LAW-OBEDIENCE
For
we do not keep the Law to be saved.
But rather, in keeping the Law we show ourselves to already have gained
salvation through the cross of Christ. In light of the cross of Christ and the
liberation from the (sting) of sin we receive from it, we are now free to keep
the Law (Gal. 4:31).
What is the Difference between Legalism and
Obedience?
We are not
Legalists when we keep the Law, because we do not look to the Law for life.
Rather the Law shows us we have true life in our hearts. We keep the Law to be
obedient to Christ and show Him how much we love Him for rescuing us from the
damning influences of trying to keep the Law to gain eternal life. Obedience is
a far cry from Legalism.
C. Matthew McMahon
What is the Difference between Legalism and
Obedience?
The Law’s
demands are inward, touching motive and desire, and are not concerned solely
with outward action.
The Grace of Law, Baker, 1976, p. 63.
How can we
understand righteousness as the positive opposite of sin unless we construe it
as the opposite of what sin is? And if
sin is the transgression of the law, righteousness must be conformity to the
law.
John Murray
Principles of Conduct.
It is a hard
lesson to live above the law, and yet to walk according to the law. But this is the lesson a Christian has to
learn, to walk in the law in respect of duty, but to live above it in respect
of comfort, neither expecting favour from the law in
respect of his obedience nor fearing harsh treatment from the law in respect of
his failing.
The True Bonds of Christian Freedom,
1645.
God’s law, as
a rule of life, is not opposed to grace.
Rather, used in the right sense, it is the handmaid of grace. Or, to use an analogy, it is like a sheepdog
that keeps driving back into the fold of grace, when we stray out into the
wilderness of works.
Jerry Bridges
Transforming Grace, NavPress, 1991, p.
93. Used by permission of NavPress – www.navpress.com. All rights
reserved.
Human
morality and submission to God’s law are entirely different in principle,
though they may appear to be similar in outward appearance. Human morality arises out of culture and
family training and is based on what is proper and expected in the society we
live in. It has nothing to do with God
except to the extent that godly people have influenced that society. Submission to God’s law arises out of a love
for God and a grateful response to His grace and is based on a delight in His
law as revealed in Scripture. When the
societal standard of morality varies from the law of God written in Scripture,
we then see the true nature of human morality.
We discover that it is just as hostile to the law of God as is the
attitude of the most hardened sinner.
Jerry Bridges
Transforming Grace, NavPress, 1991, p.
108. Used by permission of NavPress – www.navpress.com. All rights
reserved.
Love provides
the motive for obeying the commands of the law, but the law provides specific
direction for exercising love.
Jerry Bridges
Transforming Grace, NavPress, 1991, p.
94. Used by permission of NavPress – www.navpress.com. All rights
reserved.
Being under
the law is the opposite of being under grace.
Because of our sin against the law, being under law implies the wrath of
God, whereas grace implies forgiveness and favor. Law implies a broken relationship with God,
whereas grace implies a restored relationship with Him. So when Paul said we died to the law, he
meant we died to that entire state of condemnation, curse, and alienation from
God.
Jerry Bridges
Transforming Grace, NavPress, 1991, p.
110. Used by permission of NavPress – www.navpress.com. All rights
reserved.
The law of
God was not designed by a capricious tyrant in order to keep his people
miserable.
R.C. Sproul
The
Intimate Marriage, P&R Publishing, 1975, p. 149.
The law by
which God rules us is as dear to Him as the Gospel by which He saves us.
William Secker
A Puritan Golden Treasury,
compiled by I.D.E. Thomas, by permission of Banner of Truth, Carlisle, PA. 2000, p. 165.
So what is
the place of the Law in the life of the Christian? Simply this: We are no longer under the Law
to be condemned by it, we are now “in-lawed” to it because of our betrothal to Christ! He has written the Law, and love for it, into
our hearts!
Sinclair Ferguson
Tabletalk, p. 34, June 2004, Ligonier
Ministries, Used by Permission.
We are to
order our lives by the light of His law, not our guesses about His plan.
J.I. Packer
The New Encyclopedia of Christian Quotations,
ed. Mark Water, 2000, Baker, p. 190.
God’s Law
convicts of sin only as I appreciate whose Law it is I have broken.
Derek Prime and Alistair Begg
On Being a Pastor, Moody Press, 2004, p. 139.
The law
orders; grace supplies the power of acting.
Augustine
It
will do no good to say, “God can do it, if
they will only let Him.” I can do great things with men, if they will “let” me.
The law of God could have done great things with men if they had “let” it. The
law was good. The law was holy. But by itself it could not give men the
inclination of heart to follow it. Only God could to that through Christ.
Tom Wells
Christian: Take Heart! By Permission of the
Banner of Truth Trust, Carlisle, PA. 1987, p. 107.
No
human law without sanction is complete; a law without a penalty is an
altogether worthless and pitiful thing.
Are God's laws of this pitiful kind?
J. Gresham Machen
God Transcendent, 1949.