Law & the Gospel

Many years ago, I facilitated a reading group discussing Jonathan Edwards', Charity and Its Fruits. The book, originally a series of sermons on 1 Corinthians 13, focused on the importance of Christian love, and the worthlessness of all our works and sufferings without it. Edwards describes at length what Christian love does not look like. As we discussed the behaviors Edwards listed that might reveal a heart that is not loving, a woman asked, "How do I know when I've crossed a line? What I should not do?" When I responded that I couldn’t give her a checklist, because it’s a matter of the heart, she replied, "But I want a list!"

That moment stuck with me, and the tension between law and Gospel began to consume my thoughts. Reading Edwards showed me how easy it is to get bogged down by the "requirements" of perfect love. I turned to Galatians and pondered, “What does Paul really mean when he says we have ‘died to the law’ (2:19)? And when he says:

‘[Y]ou also have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead, in order that we may bear fruit for God. For while we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death. But now we are released from the law, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit and not in the old way of the written code’" (Rom 7:4-6)?

That lady’s frank question helped bring Paul's meaning into focus. Our sinful flesh is stimulated by the law. It responds either with rebellion or with prideful rule-keeping (which is a different kind of rebellion). The “rule-keepers” among us find submission to a finite list relatively easy. We can do the list, whether our heart is in it or not, and call it a day. The rest of our lives and hearts remain our own. But the law of Christ is not limited to a list of Ten (Mt 22:35-40). It is a whole life transformed by love: God’s love for us and our love for Him.

"But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts crying, 'Abba! Father!' So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God . . . now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and worthless elementary principles of the world, whose slaves you want to be once more? (Gal 4:4-7, 9).

The law, Paul tells us, is “weak and worthless.” The flesh, in its weakness, begs us to stick with what is weak (Rom 8:3). The flesh doesn’t really want to change. Like Israel in the wilderness, it prefers the familiarity and predictability of bondage to the seeming uncertainty of a life of faith and freedom. But God has given us the Spirit of His Son—the same Son who cried, "Abba, Father!" in the Garden of Gesthemene (Mk 14:36), whose love for God was so great He sacrificed all. Christ fulfilled the law perfectly (Mt. 5:17). How did He do it? Not through slavish obedience, but through the love of a Son for His Father, which is how He will accomplish it in us:

“There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit . . . So then, brothers, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. For if you live according to the flesh, you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, 'Abba! Father!'” (Rom 8: 1-4, 12-16).

By the Holy Spirit our hearts cry out in love to God. No longer enslaved to the law, we walk in the love which is mightier than any "Thou shalt not." We no longer live by words carved in stone (2 Cor 3:3-7). Serving God in the freedom of love, we not only fulfill the law, we overflow it. Love doesn't just do no harm, it heaps kindness upon kindness. Consider the testimony of Paul, who happily traded his beloved law for the gospel:

"But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith—that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead" (Phil 3:7-11).

Paul considered his blameless life of obedience to the law rubbish compared to the righteousness of faith in Christ. He calls us to do the same:

"It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery . . . You are severed from Christ, you who would be justified by the law; you have fallen away from grace. For through the Spirit, by faith, we ourselves eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love" (Gal 5:1, 4-6).

To return to living by law is to reject God’s own righteousness revealed in Christ (Rom 3;21-22). The proper response to the grace of God is “faith working through love.” Faith does not work through law. It works through love, and love does not need a checklist. As Paul puts it, “Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law” (Rom 13:10).

Love doesn’t murder. Love doesn’t commit adultery. It does not steal or covet. Why? Because it’s against the rules? No, because love loves! This is how, practically speaking, the Gospel of Christ renders the law obsolete. The law can never generate this kind of love. Only the power of the Gospel can. We must not let ourselves be burdened again by that yoke of slavery!