine solution, which is exactly what Jesus Christ did on the Cross. Jesus Christ fulfilled the royal law as no one else in history.

4. Therefore, the integrity of the subject is greater than the obnoxiousness of the object in fulfilling the royal law. The integrity of the subject is personal love for God and impersonal love for all mankind.

5. Impersonal love cannot function as a problem solving device unless the believer has first attained personal love for God.

6. Since contradictions cannot exist in the spiritual life of the Church Age and the function of the royal law, the believer cannot account for his thoughts and actions in undefined terms. Mastering the concepts of the royal law is the ability to define the functions, the mechanics of the spiritual life in relationship to people.

7. Postsalvation epistemological rehabilitation demands that the rate of learning Bible doctrine must always exceed the rate of forgetting doctrine. Why? Because you cannot apply what you do not know. Only emotion does that, and emotion destroys the spiritual life. Furthermore, you cannot apply doctrine you have forgotten and is now buried under the scar tissue of the soul.

8. The royal law stands as a monument to your eternal, spiritual royalty.

9. We have a unique spiritual life and this spiritual life is based on the fact we are royalty since the day we were born again. In that royalty we have the most fantastic options that have ever existed. We have the option of the staying power of the spiritual life used by our Lord on the Cross.

10. Those who use the royal law now will have the most fantastic things in eternity.

E. The A Fortiori Fulfillment of the Royal Law on the Cross.

1. The Latin prepositional phrase A FORTIORI means “with stronger reason.” It became a system of logic related to comparison and inference. A Fortiori is a conclusion or recognized fact of doctrine which is inferred as being inescapable or more certain. Hence, a fortiori is used as an inferential conclusion, which is more conclusive than a recognized fact through the function of comparison and inference.

2. The a fortiori of deliverance from the last judgment illustrates the function of this system of logic as in Rom 5:8-9, “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died as a substitute for us. Much more therefore, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be delivered from the wrath of God through Him.”

a. If the greater benefit was given by God on the Cross, He will not withhold the lesser benefit to the believer in Jesus Christ.

b. If the believer is benefitted by the integrity of God in his perfect righteousness and justice, how much more will he be benefitted through the love of God as expressed by the grace of God?

c. It is much easier to deliver the believer from the last judgment of Rev 20:11-15 than for God to impute all sins to the impeccable human nature of Jesus Christ on the Cross.

3. Rom 8:31-32, “To what conclusion are we forced? If God [is] for us, who [is] against us? God, who indeed did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him over as a substitute for everyone of us, how will He not also with Him graciously give to us the all things?”

a. We are forced to this conclusion by the royal law.

b. What the righteousness of God approves (grace blessing for the advancing believer plus greater blessing for the mature believer), the justice of God executes through the love of God as expressed in the grace of God.

c. If God accomplished the greater difficulty on the Cross, it is obvious that God can accomplish the lesser difficulty of the operational spiritual life.

F. The Royal Law in First Peter.

1. 1 Pet 2:18, “Servants, submit yourselves to your masters with all respect, not only to those who are good and considerate, but also to the unjust [unreasonable, harsh].”

a. “Servants” refers to anyone who is under authority in life. Legitimate systems of authority are mandated by the word of God. We begin by learning authority in the home. Authority is designed to protect our freedom. Authority is designed to protect the human race from self- destruction. Human maturity depends on attitude toward authority. Regardless of what kind of a boss you have, you do your job as unto the Lord. If you reject authority in one part of your life, it will overflow into rejection of authority in another part of your life, and then another part.

(1) You cannot be effective or oriented to life without recognition of authority. You cannot learn without authority.

(2) Human authority is not always right, but authority is always necessary.

(3) Doctrinal authority in the word of God is always right.

(4) People do not think right without respect for authority.

(5) Without respect for the authority of God, there is no true spiritual life or true happiness in life.

b. Many people cannot accept authority once they think authority is wrong and has mistreated them. This passage says that is not the issue.

c. Respect is a system of love, Eph 5:22ff. How do you love someone who is unfair? By first having personal love for God, and then impersonal love for those who are unjust, unreasonable, harsh.

d. Royalty has to be self-disciplined far beyond others, in order to be successful. 2. 1 Pet 2:19, “For this [is] grace, if for the sake of conscience toward God anyone bears up under the afflictions when suffering unjustly.”

a. The beginning of this verse points to the end of the next verse.

b. When you are under unjust authority, real or imagined, the first thing you should have is grace orientation. You endure alone; you do not get help from other people. You do it alone because you have the Bible doctrine to do it. You do not complain to others. You do not judge, malign, or put down the unjust authority.

c. This is what Jesus Christ did on the Cross—He endured while suffering unjustly because of conscience toward God the Father. This was His staying power. Jesus Christ did this so that we might share the happiness of God. There is a far greater happiness from succeeding by enduring unjust treatment because of conscience toward God than from revenge.

d. “What is right” is to do your job as unto the Lord even when the authority is unjust. When the authority is wrong the divine solution is to put the matter in the Lord’s hands. You are going to be tested in this way, so that you can grow up spiritually.

