If we love Jesus then we will keep his commandments.

John 14:15 If ye love me, keep my commandments.

So, if we don't keep the commandments, would that show us that we don't love Jesus?

Matthew 22:37 Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.

 38 This is the first and great commandment.

I'm pretty certain that every Christian I’ve ever known, including me, falls short of this commandment.

When we fall short of a commandment, we are not keeping it.

If some are so bold as to say that they dutifully keep that commandment, then the next line has to be the clincher:

 39 And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.

Are we faithfully and dutifully keeping these two commandments?

Does Jesus care if we keep the commandments? Of course he does.

Does Jesus want us to live lawlessly after we are saved? Of course not.

His law is a reflection of his perfect, holy, righteous character.

Ephesians 2:8 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:

 9 Not of works, lest any man should boast.

 10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.

Ephesians 2:10 is "after" telling us how we are saved by grace through faith:

After we are saved, we are to walk in good works, not as a way to get saved.

However, the only way to truly keep the law 100% in our hearts, is when Jesus, in us, keeps the law.

He cannot do anything contrary to his law.

All Jesus ever does is in perfect accord with his law.

So by our yielding to him, he is going to be doing the good works through us.

Whatever seemingly good works we do, when it’s not him, are thus spotted by our flesh, and no different then with the Pharisees.

Isaiah 64:6 But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags; and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away.

The commandments are not the way to get saved or way to stay saved.

However, if we yield to Jesus, the good works will be the fruit of his Spirit in us, and not we of ourselves.

Else we’d have room to boast, but we can't, all glory belongs to Jesus.

There are three options: 

1. 1) Ignore the commandments
2. 2) Be a Pharisee using the commandments to our own glory
3. 3) Allow Jesus to keep his commandments through us

The first 2 are an offense. The last 2 involve "keeping the commandments", and the Pharisees were quite adept at "keeping the commandments".

1) Ignore the commandments: Antinomian - against law - anything goes

Romans 5:20 Moreover the law entered, that the offence might abound. But where sin abounded, grace did much more abound:

Romans 6:14 For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace.

 15 What then? shall we sin, because we are not under the law, but under grace? God forbid.

Several of the early church writers, including Irenaeus, Hippolytus, Epiphanius, and Theodoret mentioned that the Nicolaitans were antnomians.

Iranaeus, 125-202, studied under bishop Polycarp, who was a disciple of John, was the first to mention that.

Revelation 2:6 But this thou hast, that thou hatest the deeds of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate.

 15 So hast thou also them that hold the doctrine of the Nicolaitans, which thing I hate.

2) Be a Pharisee using the commandments to our own glory:

Leviticus 22:31 Therefore shall ye keep my commandments, and do them: I am the LORD.

However:

Ephesians 2:9 Not of works, lest any man should boast.

Galatians 2:21 I do not frustrate the grace of God: for if righteousness come by the law, then Christ is dead in vain.

Galatians 2:16 Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law: for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified.

Galatians 5:4 Christ is become of no effect unto you, whosoever of you are justified by the law; ye are fallen from grace.

If we "try" to keep the commandments, ourselves, we're actually not keeping them, but defiling them.

The best we can do ourselves is tainted and stained by our sinful flesh.

If the desire to keep the commandments, to be holy, for righteousness, comes from ourselves, from our own heart, it can only lead to self-righteousness.

When we "strive for righteousness" on our own, it is actually filthiness to the LORD: 

Isaiah 64:6 But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags; and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away.

That paints us in a very unfavorable light:

Psalm 39:5c verily every man at his best state is altogether vanity.

Ecclesiastes 7:20 For there is not a just man upon earth, that doeth good, and sinneth not.

The Pharisees were far more tied into keeping the commandments than anyone at anytime in history:

Acts 26:5 Which knew me from the beginning, if they would testify, that after the most straitest sect of our religion I lived a Pharisee.

So when Jesus said:

Matthew 5:20 For I say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.

How can our righteousness possibly exceed the righteousness of the Pharisees?

So how can we keep the commandments without being self-righteous Pharisees?

It is only when we allow Jesus to keep his commandments through us.

