Grace and Law (part 1) - Grace and law and the old and new covenants
Hebrews 8:6 But as it is, Christ has obtained a ministry that is as much more excellent than the old as the covenant he mediates is better, since it is enacted on better promises.
7 For if that first covenant had been faultless, there would have been no occasion to look for a second.
8 For he finds fault with them when he says: “Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will establish a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah,
9 not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt. For they did not continue in my covenant, and so I showed no concern for them, declares the Lord.
10 For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my laws into their minds, and write them on their hearts, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.
11 And they shall not teach, each one his neighbor and each one his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest.
12 For I will be merciful toward their iniquities, and I will remember their sins no more.”
13 In speaking of a new covenant, he makes the first one obsolete. And what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away.
The concept of covenant governs our understanding of meeting requirements or standards, and as far as the old and the new covenants are concerned, it seems that the old is one that required an effort on the part of the people and when they did not follow through the requirements of the law, the Lord showed no concern for them. The old covenant placed the onus on men to fulfil the law (self-effort approach) while the new derived an empowerment from the Lord. Hebrews 8:10 tells us that the new covenant is one in which the law is written directly on the hearts of men, and this refers to the born-again nature that men become birthed into at the point of regeneration of their spirit-man when they are “saved” (or what we like to call it).
There is nothing wrong with the law. The psalmist David wrote that God’s law is perfect. Jesus Himself came to fulfil the law. If it is imperfect or flawed, then God has made a mistake in instituting it or coming in the flesh to fulfil. In essence, there is nothing wrong with the law.
What then is the issue if there is nothing wrong with the law?
The issue is with how the covenants were instituted. A covenant is a contract or a will, something that is legally binding. Hebrews 8:7-8 tells us that the first covenant had a fault and Hebrews 8:13 tells us that the new covenant makes the old one obsolete. You may be asking at this juncture, “Why in the world did God institute a first covenant if He knew that it was flawed?”. Well, the answer is simple. The very thing that caused the fall of man was still evident after the fall: self-focus (Gen 3:5 “…you shall be like God.”) and God addressed it by bringing in the law and its statutes and deliberately tied the law in with the need for men to keep all of it.
James 2:10-11 For whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become accountable for all of it. For he who said, “Do not commit adultery,” also said, “Do not murder.” If you do not commit adultery but do murder, you have become a transgressor of the law.
However, Man is never able to keep the law fully. Somewhere somehow down the line of his life, he would have erred in at least one point and in so doing, failed in fulfilling the whole of the law. The law was designed to point out the inadequacies in Man in keeping its perfect nature. Like a game of snake and ladders, you can progress higher and higher up the ladder (on your own) thinking that you are doing fine until you hit a snake (sin) and it was as if you failed to do any good from the start.
The instituting of the two covenants did not change the fact that the law still has to be fulfilled, but while the old focused on “doing and keeping”, the new focuses on “done and upholding”. The law is not done away simply because we are emplaced under the new covenant.
Romans 3:19-20 Now we know that whatever the law says it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God. For by works of the law no human being will be justified in His sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin.
The oft-quoted passage in Romans 3 given above tells us clearly that no one can ever be justified before God by keeping the law and that the law can only bring about knowledge of sin. This means that without the law, although sin is present, we will not have knowledge of what exactly constitutes sin. It is like the speed limit on the road. Without the speed limit, all we can say is “I think you are going a little too fast”, but with the speed limit, we can now say, “You are speeding.” The law passes an absolute and explicitly spells out when the line is cross, and even pegs a punishment that commensurates the breaking of that law. Romans 4:15 tells us, “For the law brings wrath, but where there is no law there is no transgression.”
The apostle Paul continued in Romans 3:28 “For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law” and at Romans 3:31 answered a pertinent point that he knew would be one of contention if left unanswered, “Do we then overthrow the law by this faith? By no means! On the contrary, we uphold the law.” In other words, although we are not justified by keeping the law, it does not mean that the law is now obsolete and to be thrown away. It is the old covenant that is obsolete, not the law!
In fact, on the contrary, the law is to be upheld.
Question: “Do you mean that God instituted the new covenant that makes us righteous by our faith through His grace only to bring us under the law again?”
The phrase “under the law” (or “under law”) really means to be subjected to the workings of the law, which basically spells out boundaries to be kept, usually tied in with consequences to govern behaviour and enforce order. Romans 6:14 tells us that “For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace.” In other words, we are not subjected to the workings of the law (dos and don’ts) but yet, it does not mean that we are free to sin.
The issue here lies with upholding the law under the new covenant VS being placed under law under the old covenant. So God made us righteous under the new covenant by our faith alone instead of us having to come into right standing with Him by us working the law out; our faith alone suffices. Yet, under this covenant, it does not remove the need for the fulfilment of the law. The law was fully fulfilled by Jesus through whom the new covenant was instituted. All we are expected to do is to uphold it.
The short answer to this is - God instituted the new covenant that makes us righteous by our faith through His grace and expects us to uphold the law.
What does it mean then to uphold the law? Well, stay tuned to the next part!
Jason