3. 1 Pet 2:20, “For what kind of credit [do you have with God], if, when you sin and take a beating for doing wrong, you endure it? But if, when you do what is right and suffer for it, and you endure it, this [is] grace associated with God.”

a. There are two lines of poetry in this verse, not prose. This is a couplet of opposites. The apodosis is not really part of the poetry, just the two first class conditional clauses in the protosis. There are two antithetical conditional sentences in this verse. The hypothesis here is a proposition set forth as an explanation of the doctrine of the fulfillment of the royal law in the Church Age. The first line is the false fulfillment of the hypothesis and the second line is the true fulfillment. The first conditional sentence does not express the hypothesis related to the royal law, while the second sentence does. The royal law has no credit in the first conditional sentence because the believer is under divine discipline and is toughing it out under his own power. The royal law has credit in the second sentence because the person involved is a victim of injustice and wrong treatment and he followed the mandate of the royal law.

(1) The proposition will be developed by opposite lines in the couplet.

(2) Therefore the protosis of the first class condition in the first line does not express a hypothesis related to the royal law.

(3) The royal law has no credit in the statement of the first line of the couplet, because it is a statement of sin and divine discipline. The believer described in the first line is a strong believer, who is using his human strength to tough it out and glorify himself.

(4) But the royal law has great credit in the second line of the couplet, because the two participles indicate the believer is doing what is right and suffering for it.

(5) As the victim of injustice and wrong treatment, the believer endures it and through the prototype spiritual life he fulfills the royal law and glorifies God.

(6) The first line of the couplet has no credit with God; the second line of the couplet gives all the credit to God.

b. There is no credit with God in toughing it out as a solution to carnality, when the staying power solution is the status of arrogance and glorifying self.

(1) Human strength uses arrogance instead of spiritual strength, which demands humility. The difference between the fist and second line is the difference between arrogance and humility. The staying power of the human solution cannot be perpetuated through carnality.

(2) The human solution for the carnal believer is being a tough person, being capable of great endurance in the energy of the flesh. He can endure and is not easily broken. He is not easily influenced by adversity or pain of soul and body. In fact, he considers his own brand of sins to be more than compensation for the discipline he is getting from God. Therefore, he bears the adversity of divine punishment without rebound.

(3) Often people take a beating for sin through illness or great pain or some other form of suffering, but there is no credit for toughing this out. You are not naming your sins, you are only trying to endure the suffering yourself. The believer in line one of the couplet is doing a lot of sinning and is shaking off the discipline and continuing to sin, so that he is hurting more and more. That is a human solution, which is arrogance and no solution. You do not have to stay with the first line of the couplet. You have the rebound technique.

(4) The carnal believer glorifies himself. He never glorifies God. There is no credit with God in the tough it out solution to carnality when the staying power is the status of arrogance and glorifying self. They have great power in arrogance and utilize it. Emotional revolt of the soul is part of his strength in toughing it out. Emotion becomes their god. They become so negative to rebound, they do not care about the adversity. They are totally thoughtless about anyone else and will take others down with them. They live for revenge. A good illustration of this was Pharaoh and the Jews of the Exodus generation.

(5) God makes war against this arrogant believer. As this believer gets to the end of his life, he breaks down under the adversity and suffering. The quickest way for a believer to ruin his life is to fail to execute the royal law.

(6) Our credit with God is not how strong we are in the energy of the flesh, but how strong we are in the filling of the Holy Spirit in the fulfillment of the royal law of our spiritual life. The human solution glorifies self. The divine solution glorifies God. If you succeed on human power, you glorify yourself. If you succeed on divine power, you glorify God.

c. The believer in the second line of the couplet is doing what is right by using rebound and suffering for blessing. When you do right and you suffer for it and you endure that suffering, then you are fulfilling the royal law. (Compare Heb 12:2 where our Lord Jesus Christ endured suffering for doing right.) This believer has great happiness under suffering. This one is glorifying God. The human solution glorifies self; the divine solution glorifies God.

d. God has provided a system for the most fantastic grace when we suffer for blessing. But this blessing will never come your way as long as you hold a grudge or seek revenge. We fulfill the royal law by enduring suffering, when we suffer for doing what it right. The only way you can get into the grace associated with God at the end of the sentence is to rebound.

e. Grace associated with God includes the blotting out of all of our sins at the Cross. This is where grace turns cursing into blessing. Grace associated with God means that when you rebound you receive credit and cursing is turned into blessing. Grace associated with God is the spiritual life, harmonious rapport with God.

f. Principles.

(1) Rebound takes the believer from line one to line two. This person uses no rebound.

(2) No matter how strong you are humanly speaking, it is no credit with God for toughing it out. The human solution is no solution.

(3) Our credit with God is how strong we are in the execution of the spiritual life of the Church Age.

(4) Spiritual strength demands humility; human strength feeds on arrogance.

(5) The human solution glorifies self; the divine solution glorifies God.

(6) If you succeed on human power, you glorify yourself. If you succeed on divine power, you glorify God.

(7) The first line has no credit with God, a protosis with no apodosis, no conclusion. The second line has credit with God, an apodosis, and glorification of God.

g. Summary of the Second Line.

(1) The divine solution is the only solution. The human solution is no solution.

(2) Under pressure of unjust treatment, the winner believer does not react, but fulfills the royal law. Personal love for God motivates rejection of revenge and grudge solutions. Instead he puts the matter in the hands of the supreme court of heaven and stays out of the way. He stays out of God’s way so he does not get hurt.

(3) Human strength to tough it out functions on the sins of human arrogance and emotion plus the habitual use of the three arrogance skills.

(4) The difference between line one and line two is found in Prov 3:34 as quoted in Jam 4:6 and 1 Pet 5:5, “God makes war against the arrogant believer, but He gives grace to the humble believer.”

4. 1 Pet 2:21, “For this purpose you have been called, because Christ also suffered as a substitute for all of you, leaving behind for your benefit a copybook that you should follow in His steps,”

a. The call of God is the ministry of God the Holy Spirit whereby He invites the unbeliever to believe in Christ, after He has made the gospel understandable academically to the spiritually dead unbeliever through the ministry of common grace. We have been called to live the same spiritual life which our Lord lived in His humanity during the dispensation of the hypostatic union. Our Lord fulfilled the royal law on the Cross through the prototype spiritual life with emphasis on personal love for God the Father and impersonal love for all mankind.

b. In the greatest suffering that ever existed, there came the greatest happiness that ever existed, Heb 12:2.

c. The Greek word HUPOLIMPANO means to leave behind for someone something of value, and that something of value is the greatest spiritual life that ever existed in all of human history along with the New Testament Scriptures. This spiritual life produces sharing the happiness of God. This spiritual life is the greatest riches, the greatest value that has ever existed, and it has been left behind for us.

d. The model or copybook is the New Testament Scriptures and the heritage of the Church Age believer. It has been left behind for us as something of value. The copybook records all the details, the responsibility of every Church Age believer regarding the fulfillment of the unique spiritual life of all human history. When we follow the copybook, we are doing a right thing in a right way.

e. “Following in His steps” refers to the unique spiritual life, which our Lord used in His human nature only. We are to follow in His footsteps in the sense that we have the same spiritual life that He used and has now given to us. You have a spiritual life which is able to handle extreme suffering with sharing the happiness of God. We are called to execute the unique spiritual life of human history and fulfill the royal law, just as our Lord did.

f. Principles.

(1) Bible doctrine is the thinking of Christ, reduced to writing in our copybook, 1 Cor 2:16, “We have the thinking of Christ;” Phil 2:5, “Let this thinking be in you which was also in Christ Jesus.”

(2) We ride on the crest of the waves of history when this Bible doctrine circulates in our stream of consciousness as epignosis.

(3) We drown in the bottom of a wave in divine discipline when we reject Bible doctrine.

(4) History is not who and what we are; history is the impact of Bible doctrine in the souls of humble believers.

(5) The greatest impact in history is the unique person of Jesus Christ in hypostatic union.

(6) The impeccable human nature of Jesus Christ in hypostatic union magnified His word above His name. Ps 138:2, “I will prostrate myself at the sight of Your holy temple And give thanks to Your person for Your unfailing love and doctrine; For You have magnified Your word above and beyond all of Your name.”

(a) This is a reference to the doctrine of kenosis as it relates to the doctrine of impeccability in the dispensation of the hypostatic union.

(b) The impeccable human nature of Jesus depended on the function of the prototype spiritual life to solve the problems and pressures, the testing and blessings of life, as well as establishing the true values of life.

(d) We can magnify His word above and beyond our persons as human beings born again by faith alone in Christ alone into His royal family.

(e) However, you cannot have a passion for the word of God and live outside of its boundaries. Outside of those boundaries you are not going to fulfill the unique spiritual life of all human history.

