Old Testament Relevance?

Q: I was looking for information on tattoo's and came across this web site that says, (and I quote), "It is ALWAYS (sic) wrong to apply Old Testament Law, which was given only to the Jews, to New Testament times. We DO NOT (sic) live under the Old Testament Law. To take a verse our of the Old Testament and attempt to apply it today is to practice legalism." Is that true? We don't have to do anything it says in the Old Testament?

(You can check it out for yourself. The web site is
http://www.scripturessay.com/article.php?cat=&id=523/.)

A: This information is seriously misguided. It is not true. It is not accurate information. I looked at that web site and it appears to be written by the pastor of a small church in Arizona. There's no doubt that the author is sincere - but in this case I believe he is sincerely wrong.

Jesus said in Matthew 5:17-20, "Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. Therefore anyone who sets aside one of the least of these commands and teaches others accordingly will be called the least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven."

I don't believe Jesus could have made it any more clear than this. The Ten Commandments are probably the best illustration of Jesus' point. Not a single one of them has been abolished. God's people are still expected to obey them even today. And we will be expected to obey them.

For the record, I believe the primary difference that you'll find between the guidance in the Old and New Testaments is how we deal with sin. In the Old Testament, sin was to be confessed and then a sacrifice was made for sin in order to reconcile the sinner to God. In the New Testament, sin is still to be confessed --- but the Jesus is the sacrifice made for that sin in order to reconcile the sinner to God. Because of this, we also don't need an intercessor between ourselves and God. In the Old Testament nobody was good enought to talk directly to God ... they had to have a priest intervene on their behalf. But in the New Testament, Jesus makes us good enough to talk directly to God. There is no longer a need for a priest to intervene on anyone's behalf. Other than these differences, the Old and New Testament basically say the same thing.

A final note: the conversation on that web site was about tattoo's. While the Old Testament says tattoos are strictly forbidden, the author explains that this had cultural contact around it that may mean something different today. There are other places in the Old Testament where what's said cannot be directly interpreted ... because the cultural context changed the meaning. So what's said in the Old Testament, in this case "no tattoos" is still true. But the context may give it a different meaning. In other words that tattoos that it was forbidding back then may not be the same tattoos that we have today.

And so ... you really cannot read the Bible without considering the context because it often has a bearing on the what the Scriptures are really telling us. It's why people "wrestle" with Scripture. It's why we're told to contemplate Scripture. If all you do is read the Bible, you'll fall seriously short of what God intends for you in terms of hearing what God has to say in the Bible. This studying of the Scriptures, wrestling with it, contemplating it, thinking it through, discussing it with others ... all are efforts to look at the context of what's being said and realize the communication from God that we find in the Bible is more than just the words that are printed.