Law and the Gospel

Galatians 3:22-24 But the Scripture has confined all under sin, that the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe. But before faith came, we were kept under guard by the law, kept for the faith which would afterward be revealed. Therefore the law was our tutor to bring us to Christ, that we might be justified by faith.

Definition of terms is vitally important in order to communicate and understand the true meaning of the phase or sentence in which the word is being used. The 1828 Webster’s dictionary defines the word “justify” in theology as: to pardon and clear form guilt; to absolve or acquit from guilt and merited punishment, and to accept as righteous on account of the merits of the Savior Jesus Christ, or by the application of Christ's atonement to the offender. I read how we have been blessed in the West (referring to Western Christianity, which is a religious category composed of the Latin Church and Protestantism, together with their offshoots such as Independent Catholicism and Restorationism) to live in a culture where there has been much exposure to the Word of God and the gospel. Yet in many places, the Word has not been taught accurately, or it has not been preached in a balanced fashion so as to include everything that the Bible teaches. As a result, many biblical concepts are popularly bandied about (meaning discussed by many people in a casual way or loose manner), but they are gravely misunderstood.

One of these often heard but misunderstood ideas is the notion that God is love. Certainly, the Bible teaches that “God is love” (1 John 4:8), but unless this statement is understood in its full, biblical context, significant confusion arises. Many people today understand the teaching that God is love according to the definitions of love in our culture. Consequently, when many people hear, “God is love,” they think of a being who makes no demands and who indulges our every desire. God meets us where we are at, but doesn’t keep us where we are at.

They point out that Martin Luther and the other Protestant Reformers stressed the love of God for His people, but they preached a God who makes demands, who expects people to obey Him and judges them if they do not. In other words, before preaching the gospel, they preached the law. They understood that the gospel is good news only if we first know the bad news, namely, that God is perfectly holy and demands perfect obedience. This is bad news because, in our fallen sin nature of the flesh, we cannot render such obedience. Romans 3:23 explains that “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” We all know that nobody is perfect. But the good news of the gospel tells us that Christ has rendered such obedience in our place so that in Him, by faith alone, we become the righteousness of God 2 Corinthians 5:21 tells us, “For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” And then, having received peace with God, we thank Him by loving, trusting, obeying and serving Him.

Romans 7:7 What shall we say then? Is the Law sin? Certainly not! On the contrary, if it had not been for the Law, I would not have recognized sin. For I would not have known [for example] about coveting [what belongs to another, and would have had no sense of guilt] if the Law had not [repeatedly] said, “You shall not covet.”

The point is that there is no gospel without the law. When Scripture says that God is love, it means that God is a God of holy love. We need the gospel because we have violated the standards of our holy Creator (His holy Word, Will and Way), and people need to hear the law preached in order to know those statutes, commandments and teachings as standards, how they have failed them, and what the solution is for their punitive failure. Thus, the Reformers were clear that one of the chief tasks of faithful preachers and teachers is to preach the law and then point people to the gospel, which meets their need for the righteousness of Christ and salvation. And this preaching of law and gospel is not only for non-Christians but also for believers. We who trust in Christ are still in the flesh this side of eternity and need regularly to be pointed to Christ.

They conclude that God never gives His law without also giving the gospel or the promise of the gospel, and He never gives the gospel without telling us His law. We need both law and gospel to be equipped to know, appreciate and serve the Lord. As we have the opportunity to study or hear the law of God, we should take advantage of it. But we should also not study the law without also looking to the gospel.