“Therefore, the law is holy, and the commandment holy and just and good.”—Romans 7:12
We live in a society that hates law. It sees law as restrictive and threatening to personal freedom. Therefore, it is important for us to realize how this attitude can also affect our thinking about God’s Law. There is nothing more practical for us to recover in our day than a biblical understanding of love and righteousness. And the Law of God shows us what love and righteousness looks like in specific circumstances, and it demonstrates what it means to love and live righteously because the Law reflects God’s moral character.
The subject of God’s Law is very important because a proper understanding of God’s Law is essential for a healthy Christian life. Exodus 19 teaches us that the Law of God is founded in grace and is the expression of love both to God and man. That is exactly how Jesus summarized the Law in Matthew 22:37-40 when He said, “You shall love the Lord your God with all of your heart, with all of your soul, with all of your mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.”
Jesus defined love as the keeping of God’s Commandments, and the Apostle John wrote, “By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and keep His commandments. For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments. And His commandments are not burdensome” (1 John 5:2-3). Yet we live in a culture where there is great hostility to God’s Law. Think of how the government schools and our nation’s court system fight vigorously to banish the Ten Commandments from public view. Think how retired Chief Justice Roy Moore was put on trial in his own court room for refusing to remove a beautiful monument of the Ten Commandments from the Alabama Supreme Court building. Even within the church you will find professing Christians who say that the Ten Commandments were for the people in the Old Testament. And if you are found quoting the words of Psalm 119:97, “Oh, how I love thy law! It is my meditation all the day long”, you will be called a legalist. Yet King David’s greatest expression of love towards God was to say, “Oh, how I love thy law, O Lord.”
In the New Testament, when Jesus wants to teach His disciples how to manifest their love towards Him He says, “If you love Me, keep My commandments.” The expression of love that Jesus commanded from His disciples was obedience to His commandments. That is why Jesus said in Mark 3:35, “For whoever does the will of God is My brother and My sister and mother.” And the Apostle Paul wrote in 1Timothy 1:8, “But we know that the law is good if one uses it lawfully.” And again, “Therefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy and just and good” (Romans 7:12). That is a New Testament description of a Christian. Therefore, the subject of obedience to the Law of God and how it relates to God’s grace and the gift of faith in the life of the Christian is important for us to understand. You see, we are not saved by our keeping the Law of God — the Law of God demands perfection, both internally and externally — we are sinful and thus it is impossible for us to perfectly keep God’s Law. However, we are saved by Jesus’ perfect keeping of the Law of God, and if we profess to be redeemed by Jesus Christ but are not striving to keep the Law of God then we demonstrate that we are not saved because the Lord saves us by His grace in order that we might respond to Him in faith, love, and thankfulness by keeping His commandments. This is what it means to be conformed into the image of Christ (Romans 8:29).
What is your view of God’s Law? Do you find it restrictive and burdensome, or is the Law your delight and meditation? David demonstrates the heart of a true believer when he wrote in Psalm 119:35, “Make me walk in the path of Your commandments, for I delight in it.” And again, in Psalm 40:8, “I delight to do Your will, O my God, and Your law is within my heart.” Does your heart respond in the same way to God’s Law? It ought to if you profess to be a Christian. “Now by this we know that we know Him, if we keep His commandments. He who says, “I know Him,” and does not keep His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him” (1 John 2:3-4).
Friday Devotional: January 22, 2021
In Christ,
Pastor S. Henry