Note: Francis David Nichol (1897 –1966) was born in Australia, but his family moved to Loma Linda, California, in 1905, when he was 8 years old. Nichol was graduated from the Pacific Union College in 1920 and joined the staff of Signs of the Times the next year. In 1927, he became an associate editor of Adventist Review; in 1945, upon the retirement of Francis Wilcox, Nichol became the editor of the Review, a post which he held until his death in 1966.

This is Section One of the book, “Answers to Objections” containing the first 19 objections to the continuing obligation of the moral law.

Objection 1: Adventists quote much from the Old Testament in proof of their doctrines, particularly the law and the Sabbath. Shouldn’t Christians find their guidance and doctrines in the New Testament?

We do quote much from the Old Testament. We also quote much from the New. Because we are Christians and believe that all Scripture is inspired, we make no distinction in authority between the Old and the New Testament. We believe that the whole Bible, from Genesis to Revelation, is inspired by God and thus rightly the guide for our lives.

Some people, when they discuss the law and the Sabbath, seek to set up a contrast or even conflict between the Old and the New Testament, as though the former were of little or no value and superseded by the latter. This false contrast lies at the root of much of the erroneous reasoning of those who contend that the Sabbath was abolished at the cross.

The “Bible” of the apostles was what we know as the Old Testament. What is now known as the New Testament did not exist during the life of Christ, and did not even begin to be written until years after His ascension. Nor were there printing presses and overnight mail to distribute these writings. Only slowly did they gain circulation. During most of the first century of the Christian Era, the term “the Scriptures,” often mentioned by the New Testament writers, referred to what we call the Old Testament. To sum up, the Old Testament was the Bible of Jesus, His disciples, the Apostles, and the other gospel and New Testament writers, such as John and Luke.

Moreover, the Old Testament is about the Messiah, his atoning death, his resurrection, and much else about him. The reason the disciples did not understand the events of crucifixion week was that they did not rightly understand the Old Testament.

Christ admonished the Jews to “search the scriptures; for in them you think you have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me.” John 5:39. And then He added, “Had you believed Moses, you would have believed me: for he wrote of me. But if you believe not his writings, how shall you believe my words?” Verses 46, 47.

On His resurrection day, on the Road to Emmaus, “beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself.” Luke 24:27. Then, back in Jerusalem, He appeared to the disciples, saying,

“‘This is what I told you while I was still with you: Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms.’ Then he opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures.” Luke 24:44-45.

Again, for Christ, the Scriptures were the Old Testament; He knew nothing of any notion of discounting, deprecating, or running down the Old Testament.

Nor did the apostles give any hint that they discounted the Old Testament in favor of the writings they were then producing, and would later produce. Paul wrote to Timothy:

“From a child thou has known the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.” 2 Tim. 3:15-17.

Could the New Testament accomplish more than this! Both Christ and the apostles repeatedly cited the Old Testament in confirmation of their teachings. To Satan, Christ said, “It is written,” and thrice quoted the Old Testament. (See Matt. 4:4-10) He chided the scribes and Pharisees by quoting the fifth commandment, from the book of Exodus, and by quoting the words of Isaiah. (See Matt. 15:1-9) See also Christ's conversation with the rich young ruler and with the lawyer. (Matt. 19: 16-19; Luke 10:25-28) Prominent in these references to the Old Testament are the quotations from the Ten Commandments.

How did Paul prove that all men, Jews and Gentiles, were guilty before God and thus in need of the salvation offered through Christ? By quoting from the Old Testament. (See Rom. 3:9-18)

How did Paul know that he himself was a sinner before God and in need of the gospel? By calling to mind what was written in the Old Testament, specifically what was written in the Ten Commandments. (See Rom. 7:7) To the church at Rome Paul commanded: “Owe no man anything, but to love one another: for he that loves another hath fulfilled the law.” Rom. 13:8.

Did Paul profess to be setting forth a new code, which was the result of a new revelation then given to him? No, he quotes the Old Testament, and specifically the Ten Commandments. (See verses 9, 10) And how did Paul support his appeal to children to obey their parents? By quoting from the Old Testament, specifically the Ten Commandments. (See Eph. 6:1-3.)

As James develops his argument against having “respect to persons,” does he set forth new laws? No, he quotes the Old Testament, focusing on citations from the Ten Commandments. (See James 2:8-12)

And what proof did Peter offer in support of his declaration that we should be “holy”? “Because it is written, Be you holy; for 1 am holy.” 1 Peter 1:16. His proof is a quotation from Leviticus 11:44.

The Scriptures, from Genesis to Revelation, are one whole. The source of the Old and the New Testament is the same: the inspiration of the Holy Spirit of God. Their objective is the same: to unfold the plan of God, to reveal Christ, to warn against sin, and to present God's holy standard of right.

Someone long ago well observed: The New Testament is concealed in the Old, the Old Testament is revealed in the New. We can best understand the promise in the last book of the Bible, of a re-created, a new, earth and a verdant tree of life, when we turn to the first book of the Bible that describes. The good earth, with its original tree of life, that came forth from God’s hand when He first created this world. We best grasp the meaning of the cross, and Christ’s words, “I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me,” when we read the Genesis account of man’s fall.

We should never forget that the very titles “Old Testament” and “New Testament” are man-made titles. Bible writers do not thus divide the Scriptures. Both Testaments deal with the drama of sin and salvation. The Old Testament presents the promise of a new earth and a new covenant, as well as picturing man’s iniquities from earliest days. The New Testament discusses at length the “old man” of sin and the ancient problem of man's rebellion, as well as describing the “new man” in Christ Jesus and the glories of a world to come.

The interrelationship of Old Testament to New, the dependence of one on the other, has ever been understood by our adversary the devil. That is why he long ago began his attacks on the Bible by seeking to undermine the historicity and authenticity of the Old Testament.

It was at this point that higher criticism of the Bible began. And with the Old destroyed, the New soon collapses for lack of historical foundation and meaning. It is understandable that Modernists [liberals] should be found minimizing the spiritual authority and significance of the Old Testament.

But what is inexplicable is the attitude toward the Old Testament of some who consider themselves Fundamentalists. Why would they seek to tear in two the seamless garment of Scripture? Why should they set forth the doctrine that a holy command of God in the Old Testament must wait for restatement in the New before it has authority in the Christian Era?

It is beyond clear that the New Testament writers quoted from the Old, not to inform their readers that a particular passage from the Old was still binding, but rather to corroborate, and lend the Old Testament’s authority to, their own new writings. In other words, the apostles, who reminded their readers that the “holy men of God” in “old time” “spoke as they were moved by the Holy Ghost,” wished their readers to see that they were speaking by the same Holy Ghost. (2 Peter 1:21) Hence they repeatedly cited, in support of their own teachings, the words of those “holy men” who wrote the Old Testament.

It is true that the ceremonial ritual described in the Old Testament expired at the cross, because it had been fulfilled—shadow had met reality, type had met anti-type. And of course the New Testament writers clearly state that those rites had come to an end. (Gal. 5:1-6; Eph. 2:14-16; Col. 2:14-17; Rom. 14:1-15:7) But that fact in no way makes the Old Testament inferior to the New, or justifies the contention that the New supplants the Old.

Objection 2: Adventists seek to prove that there are two laws described in the Bible, one moral, the other ceremonial. But there is only one law.

The logic of the objection is this: There is but one law; the Bible speaks clearly of a law abolished; therefore, the Ten Commandments were abolished, including, necessarily, the Fourth Commandment, on which Adventists build their case for the Sabbath. So much false reasoning has been reared on this “one-law” doctrine that it must be considered at length.

The word “law” is used in the Bible in a number of ways. For example, in the phrase, “the law and the prophets,” the word “law” means the five books of Moses, the Pentateuch, because in these books the laws are set forth. It is obviously true that the word “law” is often used in Scripture without reference to any particular code or set of laws, as a collective term to describe any and all laws, but this does not mean that only one law exists.

To contend that every time the Bible uses the word “law” it means the same code would be as reasonable as to contend that every time the Bible uses the word “day” it means the same period of time. “Day” may mean (1) the light part of the twenty-four-hour cycle, that is, day in contrast to night, or (2) the whole twenty-four-hour period, as seven days in a week, or (3) an indefinite period of time, as “now is the day of salvation.” What would we think of a man who reasoned that because there is a text that speaks of the ending of the day, therefore the “day of salvation” has ended?

Why Does Paul Say “the Law was Abolished” and also “We Establish the Law”?

The Bible does say that “the law-was-abolished-by Christ.” (See Eph. 2:15) But Paul, who wrote that statement, also declares: “Do we, then, make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law.” Rom. 3:31. The contrast between the statements is sharpened when attention is called to the fact that Paul used the same Greek root for the words here translated “abolished” and “make void.” That root, kataigeo, means “to make inoperative,” “to cause to cease,” “to do away with,” “annul,” “abolish.”

But did the inspired writer say to one church that the law is abolished, and then to another church exclaim, “God forbid,” at the very thought that the law-is abolished, and refer to the same law ill each instance? Paul must obviously be speaking of two different laws. The contrast between these two texts is alone sufficient to expose the fallacy of the argument that the Bible speaks only of one law.

How the Ten Commandment Law Was Very Distinct from Other Law

The first formal recording of all codes of divine laws was at the time of the Exodus. Then it was that God who had chosen a people for His name, set them on their way to the Promised Land. The former centuries possessed no Scriptures, for none of the sixty-six books of the Bible had been written. Through Moses God began to give to men a written revelation to guide them, and from his day onward (with one striking exception) the words of God for man have been penned by human agents, the prophets.

That one exception was a code of laws that God spoke to men with His own voice. Sacred history records no other sermon ever preached by God to man amid the supernatural, flaming glory that surrounds the eternal God. Referring to this lone majestic instance, Moses declared to Israel:

“For ask now of the days that are past, which were before thee, since the day that God created man upon the earth, and ask from the one side of heaven unto the other, whether there hath been any such tiling as this great thing is, or hath been heard like it? Did ever people hear the voice of God speaking out of the midst of the fire, as thou has heard, and live?” Deut. 4:32, 33.

And when God had spoken the code, the ten commandments, the record declares, “He added no more.” (See Deut. 5:22) The sermon was finished, it was a complete whole, there was nothing more that God desired to add. Then He wrote down the sermon with His own hand on two tables of stone. (Deut. 5:22)

On no other document in the history of mankind has the hand of God ever been inscribed. “The tables were the work of God, and the writing was the writing of God, graven upon the tables.” Ex. 32:16. And what God wrote on those tables of stone He described as a law. (See Ex. 24:12)

Then follows another dramatic moment, a sequel to the giving and the writing of this law. Moses started down from the mount with the two tables in his hands. He was bringing to Israel the permanent record of that awesome sermon by the God of heaven. His indignation at the sight of Israelites worshiping the golden calf caused him to dash the stones to earth and break them, a symbol of their breaking of the divine code

Did the Lord then command Moses to write a copy of the code to take the place of the broken tables? No. The Lord wrote the Ten Commandments a second time on new tables of stone. A most distinctive code, indeed, that God Himself should twice write it on stone. He entrusted to His prophets many vital messages for men, but the Ten Commandments He wrote Himself.

The focal point, the most holy object of the religious service instituted by God for the Israelites, was the ark of the covenant, above which hovered the holy light of the presence of God. When, in the journeying of the Israelites, the ark was to be moved, none were to touch it lest they die. And in that most sacred of all the sacred objects of the sanctuary Moses was instructed to place the tables of stone. (Deut. 10:5) Nor was any other code of laws placed within that sacred ark. “There was nothing in the ark save the two tables of stone, which Moses put there at Horeb.” 1 Kings 8:9.

Let us summarize these historical facts concerning the giving of the ten-commandment law:

1. God spoke the law with His own voice in the hearing of all Israel-He gave no other law in that way.
2. God wrote the ten-commandment law with His is own ﬁnger-the only law that He ever wrote out for man.
3. God wrote the law on stone, and Himself prepared the stone-the only law of Bible record that was ever thus written.
4. God sent Moses down from the mount in the sight of all Israel, bearing the two tables of stone that contained only the Ten Commandments.
5. God Himself rewrote the law after Moses had broken the ﬁrst tables.
6. God instructed Moses to place the tables within the ark of the covenant. The only law thus honored.

Many objectors profess to be unable to ﬁnd in the Bible any grounds for believing that the ten commandment law is a distinct code of laws, not to be confused with any other code. We would ask: If they could have dictated the manner of the giving of this law, and had wished to provide convincing proof that it was a law set apart, what procedure could they possibly have followed that would have set it apart more fully?

The Other “Law”

But the ten-commandment law was not the only one formally set forth by God at Sinai. There was a code of laws, known as ceremonial laws, that gave the rules for the religious ritual that the Jews should follow; for example, their sacriﬁces and offerings, their annual feast-days, the duties of the priesthood. Leviticus is ﬁlled with these laws. There were also civil laws to govern the Jews as a nation, such as laws on marriage, divorce, slave holding, property. (See Exodus 21)

To the extent that the spiritual understanding and willingness of the Israelites permitted, the Lord caused these civil statutes to reﬂect the high ideals of the ten-commandment law. But often God lowered the standard to meet the people where they were. The provisions governing slave-holding are one illustration of such an accommodation of the low spiritual state of a people. Divorce is another; of the divorce statute Christ declared: “Moses because of the hardness of your hearts suffered you to put away your wives: but from the beginning it was not so.” Matt. 19:8; Mark 10:4-6.

But these ceremonial and civil laws were not given by God directly to Israel. As to how God made these laws known, who wrote them, and where they were deposited, the Scriptures are clear:

1. After stating that the Lord wrote the Ten Commandments “upon two tables of stone,” Moses adds immediately: “And the Lord commanded me at that time to teach you statutes and judgments.” Deut. 4:13,14. A later Bible writer sets forth the same distinction: “Neither will I make the feet of Israel move any more out of the land which I gave their fathers: only if they will observe to do according to all I have commanded them, and according to all the law that my servant Moses commanded them.” 2 Kings 21:8.

2. In telling the events of Sinai, Nehemiah, in addressing the Lord, also speaks of the fact that certain laws were spoken by God and others were given to Israel through Moses writing them out: “Thou came down also upon mount Sinai, and spoke with them from heaven, and gave them right judgments, and true laws, good statutes and commandments: and made known unto them thy holy Sabbath, and commanded them precepts, statutes, and laws, by the hand of Moses thy servant.” Neh. 9:13, 14. 2. “Moses wrote this law.” Deut. 31:9.

3. “And it came to pass, when Moses had made an end of writing the words of this law in a book, until they were ﬁnished, that Moses commanded the Levites, which bare the ark of the covenant of the Lord, saying, Take this book of the law, and put it in the side of the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God, that it may be there for a witness against thee.” Deut. 31:24-26. The words: “Put it in the side of the ark,” might seem to suggest that this book was placed within the ark. But that would make it contradict the already quoted words of Scripture, that the Ten Commandments was the only law placed therein. The Revised Version reads: “Put it by the side of the ark.” Most commentators agree with this RSV translation.

Because of the fact that the ceremonial law, and also the civil statutes, were written out by Moses, and by him given to the people, they are generally described in the Bible as "the law of Moses." See, for example:

2 Chron. 23:18. Priests to offer burnt offerings, "as it is written in the law of Moses."
2 Chron. 30:16. Priests conducting Passover “according to the law of Moses.”
Ezra 3:2. Building of an altar for burnt offerings “as it is written in the law of Moses.”
Dan. 9:13. The destruction of Jerusalem had come “as it is written in the law of Moses.”
Malachi 4:4. “Remember you the law of Moses my servant, which I commanded unto him in Horeb [Sinai] for all Israel.”

