Law And Grace

Issues – November 2016 – Grace & Truth Magazine

Law And Grace

There is perhaps no other question that so persistently stays alive among believers as the question, “What is precisely the relationship between law and grace in matters that concern man’s salvation and his walk before God?”

In Israel’s day God gave the law to a self-confident people to let them experience their lack of power and discover that the law could not be of any help in their quest for eternal life (Mt. 5:16-26). Those who repented to God became aware that the law did not help them in their relationship to Him, but it righteously condemned them. Their only hope was mercy from God (Ps. 130:3-4).

This question did not disappear after the Lord Jesus died. Paul wrote two epistles – Romans and Galatians – that more than his others deal with two aspects of this question. Thus God has not left us in the dark as to how we can be just before God through grace and how our walk can by grace be acceptable in His sight. In both aspects man is inclined to seek help from the law.

The Issue Today
If we think that this question is settled today in the hearts of believers as it should be, we are sadly mistaken. We need not be surprised that liberals and modernists resort to teaching “the law,” because it is a natural tendency of man to turn back to it. We are saddened, however, to find that this tenacious tendency has been able to raise its head among those who know that the Christian is to walk by the Spirit.

Consider an example: Are parents not more inclined to teach their children by do’s and don’ts than by speaking to them of the Lord Jesus and how their actions relate to Him? Yet we could do the latter even when our little ones are very young. Their knowledge of the Savior would be a better help to them than many commands and prohibitions. Let me hasten to say that I am not in the least advocating that we not give them do’s and don’ts, but I am speaking of the main course on our menu. After all, even in the Epistles we find do’s and don’ts.

Our problem is not restricted to bringing up children. Some of today’s popular preachers use a legal approach in their efforts to bring about acceptable Christian living among the young. This in itself is sad enough, but even sadder is the fact that many who ought to be teachers of the truths of God show openly their delight in such methods. So the question is only too alive and well today. Sad to say, the Christian community thereby displays that it is not alive and well.

This is not the time or the place to go into such matters in further detail; rather I’d like to point to the better (and, I am sure, the only Christian) answer to this question.

The Answer To The Issue
In Romans, Paul shows that if a man wants to come into such a condition before God that God can accept him, he can do nothing but to believe God’s judgment upon his ungodliness and to believe God when He presents Christ as the only sufficient sacrifice (Rom. 4:1-8:17). I believe few born-again teachers have much difficulty with this part of Paul’s doctrine, although many young Christians are struggling to learn the truth of this doctrine in their own lives.

In Galatians, however, Paul speaks of another question. Everyone who is born-again and who is spiritually healthy desires to please God in his practical life. The question is how this is to be achieved. There is of course only one way: God’s way! This is the way of grace. But along that way there is a ditch on the left that seems to some preferable to the road itself. Certain teachers in Galatia advocated this left ditch as the way; they used the law of Moses to this end. Paul addresses them on their effort to do so and says very conclusively, “If righteousness is by law [note the absence of the article] then Christ has died for nothing” (Gal. 2:21 JND). No small claim! He thereby refutes the claim that the law of Moses would be of help to those who longed to “have a fair appearance in flesh” (Gal. 6:12). Only grace can help one attain a lifestyle that is pleasing to God. The law addresses (see 1 Tim. 1) only our natural man, and the natural man has no ability to please God.

But it was not by chance that the article is omitted. We see that righteousness cannot be attained by any principle of law, any set of do’s and don’ts. If a Christian seeks to improve his lifestyle by studying a series of do’s and don’ts, two things happen. First of all, he practically (not positionally) places himself before God in his own righteousness rather than Christ’s; and secondly, he makes no advance in the knowledge of Christ. He is occupied with himself and his failures and achievements rather than with Him on whom his eye ought to be.

What then is the path of grace? It is “delight thyself in Jehovah, and He will give thee the desires of thy heart” (Ps. 37:4). It is knowing Him – whom to know is life eternal (Jn. 17:3). Acquaint yourself with Him! By doing so you will know Christ and the power of His resurrection (Phil. 3:10). If you want to lay aside all malice and other bad things, and you want to put on – as we are admonished in Colossians 3:10,12 – “the new man,” “tender mercies, kindness” and spiritual things, then be occupied with Christ and His glories and beauties. While you are so occupied with Him the Holy Spirit will take your life, and while you are looking elsewhere (at Christ) and occupied with Another (with Christ) than yourself, He will conform your life to the image of Him whom you want to please. That is the marvelous grace He has given to everyone who comes to Him acknowledging that in himself, that is, in his flesh no good dwells (not dwelled, but dwells) even after his conversion (Rom. 7:18).

Is Dealing With The Issue Important?
Does it matter very much how we seek to arrive at a God-pleasing life? Yes! If you want results you must follow God’s path. Besides, the seriousness of seeking a God-pleasing life by a path of do’s and don’ts is evident, for a curse was uttered not only to those who sought to introduce the law of Moses, but to all who bring in the principle of law as a guide in our life for God (Gal. 3:10). Yet many today follow this path. All Christians, however, need to be warned about where a path that may look initially so attractive will eventually lead them. Casualties have already fallen. Some weak Christians have despaired because the path that so many claimed to be the right way to a proper Christian lifestyle did not help them. They concluded that there must be something drastically wrong with them since “the path” failed them. Despair was all that was left to them.

Is this the only danger along the path that God gives us for living a God-pleasing life? Surely not! There is a ditch on the right as well, and it is this: A Christian may well start to glory in his knowledge of the things of Christ, rather than in Christ Himself. The assembly in Laodicea seems to have had an abundance of these people (Rev. 3:17). Such persons are heading for an end similar to the end of those who seek to improve themselves by law, for both seek self – the one in the ditch on the left of the road, the other in the ditch on the right. The one will be cursed, the other spued out of the Lord’s mouth. The right ditch is as wrong as the left one! We need to avoid both.

How then can we stay on the road? Go daily on your knees and tell the Lord of your own inability to keep yourself on the road. Ask Him to safeguard you from the left and from the right ditches. He will do so in His grace; indeed the Spirit will do His special work (Jn. 16:14-15) and teach you the things of Christ. While you are reading and mediating on the Word of God and enjoying the Person of Christ, the Spirit will change your life and cause it to be conformed to your Lord (2 Cor. 3:18). This is the way of grace along which the Spirit will enable you to walk to the glory of God and Christ Jesus.

This is the way of liberty, of grace and of walking in the Spirit (Gal. 3:16,25).

By John van Dijk

This article was originally printed in the October 1985 Grace & Truth Magazine.