Why the Law!

Q: What does the Bible say about the purpose of the law?

The purpose of the law is to show humanity's transgressions and our need for Christ. The Bible states in Galatians 3:19 that the law was added because of transgressions, demonstrating humanity's inability to attain righteousness through works. The law serves as a schoolmaster, revealing our sinfulness and leading us to Christ for justification by faith (Galatians 3:24). It was meant to make us aware of our guilt before God, as Romans 3:20 affirms that by the law is the knowledge of sin. Thus, the law's primary function is not to save, but to illustrate our need for salvation found in Jesus Christ.

Q: How do we know justification by faith is true?

Justification by faith is affirmed through Scripture, emphasizing Christ's work as the means of our righteousness. Justification by faith is fundamental to the gospel and is supported by Scripture such as Romans 3:22, which states that the righteousness of God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. This doctrine highlights that we cannot attain righteousness through the law, as all are under sin (Romans 3:9). Instead, it is by Christ's obedient life and sacrificial death that we receive God's righteousness. It is emphasized throughout the New Testament that our standing before God is entirely based on faith in Christ, not on our works, affirming that we are justified freely by God’s grace (Romans 3:24).

Q: Why is understanding the law important for Christians?

Understanding the law is crucial as it reveals our sin and points us to our need for Christ. For Christians, understanding the law is vital because it provides the context for God's grace. The law exposes our innate sinfulness and inability to achieve righteousness on our own (Romans 7:7). It shows us that through the law, we cannot be justified; rather, it drives us to seek salvation in Jesus Christ (Galatians 3:24). Knowing the law helps believers appreciate the grace of God and understand the freedom they have in Christ, free from the condemnation of the law. This understanding emphasizes the need for continuous reliance on Christ's righteousness rather than our efforts.

Q: What does it mean that Christ fulfilled the law?

Christ fulfilled the law by perfectly obeying it and paying the penalty for our sins. The fulfillment of the law by Christ means He not only adhered to its precepts but also assumed the penalty for sin on behalf of His people. As stated in Matthew 5:17, Christ came not to abolish the law but to fulfill it. This fulfillment is twofold: He lived a sinless life, achieving perfect obedience to the law (Hebrews 4:15), and He took upon Himself the curse of the law by dying for our sins (Galatians 3:13). By doing so, He rendered the law complete, making it no longer a means of condemnation for those who believe in Him, as He has provided the righteousness required by the law for His people.

All right, brethren, let's go to Galatians 3. Galatians chapter 3. Why the law? That's our subject. Why the law? It's been really pressed upon me lately that It's so important to preach phrase by phrase, verse by verse. I remember when the Lord first started revealing himself to me, and I had this little commentary that Brother Henry Mahan had put together, and I would read, he would make one statement, and then he would have scripture references in parentheses.

And I would go look those scripture references up, and the statement he made would be right there in the scripture. I could see right where he got that. He wasn't saying his own word. It came right from the word of God. And I remember the way that that hit me in my heart. I remember how the Lord just made that so powerful in my heart. It's not the preacher's words. I used to spend a lot of time trying to figure out what to say when I would be studying a passage.

In Nehemiah, it said they read out of the law distinctly, meaning they read phrase by phrase, verse by verse, and they gave the sense of it and helped the people to understand. That's good preaching, to just go line by line, because it's his word that he's going to bless. It's his word. When you have a new believer, somebody the Lord's just drawing to Christ, and they're talking about what they're hearing with somebody that doesn't believe the gospel. If they give them a message, that I preached, I want the person listening to that to be able to go right to the Word of God and see, well, that's what it says. Because I want them to have to say either God's Word is true and they believe it, or even though God's Word says it, I don't believe it. It's got to be one or the other. But I want it to be clear. I want it to be right from this Word.

So we're gonna look, this is God's word, and this passage is dealing particularly with the law. God gave the law, it's his law. So however he says he uses it and how the purpose for which he gave it, that's what it's for. So let's see what God says about the law.

Now I'll remind you, the Pharisees were saying, except you keep the law, you believe Christ is your righteousness. But now for sanctification, you have to go back to the law, and except you keep the law, you can't be saved. All right, here's God's word, verse 17. Let's read this to just review what we saw last time.

He said, this I say, that the covenant that was confirmed before of God in Christ, the law, which was 430 years after, cannot disannul that it should make the promise of none effect. For if the inheritance be of the law, it's no more of promise, but God gave it to Abraham by promise. The law did not disannul that promise, You can't go to the law and do any works to add to God's covenant promise. So here's the obvious question, verse 19.