The New Testament also reveals, in many of its references to law, the same distinction between the ten-commandment law and the code of laws given through Moses. Note the following references to the law of rites and ceremonies, sometimes described as the “law of Moses” and sometimes simply as “the law”:

1. “If a man on the Sabbath day receive circumcision, that the law of Moses should not be broken.” John 7:23.
2. “But there rose up certain of the sect of tile Pharisees which believed, saying, That it was needful to circumcise them, and to command them to keep the law of Moses.” Acts 15:5. Later in the chapter, when the claim of these Pharisees is restated, it is abbreviated thus: “You must be circumcised, and keep the law.” Verse 24. This well illustrates how a New Testament writer may use the non-specific phrase, “the law,” and yet mean a speciﬁc law, in this instance, “the law of Moses.” The context is generally sufﬁcient to make clear what law is intended. Certainly if circumcision is under discussion in the New Testament—and it is often the bone of contention—it is sufﬁcient to refer to the code of laws enjoining circumcision, simply as “the law”; that is, the law of rites and ceremonies given by Moses.
3. “The law of commandments contained in ordinances.” Eph. 2:15.
4. “The sons of Levi, who receive the ofﬁce of the priesthood, have a commandment to take tithes of the people according to the law.” Heb. 7:5.
5. “For the priesthood being changed, there is made of necessity a change also of the law.” Verse 12.
6. “For the law makes men high priests which have inﬁrmity.” Verse 28.
7. “There are priests that offer gifts according to the law.” Heb. 8:4.
8. “And almost all things are by the law purged with blood.” Heb. 9:22.
9. “For the law having a shadow of good things to come, and not the very image of the things, can never with those sacriﬁces which they offered year by year continually make the comers thereunto perfect.” Heb. 10:1.

The ten-commandment law gives no instruction or information on burnt offerings, the Passover, the building of an altar, the judgments that would come on Jerusalem because of disobedience, circumcision, the order of the priesthood. But the Bible repeatedly reveals that there is a law that does give such instruction. That law is the ceremonial law, described in tile Bible as “the law of Moses.”

It is true that “the law of Moses was also the law of God, because God was the author of all that Moses wrote. Hence it is not strange that a Bible writer should, at least occasionally, describe this law of Moses as “the law of the Lord,” though such instances are few. See, for example, Luke 2:22,23, where both phrases are used to describe the same law. However, nowhere in the Bible is the Ten Commandment law called the law of Moses.

Below are some representative New Testament references to another law, which does not deal with rites and ceremonies, but with moral questions, the ten-commandment law, which is also referred to, at times, as simply the commandments:

1. “If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments.” Matt. 19:17. Then Christ immediately names several of the ten commands.
2. “And they returned, and prepared spices and ointments; and rested the Sabbath day according to the commandment.” Luke .23:56.
3. “I had not known sin, but by the law: For I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shall not covet.” Rom. 7:7.
4. “For whosoever shall keep the whole law, yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all. For He that said, Do not commit adultery, said also, Do not kill. Now if thou commit no adultery, yet if thou kill, thou art become a transgressor of the law. So speak you, and so do, as they that shall be judged by the law of liberty.” James 2:10-12.
5. “Whosoever commits sin transgresses also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law.” 1 John 3:4.

What law? Certainly no one in the Christian Era believes the law regarding rites and ceremonies is still in effect. Yet John warns us that transgressing the law is sin. He did not feel it necessary to explain what law he meant. How eloquently that argues that there was a certain law, known to all John’s readers, that was the moral rule of life. What confusion and consternation his words would have created among the ﬁrst century Christians if they had been laboring under the impression that there was but one law, a law that was a mixture of ceremonial and moral precepts, and transgression of that law in the Christian Era is sin!

We grant that there are certain references to “the law,” particularly in Paul's writings, where the context fails to make wholly clear which law is intended. In some instances, it seems evident that neither law is singled out, but only the principle of law, in contrast to grace, is under consideration. But these facts provide no proof that there is only one law. Because there are obscure or difficult texts in the Bible does not mean that we cannot he sure of the meaning of the clear and the simple texts. And those easily understood texts should protect us from drawing
false conclusions from the difficult ones.

Reference to the two laws in terms of the centuries before Moses will also aid us in maintaining a clear distinction between them. Though we may rightly focus on the Exodus as the great time of the giving of the law, both moral and ceremonial, we should not conclude that the time before Moses was a period of no law, at least of no Ten Commandments. This point we shall examine more fully under objection 3. We need only remark here that the Ten Commandments existed in Eden. Also the ﬁrst tender shoots of the ceremonial vine, which was to grow large at the Exodus,
made their appearance in the form of the simple sacrificial services of our ﬁrst parents after sin entered.

Who has not had the experience of looking at a towering tree and marveling at its heavy and varied foliage, only to discover on closer scrutiny that a vine is entwined around the tree and that what appeared to be one is really two. Though a far look at a high branch, especially if it is swaying in the breeze, may fail to reveal this fact, an examination of the trunk near the roots, where the vine ﬁrst makes contact with the tree, leaves no doubt that there are two.

Now the Ten Commandments might be likened to a stately tree, with ten stalwart branches, that our ﬁrst parents found ﬂourishing in the Garden of Eden. After their fall a vine of ceremonial law was planted close by, watered by the blood of animal sacrifices. For centuries the vine grew little if any. Then at the time of the Exodus it suddenly assumed a deﬁnite form and grew large. The tree did not need the vine, but the vine was wholly dependent on the tree. In later centuries men inclined always toward cultivating the vine rather than the tree, until the foliage of the vine well-nigh hid the tree and threatened to choke it.

It is therefore easy to understand why some Christians today, looking at the Biblical word picture of that tree, with its clinging vine, should fail to see that the two are not one. Particularly is this true if the winds of theological discussion are swaying the branches. But as with a literal tree, there need be no uncertainty in the matter if attention is focused, not on the topmost limbs, but on the trunk and roots. An examination of the origins of the two laws, and the formal giving of them at the Exodus, leaves no possible doubt that there were two.

Nor can Adventists claim any special Biblical vision in discerning that there is not just one law. From the days of the Protestant Reformation onward, the great church bodies have clearly seen this and recorded the fact in their creeds and confessions of faith. The claim that there is but one law has recently gained currency among a certain segment of Christians in an attempt to rebut the Sabbath evidence now so vigorously and widely presented by Adventists. In the following pages we shall examine several arguments against the law that build on this one-law theory.

Objection No. 3: The Ten Commandments Did Not Exist Until Sinai.

Because we live after the time of Moses, the law applies to us, and we could leave the matter there. But of course the objector is trying to build a chain of reasoning that goes something like this:

There was no Ten Commandment Law until Moses.
If the world moved along safely for many centuries without the Ten Commandments, then,
Doesn’t it make perfect sense that the Ten Commandment law was abolished at the cross?
Surely, if godly men like Enoch and Abraham needed not the Ten Commandments, why should Christians?

Therefore, because of the subtle reasoning built upon it, we must give some attention to this claim that the Ten Commandments did not exist before Moses.

Right on the face of it this is an unbelievable claim. The Ten Commandments commands men not to make idols, for example, not to take God’s name in vain, not to kill, steal, or commit adultery. Could we possibly bring ourselves to believe that such a code of laws was not in force before Moses? There are some things too incredible to warrant belief, and this is one of them.

Nor, indeed, do any of the leading denominations thus believe. There is no point on which the great branches of the Christian church agree more cordially than that the Ten Commandments were in force from the beginning of the world. (See page 493 for quotations from church creeds on the law of God.)

The plausible core of the objection before us is the assumption that those who sinned before Moses’ day could not possibly have been transgressors of the Ten Commandments, because it had not yet been given. Here is the argument:

“‘Angels sinned’ (2 Peter 2:4), but they did not violate the law of Sinai, for it was not given until thousands of years after they fell and they were not under it anyway. Adam 'sinned' long before that law was given (see Romans 5:12-14); Cain sinned (Gen. 4:7); the Sodomites were 'sinners' (Gen. 13:13), and vexed Lot with their 'unlawful deeds' (2 Peter 2:8). Surely none of these violated 'the law,' which was not given till Moses.”

But the conclusion does not necessarily follow that because the ten precepts of the Ten Commandments were not audibly proclaimed before Sinai, or written down before that date, therefore those precepts were not in existence before that time. Analogy to human laws reveals how unwarranted such a conclusion is.

For long centuries England has had what is known as “the common law,” which law is an integral part of the whole system of English, and later, American, jurisprudence. Judges decided cases on principles that were understood to apply to the facts, even though those principles appeared in no statute book, but only in the minds of the English-speaking peoples. But even unschooled yeomen had had passed on to them enough of the common law to make them often times embarrassingly well acquainted with their primary rights under that law (embarrassing, that is, to tyrants who would deny them their rights) .

There was no particular moment in English history when the common law was all set out in a statute-book and proclaimed by the king as the law of the land. And even if there had been such a moment, what would we think of the person, who, looking back on the event, declared that the law had not existed prior to that great proclamation? How had judges decided cases for all those decades and centuries if the common law did not exist?

No, history teaches us that there is such a thing as “natural law,” law not needing to be written in a statute book in order to be enforced. Even so with the moral laws of God for man. When Adam and Eve were created, they were perfect, did not sin, and served God with a whole heart; we properly conclude that they had the law of God written in their hearts. God also talked to them. For a lifetime of nearly a thousand years they were permitted to pass on the divine instruction they had received. Neither they nor their children needed a code written on parchment or stone.

Paul well says that “the law is not made for a righteous man,” (1 Tim. 1:9) that is, the law as it is ordinarily understood, a formally announced code duly written down. The righteous man doesn’t need a statute book because the law is written on his heart.

After Adam's sin men soon began a rapid descent into the pit of corruption, as Paul describes it. (See Romans 1) Could they excuse their evil deeds on the ground that they were not aware of any law that they had violated? No. Paul emphatically declares that they were “without excuse.” (Verse 20) But how could they be without excuse unless they still retained some knowledge of God's holy requirements and laws? Our accountability for our sins is in terms of our knowledge. (See John 15:22)

Paul enlarges on the matter by explaining that when the “Gentiles, which have not the law [that is, have no written law, no Holy Scriptures containing the moral code], do by nature the things contained in the law, these, having not the law, are a law unto themselves: which show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness.” Rom. 2:14, 15.

We believe there is only one reasonable conclusion from these facts: Though men early fell away from God, the knowledge of Him did not immediately or completely fade from their minds, nor was the divine code, originally written on the hearts of their first parents, Adam and Eve, suddenly erased. The troublesome light of conscience, even though the rays grew dim, ever and anon illumined the dim but heavenly outlines upon the heart.

As the Revised Standard Version translates the passage: “They show that what the law requires is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness and their conflicting thoughts accuse or perhaps excuse them on that day when, according to my gospel, God judges the secrets of men by Christ Jesus.”

Unless we hold that the world before Moses knew sufficiently of the law of God to understand the moral import of their acts, we shall be charging God with injustice in destroying them for their evil deeds. The only possible way for the objector to avoid the embarrassing force of this fact is to contend that though men who lived before Moses knew nothing of the Ten Commandments, they did have a knowledge of certain eternal moral principles of heaven. If this reasoning has any validity, it must reside in the assumption that these eternal moral principles—left undefined by the objector—were different from the Ten Commandments. Only thus call it be held that the Ten Commandments are not eternal.

But what principles are more eternally moral than those of the Ten Commandments? And how could God be just in condemning the ancients for deeds that we can describe as sinful only by their nonconformity to the Ten Commandments, if indeed these commandments were not yet in force? Furthermore, if all the sinful deeds of devils and ancient men call be judged and condemned in terms of the Ten Commandments, what need is there to invoke some wholly undefined, unrevealed, moral principles in order to deal with the moral rebellion of those who lived long ago?

And can their deeds be condemned as sinful in terms of the Ten Commandments? Yes. The Bible says that Satan was “a murderer from the beginning,” and also “a liar, and the father of lies.” John 8:44. He also sought to set himself up in the place of God, a violation of the first commandment. Adam and Eve most certainly coveted the forbidden fruit, else they would not have reached for it when God had expressly forbidden it. Cain killed his brother. The Sodomites were distinguished by their lustfulness, and Christ tells us that the seventh commandment covers both the impure thought and the impure act. All of these sins were transgressions of the Ten Commandments.

But we are not left to deduction in order to reach the conclusion that the Ten Commandments were in force before Sinai. The Bible writers have much to say on the topic. How do they define sin? “Sin is the transgression of the law,” says John. (1 John 3:4) And Paul observes, “Where no law is, there is no transgression,” “for by the law is the knowledge of sin.” Rom. 4:15; 3:20. We are left in no possible doubt as to what law is intended, for Paul adds, “I had not known sin, but by the law: for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shall not covet.” Rom. 7:7.

What law says, “Thou shall not ovet”? Obviously the Ten Commandment law.

When James spoke of those who “commit sin, and are convinced of the law as transgressors,” he also left no doubt as to which law he meant. It is the law that says, “Do not commit adultery,” and, “Do not kill.” James 2:9-11.

There are those who say, and we quote their words, that “sin is a disregard for some law, but not necessarily the so-called 'moral law,' or the Ten Commandments.” But that is not what Paul and James say. We do not see how they could more clearly have stated that the breaking of a certain law is sin and that that law is the ten-commandment law.

Furthermore, the objectors forget to tell us what law John means - 1 John 3:4 - if he does not mean the Ten Commandments. They do not know, for the Bible throws no light on "some law morally binding on men other than the Ten Commandments. And the objectors as well as we are dependent on the revelations of Scripture. The same was true of those who lived in John's day.

Hence, how incredible that he should define sin—that awful thing that keeps men out of heaven—as the “transgression of the law,” without defining what law he meant, if indeed he meant some other law than Paul and James meant when they wrote of sin! The very fact that John offered no explanatory comment as to what law he meant, is the strongest proof possible that he meant the law which his readers, who by now had read Paul and James, understood as "the law', the Ten Commandments.

A favorite text of those who seek to prove that the Ten Commandments was unknown before Sinai is Moses' statement: "The Lord made not this covenant with our fathers, but with us, even us, who are all of us here alive this day." Deut. 5:3. The argument runs thus: God declares that the. Ten Commandments are His covenant. Moses is here speaking of this covenant and declares it was not made with the fathers before Sinai, therefore the Ten Commandments were not given, in fact were unknown, before that time.

What strange beliefs we would have to hold if we came to this conclusion! In the immediately preceding chapter Moses refers to this covenant and warns Israel: “Take heed unto yourselves, lest you forget the covenant of the Lord your God, which he made with you, and make you a graven image, or the likeness of any thing, which the Lord thy God hath forbidden thee.” Deut. 4:23. Are we to conclude that none of God's children before Sinai knew that it was wrong to make graven images? We can hardly believe anyone will answer yes. But the prohibition of images is the second command of the ten. Hence those who lived before Sinai must have known of the Ten Commandments. That is the only conclusion we can reach.

