What Is Our Rule of Life as Believers?

     Is it the law? No, we have been set free from the law and it's curse.. we no longer have to fear anything about it.. (Romans 7:1-6)

     So what motivates the believer? Is it a slavish fear of punishment if we don't do what we should, or sin willfully? No..

     So what is it? The answer is, Christ.. we are constrained by God's love in Christ for His people.  It is the "law of love" or "Christ's law." (Gal. 6:2), (1 Cor. 9:21)

     Can Christ be separated from his commandments and precepts? No.. Christ IS the word. (John 1:1-3), (John 1:14)

     Are we servants? Yes.

     Are we slaves? No. We are bond servants.. (Romans 1:1).  We serve willingly.

     Are we heirs? Yes. (Romans 8:17).  We are heirs and sons and daughters, waiting for our inheritance. (Romans 8:16).

     What is our inheritance? Christ. (Eph. 1:11-14).

     Are we a governed people? Yes. (Romans 13:1) Our master who is Christ, has left us specific instruction on how to walk in this world. They are called the "precepts". But it goes further than that. He has given us the will to do the things that we once would not. (Phil 2:13) For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.

     Do we need to hear this instruction? I can't speak for everyone else but I certainly do, and I need to hear and read them on a regular basis. (Isaiah 28:10 For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a little:)  Over the centuries, the precepts given by Christ in His word have been ignored and put out of sight by some, and with others they have been legalized. (That is to say that Christ's commandments to us are part of the legal system of the first covenant and therefore we cannot do them.. ) Not so.. (Phil. 2:13). The law of Christ is our guide to walk this life.. It far exceeds the law of the old covenant of works. (Hebrews 8:6)  It is a living will and testament to Christ's Church.. it is completely separate from the Mosaic law.  God has written this "law of love" in our hearts.. We rejoice because of it.

“Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah—not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, [h]though I was a husband to them, says the Lord. But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. No more shall every man teach his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them, says the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more.” - Jeremiah 31:31-34