Colossians 2:6 As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in him:

So, how did we get saved? How did we receive Christ Jesus the Lord?

Ephesians 2:8a For by grace are ye saved through faith;

The same way we were saved, is the way that we walk in him, through faith.

Galatians 5:16 This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh.

 25 If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.

Jesus, who inspired the scriptures by his Spirit, can only keep the law.

Jesus, who is God himself, during his earthly ministry could only keep the law.

The law is a picture of the pure and perfect attributes of Jesus himself.

Matthew 22:37 Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.

 38 This is the first and great commandment.

 39 And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.

 40 On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.

I John 4:8 He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.

Jesus cannot be anything but who he is.

He lives the law perfectly and absolutely, because God is love.

So Jesus will live the law in us, by his Sprit, if we walk in him:

Romans 8:2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death.

 4 That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.

The only way to walk after the Spirit is by faith.

Where does faith come from?

Romans 10:17 So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.

The more you get into the book, the more the book gets into you.

So when Jesus said to the woman taken in adultery:

John 8:11b And Jesus said unto her, Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more.

She couldn't keep the commandments before and not sin.

How was she supposed to now do what she couldn't before?

Was she to grit her teeth and clench her fists, and like the little engine that could, say, "I think I can, I think I can"?

No, she could only do it now by faith, and where did she get that faith?

From the word of God - when Jesus said the words, "go, and sin no more", that was all she needed to have the faith to keep those words.

So, she didn't go out and “try” a little harder to do a little better, or “try” to keep the commandment.

She already proved that she's a commandment breaker, like the rest of us.

However, the law was her schoolmaster to bring her to Christ.

Jesus didn’t put her back under the schoolmaster.

He forgave her and then empowered her to do what she was unable to do.

It was no longer a work of her flesh or her will, in order to keep the commandment, but rather the work of the LORD.

She went out with his power, because of his word, and by faith in his word, she was thus able to go and sin no more.

Leviticus 22:31 Therefore shall ye keep my commandments, and do them: I am the LORD.

The Pharisees never understood the third approach to the commandments; that of Jesus in them, doing the righteousness.

That thought was foreign to the Pharisee mind.

To them, if they weren't the active agent in the keeping the commandments, then the commandments were not being kept.

It had to be them keeping the commandments or nothing.

They could not fathom Jesus doing the actual keeping of the commandment in the heart of the believer, but the scriptures tell a different story:

Philippians 2:13 For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.

Jesus works our will and our doing.

Jeremiah 31:33 But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the LORD, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people.

The LORD prophesied exactly how he'd do this in the hearts of his people.

Israel's entire history was a failure to truly keep his commandments with all their hearts, and the only way that they will ever really keep his commandments is when the LORD puts them in their hearts.

II Corinthians 3:5 Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think any thing as of ourselves; but our sufficiency is of God;

It is wrong to think that we can keep his commandments in and of ourselves.

Hebrews 13:21 Make you perfect in every good work to do his will, working in you that which is wellpleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ; to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.

Jesus is the one who is to make us perfect to do his will.

Psalm 119:36 Incline my heart unto thy testimonies, and not to covetousness.

Jesus is the one that inclines our hearts to his law, not we ourselves.

Ezekiel 36:27 And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments, and do them.

Only when Jesus puts his Spirit in us, is when he "causes us to walk in his statutes"; that is the only way to really keep his commandments.

Even though we're saved by grace through faith, some of us continue to "try" to walk after the flesh after we're saved.

We still think that it's all up to us, with the same burden that grieved us before we were saved, "trying" to keep the commandments with a nature that was contrary to the commandments.

Now we find ourselves enslaved again by the same impossible thing, trying to force an Adamic nature, our flesh, to keep the commandments.

It couldn't work like that before we were saved.

And it can't work like that after we're saved.

We simply don't understand what the new nature is.

We continue to badger our flesh, the old nature into "commandment keeping", mistaking it for our new nature.

Romans 8:9 But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his.

Isaiah 26:12 LORD, thou wilt ordain peace for us: for thou also hast wrought all our works in us.

Philippians 1:6 Being confident of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ: