The Believer And God’s Holy Law

Romans 10:4

Frequently, the word “law” is used in the Old Testament, particularly in the Psalms, to refer to the whole Word of God, the whole revelation of God and his will in Holy Scripture. Sometimes the word “law” is used to refer to the ceremonial and dietary law, and sometimes to the civil law given to the nation of Israel. And the word “law” is often used to refer specifically to the ten commandments as recorded in Exodus 20. That is what preachers and theologians usually refer to when they use the word ‘law” with reference to the law of God.

The ten commandments are commonly referred to as “the moral law”. However, you will search the Word of God in vain to find a separation between the ten commandments and the other laws given by the hand of Moses to the children of Israel. When the scriptures declare that believers in Christ are free from the law and that Christ is the end of the law, the declaration is that we are free from all the Mosaic law (civil, dietary, economic, and moral) by which the nation of Israel was governed in the Old Testament.

Many try to separate the moral law, the ten commandments, from the rest of the law of God given by the hand of Moses to Israel. We are told that the believer is free from the dietary laws, circumcision laws, sacrificial laws, etc.; but he is still under the moral law. But when Paul told the Galatians that such doctrine as that is nothing better than witchcraft (Gal. 3:1), and affirmed our total freedom from the law, he quoted from a passage from Deuteronomy which specifically refers to the ten commandments (Gal. 3:10; Deut. 27:14-26).

The Believer’s law, our rule of life, is not one section of Scripture, but the whole revealed will of God in Holy Scripture. We take the Word of God in its entirety as our only rule of faith and practice. However, we rejoice in the fact that we are no longer ruled, motivated, or governed by the law. We do not live before God upon legal principles. Therefore we sing with joy,

“Free from the law, oh, happy condition!

Christ has redeemed us from every transgression.”

When the Word of God declares, as it universally does, that all who look to Christ as their Lord and Savior, that all who own him as their King, are totally free from the law, this is what that freedom means:

· We have no covenant with the law. We live under a covenant of grace.

· We have no commitment to the law. Our commitment is to Christ, who obeyed the law for us.

· We do nothing by constraint of the law. “The love of Christ constraineth us.’

· We fear no curse from the law. “Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us. For it is written, Cursed is everyone that hangeth on a tree.” “There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus.”

Don Fortner