FALSE VIEWS OF PAUL'S WORDS
OF all the unscriptural views now prevailing, none resorts to weaker refuges and to more untenable positions than that which opposes the perpetuity of the law of God. Every position taken by the no-law teachers on Paul's letter to the Romans, may be fairly turned against them. Every text which they claim as teaching the abolition or non-obligation of the law, is found, when fairly considered, to prove the very reverse. Perhaps no objection is put forth with less thought and reason than that which is based on Paul's words to the elders of the church of Ephesus, Acts 20:20-27. They claim this: that Paul said he kept back nothing that was profitable to them, and shunned not to declare the whole counsel of God; but that he said nothing to them about keeping the law, and therefore it is not profitable. A conclusion more at variance with the facts cannot easily be drawn from any premise. 1. Paul preached some three years or more in Ephesus, and we have no record of anything which he preached during that time except what is said in verse 21, namely, that he taught repentance toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ. But this is plainly an enforcement of the law, for we must repent toward him whose law we have transgressed; and Paul did not teach repentance towards Jesus Christ, because he is the Mediator. By the law is the knowledge of sin, Rom. 3:20, and we must have faith toward Christ, by whom we receive remission of sin. Therefore, from all that we are able to learn of Paul's teaching at Ephesus, we find that he did enforce the commandments of God in distinction from the faith of Jesus. Rev. 14:12. And this "publicly and from house to house," showing that these two principles, the law of God and the gospel of Christ, were the burden of all his work. Besides this, no one of the objectors can possibly tell what Paul did, or did not, preach during his three years' labor at Ephesus. 2. Or, if they apply his words to what he wrote to the Ephesians as well as to what he preached to them, the objection is equally faulty, for he wrote many profitable things in his other letters which he did not write to the Ephesians. 3. Or, if they, without any warrant, refer his words to all of his letters, the objection is contrary to the facts; for he did most emphatically teach the perpetuity of, and our obligation to, the law. He said the law proves us sinners; the object of the gospel is to have the righteousness of the law fulfilled in us; the law is spiritual; the carnal mind is not subject to it (as carnality and spirituality cannot agree); God is dishonored by those who break the law; and the law is not made void. 4. And, if his words be applied to what he wrote to the Ephesians and to what he wrote in all his other letters, the objection is faulty in this respect, that James, Peter, Jude, and John, wrote many profitable things which are not contained in the writings of Paul. To maintain this objection the objector is obliged to take the position that the writings of James, Peter, John, and Jude are not profitable! and he must reject the book of Revelation, which will shut him out of the holy city and from the tree of life. Rev. 22:19. Surely no intelligent Bible reader can honestly and conscientiously take a position involving such awful consequences. And so, looking whichever way we will, the objection is weak and inconclusive, and can be used only by those who are not particular as to the means employed to further their own object. We think, as Dr. Doddridge said, that he did not shun or decline to tell anything which was to profit them. But that we have in his writings all things which are profitable to us we know is not true, as others wrote many things of equal profit which he did not write. What he preached at Ephesus, as to particulars, we do not know; but we do know that there and elsewhere, he maintained the integrity of the law in the most direct and unequivocal manner.