Then what does Moses mean in Deuteronomy 5:3? We think that the simplest explanation is that he viewed the gathered hosts at Sinai as the birth of the chosen nation that God had promised Abraham would spring from him. Through Moses, God told Israel that if they would be obedient to His covenant, “you shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, and an holy nation.” Ex. 19:6. Not until Sinai was it thus possible literally to make a covenant with the “nation” or “kingdom” of the Jews. It is also true that not until Sinai was there any formal proclamation of the Ten Commandments. The fathers before Sinai had never heard God speak His law to them as Israel had. And it was the law thus proclaimed that was the basis of the covenant. Hence in a very real sense the covenant made with Israel at Sinai had never been made before.

Commentators differ in their endeavor to clarify this text. Adam Clarke seeks to do so with the addition of parenthetical words, thus: “The Lord made not this covenant with our fathers (only) but with us (also).” Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown observe: “The meaning is, 'not with our fathers' only, 'but with us' also, assuming it to be 'a covenant' of grace; or 'not with our fathers' at all, if the reference is to the peculiar establishment of the covenant of Sinai; a law was not given to them as to us, nor was the covenant ratified in the same public manner, and by the same solemn sanctions. Or, finally, 'not with our fathers' who died in the wilderness, in consequence of their rebellion, and to whom God did not give the rewards promised only to the faithful; but 'with us,' who alone, strictly speaking, shall enjoy the benefits of this covenant by entering on the possession of the promised land.”(For comment on the claim that because there is a new covenant, therefore the Ten Commandments is abolished, see objection 5.)

But says the objector finally: “If the Decalogue was in existence before Moses, how is it that it was first proclaimed and first written down at Sinai?” Such a question reveals a forgetfulness of history. We might as appropriately question whether any of the moral instruction of the Holy Bible is really binding on us, seeing that none of it was written before Moses.

The simple facts are that by the time of Moses and the children of Israel the knowledge of God and His laws had become so blurred in men's minds that it became necessary that a written revelation be given to the world. Coming directly out of Egyptian darkness, the Israelites were in special need of clear-cut declarations on the great moral precepts. For this reason God with His own finger carved in the everlasting stone the Ten Commandments. No one need then be in doubt. The changing moral conceptions of those Israelites could ever be corrected by the unchanging words graven in the stone.

Objection 4: The very wording of the Sinaitic law proves that it was designed only for the Jews. God introduced the Ten Commandments by stating: “I am the Lord thy God, which have brought thee . . . out of the house of bondage” (Ex. 20:2). To whom is that applicable? Only to the Israelite nation, of course. See, also, Deuteronomy 4:8, Romans 9:4, and similar passages, which state specifically that the law was given only to the Israelites.

We would ask: To whom else could the Lord have given the 'Ten Commandments? To the Egyptians, the Philistines, the Amalekites, the Hittites, the Jebusites, or any other of the many pagan peoples that cursed the earth with their unholy presence? No, you say. God could not make a revelation of Himself to any people until that people were of a mind and heart to hear Him.

God found in Abraham and his descendants such a people. Accordingly He gave to them a revelation of His will and ways. Yes, He spoke exclusively that great day at Sinai to a literal people called Israelites, who had been delivered from a literal bondage in Egypt. But, we inquire again: To whom else could He have spoken?

We would further inquire: To whom was God speaking when He gave His great messages through Isaiah, Jeremiah, Daniel, and all the mighty prophets of Old Testament times? The answer is: To the Israelites. The inspired messages that constitute the Old Testament were addressed almost wholly to the Jews, and the prophets who delivered the messages were Jews.

But does any lover of the Bible wish to suggest that therefore the beautiful messages of salvation in Isaiah, for example, which are so often addressed directly to Jerusalem, are not also addressed to us? Many a Christian minister has taken for his text these words from Isaiah: “Cry aloud, spare not, lift tip thy voice like a trumpet, and show thy people their transgression, and the house of Jacob their sins.” Isa. 58:1. But no listener in the pew is troubled or confused or informs the preacher that the text is addressed to Jews, not Gentiles.

And who are the writers of the New Testament? With one possible exception they are all Jews. To whom did Christ address virtually all that He said while on earth? To the Jews. To whom is the Epistle to the Hebrews addressed? Obviously, to Jews. To whom is the Epistle of James addressed? “To the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad.” James 1:1. But does any Christian have difficulty with these facts, or feel that any portions of the New Testament are not really for him? No.

In the objection before us, Romans 9:4 is cited. It reads as follows: “Who are Israelites; to whom pertains the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the promises.” Evidently it is offered as proof because it says that “the giving of the law” was to them.

But it says more than that. The “covenants” also were given to them. Note the plural. Both the old and the new covenant! The new covenant is made with the “house of Israel, and with the house of Judah.” (Jer. 31:31; Heb. 8:8.) But does any Christian believe that the new covenant is confined to the believing Jew? No. We all claim a part in it and believe that the new covenant promise is intended for us as well, even though the announcement of it is addressed directly, and apparently exclusively, to the Jews.

The words of Moses in Deuteronomy 4:8 are also cited. They read as follows: “And what nation is there so great, that hath statutes and judgments so righteous as all this law, which I set before you this day?” This statement is a good commentary on Romans 9:4, which we have already shown proves more than the objector wants to prove.

Another inspired comment on Deuteronomy 4:8 is the statement of Christ: “Salvation is of the Jews.” John 4:22. But has any Christian despised salvation because of this fact?

We must never forget that the revelations and admonitions of the Scriptures are not given in a vacuum. Almost always they are placed in the context of historical events and flesh-and-blood people. The sermon on the mount has as literally a rocky platform as the address from Sinai. And the multitudes addressed in that sermon were as definitely Jewish as the hosts gathered before Sinai.

Often God took occasion in giving a revelation, or invoking a certain course of conduct, to refer to some actual experience through which the listeners had passed. That is a hallmark of the Bible’s teachings. But that fact never troubles any of us, nor prevents us from believing that the teachings of God’s word also apply to us as well.

Now, inasmuch as God worked mighty miracles to draw out of the turbulent sea of paganism a people for Himself, how appropriate that He should place His revelation to them in the context of the immediate experience that they had miraculously come through. Thus they might be prompted to give that revelation maximum weight in their minds and be most diligent in obeying it. Furthermore, that historical context provides a setting that we today, who are also flesh and blood, can understand, and, understanding, be likewise prompted to greater obedience to God.

A Bible commentator observes on Exodus 20:2:

"This [deliverance out of Egypt] in the manner of Scripture and of Providence is the earnest and the guarantee of their deliverance from all other and greater kinds of bondage. The present is the type of a grander future. We must descend the stream of revelation to the New Testament before we fathom the depths of this greatest deliverance.” - James G. Murphy, Commentary on the Book of Exodus.

Any display of God's mercy and deliverance to His children at any moment in earth's history is a reason why those living at that time and those who read of the account in all subsequent ages should serve Him with their whole heart and obey His holy will.

We cannot forget Paul’s extended lesson in Romans, to wit: We are sinners because the law points out our sin. “Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law: that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God.” Rom. 3:19.

So are we gentiles not actually sinners, not guilty before God, because the moral law was not given to us? Are Jews the only sinners because the moral law was given only to the Jews? No, the text clearly states that, “all the world” are guilty before God. It is obvious that the Ten Commandment law was given to the whole world, because it points out the sin of “all the world.”

And there is no way to avoid this by claiming that the law Paul is referring to is not the moral law. Look at his examples: “Thou therefore which teachest another, teachest thou not thyself? thou that preachest a man should not steal, dost thou steal? Thou that sayest a man should not commit adultery, dost thou commit adultery? Thou that abhorrest idols, dost thou commit sacrilege? Rom. 2:21-22

So we are obviously discussing the moral law, the Ten Commandment law, and just as obviously, it condemns the whole world, Jews and gentiles. Although the Ten Commandment law was given to Moses on stone tablets at Mt. Sinai amid thunder and lightening, and God’s audible speaking, it was not only for the Jews. It clearly applies to all of us, Jew and gentile alike, and it points out the sins of everyone, Jew and gentile alike. And, as we demonstrated in our answer to objection 3, it was in the world long before Sinai.

Yes, the law’s condemnation is not limited to Israel, but makes us all sinners, “all the world.” Paul is quick to add, however, that just as one law—the Ten Commandment law—condemns all of us, one gift of salvation in Jesus Christ is provided to all of us:

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. But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets; Even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ 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; Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus: Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God. Rom. 3:20-25

Attempts to confine the Ten Commandment law to the Jews do not make sense biblically. They also illustrate an unseemly desire to be free of moral strictures that God clearly intends to be universal. (Of course, few are so bold as to argue that Christians are now free to worship idols, murder, steal, perjure themselves, or sleep with their neighbor’s wife. Per usual, this objection is really directed only at the Fourth Commandment.)

Objection 5: The Bible says that the Ten Commandments are the covenant that God made with Israel at Sinai, that is, the old covenant. (See Deut. 4:13.) This covenant has been abolished, and we live under the new covenant. Therefore we have nothing to do with the Ten Commandments.

The text reads thus: “And he [the Lord] declared unto you his covenant, which he commanded you to perform, even ten commandments; and he wrote them upon two tables of stone.” Deut. 4:13.

The key word here is “covenant,” translated from the Hebrew word berith, which may be translated “compact, league, covenant.” The gist of a “covenant” is an agreement between two or more parties. Webster’s Dictionary thus defines covenant: “An agreement between two or more persons or parties.”

We find various references to God’s covenant with the Israelites of the Exodus, couched in covenant language. For example, “The Lord our God made a covenant with us in Horeb.” Deut. 5:2. “The tables of the covenant which the Lord made with you.” Deut. 9:9.

Why did Moses describe the Ten Commandments themselves as the covenant? For the same reason that Moses said to the Israelites, “And I took your sin, the calf which you had made, and burnt it.” Deut. 9:21. Strictly speaking, the sin was not the calf itself; the sin was idolatry, false religion, breaking the first and second commandments, the rebellious will demonstrated in so doing. But the golden calf was a symbol of the sin committed, so Moses calls it the sin.

Likewise, the covenant was an agreement made by the Israelites to follow God’s laws, all of them, including the civil and ceremonial laws (Ex. 19:5-8). But the Ten Commandments, being the core of the law, were the symbol of the covenant.

Webster calls a covenant, “a solemn compact between members of a church to maintain its faith, discipline, etc.; also, the document recording such a compact.” The important thing about the Mayflower Compact was not the document that memorialized it, but the actual agreement of the Pilgrims; the paper might be important as an historical document, but the important thing at the time was the solemn agreement.

This is always the case agreements or covenants; the important thing about any contract is not the writing on paper that memorializes it, but the mental agreement itself and the attitude of lawfulness accompanying it, that is, the will to be bound by an agreement one has entered into, the will to be bound by one’s word.

When the Israelites came to Sinai, the Lord said to them through Moses: “Now therefore, if you will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then you shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people: for all the earth is mine: and you shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, and an holy nation. These are the words which thou shall speak unto the children of Israel.” Ex. 19:5, 6.

The response of the Israelites was agreement: "And all the people answered together, and said, All that the Lord bath spoken we will do. And Moses returned the words of the people unto the Lord." Verse 8.

Then follows in the next chapter the proclaiming of the Ten Commandments by the voice of God. This is followed, in the next three chapters, by a summary of civil statutes, which show the application of the Ten Commandment's principles, and by an even briefer summary of certain ceremonial requirements that the Lord gave to the people through Moses.

Then in chapter 24 we read that Moses “told the people all the words of the Lord,” and again the people responded, “All the words which the Lord bath said will we do.” Verse 3. “And Moses wrote all the words of the Lord.... And he took the book of the covenant, and read in the audience of the people: and they said, All that the Lord, hath said will we do, and be obedient.” Verses 4-7. Then Moses took the blood of certain sacrificial animals and “sprinkled it on the people, and said, Behold the blood of the covenant, which the Lord hath made with you concerning all these words.” Verse 8.

Here the record explicitly states, not that the words of the proclaimed statutes and judgments and laws were the covenant, but that the covenant was made '“concerning all these words.”

Refer back for a moment to objection 2, on the two laws. Here two comments may properly be interjected:

1. The fact that Moses wrote a copy of the Ten Commandments in this “book of the covenant” does not minimize the force of the distinguishing fact that God wrote the Ten Commandments with His own hand on tables of stone. A copy implies an original. Endless copies of the Ten Commandments have been made. The Israelites had simply heard the Ten Commandments as God spoke it. They promised to be obedient. Moses, in giving them a copy to see in a book, made doubly certain that they fully realized what they were covenanting to do. God Himself had not yet transferred the words of the Decalogue to stone. The distinction between the earthy touch of Moses hand and the divine hand of God and the sharp distinction between the varied laws in the book and the one supreme moral law are sharply emphasized a few verses further on: “And the Lord said unto Moses, Come up to me into the mount, and he there: and I will give thee tables of stone, and a law, and commandments which I have written; that thou may teach them.” Ex. 24:12

2. The fact that statutes and judgments and certain ceremonial precepts in addition to the Ten Commandments were included in the covenant does not make them all one law or confuse their distinctive features one whit. The essence of the covenant, the agreement, between God and the Israelites was that they would obey Him. This meant that they would faithfully keep not only the Ten Commandments but also the civil statutes, which were to govern them as a nation, and the ceremonial precepts, which dictated the religious ritual by which they expressed their desire for forgiveness for transgressions of the moral laws.

However, the very fact that the civil statutes were simply an extension of the Ten Commandments’ principles, and the ceremonial precepts simply set forth the means by which the Israelites were to express their sincere desire for freedom from sins committed against the moral code, fully justified the Biblical description of the Ten Commandments as that concerning which the covenant was made. The civil statutes and ceremonial laws were accessory to the Ten Commandments; they owed their existence and meaning to it, but it was not dependent on them.

With these facts in mind we are able to understand a whole series of statements concerning the “covenant” that is found in the Bible record following the Exodus experience. Five facts stand out sharply as we trace the record of this covenant through the Old Testament:

1. The frequent references to it by one after another of the prophets.

2. The sorry fact that Israel so repeatedly broke it.

3. The repeated combining of the statement that the people broke the covenant, with the statement that they had violated various commands of the Ten Commandments, the latter fact explaining the former.

4. The reminding of Israel that sacrifices were not a substitute for obedience, and the essentially minor status that the Lord gave to the ceremonial ritual.

5. The promise of a new covenant. Anyone who reads the Bible attentively will surely agree with these five statements.

Moses warned Israel against transgressing the covenant by serving “other gods.” (Deut: 17:2, 3) The Lord revealed to Moses that after his death Israel would “go a whoring after the gods of the strangers of the land. ... and will forsake me, and break my covenant which I have made with them.” Deut. 31:16. When Joshua was dying he warned of the day when Israel would transgress the covenant by serving “other gods.” (Joshua 23:16) A judgment was pronounced upon Solomon because he had gone after “other gods” and had not kept “my covenant.” (1 Kings 11:11.) In the last years of the kings of Israel the inspired writer recounted their long years of turning repeatedly to heathen gods and rejecting God's covenant. (See 2 Kings 17:7-23)

Jeremiah was instructed by the Lord to tell the “men of Judah” in their dark hour of national disaster that they had failed to keep the covenant He had made with their fathers at Sinai, “saying, Obey my voice, and do them, according to all which I command you: so shall you be my people, and I will be your God.” But “they went after other gods to serve them.” Jer. 11:4, 10. Hosea declares: “The Lord hath a controversy with the inhabitants of the land, because there is no truth, nor mercy, nor knowledge of God in the land. By swearing, and lying, and killing, and stealing, and committing adultery, they break out, and blood touches blood.” Hosea 4:1, 2. And he goes on to add a little later in his description: “They have transgressed my covenant.” Hosea 8:1.

