As all men before conversion, in every age and country, are imagined to be equally under the law, the Gentile no less than the Jew, so the Christian is put under the same law, not (they say) for justification, but for a rule of life. Every whit of the system is false; the whole is a denial in principle both of Judaism and Christianity, of law and gospel, and even of sin and holiness, as taught in God's Word.
It is certain from Rom. 2 and 3 that the Jew is under law in contrast with the Gentile. It is certain from Rom. 4 and 5 that between the fall and Moses not one could be said to be under law. It is certain from Rom. 6 and 7 that the Christian is not under law but under grace, and this not only for justification but for his walk; so that, even if he had been a Jew, he is become dead to the law and belongs to another—Christ risen. To be connected now with both is spiritual adultery and leads to bad fruit. Rom. 8 is distinct that God has wrought in Christ the mighty work of condemning sin and delivering ourselves who believe, in order that the righteous sum of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. And, in truth (as we are shown in Gal. 5), walking in the Spirit is the true guard against the lusts of the flesh; and if we are led by the Spirit, we are not under law; and yet we love, in which one word the whole law is fulfilled. For the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, etc., against which there is assuredly no law. He that is under law does not love, but breaks the law; while he that loves fulfills the law (Rom. 13) without being under it (indeed, by being under grace and not law). For the law is the strength of sin, never of holiness (1 Cor. 15), and applies not to a righteous man, but to the lawless and disobedient (1 Tim. 1).
Those who desire to be law-teachers in our day are evidently, therefore, equally unsound as to justification and the walk of the Christian, and, what is more serious still, virtually frustrate God's grace, and annul for righteousness the death of the Savior. "For," says the Apostle, "I through the law am dead to the law, that I might live unto God. I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God [not who kept the law for me, but], who loved me, and gave Himself for me. I do not frustrate the grace of God: for if righteousness come by the law, then Christ is dead in vain." Gal. 2:19-2119For I through the law am dead to the law, that I might live unto God. 20I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me. 21I do not frustrate the grace of God: for if righteousness come by the law, then Christ is dead in vain. (Galatians 2:19‑21). Do you say Christ was only keeping the law in dying on the cross? Then you ignorantly blot out grace and debase the Savior's infinitely precious death to the mere doing of a man's duty; for the law is just the expression of man's duty to God, not of God's grace to the sinner, nor of the saint's devotedness to God, still less of all Christ did to glorify God in either life or death. But the notion is utterly false. "By the grace of God" (in contrast with His law) Christ tasted death for everything (Heb. 2:99But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honor; that he by the grace of God should taste death for every man. (Hebrews 2:9)).