The Law Still Speaks

The entrance of thy words giveth light; it giveth understanding unto the simple.
(Psalm 119:130)

          In seminary I heard an alarming statistic about Presbyterian preaching: the vast majority of PCA ministers in the 1990s were spending more than two-thirds of their time preaching only from the New Testament. And most of that preaching came only from St. Paul’s epistles.

          Well, you and I here in Leakesville have sought to accord the Old Testament its proper place in our study of the Word. In fact, we’ve been exploring the Decalogue for the past three months. We have established that the Old Testament law is still relevant.

          But before we move along, we’re going to spend time in the Word today seeing exactly how the law is still relevant to you and me.

          The law still speaks to you and me in 2008 – if our hearts are not hardened by unbelief to the point we reject God’s counsel. The law speaks words of conviction, words of encouragement and words of enlightenment in wisdom.

          No, the Old Testament law cannot save you. But only the Old Testament law can point you to the one, true Savior, Jesus Christ.

          Let us give attention to the Word of God.

          The first point we must note as we explore the Word – and particularly Galatians 3:10-25, is that the Old Testament law cannot save you from Hell.

          Paul says plainly that no one will be justified (declared perfectly righteous, or in total conformity to God’s law) before God by keeping His law. To bolster his argument, he marshals Deuteronomy 27:26, where the Lord pronounces a curse (His abiding wrath) on anyone who does not continue in His law to do all the law requires. Our perfect God demands perfect obedience to His perfect law – which, because of our corruption in Adam, is impossible for imperfect sinners like you and me.

          The problem is not with the Lord, of course, or with His law. Many professing believers in Greene County try to assail the law as being “outdated” or even “bad,” when the problem actually lies in them. Or, better said, in you and in me.

          The Lord has been in the business of law-giving from the beginning of man’s creation. When God placed Adam and Eve in Eden, He gave them a positive commandment (to dress and to keep the Garden) and a negative (if you please) commandment (to not eat of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil). Adam had the original capacity to keep God’s law perfectly or to break it … and you know the rest of the account. Adam’s disobedience has brought sin and the curse on each of us.

          Were you and I to keep God’s law perfectly, we would enjoy life. The Scriptures clearly testify to the blessedness of walking in God’s holy ways. But the fact remains you and I, conceived in sin (Psalm 51:5), stray every day from God’s ways and have no ability whatsoever to keep God’s law. Just as one slip costs a tightrope-walker immensely, so one violation of God’s law (one lustful thought, one hateful word to another person) costs you Heaven and earns you Hell.

          We didn’t study the Decalogue in hopes that you could “straighten up and start flying right” and thereby placate the righteous Lord and you’re your way into Heaven. God’s law can’t save you, because you cannot keep it.

          That doesn’t mean, however, that His law has nothing to do with salvation. In fact, the law is essential to your salvation.

          In Galatians 3 and particularly in Romans 7, St. Paul teaches that the law imparts necessary knowledge: knowledge about yourself, about Christ and about how to navigate this life.

          Paul must have anticipated the objection from the self-righteous Pharisees of his day: “Paul, it sounds like you’re saying God’s law has no value. That’s blasphemous!” His response is penetrating: “The law indeed has great value – just not in the way you assume it does. The law is not a means by which you can earn God’s approval unto salvation; instead, the law teaches critical lessons for salvation.”

          The law instructs you and me about our need for the saving grace of God in Christ, because it instructs us in our own nature and inability to keep the law as we should. In Romans 7:7 and following, the Apostle says it was only by reading and appropriating the moral law of God that he realized he was a sinner. Before he took God’s law seriously, Paul – Saul at the time – was a member of the “walking dead,” those who amble around this life thinking they are pretty decent folk who deserve to go to Heaven because they pay their taxes, are faithful to their spouses and go to work every day. Why, they even give to charities! But when the perfect law of God, His holy standard for entrance into Heaven, confronts them, they see how heinous they are. The commandment excites further rebellion in them as they live out their natural, and not-so-good, inclinations to sin.

          I might think I’m a pretty decent golfer (which I’m not!), and I might even win the local tournament every year. But the standard for truly excellent golfers is set by the Professional Golfers Association of America, and when I measure myself against the PGA’s requirements, I see what kind of golfer I really am. Thus the law of God, as it reveals our hatred of authority (for instance) as we cut corners at work, shatters any notion that you and I are “good people” who deserve Heaven. Against God’s standard, you never will be good enough to have the right to enter Heaven, regardless of how highly you and those around you think of you. And without the light that only this law provides, you forever would remain a member of the “walking dead.”

          The law also imparts necessary knowledge about Christ. In Galatians 3:23-25, Paul refers to the law as our pedagogue or schoolmaster, given to lead us to Christ. In that era, young Greek boys would be under the tutelage of a schoolmaster during their adolescent years; the schoolmaster would give them instruction in how to be men when they came of age. In the same way, the law prepared men for the coming of Christ both by pointing out our need for a Savior (that was the point of all those sacrifices) but also by illustrating Christ’s person and work. Recall from our study of Leviticus that the sacrificial offering had to be male, spotless and costly to the one offering it. This is but one example in how the Old Testament regulations pointed to the spotless Lamb of God, the only-begotten Son of the Father, who came to suffer in our place according to the law and to keep the law on our behalf. “Search the Scriptures,” Jesus told the Pharisees, “for they testify of me.” The more you know the law, the more you will wonder at God’s astounding plan of salvation worked out in history – and at His beloved Son, our Redeemer.

          The law also imparts necessary knowledge for how to navigate this life in a manner pleasing to the Lord. Remember, God gave Moses the Ten Commandments in the context of redemption. He had saved His people from slavery in Egypt, and now – being redeemed for His service – they were to walk in His ways. As they walked in this law, they would experience God’s richest blessing, just as Leviticus 18 informs us that the person who keeps God’s law will live in it. To be sure, parts of the law no longer have abiding authority over you and me: Jesus fulfilled all the ceremonies, and the civil laws of ancient Israel no longer bind us Americans. But as the New Testament authors quote from the Decalogue to give specific instruction to Christians as to how to live the Christ-centered life (“Children, obey your parents”), you and I learn that the moral law remains our guide in living from the heart for Jesus. Micah 6:8 says that God has shown you and me what is right. By the opening of His law, you and I – saved by the law-keeping of Christ – know how to live for Him in a sin-darkened world.

          Psalm 119:130 says the opening of God’s Word brings light, which means the law – the living Word – still speaks to you and me today.

          Perhaps the law speaks words of conviction to you. Are you among the “walking dead,” much like Paul before his conversion to Christ? You have physical life, certainly; and you think you’re a pretty decent person and that decent people ought to go to Heaven. If this is your mindset, look again into the law. See how comprehensive and demanding all 10 commandments really are. You will be shattered – but this is the first step toward genuine healing and true life.

          Perhaps the law speaks words of encouragement to you. You perceive your utter inability to keep the law perfectly, but you also see how Jesus kept the law flawlessly on your behalf (Jesus came not to destroy but to fulfill every jot and tittle of the law, he said). Examine the law more and more – even Leviticus, even those sections of Scripture no one seems to read these days. In them, you will learn of the Lamb of God and of the wonder of his work for you.

          Perhaps the law speaks words of direction to you. You understand your need for Christ and rejoice in his redeeming work for you – but now you need to fill your mind with the perfect law that gives liberty to those who walk in it. Your unregenerate family, friends and coworkers will entice you to this sin or that; they will even deny that sin is sin. Flee to God’s law and look deeply into it.

For only His Word brings light and wisdom.