(f) Therefore, you must have a passion for the word of God to live inside the boundaries.

(g) To establish the values of the spiritual life, Bible doctrine must become much more important than we are.

(h) To live the spiritual life, Bible doctrine must be more important than your person.

5. 1 Pet 2:22, “[Christ] who did not sin, not even was any deceit found in His mouth;”

a. The Concept of Deceit.

(1) Deceit includes every form of lying, and behind it is the motivation of trickery, duplicity, hypocrisy, the disguise of bitterness, hatred, rancor, malice, spite, vindictiveness, implacability, resentment. This is how the royal law (“You shall love you neighbor as yourself”) was not observed and broken so many times. But this was not true of our Lord Jesus Christ.

(2) Deceit is the disguise of the lust pattern of the sin nature, and therefore, a very common type of sin. People use deceit to gain power, approbation, pleasure lust, sexual lust, crusader lust. All of this is inordinate ambition resulting in inordinate competition.

(3) Deceit hides malice, the lust to destroy someone with falsehood.

(4) Deceit advances under false colors. It flies the flag of the arrogance skills. Self-justification uses deceit in legalism. People use deceit to justify their own position.

(5) The result is perversion of the truth, prevarication of the facts, speaking falsely with deliberate intent.

(6) Deceit can be the eye-wash or window dressing of flattery, the flim-flam of sham, the social juggling of people, the contriving of duplicity, the artifice and subterfuge to inflate the ego of others, manipulating people and schemes to undermine others.

(7) The impeccable human nature of Jesus Christ in hypostatic union resisted every temptation in every one of these things.

b. You cannot build any relationship in life on deceit, which includes your relationship with God. If you are deceived regarding how to be saved, you have no relationship with God.

c. If you are deceived regarding the postsalvation spiritual life, you have no harmonious rapport with God.

d. You cannot build relationships on deceit.

(1) You must have impersonal love for all mankind.

(2) You have no impersonal love for all mankind without personal love for God as the motivation.

(3) When you have impersonal love for all mankind, you have the capacity for personal love for a select few.

(4) If you overload your soul with too many personal love relationships, you will never find happiness in personal love.

e. Heb 9:14 says that He “offered Himself without blemish to God.” 1 Jn 3:5, “in fact sin is not in Him.” 2 Cor 5:21, “He made Him who knew no sin to become sin as a substitute for us.”

6. 1 Pet 2:23, “[Christ] who when they hurled their insults at Him, He did not retaliate; while suffering, He uttered no threats, instead He repeatedly entrusted Himself to the One who judges in a righteous and just manner;”

a. The impeccable human nature our Lord used four procedures to not retaliate.

(1) The faith-rest drill, forth stage, by putting the matter in the hands of the supreme court of heaven.

(2) He used personal love for God the Father as the motivation for impersonal love for all those at the Cross insulting Him.

(3) He used impersonal love for those who wronged Him unjustly.

(4) He shared the happiness of God in the staying power of both imputation and judgment of all sins.

b. Our Lord did not bear a grudge against those who were insulting Him. Heb 7:26, “For it was fitting that we should have such a high priest: holy, blameless, pure, set apart from sinners, exalted above the heavens.” Therefore, we have the most exalted of all spiritual lives because we have the most fantastic person as our Lord and Savior.

c. The impeccable human nature of Christ on the Cross entrusted Himself to God the Father who judged righteously. The human nature of our Lord placed His trust in the righteousness, justice, and love of God.

7. 1 Pet 2:24, “and He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross, so that we might die to sin and live to righteousness; for by His wounds you were healed.”

a. Instead of carrying a grudge toward those who sin against us, Jesus Christ carried our sins in His own body on the Cross.

b. Compare 1 Pet 3:18, “For Christ also once for all suffered as a substitute for our sins, the Righteous One as a substitute for unrighteous ones, in order that He might bring us to God, on the hand one having been put to death in the flesh, but on the other hand, having been made alive by the Spirit.” 8. The fulfillment of the royal law in Christian marriage is taught in 1 Pet 3:1-9.

a. Outline.

(1) The impact of the second divine law of Christian marriage, verses 1-2.

(2) The importance of the woman’s inner beauty, verse 3.

(3) The woman’s inner beauty in marriage defined, verse 4.

(4) The divine institution of marriage in order to give an illustration from the past, verses 5-6.

(5) The continuation of the Christian institution of marriage, verses 7-9.

b. 1 Pet 3:1, “In the same manner, you wives, remain under the authority of your own husbands, so that if any of them are disobedient to the word, they may be won without saying a word by the behavior of their wives,”

(1) In this illustration, the husband has rejected Bible doctrine and the wife has not. She is to remain under his authority.

