It is common today for preachers to say that the law is the believer's
rule of life. Very few people would tell us that the law is a means of
justification. But many insist upon bringing the children of God back under the
yoke of bondage for sanctification.
The Apostle Paul says that such reasoning is
foolish! "Having begun in the Spirit, are ye now made perfect by the
flesh?" He states the fact very plainly, "Ye are not under the law,
but under grace." "Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to
everyone that believeth." We have been made free, my brethren, by the Son
of God, and we are free indeed! "Stand fast therefore in the liberty
wherewith Christ hath made us free, and be not entangled again with the yoke of
bondage."
Not only is it unwise, it is a sinful practice, contrary to the faith
of the gospel for a believer to make the law a basis for his life before God.
Our acceptance before God is entirely the work of Christ. He is all our
righteousness both in justification and in sanctification. If you do anything,
whether it be circumcision, the keeping of the
Sabbath, or even purity of conduct, in order to be accepted by God, you are
fallen from grace! And Christ shall profit you nothing!
In Jesus Christ, by virtue of his representative obedience and
substitutionary death, we are free from the law. We bare no curse from the law,
no covenant with the law, no condemnation by the law, and no commitment to the
law. Does that mean that we are lawless? Can we now sin without fear? Perish
the thought! We live by the commandment of God. "And this is his commandment, that we should believe on the name of his Son
Jesus Christ, and love one another, as he gave us commandment." We trust
Christ alone for our entire acceptance before God. And we walk before our
brother, in love. These are those things that are pleasing in his sight."