Despite their almost constant turning away from God's moral precepts, they did not always turn from the ceremonial laws of sacrifices, burnt offerings, feast days, and the like. They evidently at times observed these ceremonies while transgressing the Ten Commandments, as though the religious ritual could substitute for obedience to the moral law. It is this fact that explains some striking passages in the Old Testament and reveals still further the sharp contrast between the ceremonial laws and the moral laws.

Through Hosea the Lord said to the morally corrupt “inhabitants of the land”: “For I desired mercy, and not sacrifice; and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings. But they like men have transgressed the covenant.” Hosea 6:6-7. It is true that the Israelites sometimes forgot even the ritual of their religious services. But that, evidently, was not at the heart of their apostasy.

Long after they had “transgressed the covenant” of moral law, they were still observing the sacrifices, rituals, and feasts in obedience to the ceremonial law, as if the outward forms were a proper substitute for heart obedience to God's moral requirements. That is why the Lord, through Hosea, pronounced this judgment: “I will also cause all her mirth to cease, her feast days, her new moons, and her Sabbaths, and all her solemn feasts.” Hosea 2:11. A reference to the ceremonial law reveals that all the special days here listed are found in that code. In similar language the Lord inquires through Isaiah, “To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices unto me?” Isa. 1:11. He describes their offerings as “vain oblations.” “Stop bringing meaningless offerings! Your incense is detestable to me. New Moons, Sabbaths and convocations—I cannot bear your worthless assemblies.” Isa. 1:13 NIV

And why was this whole ceremonial service of offerings and special holy days so abhorrent to God? Because their observance of the ceremonial law was hypocritical! The sacrifices, the Passover Sabbath, Day of Atonement Sabbath, and essentially all the ceremonial rituals and remembrances were intended to express their repentance for violations of the moral code and a desire for cleansing from sin. But the Israelites were set in evil ways and had no heart desire to reform. “Your hands are full of blood.” Verse 15. After pleading with them to turn from their corrupt ways, the Lord declares, “If you be willing and obedient, you shall eat the good of the land.” Verse 19. Here is the echo of the covenant agreement made at Sinai.

Jeremiah presents a similar description of the violation of God's moral code by rebellious Israel:

“Will you steal, murder, and commit adultery, and swear falsely, and burn incense unto Baal, and walk after other gods whom you know not; and come and stand before me in this house, which is called by my name, and say, We are delivered to do all these abominations?” Jer. 7:9,10. Then follows this declaration that shows perhaps more sharply than any other in this series of passages the clear distinction between moral and ceremonial laws: “Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel; Put your burnt offerings unto your sacrifices, and eat flesh. For I spoke not unto your fathers, nor commanded them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices: but this thing commanded I them, saying, Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and you shall be my people: and walk you in all the ways that I have commanded you, that it may be well unto you.” Verses 21-23.

But did not the Lord give commandments at Sinai concerning offerings? Bible commentators believe that the only way to resolve the apparent contradiction is by interpreting this passage in Jeremiah to mean that by comparison with the glory and primacy of the moral code given at Sinai, the ceremonial statutes pale into insignificance. To borrow the words of the learned commentator, Lange, on this passage:

“Thus those commentators are right who find here this meaning, that the whole of the enactments relating to sacrifices do not enter into consideration in comparison with the importance of the moral law.”

It is doubtless in this same sense that we may understand those scriptures that equate the covenant with the Ten Commandments (Deut. 4:13), even though certain ceremonial laws and civil statutes were also involved (Ex. 24:3-8). As earlier stated, the civil statutes were only an extension of, and the ceremonial laws only all accessory to, the Ten Commandment law.

Now, in this long, dismal record of Israel's backsliding, where lay the trouble? Were the terms of the covenant at fault? Nowhere do the prophets suggest that the Ten Commandments were either inequitable or deficient. Had God failed in His part of the agreement? No. The trouble was with the Israelites, who failed to live up to their promises.

They were stiff necked, hard of heart, rebellious. Christ could say to His Father, “I delight to do thy will, O my God: yea, thy law is within my heart.” Psalm 40:8. But not so with the children of Israel. “Their heart went after their idols.” Eze. 20:16. “The sin of Judah ... is graven upon the table of their heart.” Jer. 17:1. The children of Israel had promised at Sinai, “All that the Lord hath spoken we will do.” Ex. 19:8. But they knew not how deceitful were their hearts, how weak their will and their spirit.

Only after reviewing this sad history are we are able to appreciate the promise of the new covenant as foretold through Jeremiah:

“Behold, the days come, says the Lord, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah: not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; which covenant they brake, although I was an husband unto them, says the Lord: but this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; after those days, says the Lord. I will put My law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people.” Jer. 31:31-33.

The promise of the new covenant is not a forecast of an era when grace would supplant law, but of a time when the law of God would be written in men’s hearts by the grace of God acting upon those hearts. So far from God’s law being abolished, it is enshrined within those who have received a new heart.

Now, if there is only one law, as some contend, then the new covenant, under which all of us declare we may live today, calls for the writing upon our hearts, not only of God’s moral precepts, but of all the ceremonial statutes also! The logic is inexorable—if there is only one law. Could better proof be offered that there must be more than one law?

The writer of Hebrews, in referring to this passage in Jeremiah, makes clear that the trouble with the old covenant lay, not with the law, but with the people. The Lord found “fault with them.” (Heb. 8:8.) In the same connection we read concerning the new covenant, that Christ “is the mediator of a better covenant, which was established upon better promises.” Verse 6.

The first covenant broke down on the faulty promises of the Israelites. The second covenant is built upon the divine promise of God to change our hearts.

The first covenant was ratified at Sinai by the shedding of the blood of sacrificial animals. (Ex. 24:5-8) The second covenant was ratified at Calvary by the shedding of the blood of Jesus Christ. (Heb. 9:12, 23) The mediator of the first covenant was Moses. (Ex. 19:3-8; 24:3-8) The mediator of the second covenant is Christ. (Heb. 8:6)

Under the first covenant the worshiper brought his offering to all earthly priest, who ministered at an earthly sanctuary, which ministry could not of itself “make him that did the service perfect, as pertaining to the conscience.” Heb. 9:9. Why? Because this earthly sanctuary service “stood only ill meats and drinks, and divers washings, and carnal ordinances, imposed on them, until tile time of reformation.” Verse 10. Only as the worshiper looked by faith beyond the animal sacrifices to the sacrifice of Christ, the promised Messiah, could he receive genuine spiritual blessing and forgiveness of sins. And because it was possible for a child of God in the days preceding Christ's first advent to exercise true faith and to look beyond, the new covenant experience could be his.

Under the new covenant we appropriate by faith the offering made by the Lamb of God, coming boldly to the throne of grace and into the presence of our great High Priest. We look back to Calvary and upward to heaven. (Heb. 9:11-15, 24-26; 10: 19-22) It was foretold of Christ that He would “cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease.” Dan. 9:27.

No longer was there any occasion for the slaying of animals; hence the laws regarding such offerings became unnecessary. There were no longer to be earthly priests drawn from a certain tribe and according to a certain law of the ceremonial code. Hence we read, “For the priesthood being changed, there is made of necessity a change also of the law.” Heb. 7:12. The Levitical priesthood was changed, abolished, and so was the law that governed the selection and the ministry of that priesthood.

Yet under the new covenant God promises, “I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts.” Jer. 31:33. Far from doing away with or changing this law, He is going to write His law on our hearts. So it is very clear that the law He is writing on our hearts is wholly different law from that dealt with in Hebrews 7:12.

The New Covenant entails not a change in the Ten Commandments, but rather a change in the location of these commandments: this is the essence of the difference between the two covenants. And the effecting of this change requires Christ and His divine sacrifice. In other words, to live under the new covenant is to live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved us and gave Himself for us.

Faith and obedience to God’s commandments go hand in hand. How significant in this connection is the description of those who will finally be awaiting the return of Christ: “Here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.” Rev. 14:12.

Yes, and how significant is Paul's statement that the “carnal mind,” which distinguished rebellious Israel, is “not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.” Rom. 8:7. Also his statement of what has taken place for them which are in Christ Jesus: “For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh. That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.” Rom. 8:3,4.

The weakness is not in God's holy law but in us who are too weak of ourselves to give obedience. When we are changed by the gospel from carnal to spiritual, then the law can be written in our hearts. The person who says that he has nothing to do with the law because he lives under the new covenant, reveals instead that he has nothing to do with the new covenant, for the new covenant believer has the law engraved on his heart.

Objection 6: Paul states that the “ministration of death, written and engraved in stones” was “done away.” Therefore the ten-commandment law, which was written on the tables of stone, has been done away.

What exactly did Paul say? The introduction to this passage finds Paul declaring to the Corinthian brethren: “You are our epistle written in our hearts, known and read of all men: for inasmuch as you are manifestly declared to be the epistle of Christ ministered by us, written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God; not in tables of stone, but in fleshy tables of the heart.” 2 Cor. 3:2-3.

Here is the key to interpret the words that follow. His figure of speech is patently borrowed from the Scriptural contrast between the old and the new covenant, tables of stone contrasted with “tables of the heart,” “ink” contrasted with “the Spirit of the living God.” These Corinthians, he said, were “ministered by us.”

By an easy transition Paul moves into a discussion of the two covenants, by adding immediately that Christ “also hath made us able ministers of the new testament [covenant]; not of the letter, but of the spirit: for the letter kills, but the spirit gives life.” (The word ‘testament’ in this and almost all other instances in the New Testament does not have the meaning of a “will” as made by a testator in anticipation of death, but of covenant, and is so translated in the Revised Version.)

We might close the discussion right here, for our examination of the two covenants revealed clearly that the ratifying of the new covenant did not mean the abolishing of the, Ten Commandments. However, let us proceed.

“But if the ministration of death, written and engraved in stones, was glorious, so that the children of Israel could not steadfastly behold the face of Moses for the glory of his countenance; which glory was to be done away: how shall not the ministration of the spirit be rather glorious?

For if the ministration of condemnation be glory, much more does the ministration of righteousness exceed in glory. For even that which was made glorious had no glory in this respect, by reason of the glory that excels. For if that which is done away was glorious, much more that which remains is glorious. Seeing then that we have such hope, we use great plainness of speech: and not as Moses, which put a vale over his face, that the children of Israel could not steadfastly look to the end of that which is abolished." Verses 7-13.

Here is a series of contrasts, intended not so much to belittle the old dispensation as to glorify the new. It was ever Paul’s studied endeavor to prove that Christ and His ministry are the blazing glory beside which the spiritual glory of the former times seems pale. This argument particularly marks the book of Hebrews, which was written for the Jewish believers, who had thought that the glory of Sinai and the ministration of the divine law under the Jewish priests and rulers were the last word in heavenly glory.

The contrasts that Paul seeks to make are essentially the same as the contrasts between the old and new covenants:

1. "The ministration of "death" versus "the ministration of the spirit."

2. "Ministration of condemnation" versus "ministration of righteousness."

3. "Letter kills" versus-spirit gives life."

4. "Was glorious-versus-exceed in glory."

5. "Done away" versus "remains."

Numbers one and two are simply variant expressions. The questions are therefore:

1. What are these two ministrations?

2. What is meant by letter and spirit?

3. What is this relative "glory"?

4. What was "done away" and what "remains"?

The objector quickly answers: The “ministration of death” was that which was “written and engraved in stones,” and is Plainly the Ten Commandments. Not so fast.

Is it correct to speak of the “administration” and the “law” as synonymous? No. The administering of the law is not the same thing as the law itself. The “ministration of death,” or “the ministration of condemnation,” refers to the administering of the law that was “written and engraved in stones.”

By a figure of speech the law is called death and condemnation. On a certain occasion in Elisha's day the sons of the prophets gathered with him around a "great pot" in which had been cooked certain "wild gourds." Evidently the gourds were poisonous, for one of those eating cried out: "There is death in the pot." (See 2 Kings 4:38-41) He meant, of course, that there was something in the pot that would cause death.

Paul had earlier said to the Corinthians, “The sting of death is sin: and the strength of sin is the law.” 1 Cor. 15:56. That is, if it were not for the law of God, which condemns those who violate it, there would be no sin, and hence no death in penalty for sin, “for where no law is, there is no transgression.” Rom. 4:15. Thinking on this fact and the contrasting fact that “the law is holy ... and just, and good,” caused Paul to inquire: “Was then that which is good made death unto me?”

Here he speaks of the law as “death.” Now, how does Paul say that we escape from this “ministration of death,” this “ministration of condemnation”? By abolishing the law of God? No. Heed his words:

“There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.” Rom. 8:1-4.

We do not escape condemnation and death by trying to abolish the law [which cannot be done anyway]. Rather we escape condemnation and death through Jesus Christ, who pardons our sins and changes our hearts so that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us. Paul describes this changed state as walking after the Spirit, and adds that “to be spiritually minded is life and peace.” Verses 5, 6.

Here is a state of condemnation and death changed to one of no condemnation but rather life. In other words, the administration of condemnation and death exchanged for an administration of the spirit and life. How evident that we are here discussing the two covenants. And how evident also that Paul’s words in Romans 8 parallel his words in 2 Corinthians 3.

The cold letter of the law as it appeared on the stone tables had no life-giving power. It could only point accusingly at every man, for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. An administration of the law based on its letter alone results only in death for violators. But an administration of it based on the forgiveness possible through the sacrifice of Christ Jesus and the work of His Holy Spirit upon the heart results in life.

The contrast between “letter” and “spirit” does not mean a contrast between an age of law and an age of freedom from all law. As we have already noted, when God’s Spirit is in control, the law’s requirements are carried out in our hearts.

What, now, of the “glory” mentioned by Paul? He plainly speaks of the relative glory of two ministrations. The justice and righteousness of God shone forth in awesome, even terrifying glory on Mount Sinai as He proclaimed His law. He stood there as a consuming fire. But how much greater the glory of God that bathed the earth with its life-giving rays where Christ came down to “save his people from their sins.” Matt. 1:21.

Here was the glory of justice and mercy combined, for in dying for our sins, our transgression of the law, Christ revealed how God at one and the same time could “be just, and the justifier of him who believes in Jesus.” Rom. 3:26.

This brings us to the last question: What was done away and what remains? The question is really already answered. The glory attendant upon the giving of the law is so greatly excelled by the glory attendant upon the saving of men from its violation that Paul could appropriately speak of the first as “glorious” and the second as “the glory that excels.”

But right here Paul weaves in an incident in connection with the giving of the law at Sinai to illustrate a point that he wishes to make in the verses that immediately follow this disputed passage. When Moses came down from the mount with the tables of stone in his hands, “the skin of his face shone; and they were afraid to come nigh him.” So Moses “put a veil on his face-while he spoke to the Israelites.” (See Ex. 34:29-35)

Paul refers to this: “The children of Israel could not steadfastly behold the face of Moses for the glory of his countenance; which glory was to be done away.” 2 Cor. 3:7. He refers to this again in verse 11, saying it was “done away,” and then again in verse 13 in these words: “And not as Moses, which put a veil over his face, that the children of Israel could steadfastly look to the end of that which is abolished.”

