Do We Make Void the Law?
By G. C. Tenney
The psalmist says, “It is time, Lord, for thee to work, for they have made void thy law;” and we are frequently made painfully conscious that this is true of the present time, when people urge the abrogation of the moral law as an excuse for not obeying its precepts. Those who do so make a grave mistake which the Judgment will certainly reveal. But this state of things becomes more a matter of regret than surprise to us when we consider the so-called liberal tendency of the times and the teaching of those who are regarded as safe teachers. As an instance of this teaching, we notice in Yale Lectures on Preaching, by H. W. Beecher, as published in the Christian Union recently, these remarks concerning “Take the ten commandments. It is true that by a very liberal construction you can make them cover about everything in creation, as, by beating gold with gold beaters’ skin you can make a piece as big as my hand cover an acre or so. The ten commandments stand where men emerge from the lowest conditions, and in the dawn of the recognition of God’s authority. They have to do with the commonest vices of men, and with their plainest duties in society. They are the charter that imposes conditions, without which there could not be rectitude, or the proprieties of life, or the sanctities of the household. But they are all negative. All that which is called in the New Testament “the fruit of the Spirit” is left out of them. Of the glow of interior illumination there is not a ray in them. Far back they stand in the beginning of the history of the world, and far down in that history which reproduces itself in every generation. They are adapted to the building up of a lower style of man. Their cry forever is, “Thou shalt not,” “Thou shalt not.” Woe to that man who has lived among churches and Bibles and preachers, and has not got higher than the ten commandments! And yet we see them emblazoned in the house of God as though they expressed the highest ideas to which men have reached. They say to men, “Thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not bear false witness, Thou shalt not commit adultery”; the grosser and more bestial forms of sin are forbidden by them; but those moral virtues and spiritual attainments which belong to a developed manhood are not enjoined in them.” Such teaching does not accord with the word of God concerning the moral law. For though it does not deny its existence in the lower walks of life, and recognizes its usefulness at the outset of a moral life, to the Christian it becomes as a spelling book to an advanced scholar, the first mile post, long since passed. The liberal construction mentioned as possible was made by our Saviour, both in his life and teachings. He magnified the law and made it honorable, and gave it an application which reaches to the thoughts and intents of the heart. Paul testifies that “the law is holy.” David says, “The law of the Lord is perfect, converting soul.” And the conclusion of the whole matter is, “Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man.” Eccl. 12:13. Are we better than holy, or more perfect? If so, we are above the law of God. If we are less than that, we are below it. A person whose155character is formed by this law will naturally bear the fruits of the Spirit; for a good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, nor do we expect to find the graces of the Spirit in a willful commandment-breaker; but we observe that those who in their lives most closely fulfill the law as expounded to the lawyer, Matt. 22:37–40, bear most of the fruits of the Spirit which are developed as the natural outgrowth of such a life. Let us not add to our sins that of making void God’s law, but rather pray with the psalmist, “Open thou mine eyes that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law.”