2717.—The Law and the Prophets.
By Editor
Would you please explain through your good paper Luke 16:16? The law and the prophets were until John. From that time the Gospel of the kingdom of God is preached and every man entereth violently into it. A READER. There is an ellipsis in our Lord's statement, which, if not taken into account, may mislead us, but which, if we had no wrong conception, would not in any wise be misleading. The law and the prophets were preached until John. From that time the Gospel of the kingdom of God is preached; and then we have the parallel between the two parts of the sentence. That is, until the time that John came, God's prophets and teachers and priests preached the law and the prophets. That was the burden of their message,—the instructions that were given through the law and the prophets; but when John came, a new feature was added to the great Gospel message. The law and the prophets were still binding, as our Lord Himself again and again teaches, but the great burden of the message then was, "the kingdom of God is at hand." And it demanded very earnest, persistent faith in order to grasp the message then, and avail themselves of its blessings. The thought of games or sports may have found place in the figure which the Lord uses. "Every man entereth violently into it." That is, he gives himself to the obtaining of that kingdom with eagerness, intensity, agony, just as Jesus says in another place: "Strive to enter in at the straight gate;" literally, "agonize to enter in." The next verse shows that the law is not to be done away because the Gospel of the kingdom of God is preached; for the Gospel confirms the law. "It is easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one tittle of the law to fail." The Gospel brings us to that place where we can keep God's law and rightly serve Him. Those who teach that the law and the prophets there came to an end, many times teach us that they continue to the Crucifixion when they were nailed to the cross. If they continued to the Crucifixion they certainly did not cease three and one-half years before when John began his preaching. The thought of the text is not that the law of God then came to an end. The thought conveyed is the change which took place in the burden of the message when John came.