Wherefore then serveth the law? Why did God give the law? It was added because of transgressions. Till the seed should come to whom the promise was made. Now skip verse 20, we'll come back here. Verse 21, is the law then against the promises of God? God forbid.

For if there had been a law given which could have given life, verily righteousness should have been by the law. But the scripture hath concluded all under sin that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe. But before faith came, we were kept under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed. Wherefore, the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, or the law was our schoolmaster until Christ, that we might be justified by faith. But after that faith has come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster. For you are all children, the children of God, by faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek. There is neither bond nor free. There is neither male nor female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you be Christ, then are you Abraham's seed and heirs according to the promise. So why did God give the law at Sinai? Wherefore then serveth the law?

The Lord says it was added because of transgression. God added the law to show his people our sins, our transgression. That's what it was given for. Now it takes God to give us a new heart to make us hear the law, to hear what the law says about us. That's why so many folks try to come to God by the works of the law, because they haven't had God give them a new heart and ears to hear what the law says about them. It takes God to do that before we can hear. But the law was given to show our transgressions. Look with me in Romans 3, and let's see that. Romans 3. Romans 3, 19.

Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law. That's only ones the law speaks to are those under the law. that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God. Therefore, by the deeds of the law, there shall no flesh be justified in his sight. For by the law is the knowledge of sin. Now you mark Romans three, I'm gonna come back here in just a moment, but I just want you to take what we just read. He says, whatever the law says, it's only speaking to them who are under the law.

Now everybody that's trying to come to the God by the law is under the law. Only those the Lord has given faith in Christ are not under the law. The law's not speaking to you if you're not under the law. And God says repeatedly in his word, his people are not under the law. But if you're under the law, the law shuts your mouth. We can't boast that we've kept it. It declares us guilty before God. That's the purpose. By the law is the knowledge of sin.

Go with me to 2 Corinthians 3, and let's look another place, 2 Corinthians 3. You remember how Paul thought that the law was given to give us life, you remember that? In Romans 7, he said the law that was unto life, he thought it was. But here's what the law was given for.

2 Corinthians 3 verse 9, he's telling us here how much greater the everlasting covenant of grace is in comparison to the law given at Sinai. And he says here, Well, back up in verse six, he said, God made us able ministers of the New Testament, not of the letter, but of the spirit. For the letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life. What's he talking about, the letter? Verse seven, but if the ministration of death, the law was given to minister death to us. That's what it was given for. It's called the ministration of death. Well, what law is he talking about? The law written and engraven in stones.

He said it was glorious so much that the children of Israel could not steadfastly behold the face of Moses for the glory of his countenance, but that glory was to be done away. We're going to see that in our text. The glory of that covenant was to be done away. But he says, if that covenant was glorious, how shall not the ministration of the Spirit be rather glorious? For if the ministration of condemnation be glory, see, that's what the law was given, to condemn us. It ministered condemnation to us. If it was glorious, much more did the ministration of righteousness exceed in glory.

The new covenant, God gives us righteousness without our works. So I just wanted you to see that. It's administration of death, administration of condemnation. See, the law requires perfect obedience. In the heart, it reaches to the heart. The law is spiritual. It reaches to the thoughts and intents of the heart. And we're carnal. We're sold under sin. The law is spiritual, speaks to the heart.

And it's not our fellow man that's the standard. We have a bad habit of looking at others and thinking, well, I'm not as bad as they are. Well, you might not be, but they're not the standard. God's law is the standard. His law is holy, just, and good.

And we're carnal sinners by nature. And to break one law is to break the whole law. If we in thought, if you just have a thought and think, I'd like to have that new car they just came out with. I'd like to have that car my neighbors got, pulled up in the driveway, broke the whole law. Covetousness. We can't keep the law. That's the point. God's showing us we can't come to God by the law. All right, secondly, God declares how long that law was to be in effect.

Back in our text in Galatians 3.19, He says, where then serves the law was added because of transgressions till the seed should come to whom the promise was made. And you remember back in verse 16, he told us that seed is Christ. It was, the law was given to Christ, the seed should come to whom the promise was made. The promise was made to Christ.

We saw this last time, you remember, before the world was made, God made promise to his son. And the promise was just what he told Abraham. In thee shall all the nations of the earth be blessed. I will make your children like the stars of heaven and like the sand of the sea. That's what God promised our Savior. And our Savior's end of that covenant was, He had to come and fulfill the law for God and for his people. That's what our Savior agreed to do.

