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THE END OF THE LAW

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Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Jan 9, 1893

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 19, No. 10.

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THE END OF THE LAW.

By W. N. G.

SOME of the brethren at Unionville, Iowa, have been threatened with prosecution for laboring on Sunday. A minister of the United Brethren denomination reproved them for Sunday labor, and after they had reminded him that they kept the Sabbath of the law of God, said that "Christ is the end of the law." Although a professed minister of the gospel, he seems to think that Christ put a stop to the operation of the law of God. He should read Matt. 5:17, 18, where Christ expressly says: "Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets; I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill. For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in nowise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled."
James 5:11 says: "Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord; that the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy." Does James mean to say that the Lord has come to an end? Does he not mean the object or design of the Lord? These are definitions of the word "end" in every dictionary. In 1 Peter 1:9 we have: "Receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation of your souls." Does Peter mean to say that the annulling of our faith would be the salvation of souls? No one would be so foolish as to suppose that to be his meaning.
Yet it would be just as reasonable as to put such a construction upon Paul's words in Rom. 10:4: "For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believeth." In 1 Tim. 1:5 we read that "the end of the commandment is charity." This U. B. minister, to be consistent, would argue that charity works an annulment of the commandment; but he is forestalled by Rom. 13:10, which says that "love is the fulfilling of the law." In other words, the fulfilling of the law is the manifestation or fruit of charity, or love. To what great lengths will men not go to evade the claims of God's great rule of life? W. N. G.