The Law of God is one of the most misunderstood parts of the Bible. Some people believe that Jesus lives in us to equip us to keep the Law of God. “Jesus fulfills the Law through me as I trust Him,” you may hear them say. Truthfully, I used to teach this myself and have even written in earlier books that as Christ lives His life through us we will fulfill the Law without even having to focus on it. It made sense to me until I began to look more closely at what the Scripture says about the subject. (We are all growing in grace, even authors who write about it!) The problem I came to see with this viewpoint is that it still leaves us in a relationship to the Law. It simply changes from a negative one to a positive one. What the Bible actually teaches, however, is that you and I have no relationship to the Law—neither positive nor negative. The Law has nothing to do with us. It’s important to understand God’s original purpose in giving the Law. Reading about the early history of man after the Creation recorded in Genesis, you notice that for centuries there was no law given to the human race. Then God selected Abram (Abraham) to begin a new work. From Abraham, then Isaac, then Jacob and his sons came the 12 tribes of Israel. They go down to live in Egypt, as a result of Joseph’s journey there. Finally, in response to the people’s cries for deliverance, God selects Moses as His leader to take Israel back to the Promised Land. There, on the way to Canaan, God calls Moses to meet with Him on Mount Sinai, and He presents the covenant known as the Law of Moses (Exodus 19). The many chapters that follow—through Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy—spell out the details of what was also known as the old covenant, the constitution of God’s relationship with Israel. That covenant stayed in effect until the new covenant was inaugurated by the death of Jesus Christ. Why did God give Israel the Law? Many think the Law was given to squelch sin among the people, but the real reason was very different.
For what purpose do you think the Law was given? Do you think it was given so that the trespasses in people’s lives might be decreased? The apostle Paul explains why God gave the Law to Israel. He wrote, “The Law came in so that the transgression would increase” (Romans 5:20). That biblical fact comes as a surprise to many people. God didn’t give the Law to stop sin among His people but rather to stimulate it! What possible reason would He have in doing such a thing? It was so that the people would come to see their sinfulness and abandon the misguided notion that their own moral character would ever be enough to achieve acceptance by God. The basis of God’s acceptance of humanity has never been our own goodness. But it has always been because of His grace. By stimulating sin in the people’s lives, the Law would cause them to see how much they needed grace. This was a perfect situation because Paul went on to say, “But where sin increased, grace increased all the more” (Romans 5:20). Man’s sin increased, and God’s grace increased. Grace could not respond to the sense of self-righteousness that trapped Israel—but it would overtake and overshadow their sinfulness once they saw and admitted it. That’s how it still works today, even among Gentiles (non-Jews) who try to keep religious rules as a way of gaining God’s favor. Although the Law wasn’t given to the Gentiles, it will do the same thing to you that it was intended to do in the lives of the Jewish nation of Israel when it was given to them. In another New Testament passage, Paul described the Law as a tutor that came to lead them to Christ so that they would be justified by faith (see Galatians 3:24). So the Law was given to Israel to show them their sinfulness and their inability to earn acceptance by God through works. How, then, could we rightfully think that Jesus Christ lives inside us to help us keep the Law? Jesus Christ didn’t come to help us keep the Law. He came to fulfill the Law on our behalf and to deliver us from the Law system altogether! Romans 10:4 says, “Christ is the end of the Law for righteousness to everyone who believes.” We don’t even need to keep the Law today because we have the fulfillment of the Law living in us, and He has taken us away from all that! Note that I didn’t say we break it. I said we don’t keep it. Again, we have no relationship to the Law whatsoever. Jesus has no intention to help you keep God’s Law, but that’s not all. He also wants you to know that you make a serious mistake when you focus on the Law at all. Your focus is to be on Him, not a set of rules that you imagine God requires of you. Your Father has no rule-keeping requirements for you! Jesus has ended that whole system. The Bible plainly says that “you are not under law but under grace” (Romans 6:14) and that “now we have been released from the law” (Romans 7:6). Trying to live in the Law system is a misguided effort regardless of how sincere it may be. You don’t have to do anything to earn your Father’s acceptance. The Father accepts Jesus, and because you are in Him, you are as accepted by God the Father as Jesus Christ Himself! (See Ephesians 1:6.) Sometimes those of us who teach of our freedom from the Law will cause critics to suggest that we are antinomian—a word that means “against the Law.” My contention is that they are against the Law because they deny its biblical purpose under the old covenant and want to turn it into a moral code for living today. Trying to live by the Law is a curse because nobody can do it, but we don’t have to do it! The Bible plainly says that “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law” (Galatians 3:13). To try to live by religious rules today is to try to put yourself right back under that curse! The Scripture says, “For as many as are of the works of the Law are under a curse” (Galatians 3:10). So the lie that Jesus empowers us to fulfill the Law of God suggests that Jesus came in to us to put us under a curse! Paul told the church at Rome, “Therefore, my brethren, you also were made to die to the Law through the body of Christ, so that you might be joined to another, to Him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit for God” (Romans 7:4). Religious rules can never produce fruit. They only produce religious nuts! However, a lifestyle lived out of union with the Christ who dwells within us produces authentic spiritual fruit that honors God.
If you’ve been taught that your relationship with God needs to stay focused on behaving in the right way, the idea that you don’t have to live by religious rules anymore may be a little scary at first. Be assured that I’m not suggesting here that behavior isn’t important. The truth is that if you want your behavior to honor your Father, it won’t happen by trying to keep religious rules. In fact, the Bible says that religious rules actually arouse sinful desires in you. Romans 7:5 says that sinful passions are “aroused by the Law.” Does it make sense that Jesus would empower you to focus on the Law when the Bible says the Law stimulates sin? Our focus is to be Christ Himself, not a system of rules that we wrongly imagine God is expecting us to use as a code for living. Jesus is our source of living, and His life within us is more than enough to ensure that the actions in our lifestyle honor the Father. If we have believed that Christ empowers us to keep God’s Law, we have believed a lie that will have the opposite effect in our lives than the one we want. Life isn’t about keeping rules. It’s all about Him—about living in His love and allowing that love to pour out of us onto others. The Law keeps us looking at ourselves and constantly judging ourselves for our failures. Grace allows us to stay focused on Christ and empowers us to express His life and love to everybody else. Which way do you want to live?
McVey, Steve (2011-02-01). 52 Lies Heard in Church Every Sunday (pp. 188-190). Harvest House Publishers. Kindle Edition.
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