He said, I didn't come to destroy the law. And people think that means, religious folks think that means, see, the law's still in effect. You still have to keep it. That's not what he was saying. He said, I did not come to destroy the law or the prophets. If that meaning is what that means, that he didn't destroy the law so you still have to keep it, does that mean you have to keep the prophets? No, he said, I didn't come to destroy the law or the prophets, I came to fulfill. He fulfilled the law and the prophets. And when he said he fulfilled them, it means he filled them full.

He gave perfect obedience. what the law commanded and then went to that cross and bore the sin of his people and bore the curse that the law demanded. The law said we had to die. He bore that for his people and died for his people so that the law has been filled full. You cannot put another drop in the law, it's full.

It's full and Christ did it by his obedience entirely. That's why verse 13 says, Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law being made a curse for us. He fulfilled it. But the law was given until Christ the seed came. And then the other thing that he has to do is, the law's given until he comes into the heart.

So Christ comes into the heart of his child, the one that he redeemed, and gives you faith to hear the law say you're a sinner, and to see that Christ is the righteousness that we must have. Now go back to Romans 3, this is why I wanted you to hold your place there. Back in Romans 3, after he tells us what the purpose of the law was, the knowledge of sin, He says in verse 21, but now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested. The righteousness of God without the law.

And it is witnessed by the law and the prophets. This is what the law and the prophets have been bearing witness of the whole time. This is what they've been declaring the whole time. The righteousness of God. Watch now. even the righteousness of God, which is by faith of Jesus Christ." That means by his obedience. That means Christ is the righteousness. It's by his faithful obedience to God. That's where you see the righteousness of God. The Lord Jesus is Jehovah Sid Canu, the Lord our righteousness. His righteousness is unto all and upon all them that believe, for there is no difference, for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. All right, now back in our text, here's the next question.

Is the law then against the promises of God? Is the law then against the promises of God? God forbid. For if there had been a law given which could have given life, rarely righteousness should have been by the law, but the scripture hath concluded all under sin. See, the law is not against God's promises. It's not against God's promises because God never purposed for the law to give us life.

What is life? What is life? Well, sin is death. Righteousness is life. Life and righteousness are one. Holiness is life. If you have no sin and you're righteous and holy, you have life. When the scripture says we're spiritually dead, It's saying we're spiritually unrighteous and unholy. We have no righteousness and no holiness. We're dead. But Christ is the righteousness and holiness of his people.

God would not have sent his son to suffer and die if he could have given a law whereby we could have kept it and been saved. He wouldn't have sent his son. If we could have kept the law, he wouldn't have sent his son. The fact he sent his son declares there's no law that could have even been given to give us life.

Do you think about this? We're guilty before God gave the law. Before God gave the law at Sinai, the whole human race was already guilty because we all sinned in Adam. And because we're all born of Adam, when we are born, we come forth with a depraved heart. So we don't want to keep the law, and we can't keep the law. So there's nothing, no way we could have life by the law. It's impossible. It's impossible.

Now listen, when the Lord gives you a new heart, he doesn't take you out of your sinful flesh. He doesn't remove your sin nature from you. It's always with you. So anything you do is gonna have sin mixed with it. Everything. So we still can't come to God by the law. We still, as believers, we can't come to God by the law because sin's mixed with what we do. Do you want to stand before holy God based on what you've done, how you've kept the law? No way. No way. All right, so how did God purpose to save his people then?

All right, back in our text, Galatians 3.22.

The scripture hath concluded all under sin that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe. The scripture means God. It means God. It means his law. All scripture, every bit of it, it all concludes that all are under sin. This whole book has one message. Everybody that's born of Adam is all under sin. We can't do anything to save ourselves, nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing. At no point in our life can we save ourselves. Christ said, without me, you can do nothing.

All right, but that's all according to God's purpose. That's what the word that means. Read that again. The scripture hath concluded all under sin that, God did this on purpose. That the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe. Just like we just read in Romans three, the righteousness of God is manifest by the faith of Christ. When you read the faith of Christ, it means Christ's obedience. It means his faithful obedience.

It's important to get a Bible that makes that distinction. Most translations have edited that out. And so you missed the whole meaning. You can't just say to people nowadays, read your Bible. It matters what Bible they're reading. Because a lot of them have just completely taken the gospel out by simply changing a few little prepositions. That's an important one right there.

