Upholding the Law

Everyone knows that the Gospel of salvation by grace through faith in Christ makes the law void, right? After all, if we’re not saved by keeping the law, the law must be unimportant, right? The fact that we’re now under grace means we can toss the law of God on the junk heap of history, right? Actually, as Paul says in today’s passage, nothing could be further from the truth. In this, his third and final implication of the Gospel of grace, Paul punctures the all-too-common false assumption that the Gospel trivializes the law. In actuality, he argues, the Gospel, the way of salvation forged by God, is so dedicated to the observation of all the law’s requirements that it constitutes the greatest argument ever made for the law.

In his commentary on Romans, Dr. James M. Boice shows clearly how the life and death of Jesus prove that God did not set aside His law. He points out that no fallen human being could keep the law’s demands, but if God had lowered the requirements to a level people could achieve, it would have constituted a virtual nullification of the entire law. God’s better alternative was to send Jesus to fulfill the law perfectly as a representative for His people. Thus, Jesus was born and lived as a man under the law, compiling a record of perfect righteousness that could be imputed to believers to satisfy the law’s demands. But Jesus came not just to live but also to die on the cross. Why? Because death was the law’s prescribed penalty for sin. God’s decree was clear: “ ‘The soul who sins shall die’ ” (Ezek. 18:4). There had to be a death for sin, either the sinner himself or a substitute—and Jesus was that substitute. In a sense, therefore, the Gospel is the story of how God kept His own law.

Boice writes: “When the Lord Jesus Christ died on the cross for us, He showed that God took the law with full seriousness. The law demanded death for infractions. Jesus met that demand.” He goes on to quote Scottish commentator Robert Haldane’s apt words on this subject: “ ‘Can there be any greater respect shown to the law, than that when God determines to save men from its curse, He makes His own Son sustain its curse in their stead, and fulfill for them all its demands?’ ” The answer is an obvious no, and since God has shown such respect for His law, we must do no less.