(2) A lot of injustice may occur in marriage on the part of the husband who resents his wife’s interest in the word of God, but she is to remain under his authority no matter how he treats her.

(3) No husband is ever won over by nagging. She is to win him over by a silent testimony. She has the right to go to the supreme court of heaven. The husband can be won over by the behavior of their wife.

c. 1 Pet 3:2, “when they observe your blameless manner of life associated with respect.”

(1) She is not to react to her unjust husband in any way. She is to remain blameless.

(2) Even more important she is to continue loving her husband with the highest category of love—respect. Respect is a responding love of deference, admiration, honor, esteem, consideration, and partiality to the one with the authority over her.

(3) The greatest thing a woman can give a man in the area of love is her respect. Therefore, the Christian life must make an issue out of her love-respect for her husband rather than his flaws, sins, or failures. She enters into a silent testimony.

(a) A reacting woman cannot solve problems. Both spouses in marriage have freedom of volition. Therefore, in making an issue out of her spiritual life, the wife must remember that freedom without authority is anarchy, which is the chaos and confusion of soul under sin nature control.

(b) To avoid anarchy in the home, freedom must have values. When a wife starts nagging her husband, she has lost her values, and with the loss of values comes the malfunction of her spiritual life and the marriage. Nagging never advances the wife’s cause, only the fulfillment of the operational type spiritual life of the Church Age, which has impact in association with the royal law of Lev 19:18; Jam 2:8. The wife’s staying power in marriage are the values that come from the function of the royal law plus personal love for God the Father.

d. 1 Pet 3:3, “Your adornment must not be merely external braiding the hair, and wearing gold jewelry, or putting on dresses;

(1) Coalescence of souls from integrity love is far more important than physical beauty and attraction.

(2) Beauty should not come from external appearance only, but from the soul.

(3) Good grooming plus inner beauty of the soul is irresistible to the husband. Therefore, your spiritual values must emphasize inner beauty, but at the same time not reject the adornment of the outer person.

e. 1 Pet 3:4, “but the hidden person of the heart associated with the imperishable quality of a humble and quiet spirit, which has great value in the sight of God.”

(1) The inner beauty of the soul is defined in terms of the spiritual life of the Christian wife.

(2) The heart is the right lobe of the soul which circulates metabolized Bible doctrine or epignosis throughout the soul. Doctrine becomes part of your vocabulary, categories, memory center, frame of reference, conscience, momentum, wisdom, and the mirror of the soul.

(3) Without humility there can be no inner beauty. The Greek word PRAUS denotes a soothing, patient, calm person with those who are irritated; composure that avoids bitterness and all of the sins of reaction. Inner beauty is the only beauty that gets better with age.

(4) When a woman reacts to the man she loves, a vacuum is created in her soul, so that the problem solving devices are neglected and she loses her inner beauty. This causes the woman to become vulnerable to flattery from other men. Therefore, reacting to someone you love often results in responding to the wrong person or persons. A woman who uses reaction as a means of punishing someone she loves destroys her own inner beauty. She loses all of her values related to the spiritual life. The result is transferring her love-respect from her husband to the deceptive praise of another man.

(5) Loss of values means loss of coalescence of souls in marriage. Loss of values means even sex in marriage become a hypocrisy. For example, the wife may be having sex with her husband but be thinking of someone else to whom she has a temporary transfer of affection.

f. 1 Pet 3:5, “For in this way in former times holy women [believers] also, who had confidence in God, kept adorning themselves, being submissive to their own husbands;”

(1) Peter gives us the Old Testament illustration of inner beauty. A holy woman is one who was set apart unto God, that is, a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ. It does not mean someone who is boring and dull.

(2) Hope is confidence in God. Hope as confidence in God is part of the function of the faith-rest drill, which was the focus of the spiritual life of the Old Testament.

(3) These holy women kept making themselves attractive to their husbands by submission to the authority of their husbands. The woman was created as a responder, so that living under the authority of their husbands was not considered demeaning. A woman who says I am not going to obey my husband is out of fellowship, a carnal believer, and will die the sin unto death.

g. 1 Pet 3:6, “like Sarah, who obeyed Abraham and called him lord, you have become her daughters, if you do what is intrinsic good, and if you do not fear any intimidation.”

(1) Fear always sees the problem; faith always sees the solution. If you go through life in a state of fear, you are intimidated by life. If you are intimidated by life, you will never have any inner beauty. Inner beauty is far greater than any overt beauty.

(2) Ps 56:3, “What time I am afraid, I will trust in You.” You put your trust in the Lord and refuse to be intimidated. Great believers are those do not live by fear, and therefore, cannot be intimidated by fear. All of us have to pass the intimidation test a number of times.

