October 29 – LD 44, Day 1: The Place of the Law

Romans 7:14 - “For we know that the law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin.”

What a difference between the non-Christian and believer, when facing the law of God, the well-known Ten Commandments. For the unbeliever, the law is only the unchangeable demand of the righteous and holy God as Creator and Sovereign. For you who believe, that same law has become, in and through Jesus Christ, the loving precept, the guide for a thankful life. It comes from the same righteous and holy God as Father and Redeemer. For the unbeliever, that law can only be a matter of crushing responsibility, because he has no relationship to the Christ Who alone fulfills that law. For the natural man, that law points to everlasting condemnation, because he must obey that law perfectly, yet he does not obey it because he cannot, and will not. "Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God" (Rom 8:7,8).

But that same law points the Christian to life eternal. It does so because Christ has fulfilled that law for us. We do not have to keep that law in order to be redeemed. By His blood, Christ blotted out all our transgressions; in His life He fulfilled all obedience for us. Therefore, we are no longer under the law, but under grace. We are justified by faith, without the works of the law.

Yet, on the other hand, we who believe keep the law by the power of God's mighty grace and the work of His Spirit in our lives. Though only small in beginning and not yet in perfectness, we strive to walk in obedience to the whole law out of thankfulness for all that God has done for us in Christ Jesus. Because Christ lives in us by His indwelling Spirit, because we are thankful Christians, we are compelled to walk in obedience to that law and shall not enter into glory without it. That is the way it must be, if we are to have any comfort in life and death. For the law does not merely gloss over certain aspects of our outward conduct, but reaches into the very depths of our being. That is emphasized in the tenth commandment.