God's covenant promise is given to his people by the faithfulness of Christ. When God made that covenant, he made it in Christ. The promises were made to Christ. You will have a seed more than the stars of heaven. In you shall all the nations of the earth be blessed.

I thought that's what he said to Abraham. He did. But it was because of Christ that he said it to Abraham. It was in Christ that Abraham got that blessing. In you shall all the nations of the earth be blessed. And you know, it sounds like the Lord is And he is, to an extent, talking to Abraham, because right after Abraham had offered up Isaac's, when the Lord told him this in Genesis 22, and the Lord said, I'm gonna do this for you because you obeyed my voice. Well, he obeyed his voice by going up that mountain with Isaac. But read that as speaking to Christ. In you shall all the nations of the earth be blessed because you've obeyed my voice. He did it perfectly. Christ did it in perfection. and he did it on behalf of his people.

God's eternal promise of eternal life, promise of eternal inheritance with God is freely given. We don't do a thing to earn it, freely given to those who stop working. to those who stop trying to look to themselves, stop trying to look to their work, stop trying to look to their law keeping, their church attendance, their morality, all these things, and believe on Christ alone. That's who he gives his promise to. And it's so much by grace that he even has to give us the faith and the repentance. God has raised Christ from the dead to be a prince and a savior for to grant repentance unto Israel, his chosen Israel. And Paul said in Ephesians 2, by grace are you saved through faith and that's not of yourselves, it's the gift of God, not of works lest any man should boast. Everything God does for us is by his free and sovereign grace.

I hate when I hear people say, I made Christ the Lord of my life. God beat you to it, God made him the prince, he's Lord. And that's how come he don't have a problem getting the gospel to his people and making his people understand they are sinners and they need Christ and giving us the faith to cast it all on him and repentance to turn from ourselves and everything about us.

All right, now, here's the before and after. Now, be sure to get this. This is vital because these folks These Gentiles had believed on Christ, and the Pharisees were saying, it's okay to believe on Christ for righteousness, but if you're gonna be holy except you keep the law, you can't be saved. They were coming to them after they believed and saying, now you gotta go to law and keep it.

I've heard men use Christ's Sermon on the Mount and say, see, we're under a stricter law than they were under. You gotta work harder to obey what Christ says. That's not what Christ is teaching in the Sermon on the Mount. That's building your house on shifting sand, what he ends that sermon with. And when the storm of God's judgment comes, that house is not gonna stand. if it's up to you and your works and your law keeping. It will not stand. Christ is the foundation. Only Christ. No other foundation can no other man lay than that is laid. It's Christ. Christ.

All right, here's the before and after. Verse 23, before faith came, we were kept under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed. Wherefore, the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ that we might be justified by faith. But after that faith is come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster. Now listen, before faith came, capital F, before Christ the faithful came, How do we know that that's what that means? Because it says right there in verse 22 that this is faith that has to be revealed. Verse 24, before faith came, we were kept under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed. This is Christ.

Go to Romans 1.16, I'll show you. We're talking about Christ.

Romans 1.16. Paul said, I'm not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth, to the Jew first and also to the Greek, for therein is the righteousness of God revealed. Now watch the next word. From, capital F, faith, from Christ the faithful to the faith that he's given in his child. So our text says, before Christ the faithful came and revealed the faithful one to you, before that happened, we were kept under the law, shut up.

Now strictly speaking, that word is only written to Jews because Gentiles were never under that law. We were never under that law. Strictly speaking, he's just talking to Jews. That's why when in Acts 15, when they came with this notion that these Gentiles have to be circumcised and keep the law, Peter objected sternly. He said, neither we nor our fathers could keep that law. Why do you want to bring these Gentiles under that law? They never were under it. You and me never were under the law, given it silence.

But in regard to what Christ does, when he makes you hear that law, here's what he does. He makes you to hear that law say, you are guilty. And he shuts you up. He literally shuts you out. He makes you hear that law's guilty. He makes you see that in ourselves, we're the curse, and we're cursed. And we deserve condemnation. He makes you know and hear that law, that law For the Jews at Wanner, that law was a hard teacher. And it is for us when the Lord begins to make us hear it. He said in verse 24, the law was our schoolmaster.

The word is pedagogue. And what a pedagogue did, a man who was a wealthy king or whatever, he would hire a pedagogue. And here you got a son who's the heir of the king. Everything's gonna be given to him. But he brought his son under a pedagogue. a school teacher, a master. And what that pedagogue did is he goes around and teaches that kid how to act and how to be able to sit at a stately dinner at a king's table and behave and how to conduct himself.

