Class Notes: 6/23/2010

God disciplines those who rise above the Royal Law

In our study of how the resurrection, ascension and session of our Lord has impacted the spiritual life of believers in the Church Age we are discussing the two opposite systems, the arrogance of the Cosmos empowered by the OSN and the Grace of the Royal Law that is empowered by God the Holy Spirit.

Last time we were discussing 1Pet 3:1-9; where Peter teaches the application of the royal law to Christian marriage. We have seen that marriage is the first corporate relationship within Divine Establishment and it therefore becomes the reference for the use of authority within all relationships.

When we left off last time we were discussing the fact that although the husband is the delegated authority within the marriage, he must recognize that there is spiritual equality because as members of the Royal family of God, both the husband and wife are royal priests and have equal privilege and opportunity to execute the spiritual life.

He leads by living his spiritual life and encouraging his wife 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. Eph 5:25;

When marriage functions properly there is reciprocal honor. The husband has loyalty down toward his wife and the wife has she has loyalty up toward her husband. There is no leadership without reciprocal honor and loyalty.

The husband is responsible for seeing that the equality of spiritual life in marriage is fulfilled.

In 1Pet 3:7d; The phrase " grace of life" is a reference to the spiritual life of the Church Age.

The demands placed upon Christian marriage in the Church Age are far greater than the demands placed upon marriage between unbelievers.

"The grace of life" is a reference to the unique spiritual life of the Church Age. The "grace of life" belongs to both the husband and the wife as "fellow-heirs."

Authority in marriage does not take away this equality.

From the standpoint of the spiritual life, husband and wife have the same equal privilege and equal opportunity to advance to the maximum of the spiritual life.

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

This passage also indicates that the prayers of a husband and wife are hindered unless they are fulfilling the spiritual life. Both are recipients of the unique spiritual life of the Church Age but within the marriage, the Christian husband is the initiator and the wife is the responder.

In addition to their testimony as individuals, together they have a corporate testimony for the prosecution in the appeal trial of satan and the fallen angels. The success of Christian marriage is the result of the husband and the wife both functioning in the operational spiritual life of the Church Age.

1Pet 3:8; "Now in conclusion, everyone should be harmonious, be sympathetic in brotherly love, be compassionate, be humble;"

This is the third category of Love in the Royal Law and it is also the third law of Christian marriage.

Because of it's intimacy, one of the greatest areas of testing in life is in marriage and it takes more capacity from the spiritual life to fulfill the mandates for marriage and be successful in marriage than in any other human endeavor.

Success in Christian marriage depends on understanding personal love for God and impersonal love for mankind, and how that combination brings virtue love into the marriage.

Personal love for God plus impersonal love for all mankind maintains the personal love of each spouse for one another. When impersonal love is used as a solution, a stronger personal love for the spouse is ultimately built.

"Harmonious" does not mean always getting along. It means that the relationship will be harmonious even when there are differences. The spiritual life is harmonious rapport with God.

There must be a harmonious relationship with God before there can be harmonious relationship with others. 1John 4:19;

Within the marriage, the harmony between husband and wife is established in the coalescence of their souls.

1Pet 3:8; Sympathetic means sensitivity. True love is sensitive toward the object of love. This results in mutual respect for each other. An application of this is that neither spouse will flirt with others out of sensitivity for their spouse.

Brotherly love means personal love for God that motivates impersonal love for all mankind in dealing with those things that you do not like about others. this includes things the husband and wife dislike about the other.

The Greek word "eusplagchnos" that is translated "kindhearted" means compassion from impersonal love, not from emotional sentimentality.

Impersonal integrity love is a system for developing a greater love than can be developed by unbelievers because it is enabled by greater power.

Humility is realistic virtue of the spiritual life. As we have seen, 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 is the antithesis of arrogance.

Humility is absolute uncompromising orientation to reality.

The royal law is designed to prevent the believer from living above the law. Sex outside of marriage is an example of living above the law and God always provides severe discipline for it.

1Pet 3:9; "not returning 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."

