Hi All,
Consider Mick Mooney's comment below:
"The gospel Paul was given to preach, although glorious and liberating, was one that challenged a lot of people who heard it. It not only challenged those outside the body of Christ, but all many who were part of the body of Christ, too. Paul was accused by many leaders within the church of the day as attempting to simply wipe way the Old Testament and the legal requirements attached to it. He was charged with creating his own idea of God's gospel by purposely ignoring the whole history of God in the Old Testament. Many claimed he was simply seeking to proclaim his own message, an 'easy believing message', at the expense of ignoring the Law and the Prophets.
"Of course, Paul didn't think this way at all. On the contrary, Paul embraced the Old Testament, not with a false understanding of it, but as he saw God's true intentions within it. He never saw its true purpose as a written code describing how to obtain righteousness and blessings by works, but rather, he saw the message of Jesus within it and how, through Jesus, the glory prophesied in the Scriptures was now available for the church and established for us through the perfect redeeming work of Jesus. In fact, everything Paul preached can be found in the Old Testament (Acts 28:23).
"The Apostle Peter, at the time of writing his two letters to the church, also had this understanding when he looked into the Scriptures. He didn't see the prophets preaching rules and regulations; but rather, he saw that they were testifying to and prophesying about the coming of an era of grace for all (1 Peter 1:10-11)."
Grace=Peace,
Jeremy
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