It was the glory of the former administration, now ended, and not the law that was being administered, that was “done away” or “abolished,” just as, by historical analogy, Paul reminds us that it was the glory on Moses’ face that was “done away” by the veil on his face. The record declares that the veil was on Moses' face, not on the tables of stone, that it was his face that shone, not the tables of stone, and that it was the glory on his face that faded, not the luster that ever surrounds the divinely written Ten Commandments.

Well do Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown, in their Bible commentary, make this general observation in their comments on 2 Corinthians 3:

“Still the moral law of the ten commandments, being written by the finger of God, is as obligatory now as ever; but put more on the Gospel spirit of love, than on the letter of a servile obedience, and in a deeper and fuller spirituality (Matthew 5:17-48; Romans 13:9)."

Objection No. 7: Paul's allegory on the two covenants in Galatians 4 proves that we have nothing to do with law in the Christian dispensation.

In the fourth chapter of Galatians, Paul recounts that Abraham had two sons. After relating the incidents of the birth of Ishmael to the bondwoman Hagar and the birth of Isaac to the free woman Sarah, the first “born after the flesh,” the second “by promise,” Paul declares:

“Which things are an allegory: for these are the two covenants; the one from the mount Sinai, which genders to bondage, which is Hagar. For this Hagar is mount Sinai in Arabia, and answers to Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children. But Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all. Gal. 4:24-26.

God had promised Abraham a son. He believed the promise, and the Lord “counted it to him for righteousness.” Gen. 15:6. This promise was of vast significance to Abraham, for God had also promised him: “In thy seed [Christ] shall all the nations of the earth be blessed.” Gen. 26:4. (See Gen. 12:3)

But his faith and that of his long-childless wife, Sarah, evidently waned. She encouraged him to take Hagar to wife and thus raise up seed. But the Lord told him that Ishmael, who was born of that union, was not the fulfillment of the divine promise of a son and that that promise would yet be fulfilled.

Adapting this historical incident to the current experience of the Galatian Christians, who were trying to secure Heaven's promised salvation by observation of the ceremonial law—you you observe days, and months, and times, and years” Gal. 4:10 he declares that here is an “allegory,” or a figurative description of “the two covenants.”

In the allegory Hagar stands for Sinai. She was a bondwoman, and her children would therefore be in the same state of slavery. She also stands for “Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with, her children.” From Mount Sinai came the old covenant. How can it be said that the old covenant “genders to bondage”? All Bible commentators, along with the apostle Peter, agree that our brother Paul wrote some things hard to be understood, and the book of Galatians illustrates that fact. But we believe that in two ways the old covenant might be regarded as leading into bondage.

1. The ceremonial ritual of numerous sacrifices, feast days, and the like, by which the Israelites were to express their desire for freedom from sin, the transgression of the moral law, tended to become more and more an intolerable burden upon them as the rabbis constantly refined and multiplied the ritual.

At the Jerusalem council the early Christian leaders first considered in a formal way the contention of certain Jews who declared “that it was needful to circumcise them [the Gentile converts], and to command them to keep the law of Moses.” Acts 15:5. To this contention Peter replied, “Now then, why do you try to test God by putting on the necks of Gentiles a yoke that neither we nor our ancestors have been able to bear?” Acts 15:10.

This question seems to parallel the one that Paul asks the Galatians: “But now that you know God—or rather are known by God—how is it that you are turning back to those weak and miserable principles? Do you wish to be enslaved by them all over again? You are observing special days and months and seasons and years!” Gal. 4:9-10.

Obviously, here is a “bondage” that suffices to provide a reasonable interpretation of Paul's words about the Sinaitic covenant genders to bondage. The Pulpit Commentary well observes on Galatians 4:25:

“The religious life of Judaism consisted of a servile obedience to a letter Law of ceremonialism, interpreted by the rabbis with an infinity of hair-splitting rules, the exact observance of which was bound upon the conscience of its votaries as of the essence of true piety.”

2. The moral law, central to the old as well as the new covenant, can also be considered as bringing a man into bondage—if that man seeks to keep the law in his own strength, and by the keeping of the law be his own Savior. “The law works wrath,” says Paul. Rom. 4:15. Why? Paul explains: “I was alive without the law once: but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died.” Rom. 7:9. In other words, knowledge of the moral law equates to consciousness of sin and guilt, or “wrath.”

But here is another real sense in the law brings bondage: “Know you not, that to whom you yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants, you are to whom you obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?” Rom. 6:16. If, after having accepted the grace and pardon of Jesus Christ, you refuse His transforming righteousness in your life, you are once again a slave of sin and death.

Now, how could those of whom Paul was speaking—“Jerusalem which now is, with her children”—hope to escape from their bondage? By moving from the old covenant to the new covenant: “Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all.”

In Hebrews, Paul uses the same figurative language:

“You have not come to a mountain that can be touched and that is burning with fire; to darkness, gloom and storm; to a trumpet blast or to such a voice speaking words that those who heard it begged that no further word be spoken to them, because they could not bear what was commanded: “If even an animal touches the mountain, it must be stoned to death.” The sight was so terrifying that Moses said, “I am trembling with fear.” But you have come to Mount Zion, to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem. You have come to thousands upon thousands of angels in joyful assembly, to the church of the firstborn, whose names are written in heaven. You have come to God, the Judge of all, to the spirits of the righteous made perfect, to Jesus the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel..” Heb. 12:18-24.

Without going into a detailed examination of figures of speech, which would carry us beyond the range of the particular question at issue—the perpetuity of the Ten Commandments—we may say that Paul is describing the state of those who are under “the new covenant.”

Isaac was the child of promise, the answer Abraham’s act of faith and obedience. Because we come under the new covenant by our act of faith in accepting the Lord Jesus Christ, and His promise to write His law in our hearts, we are no longer “by nature the children of wrath, even as others” (Eph. 2:3), but the children of promise. We become children of promise by the sacrifice of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by accepting through faith God's promise of a new covenant relationship.

Blending the two ideas, Paul really comes to the climax of his allegory with these words: “Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are the children of promise.” Abraham's act of faith in believing God's promise was counted unto him for righteousness. Our act of faith in believing God's fulfillment of His promise in Christ Jesus is counted unto us for righteousness. That is how we acquire true righteousness, new covenant righteousness.

And why did the Lord make His promise to Abraham? “Because that Abraham obeyed my voice, and kept my charge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws.” Gen. 26:5.

And how are those described who are literally waiting to be taken to “Jerusalem which is above”? “Here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.” Rev. 14:12.

No, Paul’s words in Galatians do not teach freedom from the law of God. They teach freedom from bondage to sin through Jesus Christ and the new covenant relationship.

Objection No. 8: Paul declares that we are not under the law, but under grace. (Rom. 6:14) The law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. (John 1:17) Paul also declares that “Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believes.” (Rom. 10:4) These texts prove that the law was abolished by Christ.

There is no conflict between law and grace, or between law and gospel. A simple definition of the two will show this. By law we mean God’s standard of right and wrong, the yardstick by which we can tell whether we have fallen short of God’s requirements. The word “gospel” means good news, the good news that God has provided salvation from sin, and the Bible defines sin as violation of the divine law. (1 John 3:4) So, then, the gospel is the good news of God’s plan to pardon us from having broken the law, and to empower us to keep it going forward.

Thus, law and gospel are not in opposition, but in close fellowship. The very existence of the gospel proves that the law is still in force, for what would be the point in preaching the good news that God has provided salvation from breaking the law if the law were no longer in force? A man cannot break a law that does not exist, and cannot be punished for breaking a law that has been repealed. Hence the very idea of the gospel presupposes that the law exists and is in full force.

Let us now read the key text in this discussion: “Sin shall not have dominion over you: for you are not under the law, but under grace. What then? shall we sin, because we are not under the law, but under grace? God forbid.” Rom. 6:14-15. Whatever else Paul wishes us to understand, he does not want us to think that the reign of grace frees us from obedience to the law, “What then?” says he, “shall we sin,” break the law, “because we are not under the law, but under grace? God forbid.”

The next verses make clear that Paul uses the phrase “under the law” to mean “under its condemnation,” and “under grace” to mean “living under God’s plan of salvation that offers pardon from condemnation, and power to achieve freedom from the bondage of sin”:

“Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness? But God be thanked, that ye were the servants of sin, but ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered you. Being then made free from sin, ye became the servants of righteousness.” Rom. 6:16-18.

The contrast is between servants of sin and servants of obedience unto righteousness. What is it that gives strength to sin? It is the law, says Paul. (1 Cor. 15:56) The fact that the law exists and pronounces a death penalty for evildoing and evil living is what gives sin its power over those who indulge in unlawful acts. The law does not lay its strong hand on the man who does not violate it. Its strength is felt only by the lawbreaker.

Paul says sin is no longer to hold us in its grip, because we are living under, we have accepted, God's plan of grace, which gives us a power that breaks the grip of sin. Thus instead of being servants of sin, we become servants of “obedience unto righteousness.”

And what is righteousness? It is right doing, right living, having the law written on our hearts, which is the very opposite of sinfulness or lawlessness. Paul in a later chapter tells how the grace of the gospel of Jesus Christ brings righteousness to us, and how this righteousness is directly related to the law. We read:

“What the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.” Rom. 8:3-4.

Paul deals with the same problem in Galatians 3:24-25: “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.”

The law can show us our sinfulness and bring to us such conviction of sin that we shall be driven to Christ, who can free us from our sins. When we receive Christ we are no longer under the domination—the condemnation—of the law. But we are not freed from obedience to God’s law, for in accepting Christ we receive divine power for obedience to that law, as is explained in the passage just quoted from Romans 8. Thus Galatians 3:24-25 gives no support to the claim that the law is abolished.

How plain and simple it is, then, that when we accept God’s Son and the grace He offers, we do not turn our back on the law, Rather, we find that the righteousness of the law is fulfilled in us. Instead of being sinners, breakers of God’s law, we find that we are obedient to it.

In the light of these facts there is no difficulty in the text: “The law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.” (John 1:17) While Moses served a very great purpose in the plan of God, for through him God gave to the world the written form of the moral code, yet through Christ came divine grace, without which the law cannot truly be kept.

The man who accepts Christ no longer strives to obtain righteousness by keeping the law. Upon his acceptance of Christ, the Savior's righteousness is imputed to him. Says Paul: “Now the righteousness of God without [or, apart from] the law is manifested being witnessed by the law and the prophets; even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe.” Rom. 3:21-22. Because the righteousness of God can be obtained apart from the law, Paul can well declare: “Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believes.” Rom. 10:4. To everyone who believes on Him, Christ brings to an absolute end the use of the law as a means of obtaining righteousness.

Or, again, we may understand that word end as meaning the objective or purpose [or “culmination” as in the NIV]. Christ was the objective the law had in view, for the purpose of the law is to cause men so to realize their sinfulness, their unrighteousness, so that they will go to Christ for His righteousness, which not only is imputed in justification but is actually imparted in daily living, as is clearly taught in Galatians 2:20. This use of the word “end” is found in James 5:11 and 1 Timothy 1:5.

Both law and grace came from heaven. How happy are we as Christians that we are not called upon to reject one in order to have the other. By the power of God’s grace we no longer dwell under the condemnation of the law, but are in Him raised up to the lofty plane of complete obedience to this divine code.

Well do Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown, in their Bible commentary, make this observation in a note at the close of their comments on Romans 6:

The fundamental principle of Gospel obedience is as original as it is divinely rational; that “we are set free from the law in order to keep it, and are brought graciously under servitude to the law in order to be free” (v. 14, 15, 18). So long as we know no principle of obedience but the terrors of the law, which condemns all the breakers of it, and knows nothing whatever of grace, either to pardon the guilty or to purify the stained, we are shut up under a moral impossibility of genuine and acceptable obedience. Whereas when Grace lifts us out of this state, and through union to a righteous Surety, brings us into a state of conscious reconciliation, and loving surrender of heart to a God of salvation, we immediately feel the glorious liberty to be holy, and the assurance that “Sin shall not have dominion over us” is as sweet to our renewed tastes and aspirations as the ground of it is felt to be firm, “because we are not under the Law, but under Grace.”

Objection No. 9: Luke 16:16 proves that Christians have nothing to do with law.

Luke 16:16 reads as follows:

“The law and the prophets were until John: since that time the kingdom of God is preached, and every man presses into it.”

Place beside this the parallel passage in Matthew 11:13:

“For all the prophets and the law prophesied until John.”

The word “were” in Luke 16:16 is a supplied word. Luke simply wrote: “The law and the prophets, until John.” If the translators had compared his words with those of Matthew, they would have seen that Luke did not mean that the law and the prophets ended in John’s day, but that they “prophesied” until that day. The difference is very great and provides the key to the meaning of the passage under discussion.

The phrase, “the prophets and the law,” or more commonly, “the law and the prophets,” is used often in the Bible to describe the writings of Moses plus the writings of the other Old Testament prophets. The writings of Moses, the first five books of the Bible sometimes called the Pentateuch, were so distinguished by recording the laws given to Moses—moral, ceremonial, and civil—that they very understandably were often described as “the law,” in contrast to the writings of the other prophets.

That fact in itself removes this objection from consideration, for neither Luke nor Matthew is really discussing the ten-commandment law. They are discussing the entire Old Testament. What they are saying is that the Old Testament pointed forward to Christ, but now that we have Christ we preach not the prediction of the kingdom of God, but its arrival.

What these gospel writers are saying in context is that “the law and the prophets,” the Old Testament, pointed forward to Christ. Skepticism that Jesus was the Messiah was very common among the Jews of Jesus’ day, but of course they insisted that they believed Moses and all the prophets. Christ sought repeatedly to make clear to them that He was the one foretold by the prophets, and likewise his forerunner, John the Baptist was foretold, and that now the kingdom of God was being preached unto them.

When Christ began His public ministry He declared, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand.” Mark 1:15. The prophets had foretold the coming of the Messiah. Christ announced that those prophecies were now fulfilled.

To the skeptical Jews, who failed to see in Christ the fulfillment of these prophecies, He declared: “Do not think that I will accuse you to the Father: there is one that accuses you, even Moses, in whom you trust. For had you believed Moses, you would have believed me: for he wrote of me. But if you believe not his writings, how shall you believe my words?” John 5:45-47.

When Philip found Nathanael and sought to bring him the thrilling news that the promised Messiah had come, he said, “We have found him, of whom Moses in the law, and the prophets, did write, Jesus of Nazareth.” John 1:45.

When Christ was resurrected from the dead He came that same day to the troubled, bewildered disciples and inquired, “Why are you troubled? And why do thoughts arise in your hearts?” Luke 24:38. Then He reminded them that what had happened to Him on that fateful week end was what the prophets had foretold, that all things must be fulfilled, “which were written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the Psalms, concerning me.” Verse 44.

Paul declared that his mission in life was “witnessing both to small and great, saying none other things than those which the prophets and Moses did say should come.” Acts 26:22.

Obviously, what Moses and the other Old Testament prophets wrote was one of the most important proofs Christ offered the apostles in support of His claim to be the Messiah.

Prophets “prophesy” until the time when their prophecies meet fulfillment, after that prophecy becomes history. Thus, our Lord, in declaring that the prophets and the law prophesied until John, was simply announcing that “the time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand.” He was not implying the Old Testament was now abolished, much less that the ten-commandment law had come to an end.

Objection 10: Romans 7:1-6 proves that the law is done away. Under the figure of marriage Paul explains that we are “delivered from the law,” and that, indeed, the law is dead.