As we have seen, this is part of the fulfillment of the royal law that TLJC himself functioned under as described in 1Pet 2:21-24;

v21 "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.

v22 It is Christ who did not sin, nor was any deceit found in His mouth.

v23 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.

v24 It is Christ who carried our sins in His own body on the Cross."

1Pet 3:9; When you return evil for evil in marriage, you are putting yourself above the royal law.

You were called by God to execute the spiritual life and receive blessings for time and eternity. All believers regardless of their roles in life have the equal privilege and opportunity to do this.

When one returns evil for evil, the purpose of the reaction is generally to punish someone else. Nothing is ever accomplished by reacting and it is not our responsibility to punish anyone else. Rom 12:19;

Reacting to someone you love, may result in responding to a person whom you do not love. By rejecting the authority of her husband, the reacting woman makes herself more vulnerable to responding to someone she does not love, and if she does, she will suffer for it from loss of values and more importantly because she has violated the honor code of Christian marriage.

We have seen that freedom without authority leads to anarchy and authority without freedom is tyranny, but in addition to this, freedom without responsibility leads to apathy.

Apathy is the rejection of the proper motivation that is provided in mystery doctrine of the Church Age and results in failure to fulfill the spiritual life of the Church Age.

The rule of law preserves a nation's freedom, but apathy and tyranny destroy freedom.

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 that rule by law is not violated.

Every system of freedom demands function under law. Any great nation has become great because it has a system of law and a system of freedom that corresponds to that law.

No ruler is above the law. No leader is above the laws of a nation. Once leadership rises above the law, there is tyranny. No one is greater than the law. No one is greater than the Holy Spirit. We are servants to the to the law of God.

The more you grow spiritually, the more you realize you are not above the Royal law of the spiritual life. No nation is ever greater than the spiritual life of its people because as goes the believer so goes the client nation.

To violate the Royal law is to put yourself above the law, which is arrogance. When we are punished, it is not because of our personal sins because they were all judged in the person of TLJC the Cross.

We are punished because we have placed ourselves above the Royal law of God. If we put ourselves above the law, the supreme court of heaven will punish us all the way to the sin unto death if necessary.

Our Lord did not magnify Himself above the law. He provided the solution to all the problems that mankind had with his relationship with God by not placing Himself above the law and by willingly receiving the imputation and judgment for the sins of all mankind.

Failure to execute the spiritual life is to put ourselves above the law of God and results in the greatest failure of arrogance.

An example of how one places themselves above the Royal law is sex outside of marriage. The supreme court of heaven punishes all cases where people place themselves above the law, whether related to sex outside of marriage, crime, demonism, politics or any other aspect of life.

A degenerate nation can only escape total destruction through harmonious rapport with God. That rapport only comes by salvation through faith alone in Christ alone for the unbelievers in the nation and the execution of the spiritual life of the Church Age for the believers in the nation.

One of the greatest areas 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.

But You can also put yourself above the Royal law by the sins of arrogance that result in human good and evil.

Paul discusses the Royal Law in Romans, Rom 13:8-10;

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

Personal love for God is the motivation; impersonal love for all mankind is the function, this results in wonderful personal love relationships in marriage and friendship.

We have seen that the Royal law is defined in James 2:8; Your neighbor is anyone with whom you come into contact.

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.

Rom 13:9; "For the commandments, `You shall not commit adultery, You shall not murder, You shall not steal, You shall not have inordinate desire for what another has,' so if there is any other commandment, it is summed up in this statement, `You shall love your neighbor as yourself.'"

If you keep these mandates, you will never go above the law. If you commit adultery, or murder, or steal, or have inordinate desire for what another has, you have put yourself above the law.

"You shall love your neighbor as yourself" is another statement of the royal law.

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

2Sam 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 personally lead the army.

2Sam 11:2-5; David put himself above the law by raping and committing adultery with Bathsheba.

David then put himself above the law by ordering the murder of Uriah the Hittite who was Bathsheba's husband. 2Sam 11:14-15;

David committed murder to hide the fact that he had put himself above the law of God by lusting for the wife of another man. and then stealing her and killing her husband.

When David finally was confronted by Nathan regarding his violation his response was to acknowledge it to God. Psa 32:1-5;

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