The Law and the Gospel by MILTON C. WILCOX

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Feb 24, 1916

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 93, No. 10.

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The Law and the Gospel

By MILTON C. WILCOX

The Law of God — No. 5

The Law and the Gospel

MILTON C. WILCOX

The Law

The law is God’s rule of moral conduct, the expression of “the whole duty of man.” Eccl. 12: 13, 14. In it is “the form of knowledge and of the truth.” Rom. 2: 20. It bears witness to “the righteousness of God.” Rom. 3: 21. “Through the law cometh the knowledge of sin;” nay, “I had not known sin, except through the law: for I had not known coveting, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet.” Rom. 3: 20; 7: 7.

And that “law is holy, and the commandment [every commandment of the law] holy, and righteous, and good.” Rom. 7: 12. Listen to the sweet singer of Israel as he by the Spirit extols the law:—

“The law of Jehovah is perfect, restoring the soul: The testimony of Jehovah is sure, making wise the simple. The precepts of Jehovah are right, rejoicing the heart: The commandment of Jehovah is pure, enlightening the eyes. The fear of Jehovah is clean, enduring forever: The ordinances of Jehovah are true, and righteous altogether. More to be desired are they than gold, Yea, than much fine gold; Sweeter also than honey and the droppings of the honeycomb. Moreover by them is thy servant warned: In keeping them there is great reward.” Ps. 19: 7-11, A. R. V.

And yet there is no salvation in the law. It cannot save man; for man is a sinner, and no law can justify or make righteous the person who transgresses its requirements. He who transgresses the first commandment is condemned by the law as an idolater. He who transgresses the sixth commandment is condemned as a murderer. Every infraction and transgression, great or small, in motive or deed, the law condemns.

It reveals to man what he is,—apart from God a condemned criminal chained to a “body of sin,” in himself a lazar house of corruption, hopeless, despairing. He is afflicted with the incurable leprosy of sin. The disease may not be apparent to men or to the victim, but the poison is there, and the law infallibly finds it, and points out the symptoms of disease. “The whole head is sick, and the whole heart faint.”

The disease is universal. “All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.” Rom. 3: 23. There are none exempt. It is a part of the very nature of humanity. “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” Jer. 17: 9. The question is pertinent. Sin in its nature is deceitful, deadening to the moral sense. Man does not, cannot, know his own heart. God alone can know it, and therefore we read, “I, Jehovah, search the mind, I try the heart, even to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his doings.” God alone knows the sinful heart, God alone can read and reveal it. He reveals it by means of his holy law. “Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law.” Rom. 7: 7. “By the law is the knowledge of sin.” Rom. 3: 20. Its revealing, penetrating power must visit our hearts, probe our wounds, and declare to us the condition of our souls.

The English Revised Version reads, “The heart is deceitful above all things, and it is desperately sick.” The only physician who can diagnose the malady is God. Man talks of heredity, environment, but God sums it all up in one little word of three letters, “s-i-n,” “the transgression of the law” of God. Read its fruitage in the words of our Lord in Mark 7: 21-23; in the words of the great apostle in Gal. 5: 19, 20. Read them as expressing the condition of your own soul. Admit in self-abasement that it is all true; the faithful Physician, who never spoke falsely, has not deceived us, does not deceive.

There is no hope for the sinner in the law. He admits that it is good, he acknowledges the justice of its condemnation, but he finds in his fallen, sinful nature no power to meet its holy requirements. He is “under the law,” under its condemnation.

The Gospel

But not to glory over us does God reveal to us our sins; not to tantalize us does he show us our helplessness in our human struggles with the demons of passions within. Not to reproach us does his holy law probe the innermost recesses of the heart, and reveal to us in the white light of his Spirit the intents and motives of our actions. Not to cast us off does he show us our unfitness to dwell with him.

God in his love reveals to us our sins, that he may cover our shame with his glory. He shows our helplessness, that we may learn his infinite helpfulness in victory everlasting. He permits his holy law to probe to the depths the inherent selfishness of our human heart, that his presence may shine away the darkness, and place therein the sunlight of divine love and sanctified, blessed service. To those who come to him he reveals the blackness of sin, but with the promise, He “that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.”

All this is the work of the gospel of the Son of God, good tidings of a mighty Saviour, “the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth.” Rom. 1: 16. That gospel received, brings “forgiveness of sins” “freely by his grace,” brings to the unrighteous the “righteousness of God,” takes away “the carnal mind,” changes the heart, blots out the sins, makes of the man a “new creature,” writes God’s holy law upon the heart, and sets the erstwhile bondslave free from sin’s slavery. We read of it in such scriptures as Luke 2: 10-12; Rom. 3: 19-31; chapters 5 to 8; Hebrews 8, and in fact, throughout the entire Bible, from its first note to fallen man in Genesis, to the grand song of triumph in the sublime Revelation of Patmos.

In that gospel is revealed the righteousness of God, not a different righteousness than is in the law; for to its correctness the law bears witness. Rom. 3: 21. It releases man from the condemnation of the law, takes him from “under the law,” and places him “under grace,” God’s bondservant of love.

The believer is therefore no longer “under the law,” but with the law. It is a part of his very nature. It is incorporated into his character. He is a living epistle of God in which God has written his law by his Spirit on the “heart of flesh.”

Will the believer then hate God’s law? —Nay, he will love it. God’s love binds him to God’s government. God’s Spirit writes God’s law upon his heart. Listen to the testimony of men regenerated by the power of the gospel: “O how love I thy law! it is my meditation all the

day.” Ps. 119: 97. “Great peace have they that love thy law; and they have no occasion of stumbling.” Verse 165, A. R. V. “For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision; but faith working through love.” Gal. 5: 6. “For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not grievous.” 1 John 5: 3.

Such is God’s law, and its condemnation and revelation to the sinner.

Such is God’s gospel, and its power to lift the condemnation, change the heart, and make the former sinner an obedient child of God. The message which does not aim to bring man back to obedience to God is a spurious gospel. Thank God for the genuine!

Mountain View, Cal.