And he's not a very nice person. The pedagogue would slap his hands. The pedagogue would stick him in a corner. The pedagogue would lock him in a room. He'd do all these things to take the rebellion out of that kid. He would just whip him and whip him and whip him. That's what the law was for us. A hard taskmaster.

Because it's not that there's anything wrong with the law. It's that God makes you hear the law, and every turn you make to try to grasp some last straw that you can come to God by the law, the law slaps your hand and says, you can't come to him that way. You're a sinner. But the Lord does this to make you come to Christ, to make you see you have to have Christ, to make you see.

We were heirs of God by divine election, but we didn't know it. But while we were still children, the law was saying to us, you can't come to God in me. You can't come to God in me. But then faith came. Christ, the faithful one, came. And after he's come and given us faith, we're not under that law anymore.

Now, the illustration of this schoolmaster, he's gonna deal with it in Galatians 4. Let me just read it to you. Galatians 4, verse 1. Now I say that the heir, as long as he is a child, differeth nothing from a servant, though he be Lord of all. But he's under tutors and governors, schoolmasters, until the time appointed of the father. Even so, we, when we were children, were in bondage under the elements of the world. That's the picture. That's the picture.

But after Christ has come, look at verse 25, Galatians 3.25. After that faith has come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster. for you're all children of God by faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There's neither Jew nor Greek, bond nor free, male nor female, you're all one in Christ Jesus. And I read it right there in Galatians 4.

Galatians 4.4, when the fullness of the time was come, God sent for this son made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons.

And because you are sons, you didn't know it, you were still under the schoolmaster, being whipped. But because you were sons, God sent forth the spirit of his son into your heart, crying, Abba, Father. And for the first time, you called out to God for mercy. And he revealed to you, Christ is all your righteousness. Now then, wherefore, you're no more a servant, under a schoolmaster. You're a son of God. And if you're a son, then you're an heir of God through Christ Jesus.

You see that? Before faith came, before Christ came and the spirit of his son entered your heart and taught you this, you thought you could come to God by the law, and the law was whipping you, saying, no, you can't, no, you can't. And he made you hear it. to see I can't come to God in the law. I'm a sinner condemned. And that spirit of the Lord in you, faith came. He came to you and he gave you faith. From faith to faith, he revealed he's your righteousness. And for the first time, he brought you to cry out, Abba, Father. Now you're not under the schoolmaster. You're not under the law. You're a child of God. You're a child of God. And you're an heir of God.

And all of this is through the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ because of what he did. So Christ has entered covenant. He's going to bring us to the Father. And God has promised us we're going to have that inheritance. Do you think that Christ is going to let one of his children perish? He's leading us by the Spirit, by this gospel, and he's going to keep every one of us and he will not Let us go. God's word is at stake. God's faithful character's at stake. His holy and righteous and just and holy faithful character's at stake. So look at the last word.

If you be Christ, then way back there when God told Abraham, Abraham, I'm gonna give you children like the stars of the heaven and like the sand of the sea. When God told Abraham that all that time ago, if you're Christ, God was talking about you. Isn't that crazy? That just makes me just, God was talking about us, brethren, because we're spiritual children of Abraham. And if you're Abraham's seed, you're God's sons, you're heirs of God, and it's all according to God's promise.

God doesn't lie. He's true. All right. Lord, thank you for this word. We pray you bless it and keep us knowing Christ is all to us. Lord, keep leading us by your word and don't let us return again to ourselves. Keep us looking only to Christ. Thank you, Lord, for this gospel. Thank you for your dear son. Thank you for giving us ears to hear. giving us hearts to believe you. Lord, make us walk before you by faith. Make us continue by faith, led by your son, led by your spirit, looking only to Christ. Keep us running the race, looking to the one who authored it and finished it for us. We ask it in Christ Jesus, amen.

Why the Law!

Key Quotes

What does the Bible say about the purpose of the law?

How do we know justification by faith is true?

Why is understanding the law important for Christians?

What does it mean that Christ fulfilled the law?

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Why the Law!

Key Quotes

What does the Bible say about the purpose of the law?

How do we know justification by faith is true?

Why is understanding the law important for Christians?

What does it mean that Christ fulfilled the law?

Sermon Transcript

About Clay Curtis

Comments

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