WE once had an old schoolmaster, and an excellent tutor he was; and yet in spite of this not one of his scholars ever passed their examinations, but every one failed. His rules were perfect, his discipline most rigid-in fact, nothing escaped his keen eye, but every transgression and disobedience received its just recompense of reward. He was up early and late with his dull pupils, but try how he would he could not get them to obey him, or learn the lessons he vainly sought to teach them.
If he flogged them, they did no better, and though the highest awards were offered them if they would only do what he told them, not one of his troublesome pupils ever earned one single prize. Not one good-conduct mark was ever placed against their names, but black mark after mark stood out against them, the truthful witness to their bad conduct. Consequently they were ever in disgrace, and the long-looked-for vacation never arrived, neither were the wished-for holidays ever enjoyed. The poor scholars were forever shut into the dreary bondage of trying to do that which was never done, and of seeking to please the old schoolmaster, while their ways were ever displeasing to him, because they always would do the very opposite to what he bade them.
And oh! how irksome to us did the old schoolmaster at last become, ever standing over us with his dark frown and severe threats as to what the result of our disobedience would be. We feared and dreaded him, and would gladly have thrown off his authority over us had it only been in our power, but that was an impossibility. And worst of all, we learned that he had entrusted to him the power of life and death, and that not one of his pupils had ever gained the former, but that all were subject to the latter. Shall we tell you his name? His name is
LAW!
“The law was our schoolmaster up to Christ”
We shall never forget the day when deliverance came. It was just at the moment when despair had seized upon us, when effort after effort had been put forth to meet the demands of the old schoolmaster, and every one had failed; we had tried to do good, and found only evil present with us, had done our utmost to conform to his rules, but in spite of every resolve to do the right had only found ourselves doing the wrong (for we inwardly delighted in what the old schoolmaster required of us, but, alas found ourselves utterly powerless to carry it out), and all we could see before us was hopeless condemnation.
It was just at that moment when the joyful tidings reached us that there had been One who had met all the requirements of the old schoolmaster, and because of His perfect obedience He was able to take upon Himself all that was due to us, as having failed to do what we were required to do. In His great love He took our place, suffered the condemnation which was our due, bore the curse of a broken law which rested upon us, and, blessed forever be His name! died in our stead, that we might be forever set free from the old schoolmaster. The stripes which should have fallen upon our guilty backs fell upon His, and with His stripes we are healed. He was delivered for our offenses, and raised again for our justification; and since He has been raised from the dead, a perfect clearance―or justification―from all things is ours, from which we could not be justified by the law of Moses (see Acts 13:3939And by him all that believe are justified from all things, from which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses. (Acts 13:39)).
We own that the old schoolmaster was perfectly just in all that he required of us, and just, too, in condemning us, since we were guilty of disobeying him, and breaking his commandments; and we gladly own, too, that we are forever set free from his bondage and condemnation, since “Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree” (Gal. 3:1313Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree: (Galatians 3:13)). Christ’s death on the cross is that which has set us forever free―free to live to God, and to Him who has been raised from the dead? that we should bring forth fruit unto God (see Rom. 7:44Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ; that ye should be married to another, even to him who is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit unto God. (Romans 7:4)). And now we can take up the language of faith, and say, “I through the law, have died to the law, that I might live unto God” (Gal. 2:44And that because of false brethren unawares brought in, who came in privily to spy out our liberty which we have in Christ Jesus, that they might bring us into bondage: (Galatians 2:4)).
Is it, then, that ‘since we are no longer under the old schoolmaster that we can lightly esteem his claims? No, indeed! “Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? God forbid!” We own that we have died to the law in the death of another, that is Christ (“Ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ”), so that by His death we are, now free, and can reckon ourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord (Rom. 6:1111Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord. (Romans 6:11)).
Reader, do you know this blessed deliverance? Would that it were known throughout the length and breadth of Christendom, known by those who, Sunday after Sunday, pray―
“Incline our hearts to keep Thy law.”
The old schoolmaster can only pour out his anathemas over your guilty head and condemn you utterly. What folly, then, to seek for justification at his hand, since he holds there your just condemnation! “No we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to those who are under the law, that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God” (Rom. 3:1919Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law: that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God. (Romans 3:19)). Think, dear reader, of how you stand in relation to God and a broken law, and tell us if you know of any way in which deliverance can reach you, other than the way of which we have spoken? No, before one could be set free the old schoolmaster had to be satisfied, and the grace of the gospel is told out in that Christ died for sinners, and thereby righteously we go free, who believe on him. The old schoolmaster has been silenced, and can no longer condemn, for He who was delivered for our offenses has been raised again for our justification, so that being justified by faith we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. This the old schoolmaster could never have given us, for “the law was our schoolmaster up to Christ, that we might be justified by faith.” On this divine principle it can be possessed, and on no other, even as “Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness.”
If you, dear reader, are in possession of peace with God, through the knowledge of a perfect justification, then you can join with us in telling others, that since “faith is come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster. For ye are all the children (sons, R.V.) of God, by faith in Christ Jesus” (Gal. 3:2525But after that faith is come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster. (Galatians 3:25)).
In the presence of the grace of God the old schoolmaster must retire. He has seen his dread sentence righteously executed upon our divine substitute, the Lord Jesus Christ, and what more has he to say? And since he is silenced, the blessed grace of God can freely flow out toward us, taking us out of the place of condemnation where we were, and putting us in Christ Jesus, where there is “no condemnation,” but where His full, free favor rests upon us. Oh, it is blessed to know that this is now our place before Him, “for what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit” (Rom. 8:3, 43For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: 4That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. (Romans 8:3‑4)).
May this be the reader’s privilege to know and enjoy, so that you may be able to take an everlasting farewell of the old schoolmaster, and thus walking by the Spirit, under the rule of Christ risen, meet all his requirements without being under his bondage.
“Not the labor of my hands
Could fulfill the law’s demands;
Could my zeal no respite know,
Could my tears forever flow,
Naught for sin could e’er atone,
But Thy blood, and Thine alone!”
E. E. N.