Romans 7:1-6 reads:

“Know ye not, brethren, (for I speak to them that know the law,) how that the law hath dominion over a man as long as he liveth? For the woman which hath an husband is bound by the law to her husband so long as he liveth; but if the husband be dead, she is loosed from the law of her husband. So then if, while her husband liveth, she be married to another man, she shall be called an adulteress: but if her husband be dead, she is free from that law; so that she is no adulteress, though she be married to another man. Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ; that ye should be married to another, even to him who is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit unto God. For when we were in the flesh, the motions of sins, which were by the law, did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death. But now we are delivered from the law, that being dead wherein we were held; that we should serve in newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter.”

What is Paul discussing in Romans 7? The same thing he is discussing in the chapter immediately preceding: That although we are saved by grace through faith, not by the works of the law, we do not keep on sinning. We live for Christ and bear righteous fruit for Him.

The key to understanding this passage is that when Paul speaks of “the law” that the widow has been released from, he is not talking about the Ten Commandment law or the code of moral precepts. In this passage, Paul is using the term “law” to mean the law of sin. What is the law of sin?

In order to understand what the “law of sin” is, we need to go deeper into Romans seven. In Romans 7:14-25, Paul talks about how our sinful nature wars with our God-implanted desire to do the right thing. Within this larger discussion we find this passage:

So I find this law at work: Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me. Romans 7:21-23

Here Paul speaks of “another law at work in me, the law of sin.” Paul is referring to our sinful human nature, which he calls a “law,” as though it is a natural law, like gravity. And, indeed, the outworking of our fallen human nature does seem to be as constant and predictable as gravity.

But Paul’s message in Romans 7:1-6, is that the Christian believer is, because of Christ’s death on our behalf, free from the “law of sin.” We do not need to be married to it anymore:

“So, my brothers and sisters, you also died to the law [that is, the law of sin, which is your sinful human nature controlling you] through the body of Christ, that you might belong to another, to him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit for God.” Rom. 7:4.

Clearly, the “law” of which Paul speaks is the “law of sin,” at work in us, our sinful, fallen nature, not the Ten Commandment law. But this is made even clearer in the next verse:

For when we were in the realm of the flesh, the sinful passions aroused by the law were at work in us, so that we bore fruit for death. Rom. 7:5.

The sinful passions aroused by the law? What law? Again, obviously “the law of sin” which is the outworking of our sinful, fallen human nature. The NIV drops a note after the word “flesh” (Gr.: sarx), stating that here, and in many other passages, it is not used literally but rather in reference “to the sinful state of human beings, often presented as a power in opposition to the Spirit.” Exactly. And this is what Paul calls “the law of sin.”

The really good news is that Paul is saying we are now free from this law of sin. We no longer need to live according to the flesh, or to be a slave to our fallen human nature. We are free to live according to the spirit of Christ, and let His spirit dwell within us.

“But now, by dying to what once bound us, we have been released from the law [again, the “law of sin” at work in our nature] so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit, and not in the old way of the written code.” Rom. 7:6

Being released from the law of sin, which is our sinful nature, we no longer serve “in the old way of the written code.” Now in this last clause of verse 6, Paul is referring to written law. What does he mean? He means that we don’t serve Christ by trying to keep a written code, we serve Christ with joy in salvation, and love for God and mankind. The experience of conversion and salvation in Christ means that we pursue much greater works of the Spirit than we would if we were trying to be saved by hewing to a written list of restrictions. In his paraphrase, “The Clear Word,” Jack Blanco interprets Romans 6:6 this way:

“But now we’re delivered from the condemnation of the law because our sinful lives have died. We are no longer slaves to the law of sin but serve God willingly and joyously with a new spirit, not in the old way of obeying just the letter of the law.”

I think that Blanco nails the meaning of this verse: Because the law of sin in our nature has died with Christ (and symbolically through baptism) we are free to serve God in a new and joyous way, not just by obeying a list of “dos and don’ts.”

We can now see that Romans 7:1-6 builds on what Paul wrote in the previous chapter. The “dead husband” metaphor is part of an extended argument against cheap grace, against continuing to sin after you have repented and claimed forgiveness through faith in Jesus Christ.

As we look at Paul’s letter to the Romans, we see that in chapters 2 through 5, Paul is making the case that we are all condemned sinners who are saved solely through the grace of our lord Jesus Christ, claimed by faith; we are saved by grace through faith. Then, in chapters 6 and 7, Paul makes the case against “cheap grace,” saying that just because we are saved solely by grace through faith, we do not therefore go on sinning.

In making his case against cheap grace, Paul uses three metaphors. The first is that if we accept Christ’s death on our behalf, then we died with Christ, and the dead do not keep sinning:

“What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means! We are those who have died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with [Christ] through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly also be united with him in a resurrection like his. For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body ruled by sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin—because anyone who has died has been set free from sin. Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him. The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God. In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires. Do not offer any part of yourself to sin as an instrument of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer every part of yourself to him as an instrument of righteousness. For sin shall no longer be your master, because you are not under the law, but under grace.” Rom. 6:4-14.

In verse 14, Paul segues or transitions into his second metaphor against continuing to sin, which is the master/slave analogy. Paul says that by accepting Jesus Christ as your savior, you have accepted Him as your new master. Your old master was sin, but your new master is the righteousness of Christ, by which you are redeemed, so now you must be a slave to righteousness. The slave does the will of his master:

“For sin shall no longer be your master, because you are not under the law, but under grace. What then? Shall we sin because we are not under the law but under grace? By no means! Don’t you know that when you offer yourselves to someone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one you obey—whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to righteousness? But thanks be to God that, though you used to be slaves to sin, you have come to obey from your heart the pattern of teaching that has now claimed your allegiance. You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness. I am using an example from everyday life because of your human limitations. Just as you used to offer yourselves as slaves to impurity and to ever-increasing wickedness, so now offer yourselves as slaves to righteousness leading to holiness. When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the control of righteousness. What benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now ashamed of? Those things result in death! But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Rom. 6:14-23.

The “dead husband” metaphor is the third in Paul’s argument against cheap grace. He says that you were married to sin, under the law of sin, but that husband died, and his claims on you went to the grave with him. Therefore, you are no longer under the law of sin, the tyranny of your sinful fallen nature. In other words, you need no longer be married to your “old man of sin,” your sinful nature. You have been released from the law of sin:

“Do you not know, brothers and sisters—for I am speaking to those who know the law—that the law has authority over someone only as long as that person lives? For example, by law a married woman is bound to her husband as long as he is alive, but if her husband dies, she is released from the law that binds her to him. So then, if she has sexual relations with another man while her husband is still alive, she is called an adulteress. But if her husband dies, she is released from that law and is not an adulteress if she marries another man. So, my brothers and sisters, you also died to the law through the body of Christ, that you might belong to another, to him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit for God. For when we were in the realm of the flesh, the sinful passions aroused by the law were at work in us, so that we bore fruit for death. But now, by dying to what once bound us, we have been released from the law so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit, and not in the old way of the written code.” Rom. 7:1-6.

Some people say that Paul preaches grace and does not teach the forsaking of sins, but in Romans we see a very balanced presentation of the gospel: Yes, we are saved by grace through faith, but no, we do not keep on sinning. There are several whole chapters on both aspects of this, so it is a complete misrepresentation to say that Paul preached only grace at the expense of obedience.

I think Paul realized or sensed that perhaps this last metaphor, and his use of the term “law” to mean our sinful, fallen nature, might prove confusing (as indeed we know that it did prove confusing), because he hastens to add that the law is not actually sinful: “What shall we say, then? Is the law sinful? Certainly not!” Rom. 7:7. No, the law of God, the moral law, the Ten Commandment law, is not sinful.

That is clear enough, but Paul continues with a more thorough explanation of how the Ten Commandment law defines sin and points it out to us, showing us that we are sinners:

“I would not have known what sin was had it not been for the law. For I would not have known what coveting really was if the law had not said, ‘You shall not covet.’ But sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, produced in me every kind of coveting. For apart from the law, sin was dead. Once I was alive apart from the law; but when the commandment came, sin sprang to life and I died.” Romans 7:7-9.

And just to make double certain that we understand that the law itself is not the problem, Paul explains very clearly that the problem is not with God’s law, but with us, and particularly with our sinful, fallen natures. In fact, Paul goes so far as to call the law “spiritual” and “good,” and to say that he delights in God’s law:

“We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin. I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. For I know that good itself does not dwell in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it. So I find this law at work: Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death? Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in my sinful nature a slave to the law of sin.” Romans 7:14-25.

So Paul calls the Ten Commandment law “spiritual” and states that in his higher faculties he “delights in God’s law.” Does it sound like Paul was trying to do away with the “spiritual” law that he delights in? Of course not. Yes, the Ten Commandment law condemns our sinful, fallen nature, but the answer to that is conversion, repentance, accepting Christ’s sacrifice on our behalf and being born again, not doing away with the law.

It is only if we ignore the entire context and setting of Romans seven that we can make Paul appear to teach the abolition of the Ten Commandment law. In context, he is telling us, for a third time and using a third metaphor, that because of Christ, we need not continue to sin.

Objection 11: Ephesians 2:15 and Colossians 2:14-16 prove that the law was abolished at the cross.

It is very true that these texts signal the abolition of the law, but which law?

Ephesians 2:14-16 states: “ For He Himself is our peace, who has made both one, and has broken down the middle wall of separation, having abolished in His flesh the enmity, that is, the law of commandments contained in ordinances, so as to create in Himself one new man from the two, thus making peace, and that He might reconcile them both to God in one body through the cross, thereby putting to death the enmity.”

Colossians 2:14-17 states: “Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross; and having spoiled principalities and powers, he made a shew of them openly, triumphing over them in it. Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days, which are a shadow of things to come, but the substance is of Christ.”

Under Objection 2 we found that the Bible speaks of more than one law, and that these two texts describe the ceremonial law. We might therefore proceed to the next objection without further discussion. But since some argue that these texts do away with the Ten Commandment law, the moral law, we shall here examine them further.

We found that “where no law is, there is no transgression,” and that had the commandment not told us about covetousness, we would not know it to be sin. (See Rom. 4:15; 7:7) The simple proof that there was sin long before Moses’ time established for us the fact that the law must have been in existence before then.

It is evident that by the very same process of reasoning we can quickly discover whether the law existed after Christ’s time. Did sin exist after the cross? Most certainly. The apostles went out to preach to sinners after Christ's return to heaven. The New Testament has as much to say about sin and sinners as has the Old. “But sin is not imputed when there is no law.” Rom. 5:13.

Thus it is as clear as a spring morning that the Ten Commandments is as surely in existence after Christ as it was before Moses.

The texts declare: “He [Christ] is our peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us. Having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments, contained in ordinances; for to make in Himself of twain one new man, so making peace.” Eph. 2:14, 15. “Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross.... Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holy day, or of a new moon, or of the Sabbath days." Col. 2:14,16.

What do we generally mean by “ordinances” when we speak religiously? The Standard dictionary thus defines the word: “A religious rite or ceremony as ordained or established by divine or by ecclesiastical authority; as, the ordinance of the Lord's supper.”

We found that the Jewish church before Christ had certain ordinances, even as we since Christ's time have ordinances, such as the Lord's supper and baptism. Only they had many more. They had special rites and ceremonies, like the Passover and various holy days and meat offerings and drink offerings . . . We read, for example, “This is the ordinance of the Passover.” Ex. 12:43.

When these are referred to in the New Testament, the same language is used, for example:

“Meats and drinks, and divers washings, and carnal ordinances.” Heb. 9:10.

We also found that there were various laws and commandments stating just how these ordinances should be carried out. These were all written down by Moses in a book, and are generally described by Bible writers as the law of Moses, or the ceremonial law, which is not to be confused with the ten-commandment law. How evident, then, that the law which Paul here says is “abolished” and blotted out, does not include the Ten Commandments.

The book of Hebrews contains the best explanation of the relation of the ancient Jewish ceremonies to the work of Christ. In it we read of “the law having a shadow of good things to come.” Heb. 10:1. Plainly the writer means the ceremonial law, first, because the moral law could not be described as a foreshadowing of something to come, because it deals with eternal principles; second, the writer says “the law” there spoken of deals with “burnt offerings and offering for sin.” Verse 8.

All the offerings under the Jewish service were intended to point forward to when Christ, the great sacrifice, should be offered up. When that one great, perfect sacrifice for sin was made, there was no longer need of a system of types and shadows. Christ “offered one sacrifice for sins for ever.” Verse 12. The laws and ordinances commanding the offerings of sacrifices, of meat and drink offerings, of annual holy days, like the Passover, were all abolished at the cross. Shadow met reality, type met anti-type.

In view of this we have no difficulty in understanding what Paul refers to when he speaks of the “law of commandments contained in ordinances” and the “handwriting of ordinances” in the two texts we are examining. He means simply the ceremonial law.

He makes this doubly clear by saying in the succeeding verses that because these “ordinances” are abolished we are no longer under obligation as to offerings of meat or drink, and certain holy days, which “are a shadow of things to come, but the substance is found in Christ.” The comparison with the language of the book of Hebrews is exact.

Why is it called the “handwriting” of ordinances? Because when Moses received the law, he wrote it out for the people:

“Then Moses came and recounted to the people all the words of the LORD and all the ordinances; and all the people answered with one voice and said, "All the words which the LORD has spoken we will do!" Moses wrote down all the words of the LORD” (Exodus 24:3-4).

The Law of Moses was not an oral tradition passed down through the generations. It was a handwritten code of law, hence, “a handwriting of ordinances.”

Now, in this the ceremonial law is distinguished from the Ten Commandments. Were the Ten Commandments written down by Moses? No, God wrote the Ten Commandments on tablets of stone and gave them to Moses. (Exodus 31:18). They were not written down by Moses, not part of the “handwriting of ordinances.”

It is also interesting to compare Paul with Peter on the subject of the ceremonial law. Paul says the “handwriting of ordinances” “was against us” and “contrary to us.” (Col. 2:14) What did Peter say?: “Now therefore why do you put God to the test by placing upon the neck of the disciples a yoke which neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear?" (Acts 15:10). Both Paul and Peter were very happy to be free from the ceremonial law.

That only the ceremonial law was done away with is obvious from the context:

Let us imagine that a certain jurisdiction repealed all its laws. Wouldn’t it be silly for a government official to declare solemnly that, from now on, no one may judge you for parking overtime, or failing to have your car inspected, when actually no one may judge you for murder, burglary or robbery?

On the other hand, if that jurisdiction repealed only its traffic and motor vehicle laws, how understandable and perfectly reasonable for an official to make the announcement that henceforth no one may be judged in the matter of parking, or having his vehicle inspected.

The fact that Paul mentioned only the ceremonial laws—“in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holy day, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days”—shows that it is the ceremonial laws that have been “nailed to the cross,” not the moral law.

So far from these texts teaching that the ten-commandment law is abolished, they do not even mention it.

(See objection 29, for a further discussion of the Colossian passage as it relates specifically to the Sabbath command.)

Objection 12: Through Moses, God gave commandments to His people. Fifteen hundred years later Christ also gave commandments. Adventists fail to make a distinction between God's law, which was abolished at Calvary, and Christ's commandments that bind the Christian. Hence Adventists mistakenly contend that the Ten Commandments and Christ's commandments are the same and equally binding.

The idea behind this objection seems to be that it is legalism to keep the Father’s commandments, but sheer grace to keep the Son’s!