(a) The more things you surrender to fear, the more things you fear.

(b) The extent to which you surrender to fear, the greater your capacity for fear.

(d) The more you increase the power of fear in your life, the greater your failure to focus on the problems of life rather than the solutions; therefore, you ignore or reject divine solutions.

(e) Fear is preoccupation with the problem of intimidations of life that produce fear, worry, anxiety.

(f) When stress overruns the command post of your soul, the carnal believer fulfills the principle that believers who live by fear are intimidated by fear throughout their life. If you are intimidated by fear, you will never execute the spiritual life, and you will spend your entire life under divine discipline.

(g) Fear is preoccupation with the problem; faith concentrates on the divine solution.

(h) The elative conclusion of 2 Cor 12:9 is that the divine solution is the only solution; the human solution is no solution.

(i) Fear is an emotional sin; therefore irrational. Fear is a major distraction to the deployment of the ten problem solving devices on the FLOT line of the soul. Fear is a sin of arrogance; therefore it results in the function of the arrogance skills—self-justification, self-deception, self-absorption.

(j) Fear in the soul is controlled, resolved, and eliminated by the advance of problem solving devices related to virtue-love. Fear does not exist in virtue-love. 2 Tim 1:7, “God has not given to us the spirit of fear, but of power [the two power options of the filling of the Holy Spirit and Bible doctrine in the soul] and of virtue-love and of good judgment.” 1 Jn 4:18, “Fear does not exist in virtue-love, but virtue-love drives out fear because fear has its own force of punishment. And the person who fears has not been matured in virtue-love.”

(3) Sarah had great overt beauty, Gen 12:10-16. Her original name was Sarai, which means “to be contentious” and she was in every possible way until she grew up spiritually, when God changed her name to “Sarah” which means princess, Gen 17:15. She was always argumentative, always had to be right, always involved in controversy and having her own way. She got away with her contentiousness because of her overt beauty. When she finally got her inner beauty, she obeyed Abraham and called him `lord.’ She adorned her soul with Bible doctrine, a beauty far greater than her overt beauty. The husband has to have this adornment of the soul as well.

h. 1 Pet 3:7, “Likewise you husbands, live with your wives on the basis of knowledge, sharing honor to the woman as a weaker vessel, as also joint-heirs of the grace of life, that your prayers may not be hindered.”

(1) Living with your wife on the basis of knowledge means having a knowledge which is very objective, being thoughtful and sensitive as a function of your virtue-love. A man who does not understand women does not have any virtue-love. He has no soul love, only sexual desire or appreciates the woman’s overt beauty, and that is not love.

(a) You live with your wife when there are problems. You do not run off every time there is a problem. This is a command.

(b) Virtue-love in the soul of the woman gives her inner beauty. Virtue-love in the soul of the man gives him fantastic knowledge.

(d) The husband must have an intensive love, an understanding, a lack of self-centeredness. An arrogant husband can never fulfill the spiritual life. The woman cannot respect the husband when he goes above the law by having sex outside of marriage or by abusing his authority.

(2) A woman was designed to respond, and when she cannot respond, she will react. That is the weakness of the woman. She has a higher sensitivity level than the man, unless he becomes arrogant, and then he acts like a woman.

(a) Jesus Christ created the woman as a responder to one man in marriage. A woman, as a responder, becomes arrogant by seeking the approbation of many men after marriage. When anything goes wrong in marriage, she seeks the approbation of many men, and this approbation lust is a tremendous system of arrogance that brings weakness into the life and destroys the spiritual life. With this weakness comes the tendency of becoming bitter, and the woman will enter into self-justification, which comes from the bitterness.

(b) A woman has true love in her soul when she seeks the approbation of one man only, and she is totally and completely giving honor to him. Her thoughtfulness and sensitivity belong to him. If she truly loves the man she marries, then she will center and focus on this fact, and that will result in a wonderful responding love. But if she does not, then she is never going to execute the spiritual life. No man should ever marry a man unless she can set aside approbation lust to be recognized by all the other men in her periphery. This is a part of the vanity of the weaker vessel.

(d) The man as her husband gives her all the honor she will ever need, provided that he loves her. If he cannot do that, then he should not marry her.

(e) Some women will never know true love because they have approbation lust for honor from a multiplicity of men. Men also have the same problem and rise above the law. These failures come quite easily to the woman, which makes her a weaker vessel. If the woman does not have enough love in her soul to lean on one person (her husband) and only want to be with one person all the time, then there is something wrong.

