Jesus and the Law by W. E. Gillis

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Sep 16, 1913

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 40, No. 36.

Jesus and the Law

By W. E. Gillis

What Was Confirmed by the Saviour?

By W. E. Gillis

THIS question would never have arisen but for a misapprehension of the Saviour’s mission, and a determined effort on the part of His enemy, Satan, to vitiate that mission by all means. Therefore to avoid needless argument, and if possible, to remove cause for further ignorance on the subject, we will endeavor briefly to lay before the reader the real situation.

In the first place, the question arises, “Why is a Saviour required?” and it is satisfactorily answered by the following quotations from the Sacred Scriptures:

“Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law.” 1 John 3:4.

“For the wages of sin is death.” Rom. 6:23.

“Who will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth. [‘Thy law is the truth.’ Ps. 119:142.] For there is one God, and one Mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus; who gave Himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time.” 1 Tim. 2:4-6.

“All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and Jehovah hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all.” Isa. 53:6.

Sin being the transgression of the law, the sinner must be cognizant of the requirements of this law in order to obey it intelligently; “for whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all.”

At creation, man was perfectly familiar with these statutes of heaven; for the Lord said that man was created perfect (Eccl. 7:29), and “sin is not imputed where there is no law.” Rom. 5:13. But at the time of the giving of the law at Sinai, as recorded in Exodus 20, man had wandered so far from God that it was necessary to write the law upon tables of stone, and undertake an extensive system of symbolical education, in order to bring him back to a just appreciation of its sacredness and what true obedience to its precepts meant.

The law written in stone was “the form of knowledge and of the truth in the law.” Rom. 2:20. But God’s ideal of the law is expressed by the psalmist when he declares, “Thy law is the truth.” Ps. 119:142. It was necessary that Christ, the living law, who Himself could say, “I am the truth” (John 14:6), should be manifested to the people. “The law [the form] was given by Moses, but grace and truth [the living reality] came by Jesus Christ.” John 1:17. And this real law must be enshrined in the hearts of the people until they can say with Paul, “I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me.” Gal. 2:20. The new covenant provides for this very thing, the Scripture admonishing us (Phil. 2:5), “Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus;” and assuring us, “So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God.” Rom. 7:25.

The transgression of God’s law brought in death. “The soul that sinneth, it shall die.” Eze. 18:4. The consummation of Christ’s mediatorial work results in there being “no more death.” Rev. 21:4. So the only conclusion we can come to in the matter is that His sacrifice and priesthood abolish the carnal mind (Rom. 8:7; Eph. 2:14-16), having slain it, nailing it to the cross, with all its dogmas and creeds (Col. 2:14), and in fact bring man back to perfect obedience to the law of God (Heb. 10:10). The law is not changed, but we are.

The offerings of the ceremonial law never made a man perfect (Heb. 7:19; 10:1), and of course did not find favor with God (Isa. 1:10-20; 1 Sam. 15:22), only in so far as they were efficacious as an object-lesson shadowing forth Christ. The incarnation of Christ provided the one thing that did find favor with God. “Lo, I come . . . to do Thy will, O God.” Heb. 10:7. What is the will of God?—The law of God—the Ten Commandments. See Rom. 2:17, 18. So we find in Heb. 10:9 that the operation of the ceremonial law, which spoke only of death, even to the death of the only-begotten of the Father, was limited to the coming of the Messiah, who should by His life and death establish the Ten Commandments. By doing this (verse 14), He perfects forever those who are sanctified. (“Sanctify them through Thy truth: Thy word is truth.” John 17:17. “Thy law is the truth.” Ps. 119:142.) And the Holy Spirit, bearing witness to this work (Heb. 10:15), says that this sanctifying—making holy—process is the accomplishing of the new covenant promise of having the law of God engraved by the Holy Spirit in the hearts and minds of His people.

Much more that is equally convincing might be written on this subject; but suffice it to say that “God’s work is the same in all time, altho there are different degrees of development, and different manifestations of His power to meet the wants of men in the different ages. Beginning with the first gospel promise [Gen. 3:15], and coming down through the patriarchal and Jewish ages, and even to the present time, there has been a gradual unfolding of the purposes of God in the plan of redemption.

“The Saviour typified in the rites and ceremonies of the Jewish law is the very same that is revealed in the gospel. The clouds that enveloped His divine form have rolled back, the mists and shades have disappeared, and Jesus, the world’s Redeemer, stands revealed. He who proclaimed the law from Sinai, and delivered to Moses the precepts of the ritual law, is the same that spoke the Sermon on the Mount. The great principles of love to God, which He set forth as the foundation of the law and the prophets, are only a reiteration of what He had spoken through Moses to the Hebrew people: ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord; and thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.’ ‘Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.’ Deut. 6:4, 5; Lev. 19:18.”

“The Teacher is the same in both dispensations. God’s claims are the same. The principles of His government are the same. For all proceed from Him ‘with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.’ James 1:17.”

“The conditions of eternal life under grace are just what they were in Eden,—perfect righteousness, harmony with God, perfect conformity to the principles of His law. The standard of character presented in the Old Testament is the same that is presented in the New Testament. This standard is not one to which we can not attain. In every command or injunction that God gives, there is a promise, the most positive, underlying the command. God has made provision that we may become like unto Him, and He will accomplish this for all who do not interpose a perverse will, and thus frustrate His grace. God does not employ compulsory measures; love is the agent which He uses to expel sin from the human heart.”

As saith the Scripture: “The Lord hath appeared of old unto me, saying, Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore with loving-kindness have I drawn thee.” Jer. 31:3.

Shanghai, China.