J. H. WAGGONER by Joseph Harvey Waggoner

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Apr 28, 1874

J. H. WAGGONER

By Joseph Harvey Waggoner

The Atonement.—No. 13.

As an excuse for rejecting the law of God, it is often said that we cannot be justified by the law. That is at least as much as an insinuation that they who keep the law seek to be justified by it. But this is a great mistake. They who know enough of the principles of this law to love it well know that it is too holy, just, and good, to justify a sinner. And because all have sinned against it, all are condemned by it, and none can be justified by it. See Rom. 3:19, 20. It is not the fault of the law that man is not justified by it; had he obeyed it, as was his duty to do, he would have been justified by it, for the apostle says, “The doers of the law shall be justified.” Rom. 2:13.

Charity leads us to presume that they who offer this objection do not realize that the Scriptures make a distinction between justification and salvation. If we only had regard to original justice, there could be no difference; i. e., if a man had never sinned he would have been justified, and of course saved, by his obedience. But this original or personal justice no one now possesses. Hence, while the principles cannot change, and the rule of justification is ever the same, the means are entirely different from what they would be if man had never sinned. Here is where many err. They suppose, or seem to suppose, that if the law ceases to be the means of justification, it ceases also to be the rule. They do not judge of the law by its nature or original object, but from a partial view of the position of its transgressor. The law as a rule of right, will form a perfect character, but cannot reform an imperfect one. The rule of the mechanic will determine or point out a right angle on the end of a board he is framing; and if the board is square—if the angle is right, it is justified or proved right by the rule. But if the angle is not right, the rule will point out the inaccuracy, but will not make it right. That must be effected by another tool. But if the saw is the means of making the proper angle on the board, does the saw therefore become the rule of determining angles or measurements? By no means. And there is precisely this difference between the law and the gospel. “By the law is the knowledge of sin;” but the gospel is the remedy. The law points out the errors of character, the gospel reforms them. The law being the only rule of right, “the doers of the law shall be justified.” Rom. 2:13. This is but plain justice; for no one can suppose that the man who did the law—who obeyed God in all his life—would be condemned. But Paul also says that there are no doers of the law—that all have sinned; and from this he draws the very evident conclusion, “Therefore, by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified.” Rom. 3:21. So we are justified now “freely by his

grace,” entirely by faith; works do not enter into our justification. And why not? Because, as the apostle shows, this justification by faith has respect to “the remission of sins that are past.” Rom. 3:25. Over these our future acts of obedience can have no influence or control.

It seems as if every one ought to see how absurd it is to infer that the sinner justified by grace or pardon is under no further obligation to keep that law by which, as a sinner, he cannot be justified. They who thus teach cannot realize how destructive is that view of every principle of right and justice: how it dishonors the gospel of Christ; how it tends to pervert a holy gospel of love to a mere system of license. Of all the abuse the gospel has ever received at the hands of its professed friends, this is the deepest. It is contrary to Scripture, and to all just reasoning. Ask the advocate of that theory if the law of his State will justify the thief in stealing, or the murderer in killing. He will answer, No; the law condemns such actions. Ask him how the criminal can escape the true desert of his crimes, and he will reply, Only by the governor’s pardon. Ask again, If the law condemns the transgressor, and he can be justified only by pardon, does that pardon release him from obedience to the law, so that he may thereafter disregard its claims? Will he affirm this? Will he tell you that that pardon thereafter becomes the rule of life to such a man? And if the pardoned one should again be committed for crime, will the jury try him, and the judge condemn him by the governor’s pardon, or by the statute of the State? Could we get any to take the same unreasonable position in regard to the law of the State that many take in regard to the law of God? Not one. If angels ever weep at the blind folly of mortals, it seems that such teachings furnish an occasion. To see men of talent, of learning, of apparent piety, strip the plan of salvation of every principle of justice, pervert it to a system of license, draw conclusions directly contrary to reason and common sense, and argue on the divine government as they would be ashamed to argue in respect to the government of the State; surely, this is enough to fill the Heavens with astonishment.

Let it be distinctly noted that a moral duty, whether it be called law or gospel, cannot justify a sinner. That law which points out sin, which is therefore the rule of right, will not justify. This is the teaching of Rom. 3:20, 21. It is singular indeed that they who teach the abrogation of the original law, and its insufficiency to justify, and who hold that all that is binding in the law is incorporated in the gospel, really teach justification by law—by the same system that points out sin, which Paul calls “the law.” This is contrary to reason, and to the apostle’s words in Rom. 3:20. The truth is evidently this: The gospel upholds the law, and enforces it upon the conscience, and incorporates it into the life of the believer. But it does not abrogate law, nor release the believer from obedience to it; nor does it incorporate law into itself so as to have a blending of the two in one. The difference between the law and the gospel is as distinct now as it was in the days when the gospel was preached to the sinners in the wilderness. Heb. 4:1. The law is moral; sin is immorality; the gospel is the remedy. Medicine may restore health, but health is not medicine.

This matter may be tested by the following plain statement: The blood of Christ, the blood of the covenant, is that whereby we have remission of sin. See Heb. 9:22; Rom. 3:25. And this is freely and exclusively by faith or grace. Hence, baptism may be a gospel condition of justification, because it is not any part of the original obligation or moral duty. If it were moral duty it could not be performed for remission of sin, simply because as such it would be required on its own account. So the commandment, which says, “Thou shalt not steal,” cannot be incorporated into the same system and take part in the work of remission, being itself a moral duty. How reasonable is the conditional plan which says, “Repent, and be baptized for the remission of sin.” And how absurd it would be to read, Thou shalt not kill for the remission of sin; or, Honor thy father and mother for the remission of sin. It appears absurd, as I have stated, whether these be called law or gospel, to claim justification or remission through them. But they who teach the abrogation of the law, and the incorporation of these commandments into the gospel, are responsible for this absurdity. It belongs to their system.