The Law of God 2011

Now we know that whatever the law says it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God. For by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes the knowledge of sin (Romans 3:19-20, ESV).

The relation of God’s law to the gospel is the most important practical theme in Christian theology. Charles Bridges (The Christian Ministry, 228) says, “We cannot indeed have too much of the Gospel; but we may have too little of the Law. And a defect in the Evangelical preaching of the Law is as clear a cause of inefficient ministration, as a legal preaching of the Gospel. In such a Ministry there must be a want of spiritual conviction of sin generally–of spiritual sins most particularly–and–flowing directly from hence–a low standard of spiritual obedience. Indeed, all the prevalent errors in the Church may be traced to this course.” J. Newton similarly says, “Ignorance of the nature and design of the law is at the bottom of most religious mistakes” (Works, 1:176). These statements seem excessive, but the more we consider them the more accurate they appear. The Puritans and their successors were quite insistent that the preaching of the law must precede the preaching of the gospel as preparation for it. As Edward Reynolds says, “this is the method of the Holy Ghost, to convince first of sin, and then to reveal righteousness and refuge in Christ. The law is the forerunner, that makes room, and prepares welcome in the soul for Christ” (cited in Bridges, The Christian Ministry, 238-39). Or, as John Colquhoun says, “If a man does not have spiritual and just apprehensions of the holy law, he cannot have spiritual and transforming discoveries of the glorious gospel” (cited by W. Plumer, The Law of God, 10).

—Excerpt from “The Moral Law I: The Moral Law and the Gospel,” preached by Dr. Robert Martin.