Down to Earth But Heavenly Minded

Your question involves the very foundations of Christianity. We give you in reply, one brief but comprehensive statement of Holy Scripture. “For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace.” Again, “As many as are of the works of the law are under the curse” (See Rom. 7; Gal. 3). If we are to be taught by Scripture alone, then we learn that the believer is “dead to the law.” He died in Christ as the New Testament teaches us in many places. Now, what has the law to say to a dead man? Or what has a dead man to say to the law? Is the law binding upon a dead man? The idea is absurd. “Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ, that ye should be married to another, even to Him who is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit to God.”

True it is that a Christian, walking in the Spirit, fulfills the practical righteousness of the law (Romans 8:4). But if you put a Christian under the law, you put him under the curse, for the apostle declares that as many as are on that ground, not merely as many as have not kept the law, are under the curse. In short, the entire teaching of Romans and Galatians is flatly opposed to the notion of putting Christians under the law whether for justification or as a rule of life. So far from its being the ground of justification, it is the ground of condemnation. So far from its being a rule of life, it is a rule of death. See Romans 7:10 and 2 Corinthians 3.

Does anyone in his right mind need to be told that a Christian is not to steal or commit murder? Surely not. Let us remember that Christian morals rest on a Christian basis and not on a legal basis. The law was given to man in the old creation, to test him, prove him and cause the offense to abound. The Christian is not in the old creation but in the new (2 Corinthians 5:17). He is not in the flesh but in the Spirit (Romans 7:9).

Are these things mere figures of speech or are they divine statements concerning the very foundations of Christianity? Let us look well to it, dear friend. Let us see where we are. A person who, in his actual experience, is under the law, must be a stranger to the peace and liberty of the gospel. Moreover he must be wholly ignorant of the true character of Christianity.

If we trace the history and the writings of the great apostle of the Gentiles, we find there was nothing that so grieved and pained him — nothing he so strongly denounced — as the attempt to put Christians under the law in any shape or form or for any object whatsoever. When he speaks of himself as “being under the law to Christ” (1 Corinthians 9:21), any competent person understands that the word is “under rule or authority to Christ” and has nothing to do with being under the law of Moses, which the apostle everywhere denounces in the strongest terms. The law-teachers get no quarter whatever from Paul. This is as clear as anything can be. Hence, if we are going to submit to Scripture, the law question is easily settled. But if any man refuses to submit to that authority, we do not see there is much use in talking to him.

In 1 Corinthians 9:21 the expression “under the law” is one word which simply means under the rule or authority of Christ. Paul was not under the law of Moses, nor are we either, thanks be to God.

“The Jew” as such is bound to fulfill the law, or else to meet the curse pronounced upon “every man who continues not in all things that are written in the book of the law to do them.” But where is the Jew that can meet God on the ground of moral law or ceremonial law? Did you ever hear or know of one who could claim blessing on the ground of perfect obedience? It will be said, “There is mercy.” Yes, but not under law. “He that despised Moses’ law died without mercy.” Law and mercy are two different things. If a man can fulfill the law, he does not need mercy; if he has not fulfilled the law, it has no mercy for him. What remains? Simply to take the place of a poor, ruined, self-destroyed, guilty sinner.

“O Israel, thou hast destroyed thyself.” What then? “In Me is thy help.” But on whom has this help been laid? On One mighty to save, even the Messiah of Israel, Him of whom Isaiah speaks in the following well-known passage: “Behold, My Servant shall deal prudently, He shall be exalted and extolled, and be very high. As many were astonished at Thee; His visage was so marred more than any man and His form more than the sons of men. So shall He sprinkle many nations; kings shall shut their mouths at Him; for that which had not been told them shall they see, and that which they had not heard shall they consider. Who has believed our report and to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed? For He shall grow up before Him as a tender plant and as a root out of a dry ground; He has no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see Him, there is no beauty that we should desire Him. He is despised and rejected of men; a Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; and we hid as it were our faces from Him; He was despised and we esteemed Him not. Surely He has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we did esteem Him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement of our peace was upon Him and with His bruising we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.”