The substance of most objections we have considered is that the Christian need have nothing to do with the law. Now we are informed that the Christian must give obedience to many commandments; indeed, a number of references are given to prove that Christ articulated several new commandments, which are compulsory.

The references given are largely from the record of Christ's sermon on the mount, beginning with Matthew 5:21. We need not enumerate them here. Suffice it to summarize them by saying that they are an exposition of what we call the golden rule. In fact, the golden rule is given as a kind of climax to this sermon. (See Matt. 7:12) The sermon on the mount is cited to prove that Christ set up a new code of laws that were to supersede those given by God in an earlier era.

But Christ emphatically declares that the golden rule is the epitome of the “law and the prophets”:

“Therefore all things whatsoever you would that men should do to you, do you even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.” Matt. 7:12.

As we have had reason to explain in response to previous objection, “the law and the prophets” is how the people of Christ’s time referred to the Old Testament, the law being the Pentateuch or the Books of Moses, the rest of the Hebrew Scriptures consisting mainly of the major and minor prophets.

This understanding of the matter is in harmony with the classic Protestant view of the Scriptures; namely, that the New Testament is unfolded in the Old and the Old Testament is unfolded in the New. (See the discussion on this point under Objection 1)

That Christ was indeed commenting upon and expanding very specifically God’s Ten Commandment law is evident in various of the references given by the objector as proof that Christ set up new commandments to supplant those of His Father. Take this reference:

“Ye have heard that it was said of them of old time, Thou shalt not kill; and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment. But I say unto you, That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment, and whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council, but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire.” Mat. 5:21-22.

Or this one:

“And he said unto them, Take heed, and beware of covetousness: for a man’s life consists not in the abundance of the things which he possesses.” Luke 12:15.

Many of the allegedly new commands of Christ are very obviously an expansion of the precepts of the Ten Commandments. Consider:

“You have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shall not commit adultery. But I say unto you, That whosoever looks on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart.” Matt. 5:27-28.

Is Christ here freeing us from the seventh precept of God’s Ten-Commandment law, and setting up a new law? To the contrary, He is showing how broad is the import of that command. Christ did not set aside God’s law; to the contrary, He magnified it, emphasizing its broad spiritual dimensions. And this is what the prophet Isaiah foretold of Him: “The Lord is well pleased for his righteousness’ sake; he will magnify the law, and make it honorable.” Isa. 42:21.

The well-known Pulpit Commentary observes on this text:

“He will magnify the Law; rather, to magnify the Law, to set it forth in its greatness and its glory before his people. It is not the original giving of the Law at Sinai only that is meant, but also its constant inculcation by a long series of prophets. Israel's experience (ver. 20) had included all this; but they had not profited by the instruction addressed to them.”

We have looked in vain, among the references offered by the objector as proof that Christ gave commandments to supersede the law of God, for the words of our Lord to the rich young ruler, who had asked what he should do to “have eternal life”: “If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments.” Matt. 19:16-17. And did Christ here set forth a new set of commandments? Surely here was the time to do it, for the eternal life of a human soul was at stake. But when the young man asked Christ to be specific as to which commandment, our Lord recited a number of the commands found in the Ten Commandments, and ended with the summarizing command: “Thou shall love thy neighbor as thyself.” And this last command, be it noted, is not new; it is quoted from Leviticus 19:18. What further evidence need be offered than this to prove that no new commandment from Christ was necessary to salvation?

This passage provides also a most excellent proof that apparently new commandments from Christ are but an amplification of principles set down in the commands long before given by God. When the young man declared that he had kept all these commands from his youth up, and inquired, “What lack I yet?” Christ told him to go and sell all that he had and give to the poor and “follow me.” This command to sell was simply an exposition of the tenth precept of the Ten Commandments and a commentary on Luke 12:15. And would anyone think of contending that the command, “Follow me,” meant that the youth should turn his back on God's holy law? We have Christ's own words, expressed over and over, that He did not come to set up new laws, but only to set forth what had been given unto Him of His Father.

Note these typical references, which the objector failed to include in his presentation: “For 1 have not spoken of myself; but the Father which sent me, he gave me a commandment, what I should say, and what I should speak. And I know that his commandment is life everlasting: whatsoever I speak therefore, even as the Father said unto me, so I speak.” John 12:49-50.

“He that loves me not keeps not my sayings: and the word which you hear is not mine, but the Father's which sent me.” John 14:24. (See also John 7:16; 8:28) These passages harmonize perfectly with Christ’s declaration: “I and my Father are one.” John 10:30.

They also dispose of the claim that the apostles set forth new commandments that took the place of the law of God. Would the apostles do something that even Christ would not do? When Christ sent forth His disciples on the great task of carrying the gospel to all men, He declared that they were to teach men “to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you.” Matt. 28:20. And Christ declared, “The Father which sent me, he gave me a commandment, what I should say.” John 12:49.

That the Father and Son are united in this matter of commandments is further revealed by the fact that Christ was present when the Israelites were in the wilderness, where they received the Ten Commandment law. (See, Neh. 9:11-15 and 1 Cor. 10:1-4.) Not three lawgivers, the Father, the Son, and the apostles, but one only. That is what these texts teach. They agree perfectly with the words of James: “There is one lawgiver.” James 4:12. Need we no longer keep God’s commandments, but only Christ’s? The texts before us give the clear answer.

For good measure let us add two more. The saints of God in the last days of earth's history are thus twice described: One: “The remnant . . . which keep the commandments of God and have the testimony of Jesus.” Rev. 12:17. Two: “They that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.” Rev. 14:12. Those described as saints (Rev. 14:12) are subject to God’s law. Those who are not are thus described by Paul: “The carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.” Rom. 8:7.

(For a discussion of a closely related line of reasoning see objection 13)

Objection 13: The only command that we need to keep now is Christ's new commandment to love one another, for He declared that we should keep His commandments even as He had kept His Father's commandments. And does not the Bible say that love is the fulfilling of the law?

It is quite true that Christ said, “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.” John 13:34. But there is nothing in this new commandment that indicates that it is to replace all the others. The text does not allow such a conclusion.

Christ did not say that we should keep His commandments in the place of His Father's commandments. It would be rebellion for the Son to free us from the Father’s laws and set up new ones in their place.

Christ’s purpose was not to destroy the great moral teachings and laws that had been given in former centuries. In His sermon on the mount He declared: think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill them. For verily I say unto you, till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulﬁlled.” Matt. 5:17, 18.

And when we read further in that wonderful sermon, we ﬁnd Christ telling His hearers that they were viewing various commandments of the Ten Commandments in too narrow a sense. Instead of abolishing or even restricting His Father's commandments, Christ magniﬁed them.

Thus in His commandment to the disciples concerning love, Christ wanted them to view love in a more holy sense than formerly. He wanted them to love one another not as the world interprets love—selﬁshly, sentimentally, or even sensually—but rather in the elevated way in which He loved his Father and His Father loved Him. In His life, Christ had set before His disciples an example of what true, unselﬁsh love really is, such love as had never before been witnessed on earth. In this sense, Jesus’ commandment might be described as new. It charged His followers not simply to love one another, but “that you love one another, as I have loved you.” John 15:12.

But what of the statement that love is the fulﬁlling of the law? The objector often expands this by saying that Christ declared that all we are to do is to “love God with all our heart and our neighbor as ourselves.” Let us read exactly what the Bible does say on this matter:

“Then one of them, which was a lawyer, asked him a question, tempting him, and saying, Master, which is the great commandment in the law? Jesus said unto him, Thou shall love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the ﬁrst and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shall love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” Matt. 22:35-40.

Christ was here setting forth no new doctrine. On the contrary, He was answering the speciﬁc question, “Which is the great commandment in the law?” His answer is almost an exact quotation from the Old Testament. (See Deut. 6:5; Lev. 19:18) In other words, the two great commandments to love God and to love our neighbor belong deﬁnitely to Old Testament times. Now then, if these two commandments take the place of the Ten Commandments, why were the Ten Commandments ever given? But the very Israelites who listened to the exhortation to love God and their neighbor also listened to the clear-cut command to obey the ten precepts of the Ten
Commandments.

No, these two commandments on love do not take the place of any other law. Instead, Christ declared that “on these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” How evidently wrong, then, to make these two commandments hang by themselves, and cut off everything else.

This is contrary to the teaching of Christ. According to the Bible you cannot separate love from law. “By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and keep his commandments. For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not grievous.” 1 John 5:2-3.

Thus reads the Good Book. If we truly love our fellow man, we will not steal his goods or lie about him or kill him. Indeed, we will not do any of the things prohibited by God's commandments. And if we truly love God, we will not bow down to false gods, or take God's name in vain, or use for our own purpose His holy Sabbath day. In other words, if we truly love God and our fellow men—not sentimentally or selfishly, but really—we will not willfully break any of the Ten Commandments.

Keeping the law is love, and true, unselfish love requires the keeping of the law. Instead of love’s being a substitute for law, love is the one power that brings forth true obedience to God's commandments. The Bible warns us against those who say they know and love God but refuse to keep His commandments. (1 John 2:4.) Such “love” is a counterfeit and a deception.

Objection 14: Seventh day Adventists are constantly preaching that men should obey God's commandments, keep the law, as if that were the sum and substance of true religion and a passport to heaven. But the Christian has nothing to do with law; he lives wholly by the grace of God, which God made available to him through faith in the gospel of Jesus Christ. Thus, and thus only, can any man he right with God and be in readiness for heaven.

We freely admit that we preach that men should obey God’s commandments. We also preach with equal vigor that a man’s only hope of heaven is through the grace of God made available through the substitutionary death of Chris on our behalf. There is no conflict between the two declarations, as we shall seek to show.

Note, first, that the Old Testament and the New Testament are in complete harmony regarding obedience:

OT: “And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou may freely eat: but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shall not eat of it: for in the day that thou eats thereof thou shall surely die.” Gen. 2:16-17.

NT: “Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.” Matt. 5:19.

OT: “I will perform the oath which I swore unto Abraham thy father; because that Abraham obeyed my voice, and kept my charge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws.” Gen. 26:3-5.

NT: “Why do you also transgress the commandment of God by your tradition?” Matt. 15:3. “If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments.” Matt. 19:17.

OT: “Now therefore, if you will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then you shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people: for all the earth is mine.” Ex. 19:5.

NT: “In vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. For laying aside the commandment of God, you hold the tradition of men.” Mark 7:7-8.

OT: “Thou shall love thy neighbor as thyself!” Lev. 19:18.

NT: “He that bath my commandments, and keeps them, he it is that loves me.” John 14:21.

Does the Old Testament preach obedience to the law? Of course:

OT: “And Samuel said, Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams.” 1 Sam. 15:22. “Turn you from your evil ways, and keep my commandments and my statutes, according to all the law which I commanded your fathers, and which I sent to you by my servants the prophets.” 2 Kings 17:13. “But this thing commanded I them, saying, Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and you shall be my people: and walk you in all the ways that I shall have commanded you, that it may be well unto you.” Jer. 7:23. "For I earnestly protested unto your fathers in the day that I brought them up out of the land of Egypt, even unto this day, rising early and protesting, saying, Obey my voice." Jer. 11:7.

But no less does the New Testament teach obedience to the law:

NT: “For this: Thou shall not commit adultery, Thou shall not kill. Thou shall not steal. Thou shall not bear false witness, Thou shall not covet; and if there be any other commandment, it is briefly comprehended in this saying, namely. Thou shall love thy neighbor as thy self.' Rom. 13:9. "But who so looks into the perfect law of liberty and continues therein, he, being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed." “So speak you and so do, as they that be judged by the law Of Liberty.” James 1:25; 2:12 "By this we know that we love the children of God when we love God, and keep His commandments. For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and His commandments are not grievous.” 1 John 5:2-3.

But the Old Testament is no less clear than the New that we are saved by faith, faith in the gospel, faith in the substitutionary, atoning death of Jesus Christ:

"By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his gifts and by it he being dead yet speaks." Heb. 11:7.

"By faith Noah, being warned of the God of things not seen as yet, moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saying of his house; by the which he condemned the world, and became heir of the righteousness which is by faith." Heb. 11:7. Acts 2:38.

"For if Abraham were justified by works, he hat but not before God. For what says the scripture? Abraham believed God. and it was counted unto him for righteousness. Now to him that works is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt. But to hint that works not, but believes on him that justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness. David also describes the blessedness of the man, into whom God imputes righteousness without works, saying, Blessed are they whose iniquities ale forgiven and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin.” “Therefore it is of faith that it might be by grace: to the end the promise might be sure to all the seed; not to that only which is of the law, but to that also which is of the faith Of Abraham; who is the father of us all.” Romans 4:2-8, 16.

“For this commandment which I command thee this day, it is not hidden from thee, neither is it far off. It is not in heaven, that thou should say, Who shall go up for us to heaven, and bring it unto us, that we may hear it, and do it? Neither is it beyond the sea, that thou should say, Who shall go over the sea for us, and bring it unto us, that we may hear it, and do it? But the word is very nigh unto thee, in thy mouth, and in thy heart, that thou may do it.” Deut. 30:11-14. (Paul quotes this passage in Deuteronomy, prefacing it thus: "The righteousness which is of faith speaks on this wise." See Rom. 10:6.)

"Have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy loving kindness: according unto the multitude of thy tender mercies blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin." "Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me." "For thou desires not it in sacrifice; else would I give it: thou delights not in burnt offering. The sacrifice's of God are a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou will not despise." Psalm 51:1-17.

And of course the New Testament teaches salvation by faith in Christ:

“The next day John sees Jesus coming unto him, and says, ‘Behold the Lamb of God, which takes away sin of the world.’” John 1:29. "Then Peter said unto them, Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.”

"You are the children of the prophets, and of the covenant which God made with our fathers, saying unto Abraham, And in thy seed shall all the kindreds of the earth be blessed." "Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name tinder heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved." Acts 3:25; 4:12.

"And brought them out, and said, Sirs. what must I do to be saved? And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shall be saved, Even as and thy house." Acts 16:30, 31. "For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believes; to the Jew first, and also to the Creek." Rom. 1:16. "But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested. Being witnessed by the law and the prophets; even the righteousness Of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe: for there is no difference." Romans 3:21-22.

"Therefore being justified by faith. we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ: by whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God." Rom. 5:1,2.

"But by the grace of God I am what I am." 1 Cor. 15:10. "But God, who is rich in mercy for his great love wherewith he loved Us, even when we were dead in sins, bath quickened us together with Christ (by grace you are saved;) and bath raised us up together and made us sit together in heavenly places In Christ Jesus: that in the ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus. For by grace am you saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: not of works, lest any man should boast.” Eph. 2:4-9.

"For the grace of God that brings salvation bath appeared to all men." Titus 2:11, "And the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that hears say, Come. And let him that is thirsty come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely." Rev. 22:17.

Here are the evident conclusions we must reach from studying these passages on obedience and grace in the Old and the New Testament:

1. Throughout all the history of this earth God has had but one rule for those who desire to be His children and thus qualify for heaven: obedience to His commands.

2. Likewise throughout all history, there has been only one way whereby we can be cleansed of our past sins and be enabled to give true obedience in the future; namely, the unmerited forgiveness of God, and the power of God, both of which are offered through faith in the substitutionary sacrifice of Jesus Christ.

Answers to a few questions will help to make these conclusions even more evident.

