Paul's Passing Thoughts

Sigh, ugh, (add your own if you would like). The newest thing on the radar screen is the supposed Scriptural dichotomy between law and gospel. If you go to the WHI blog and poke it anywhere, people are thanking Horton up and down, koolaid packets in-hand, for pointing out this “wonderful truth.” I am presently beginning to read a couple of books recommended by readers that smell pretty good to me so far: God’s Righteous Kingdom by Walter Chantry, and Reasons for Duty by J. Gerstner. So, for now, I’m not going to be dogmatic, but….

As I have said before, and will say again: the primary weapon of the kingdom of darkness against the kingdom of light has always been, and will always be, antinomianism, or “anti-law.” AND law, I repeat, law, is not a term that refers to Decalogue-like passages only in the Bible or “law” in law verses gospel (which I am inclined to think is the mother of all misnomers), but to ALL revelation that proceeds from the mouth of God (Mathew 4:4, 5:18). This is a simple thing; did the “law” come from God’s mouth? Then we still live by it. If not one iota or dot will be lost before the end of the age, would that not include the whole law? And wouldn’t all of it be relevant? And if there is a distinction between law and gospel, why did Jesus only mention the law in Matthew 5:18? Is it more important than gospel?

The goal, I repeat, the goal, of the kingdom of darkness is to DECEAVE, or, ie., distort God’s life-giving wisdom / revelation to believers and unbelievers alike. Satan, the king of darkness, came to Eve as an anti-what-God-really-said (antinomian) at the very beginning of redemptive history, and his rein will end the very same way when he is released to “D-E-C-E-A-V-E the nations.” At the beginning of the New Covenant, the apostle Paul called him the “lawless one,” NOT the “legalist one.” Satan did not approach Eve to try to get her to “obey God in her own efforts,” nor did he try the same with Christ in the wilderness.

Furthermore, “legalism” is distorting God’s true standard / truth with man-made standards, and is therefore a form of ant-law. That’s what the Pharisees did, and Jesus’ contention against the Pharisees was their making the law “void,” NOT an attempt to “obey God in their own efforts” (Matthew 15:6). Christ said that in the end times, the hearts of many will be cold because of “lawlessness” (often improperly translated “iniquity”), NOT legalism.

Also, it can be concluded from what Jude said that to disregard the law is to distort the true gospel: “3 Dear friends, although I was very eager to write to you about the salvation we share, I felt compelled to write and urge you to contend for the faith that was once for all entrusted to God’s holy people. 4 For certain individuals whose condemnation was written about long ago have secretly slipped in among you. They are ungodly people, who pervert the grace of our God into a license for immorality and deny Jesus Christ our only Sovereign and Lord.” There is a very fine line between those who turn the grace of God into a license for sin, and those who teach that Christians are not obligated to uphold the law because gospel and law are separate; and moreover, couldn’t uphold it even if they wanted to because they are still totally depraved.

A word study on Matthew 28:20 reveals the following idea from the Greek words regarding “….observe all that I have commanded you”: to protect or guard, hold fast, serve, watch over carefully, everything laid upon, as an order or command; injunction to; to direct with authority; to order; to charge. Christ’s mandate to the church clearly focuses on the law, not gospel. Why? Because everything we could possibly know about the gospel is found in the law? Can the two really be separated? Again, like Matthew 5:18, why does Christ only mention the law in his mandate to the church?(“all that I have commanded”). Again, it seems that either they are, in fact, inseparable, or the law is more important. Besides, the gospel is often presented in the Scriptures as imperative (to name a few: Acts 3:19, 8:22, 2021, 26:20, 1Peter4:17, 1Peter 1:2). Those verses regard presentations of the gospel, so if law and gospel are separate, would those who make such a distinction remove repentance from the gospel? After all, the likes of Michael Horton say the gospel is strictly an “announcement” and not anything that should be followed.

Does accepting a distinct dichotomy between law and gospel “protect” God’s revelation? Or is it more like divide,conquer and distort ? One would do well to weigh this question carefully in an age of “lawlessness.”

paul