Wright comments that Saunder’s correctly understands that the New Perspective has at least one commonality with the Reformed tradition in that “it sees the Jewish Law as a good thing now fulfilled, rather than (as in much Lutheran thought) a bad thing now abolished.”
As a theonomist, how do you think you would modify the above (quoted) statement?
Here’s how I take the Sander’s revolution.
The historical piece that Sanders contributed was the bringing home the idea that the Pharisees were NOT preaching a gospel of salvation by observation of the Law. This was a strawman that the Lutherans had constructed which was mostly based on the personal life and testimony of Luther (a monk who struggled with obedience to God, etc). For Luther, the “discovery” of salvation by grace and through faith then forced a radical dichotomy between Law keeping and salvation.
For Lutherans the only value of the Law is showing your shortcomings to you. The Reformed did not have as a radical a dichotomy as Luther. They saw that the Law had some continuing force even after Christ. This was the root of the eventual disagreements between “mainstream” Reformed and “theonomic” Reformed.
The implications for Lutherans is that they popularly tend to dismiss much of the Bible as “law” and go with the notion “We are no longer under the Law”. Walther’s book on the Law Gospel distinction is the classic work in that regard.
Walther was the founder of the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod. He has a methodology of parsing every passage/word in the New Testament into either Law or Gospel depending upon whether it makes a demand on a person. If it makes a demand, it’s Law. Where it gets interesting is commands like “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved”. Since it makes a demand it is LAW to the Lutheran.
As a Theonomist we believe that the categories must be properly recognized initially. The ceremonial law was gone along with the temple in 70 AD. There are no more high priest, sacrifices, etc. That part of the Law is gone except in memory. Thus, the passages which speak of not mixing wool and linen, for instance, are part of that ceremonial observation and are no longer relevant. The passages a couple of verses later which speak of a man not laying with a man are moral (see below) and still have force.
For Lutherans, this has an immediate practical result in their apologetic for homosexual practices. Both the linen/wool passage and the “men shall not lie with men” passage are law and no longer in force. Thus, the ELCA and other Lutheran bodies are now struggling with issues around human sexuality.
Believing that governments should be organized by the civil part of the Law is what makes a person at theonomist. The theonomist is someone who buys into the idea that the civil part of the Law, while describing Israel and her God, has a force outside of that immediate geographical location. The idea is that the laws and penalties from the Old Testament are God’s laws for organizing any nation of people who will follow Him.
The moral part of the law is where the battle happens. Again, Theonomy is a Reformed phenomenon. Thus, they take the moral aspects of the Law as describing things that are reflective of God’s character.
These are very practical questions. Thus, you are much more likely to find a Reformed person who takes the Sabbath question more seriously than a Lutheran.
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