Here the repentant Jew may find the true ground of deliverance from the curse of the law. Christ was made a curse by hanging on a tree. “He suffered for sins, the Just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God.” “And all who believe in Him are justified from all things, from which they could not be justified by the law of Moses.” Nor this only; they are delivered from the law as a rule or principle, being counted dead to it by the death of Christ.

This in no wise interferes with Jeremiah 31:36-37 to which you refer. It has nothing to say to the question. If “the Jew embraces Christianity” he ceases to be a Jew and takes his stand on the new ground where there is neither Jew nor Greek, but all are one in Christ. This leaves wholly untouched the promises and purposes of God to Israel which shall all be literally and infallibly fulfilled in due time. “All Israel shall be saved.” The Scriptures teem with the evidence of this grand truth. Not one jot or tittle of the promises made to the fathers can fail. To quote the proofs would demand a volume. If you will apply your heart to the study of Romans, Galatians and Hebrews, you will find a very full and satisfactory reply to your question, “What passages of Scripture tend to release the Jew from ceremonial observance?” If he believes in Jesus, he is dead to the law; if he does not, he will be damned by the law.

We cannot see how Galatians 3:19 can possibly negate the true reading of 1 John 3:4 which is “Sin is lawlessness.” The two passages are in perfect harmony. “Wherefore then the law? It was added because of transgression.” So also in Romans 4:15: “Because the law works wrath: for where no law is there is no transgression.” Is it not obvious that to have transgression there must be law? Yes; and it is equally obvious that where there is a law there must be transgression because man is a sinner.

The law raised the question of righteousness and proved that man had none. Without law man was a lawless sinner. Under law, he was a wilful transgressor. From Adam to Moses, there was no law and therefore no transgression, though surely there was sin and therefore death, the wages of sin. “Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam’s transgression” (Romans 5:14). Adam had a law; therefore his act was transgression. So we read in Hosea 6:7, “They [Israel] like Adam, have transgressed.” See margin. We are at a loss to understand the difficulties of some of our friends in reference to a matter so exceedingly plain.

We judge there is still a little confusion in your mind as to “the old husband” in Romans 7. We do not think it is the flesh any more than the law, though, assuredly, the flesh is to be reckoned dead, for such it is in God’s account, and faith always takes God’s view of matters. We are apt to get confused through not distinguishing in Romans 7 between the illustration of the marriage tie and the application. In the illustration the husband dies, but in the application it is we who have died. In short, death dissolves the tie — not the death of the law but our death. “Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ.” And again, “But now we are delivered from the law, being dead to that wherein we were held” (See Margin). In chapter 6 the question of “the flesh” is handled. In chapter 7 the question of “the law.” Death delivers from both the one and the other.

We believe that in Romans 7 the apostle gives us the exercise of a quickened soul not knowing deliverance. It is, to use a figure, a man who has got out of a trap, describing his feelings when he was in it. Do you think Paul was a “wretched man” crying out for deliverance when he penned his epistle to the Romans? Most certainly not! He was a happy man rejoicing in full deliverance. But he is describing the exercise of a quickened soul still under the law and having no power against sin. This is not proper Christian experience. Can a Christian never do right? Must he always do wrong? Can a Christian say, “How to perform that which is good, I find not?” The fact is, in all this part of the chapter, you do not get the Holy Spirit in His indwelling power. There is new life but there is no power, no sense of full deliverance, no consciousness of victory. All this you have in chapter 8 which is proper Christian experience.

We believe many of God’s beloved people have never gotten out of Romans 7. While we must admit that we should much prefer being honestly in chapter 7 to being falsely in Romans 8, yet we do not and cannot admit that chapter 7 is the proper place for one who ought to know the setting free power of these words, “There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus.” It is very good for the soul to pass through Romans 7, but it is not for the glory of God that he should stay there. If it is right for all to remain in chapter 7, then for what end did the Holy Spirit pen chapter 8?