Deuteronomy 5:22 These words the LORD spoke to all your assembly in the mount out of the middle of the fire, of the cloud, and of the thick darkness… The moral law is, from its very nature, unchangeable, and of perpetual obligation; nor can we read the history of its promulgation without seeing that the greatest care was taken to distinguish it from all other laws, and more especially from those judicial and ceremonial laws which were given for the special guidance of the Jewish people. I. THE LAW IS OUR SCHOOLMASTER TO BRING US TO CHRIST. Leighton truly says, "It is a weak conceit, arising upon the mistake of the Scriptures, to make Christ and Moses as opposites. No, Moses was the servant in the house and Christ the Son; and being a faithful servant, he is not contrary to the Son, but subordinate to Him." By showing us what God requires, the law discloses to us our own manifold transgressions, for by the law is the knowledge of sin. It conveys to us much and important instruction concerning God and concerning ourselves. It teaches us His holiness and our unholiness, His righteousness and our unrighteousness, His infinite perfections and our fallen and imperfect condition. Thus the law, when listened to in the spirit of reverence and godly fear, must produce conviction of sin, and prepare the soul for the reception of Christ. It is our schoolmaster for this great end, that by holy discipline and faithful teaching it may lead us to Him in whom alone salvation is to be found, and of whom we read that "Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believeth." II. THE LAW IS THE PERPETUAL RULE OF DUTY TO ALL WHO BELIEVE IN CHRIST. In our Divine Surety we see that the law has been perfectly fulfilled, its honour maintained, and its demands fully satisfied. And through His Almighty power, whose purpose is from everlasting, the righteousness which the Lord Jesus presented to the law is imputed to His people — it is unto all and upon all them that believe. It is the spotless robe in which they are accepted now at the throne of grace, and in which they shall be presented hereafter faultless before the throne of glory. How vainly do they talk who speak of the abrogation of the moral law! They forget that He has said, and will perform it, "I will put My laws into their minds, and write them in their hearts, and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to Me a people." Well, then, might the apostle triumphantly exclaim, "Do we make void the law through faith? God forbid; yea, we establish the law." Trusting in the Saviour, the believer is secure; but if his faith is genuine and sincere, he will ever seek to have that mind in him which was also in Christ Jesus, and he will be constrained to say, as the Psalmist did, "Oh, how love I Thy law: it is my meditation all the day!" (W. Niven, B. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: These words the LORD spake unto all your assembly in the mount out of the midst of the fire, of the cloud, and of the thick darkness, with a great voice: and he added no more. And he wrote them in two tables of stone, and delivered them unto me. |
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