(3) The husband shows honor to his wife because of his soul love. He shows honor to her by being the leader in the home. He has an intensive love for her and takes care of all of her needs. This is showing honor to her. She responds by respecting and honoring him. She is a weaker vessel when she fails to respond to him. He recognizes the equality of both being royal priests and having equal privilege and opportunity to execute the spiritual life. He leads by living his spiritual life and encouraging her in her spiritual life, so that they will have reciprocal honor. Living with the woman on the basis of honor is the recognition that you owe your wife honor by enduring devotion to her. You have reciprocal honor and loyalty with her. You have loyalty down toward her and she has loyalty up toward you. No one lead without reciprocal honor and loyalty.

(4) The husband is responsible for seeing that the equality of spiritual life in marriage is fulfilled. The grace of life is a reference to the spiritual life of the Church Age. The demands of Christian marriage are far greater than the demands of unbeliever marriage in the Church Age. “The grace of life” is a title of the spiritual life for the Church Age only. The grace life is the spiritual life of the Church Age. The “grace of life” belongs to both “joint-heirs.” Authority does not take away their equality.

(a) From the standpoint of the spiritual life, husband and wife have the same equal privilege and equal opportunity to advance to PLEROMA status (maximizing the spiritual life).

(b) From the corporate standpoint, the husband has the authority over the wife. He is the leader, with full responsibility to God for his leadership.

(5) The prayers of a husband and wife are not heard unless they are fulfilling the spiritual life. Both are recipients of the unique spiritual life of the Church Age. The Christian husband is the leader and the wife is the follower. Together they have a corporate testimony for the Prosecution. The success of Christian marriage is the operational spiritual life of the Church Age.

i. 1 Pet 3:8, “Now in conclusion, everyone should be harmonious, be sympathetic in brotherly love, be compassionate, be humble;”

(1) This is the third divine law of Christian marriage.

(2) One of the greatest areas of testing in life is in marriage. Marriage is a testing place, and it takes more of the spiritual life to fulfill the mandates of marriage and be successful in marriage than in any other factor. Success depends on understanding personal love for God and impersonal love for mankind, and how that combination brings virtue-love into marriage.

(3) Personal love for God plus impersonal love for all mankind maintains the personal love of each spouse for one another in marriage. When impersonal love is used as a solution, a stronger personal love for a spouse comes out of it.

(4) “Harmonious” does not mean you will always get along. It means that the relationship will be harmonious even when you are having differences. The spiritual life is harmonious rapport with God. You must have a harmonious relationship with God before you can have a harmonious relationship with others. The harmony between husband and wife is in the coalescence of their souls.

(5) Sympathetic means sensitivity. True love is sensitive toward the object of love. For example, neither spouse will flirt with others out of sensitivity for their spouse. Respect for one another comes out of this.

(6) Brotherly love means personal love for God motivates impersonal love for all mankind in dealing with those things which you do not like about others, especially between husband and wife.

(7) The Greek word EUSPLAGCHNOS means compassion from impersonal love, not from emotion. Impersonal love is a system for developing a great love than can be developed by an unbeliever. It means sympathy between husband and wife when it becomes necessary.

(8) Humility is realistic virtue of the spiritual life. God makes war against the arrogant believer, but gives grace to the humble believer. Humility is the realistic understanding of the integrity of God as the source of all blessing from God and the antithesis of arrogance.

(9) The royal law is designed to prevent the believer from living above the law. Sex outside of marriage is living above the law and God always provides tremendous discipline for it.

j. 1 Pet 3:9, “not giving back evil for evil or insult for insult, but on the contrary blessing instead; because for this purpose you were called that you might inherit blessing.” (1) This is part of the fulfillment of the royal law. Compare 1 Pet 2:21-24, “For this purpose you have been called because Christ also suffered as a substitute for all of you, leaving behind something of value for your benefit, a copybook, that you should follow in His footsteps. It is Christ who did not sin, nor was any deceit found in His mouth. It is Christ, who, when they hurled insults at Him, did not retaliate. While suffering He uttered no threats. Instead He repeatedly entrusted Himself to the One who judges in a just manner [the Father]. It is Christ who carried our sins in His own body on the Cross.”

(2) When you give back evil for evil in marriage, you are putting yourself above the royal law.

(3) You were called by God to execute the spiritual life and receive escrow blessings for time and eternity. All believers have the same equality to do this, whether husband or wife.

k. When the woman is not responding, she is reacting.

(1) The purpose of such reaction is generally to punish someone else. The woman cannot react to the children and fulfill her responsibility as a parent. Nothing is ever won by reacting.

(2) Reacting to someone you love, like your husband, results in responding to the wrong person, like someone you do not love. The woman loses the man she loves through reaction and revenge, putting yourself above the royal law by vilification, slander, malice, and bitter jealousy.

