DELIVERED FROM THE LAW

A strange testimony of Paul. Especially when we oserve how he first wrote: “For I was alive without the law once.” But now it is free and sovereign grace, that he may write, “Delivered from the law.” That is, delivered from the curse, from the condemnation, from the judgment, and also from the righteous sentence of death. Yes, it remains an eternal truth: “By the law is the knowledge of sin.” Thus, we receive the knowledge of our misery out of the law. God had made this law innate in the heart of Adam, and established with him a covenant of works, and He requires from man a perfect obedience. It is the sovereign power of God, that the Lord has revealed this after the fall in the hearts of His people. Did He not proclaim the ten commandments from Mount Sinai, when He in His sovereign might established the Covenant of Grace in a national form with His Israel? By this revelation of the Covenant of Grace, which is from eternity, Moses received the law out of the hand of Christ, (Acts 7:38), Who merited a full salvation for His Church, and also applies it.

But the experience of the Apostle Paul was, that he realized the holiness of God’s law. Do you too, reader? When it pleases God to place man before the mirror of His law, then man sees he is worthy to be cursed and doomed. How seldom do we hear that one becomes a sinner before God! Did not Paul have to cry out, “For I was alive without the law once”? How necessary it is that God the Holy Ghost uncovers to us the demands and the curse of the law, and binds it upon our hearts. But there will come a moment that they will appear before God’s judgment seat, and the law places them guilty before God. Oh, the righteousness of God comes with its demands, and it experimentally becomes a lost case. But there is a great difference between a submitting to the righteousness of God, or experimentally going lost under the righteousness of God in self. The latter was Paul’s experience.

“Delivered from the law.” No one can deliver himself from the law and from the curse. Onesided grace is necessary to experience this. Man may try everything to make himself loose from the law; one through his religion and another by emotions. Those, who are in Christ by faith, know that they need not fear condemnation. The law has lost its power. This is the comfort of the confirmed Church of God. This is not so easy to understand. To clearly show us this deliverance, Paul uses an illustration of married life, of the bond between man and wife. We can read this in Romans 7:1-4. Now then, we must understand this right. We might try to deliver ourselves from the law, but to no avail; this deliverance is not of man, but of God. Do you understand this? It is a free and a soverign deed of God. We might be able to speak much about this, but it is only through the grace of God if we may experimentally speak of it in spirit and in truth. How little do we hear of this in these days. As man and wife are bound together by God, so are also the law and man bound together. And man shall not separate what God has bound together. Only by death are they made free. And death has also wrought this deliverance concerning the law, viz., the death of Christ.

And now we must learn to know the death of Christ experimentally. This was a deed of God’s judgment, and now a question: “With which Person of the Trinity does a soul come in contact first, when he is brought into soul’s exercises by the Spirit of God? With God, for it is on account of sin that He has become our judge. What poor people they are who speak about Jesus Christ, without ever having learned to know God as their judge! In the true experience, God’s people have to do with God and His law. Oh no, the Lord cannot deny His righteousness. And what does man do? Does he at once bow before the Judge of heaven and of earth? No, he tries everything to satisfy the demands of the law, but the strife becomes greater. He promises the Lord he will do better; he seeks rest in this way, but cannot find it. His guilt becomes greater every day. Sometimes he has a little hope, but then afterwards it becomes more impossible again, the curse of the law becomes worse, and he can find no deliverance. But now he submits to the righteousness of God, and O wonder! Jesus is revealed to his soul, and oh, what a salvation to experience true faith in the Lord Jesus. But still there remains an empty place in their heart, and there is something missing, namely, the justification of a sinner. Many think in these days that they can have this acquittal through the exercise of faith, because the curse of the law shall be taken away. This is a very grievous error, and a despising of the Word of God. Think of the instruction of Paul, man and wife must be separated before the law loses its power.

Many speak about being cut off, but the greatest thing is if we may experience it. Oh, there is a people who are placed before God’s righteousness, and they are afraid that they will sink away eternally into everlasting destruction. Everything testifies against them . . . also the law. There they stand, under the eye of the Judge of heaven, as on who owes ten thousand talents and has not a penny to pay. Oh, the separation shall come, the eternal death sentence, and he will agree to this eternally; he is willing to sign this sentence with his own blood, for he loves God more than himself. It is only a moment, and then Christ is revealed as all-sufficient. Then he hears that Jesus takes upon Himself the demands of the law on the grounds of His merits, Who had fulfilled the sufferings that were demanded by the law to take away the curse of the law, and by His active obedience gave a right to eternal life. Oh, what a blessing it is to be acquitted by the Father, then to experience through Christ the liberty of the Apostle Paul: “But now we are delivered from the law.”

And now we may write to you, that all the children of God have this liberty in regeneration, but only when we receive a true knowledge of this acquittal do we experimentally know of this liberty. From God’s side it lies firm, but before God’s children are acquitted by the Father they are still in their own experience on enemy grounds. Do not build each other up in the sweet frames of your soul. When others tell you that you also belong with the little ones in grace, do not rest in it, but pray for the assurance of faith in Christ. Is there a more happy people than the people of God? Without Jesus there is only eternal destruction and union with Satan, whose slaves we have become. There is liberty only in Christ. In the hand of Moses the law causes many fears, but in the hand of Christ it has a sweet appearance.

Deze tekst is geautomatiseerd gemaakt en kan nog fouten bevatten. Digibron werkt voortdurend aan correctie. Klik voor het origineel door naar de pdf. Voor opmerkingen, vragen, informatie: contact.

Op Digibron -en alle daarin opgenomen content- is het databankrecht van toepassing. Gebruiksvoorwaarden. Data protection law applies to Digibron and the content of this database. Terms of use.

Printen