Word For the Day MATTHEW 5:17 (KJV)

17 Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill.

COMMENTARY: Having laid the foundation of the message in the summary statement of the Beatitudes, Jesus now proceeds to show the superiority of His message to that of the law of Moses. He makes it clear that He had not...come to destroy the law. That is, the New Testament gospel is not contradictory to the Old Testament Law; rather it is the ultimate fulfillment of the spiritual intention of the law. Where the law had degenerated into legalism among the Pharisees, Jesus now takes the law beyond more outward observance to the inner spiritual intentions of God.