(3) By rejecting the authority of her husband, the reacting woman has made herself vulnerable to someone she does not love, and she will suffer for it from loss of values. Above all, she has violated the honor code of Christian marriage.

(4) Freedom without responsibility is apathy. Apathy is tantamount to rejection of the mystery doctrine of the Church Age and failure to fulfill the spiritual life of the Church Age.

9. The rule of law preserves a nation’s freedom.

a. Rule by law is the basis for freedom and blessing by God to any national entity. The ones who are leaders in such a nation are the servants of the people to ensure rule by law is not violated. Every system of freedom demands that we function under law. Any great nation is a great nation because it has a system of law and a system of freedom that goes with that law.

b. No ruler is above the law. No leader is above the laws of a nation. Once leadership rises above the law, there is tyranny. For example, the concept of the divine right of kings.

c. No one is greater than the law.

d. No one is greater than the Holy Spirit.

e. We are servants to the to the law of God.

f. The more you grow spiritually, the more you realize you are not about the spiritual life.

g. No nation is ever greater than the spiritual life of its people.

h. To violate the royal law is to put yourself above the law, which is arrogance. We are punished, not because of our personal sins which were judged on the Cross, but because we have placed ourselves above the law of God. Because you are putting yourself above the law, the supreme court of heaven will deal with you all the way to the sin unto death.

i. Our Lord did not magnify Himself above the law. He provided the solution to all the problems of mankind with regard to relationship with God by not placing Himself above the law and receiving the imputation and judgment of all sin.

j. Our failure to execute the spiritual life is to put ourself above the law of God and is the greatest failure of arrogance.

k. Sex outside of marriage is rising above the law.

l. The supreme court of heaven punishes all cases of the above the law syndrome, whether related to sex outside of marriage, crime, demonism, or politics.

m. A degenerate nation can only escape total destruction through harmonious rapport with God in two categories: salvation through faith alone in Christ alone and a believer in Christ executing the spiritual life of the Church Age.

n. The greatest area of vulnerability for putting oneself above the law is marriage, because anytime anyone enters into sexual sins outside of marriage, they have put themselves above the law. You can put yourself above the law by the sins of arrogance, the sins of human good and evil, and sexual sins in marriage.

G. The Royal Law in Romans, Rom 13:8-10.

1. Rom 13:8, “Owe nothing to anyone except to love one another; for he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law.”

a. Personal love for God is the motivation; impersonal love for all mankind is the function, resulting in a wonderful personal love relationship in marriage, friendship, etc.

b. “He who loves his neighbor” is the royal law of Jam 2:8. Your neighbor is anyone with whom you come into contact.

c. You begin to fulfill the royal law with a personal sense of destiny. You continue to fulfill the royal law with personal love for God the Father. You complete fulfillment of the royal law with impersonal love for all mankind.

2. Rom 13:9, “For the list of pertinent commandments, `You shall not commit adultery, You shall not murder, You shall not steal, You shall not lust,’ so if there is any other commandment, it is summed up in this statement, `You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’”

a. If you keep these mandates, you will never go above the law. If you commit adultery, or murder, or steal, or covet, you have put yourself above the law.

b. “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” is another statement of the royal law.

c. David is a good example of someone who put himself above the law.

(1) David did all of these things by putting himself above the law and did not rebound.

(2) 2 Sam 11:1, David put himself above the law by not going to war with the army. As king, he should have been in the field with his army. This was an attack on national security. He failed in his responsibility as the ruler of Israel. It was his responsibility as the commander to go to war with the army.

(3) 2 Sam 11:2-5, David put himself above the law by committing adultery with Bathsheba.

(4) David put himself above the law by ordering the murder of the husband of Bathsheba, Uriah the Hittite. David committed murder to hide the fact that he had put himself above the law of God.

(5) David put himself above the law by stealing the wife of Uriah the Hittite.

(6) David put himself above the law by lusting for the wife of another man.

(7) David forced others to put themselves above the law. Absalom murdered his half-brother because his father would do nothing, then eventually revolts against his father’s rule.

(8) David never turned cursing into blessing. He kept putting himself above the law at the end of his life.

(4) Any married person can do the same thing by having sex outside of marriage. The supreme court of heaven is intolerant of this, Ps 32:1-4.

3. Rom 13:10, “Virtue-love works no evil to a neighbor; therefore virtue-love is the maximum fulfillment [PLEROMA] of the law.

“ (1) The believer who reaches PLEROMA status, reaches it because he has not, and does not, and will not put himself above the law in marriage, in government, and in the royal law.

(2) Believers who maximize the spiritual life never get involved in rising above the law.

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, Houston, Texas 77056 (713) 621-3740

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