1. How did sin begin in the human race? Answer: By man's failure in the Garden of Eden to give obedience to God's will, His holy command.

2. Where is God's will most concisely expressed? Answer: In His holy law, the Ten Commandments.

3. What is the attitude of rebellious men toward His law? Answer: “Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.” Rom. 8:7

4. How is sin defined in the Bible? Answer: “Sin is the transgression of the law.” 1 John 3:4

5. How many of us are sinners? Answer: “All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.” Rom. 3:23.

6. Then how do we stand in relation to God? Answer: “Guilty.”

7. Can a man remove his guilt for past sins, and thus stand justified before God, by faithful obedience to God's law in the future? Answer: “By the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight.” Rom. 3:20.

8. What is the purpose of the law in relation to a guilty man? Answer: “By the law is the knowledge of sin.” Verse 20. “For where no law is, there is no transgression.” Rom. 4:15.

9. What is the gospel? Answer: The good news that Christ came to die for our sins and to offer to men the grace of God (Matt. 1:21; 2 Cor. 5:18-21)

10. What is grace? Answer: The unmerited favor of God displayed toward man in saying and preserving him.

11. How is the grace of God toward guilty man displayed? Answer: (1) By offering him a means by which he may be freed from the guilt of his past sins. (2) By taking away his “carnal mind” and stony heart, which are “enmity against God” and “not subject to the law of God,” and giving him a new heart and mind that delights to do the will of God. (Rom. 8:7; Heb. 8:10)

12. How is man freed from the guilt of past sins? Answer: “You know that he [Christ] was manifested to take away our sins.” 1 John 3:5. “Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus . . . for the remission of sins that are past.” Rom. 3:24-25.

13. How does the guilty man avail himself of this proffered cleansing? Answer: By simple faith in Christ. “That whosoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” John 3:16.

14. At the moment of accepting Christ by faith what takes place for repentant sinners? Answer: There is fulfilled for them the promise of the new covenant: “I will put my law into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people.” Heb. 8:10.

15. With God’s laws thus written in our minds and hearts how do we relate ourselves to its holy requirements, its claim on our obedience? Answer: Christ “condemned sin in the flesh: that the just requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.” Rom. 8:3-4.

16. How else is this miraculous new life of the pardoned sinner described? Answer: “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ lives in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh 1 live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.” Gal. 2:20.

17. Now if Christ is the one who lives out His life through us, what will be our relation to God's law? Answer: The same relation to it that Christ bore.

18. What was Christ's relation to God's law? Answer: “I delight to do thy will, O my God: yea, thy law is within my heart.” Psalm 40:8.

19. How does the pardoned sinner reveal that he is no longer at enmity against God, but that he truly loves Him? Answer: By obedience to God, which is the opposite of rebellion against Him. “For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments.” 1 John 5:3.

20. How may we summarize the contrast between the sinner and the pardoned child of God?

The Sinner:

1. "Enmity against God."

2. "Has a carnal mind!' Minds the things of the flesh.

3. "Not subject to the law of God, neither can be"

4. Controlled by Satan (Rom. 6:16), who originated all rebellion.

The Pardoned Child of God:

1. In harmony with God.

2. Walks "not after the flesh, but after the spirit."

3. God's law in his mind and heart.

4. Christ lives in him, and Christ has His Father's law in His heart.

How evident, then, that there is no conflict between law and grace; between obedience to God's holy law, which is the true mark of the child of God, and salvation from sin through God's grace supplied through the atoning sacrifice of Christ. We are saved from sin, law breaking, that we might live a life of obedience, law keeping.

No one who would continue to sin will enter heaven. The “saints” standing in readiness for Christ's Second Advent are distinguished in two vital ways: They (1) keep “the commandments of God: and (2) have “the faith of Jesus.” (Rev. 14:12)

Adventists, who seek to prepare their hearts and the hearts of others for the Second Advent, preach that men should “keep the commandments of God” and possess “the faith of Jesus.” Law and grace are combined, and it is because we have faith in Jesus Christ our savior that we keep His commandments.

Objection 15: Why preach the law when no one can be saved by obeying it? Furthermore, man is morally unable to keep the commandments?

This objection is really only a variant of objections already answered. But because the no-law argument is made to appear so plausible under different guises, let us examine this objection.

We agree with the objector that no one can he saved by keeping the law, and that man is morally unable to keep it. But we do not agree with the conclusion he would have us draw from these facts; namely, that the law was abolished at the cross.

What would we say to the man who should argue that mirrors ought to be abolished as worthless because no one can obtain beauty by looking into them? We would say that it is not the function of a mirror to make people beautiful, that no one ever made such a claim for mirrors. The function of the mirror is to provide us with a means of knowing what we look like, whether we look as we ought. And when we have discovered how we look, we can take appropriate steps to remedy our imperfections.

Even so with the law. The law was never intended to make man holy or pure or beautiful. Its task is not that of saving man from his sins, but of showing him just what his condition is. When he gazes at the law, with mind quickened by the convicting Spirit of God, he sees immediately where this moral defect or that mars the beauty of his soul, even as he discovers from gazing into a mirror just where this physical defect or that mars the beauty of his body.

And when men thus see their spiritual defects, and become conscious of their uncleanness, they are in a frame of mind to listen to a message that offers cleansing from their defilement. In other words, only when a man realizes that he is a sinner is he ready to listen to the gospel, which is the good news of salvation from sin through the death of Christ.

It is by the law that we have the knowledge of sin. (See, Rom. 3:20) Therefore, it is evident that only as the law is made known to men can they be brought into a frame of mind that will cause them to wish to hear and accept what the gospel offers them.

We would ask: If sinful man is unable to keep the law, and when he becomes a Christian he need not keep it, pray tell why was the law of God ever given? Shall we make a farce of God’s law, and charge Heaven with proclaiming a code that was for thousands of years impossible of being kept, and that for the last two thousand years need not be kept?

We are puzzled to understand why the objection before us should be used to prove that the law was abolished at the cross. Men were no more able to keep God's holy law in the centuries before Christ than they have been in the centuries following. Nor could they in those years before Christ hope to obtain salvation through the law, for, as we have found, God has had only one way of saving men from the days of Adam down, and that is through the sacrifice of Christ. (See, Objection 14)

So, then, if the objection before us really proves anything against the law today, it proves it against the law in all past days, back to the beginning of man’s sinful history. In other words, there would be no useful place for God’s law at all in the whole history of the world.

But instead of the law having been abolished for the Christian, there is really no true keeping of the law except by Christians. The divine code would be a dead letter in this world were it not for the Christians who obey it. By faith Christ comes into our hearts, and lives out in us the precepts of heaven. (Eph. 3:20; Gal. 2:20; 1 Cor. 1:23-24)

Thus, instead of God’s law being wholly ignored and flouted in this rebellious world, there are found men and women upholding and establishing it in the only way a law can be uphel—by living in obedience to its claims. That is why Paul says, “Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law.” Rom. 3:31. Our faith in Christ has not abolished but established the law.

Objection 16: By preaching the law you endeavor to deprive Christians of the glorious liberty of the gospel.

Christ declared, “Every one that commits sin is the bondservant of sin.” John 8:34. Therefore it is the man whose life is not in obedience to the law of God who is deprived of liberty. The righteous man finds freedom and joy in God’s law.

The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul: the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple.
The statutes of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart: the commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes.
The fear of the Lord is clean, enduring for ever: the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.
More to be desired are they than gold, yea, than much fine gold: sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb.
Moreover by them is thy servant warned: and in keeping of them there is great reward. Psalm 19:8-11

Law and liberty are not opposing concepts. You need not surrender one in order to have the other. True, there are men who stand up at street corners and declare that the only way to have real liberty is to abolish all laws. But most people understand that laws wisely made and well-kept provide the only sure foundation for liberty in any country.

In any country, the ones who find in law a curtailing of their liberty are those whose habits of life are in opposition to the law. The man who is accustomed to steal or to murder finds that the law checks the freedom of his actions very greatly.

If, as citizens of this world, we find liberty in obedience to manmade law, why, as citizens of the heavenly world, do we need God’s law to be abolished in order to have liberty? Is it because the laws of heaven are unjust and deprive us of the freedom that ought rightfully to be ours? The very thought is blasphemy.

The law of God prohibits making or worshiping idols. No man who calls himself a Christian can feel deprived of liberty by such a prohibition. The law also commands us not to take God's name in vain or to desecrate His holy Sabbath day. Does the child of God want to be freed from these prohibitions? Likewise the law commands respect for parents, and prohibits killing, adultery, stealing, lying, and coveting. Certainly no follower of Christ will feel that these precepts deprive him of liberty. Indeed, the Bible definitely speaks of God’s holy law as “the law of liberty.” (See James 2:12.)

True, if the law is preached to men apart from the gospel—the saving power of God through the sacrificial death of Christ—the result will be only a feeling of condemnation on the part of the hearers. They will simply be brought to a realization of how guilty they are, without knowing of Christ’s pardon. But when the high code of heaven is presented in terms of God's promise to forgive and to give us divine power to carry out the law’s requirements, then the hearers can find joy and true liberty in such preaching; for “where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.” 2 Cor. 3:17.

No one would ever have thought of bringing against Seventh day Adventists the charge of depriving men of Christian liberty if it were not that we preach the law exactly as it reads in the Bible. Other Protestant denominations believe in the law and declare that obedience to it is necessary. They have believed so strongly that the Ten Commandments should be obeyed by all that they have persuaded legislatures in most of Christendom to enact statutes to facilitate the observance of the Sabbath command, as they interpret it.

Just why we, who invoke only the grace of God to enable men to obey the command to keep holy the seventh day, should be charged as legalists while Sunday keepers, who invoke public ordinances to compel men to rest on the first day of the week, should claim to be the exponents of grace, is surely one of the strange contradictions in modern religion.

Seventh-day Adventists have ever been vigorous opponents of the principle of approaching Sabbath rest from the legal standpoint, whereas Sunday keeping preachers are the ones who have lobbied their legislatures to pass laws to enforce Sunday rest.

Just what is there about preaching first-day sacredness from the fourth commandment—as Protestant denominations do—that allows them to bask in the warmth of grace; whereas the preaching of seventh day sacredness from the same fourth commandment consigns such preachers to the chill limbo of legalism?

The explanation cannot possibly he found in the theory that we who preach seventh day sacredness do so more sternly and rigorously than first-day preachers. Even a cursory acquaintance with the history of Christianity reveals that Sunday sacredness has quite generally been proclaimed with a severity that frightened large majorities into conformity. Although lately there has been a noticeable relaxation of this severity, it does not reflect any change of view toward the first day by Sunday-keeping religious leaders. Many of them bemoan the laxity that has crept in.

When we declare that a certain definite day has been set apart as holy, we are frequently met with the argument that there is no difference in days in the Christian Era, that it is unreasonable to maintain that a special sacredness or significance attaches to a particular day in the cycle of the week. But evidently by the actions and statements of Sunday-keepers themselves there is a vast difference in days, so vast a difference that the keeping of one particular day means that you are shackled by legalism, and the keeping of another particular day means that you roam freely over the wide expanses of grace. Seventh day Adventists never taught a sharper contrast in days than this.

Therefore the point at issue is not whether the Ten Commandments should be obeyed or not; almost all Protestant creeds clearly teach obedience to the Ten Commandments.

Nor is it a question of whether there is a wide difference in days. Protestants in general believe there is so mighty a difference as to justify civil laws and penalties to maintain the difference. The real question is this: Seeing that the Ten Commandments are in force, and seeing that there is a difference in days, which day is the right one, the seventh or the first? In the series of Sabbath objections beginning with Objection 20, a partial answer, at least, will be found.

Objection 17: The Bible repeatedly and emphatically declares that no one can he justified by keeping the law. Hence to preach the keeping of the law is to preach another gospel. “Whosoever of you are justified by the law; you are fallen from grace.” Gal. 5:4.

In harmony with the Bible, Adventists repeatedly and emphatically declare that no one can be justified by keeping the law. (See the discussion of Objection 14) The confused reasoning in the objection before us resides in the evidently mistaken idea of what the word “justified” means Scripturally.

The evidence presented under objection 14 revealed that the divine act of justifying a sinner takes place at the moment he comes to God, repentant and in faith, to claim the offered pardon for sins through the sacrifice of Christ. To teach that man can wipe out past guilt, that is, past disobedience to the law of God, by faithful keeping of that law in the future is to flout the grace of God and to preach another gospel.

The word “gospel” means good news. Good news that a divine plan has been devised whereby sinful man may be purged of his guilt; that the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world was delivered over to death for our offenses and raised again for our justification. (John 1:29; Rom. 4:25)

This is clearly revealed in the words of the angels who spoke to Joseph and to the shepherds. Said the angel to Joseph, regarding Mary's son that was to be born: “And she shall bring forth a son, and thou shall call his name Jesus: for he shall save his people from their sins.” Matt. 1:21.

To the shepherds the angel declared: “Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord.” Luke 2:10-11.

When we preach the keeping of God’s commandments we are not preaching a different gospel. We are simply echoing the words of the apostle John: “For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not grievous.” 1 John 5:3. We are simply calling on the justified-through-faith child of God to live in obedience to God.

Paul, apparently, feared that some who read what he had written about men not being justified by the law might wrongly conclude that God’s grace frees us from any obligation to keep the law. He states the matter thus: “What then? Shall we sin, because we are not under the law, but under grace? God forbid.” Paul, who knew that “sin is the transgression of the law,” is really asking this: Shall we transgress the law because we are under grace? He answers, “God forbid.”

We Seventh-day Adventists simply echo Paul’s answer when we call on those who have been saved by grace through faith in Christ’s substitutionary death to avail themselves of God’s transforming power, and refrain from transgressing God’s law in the future. Far from being legalism, this is mere Christianity, and has always been understood to be such.

Objection 18: 1 Timothy 1:9 proves that the Christian has nothing to do with the law, for we read there that “the law is not made for a righteous man.”

Let us read the whole passage:

“Knowing this, that the law is not made for a righteous man, but for the lawless and disobedient. For the ungodly and for sinners, for unholy and profane, for murderers of fathers and murderers of mothers. For manslayers [murderers], for whore mongers [pimps and madams], for them that defile themselves with mankind [homosexuals], for men stealers [slavers], for liars, for perjured persons, and if there be any other thing that is contrary to sound doctrine.” 1 Tim. 1:9-10.

The passage says nothing about the law being abolished in the Christian era. Rather, it reveals that the law serves as definite a purpose in the Christian era, just as in the centuries before Christ. The class of people against whom the law is directed—murderers, liars, etc.—are found in every period of the world’s history.

There is no text in the Bible that proves more conclusively than this one that the law was not done away at the cross. The only way to refute this proof would be to argue that the lawbreakers described in the passage must obey the law, whereas Christians are free from it. This is the strange conclusion the objector's logic forces us to.

But even this crude defense of the anti-nomian position is unavailing. Can even the most devout among righteous men claim that they never commit sin? No. Even the greatest saints have had to claim the comforting promise. “If any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.” 1 John 2:1.

But the same apostle who wrote that promise also wrote, “Sin is the transgression of the law.” 1 John 3:4. Therefore, every time we confess our sins, we are acknowledging that God’s law is still binding upon us. As we again place our hand in the hand of God and walk in righteousness, we are not brought into conflict with the law, for “the law is not made for a righteous man.”

There is really nothing hard to understand about this text. It is a simple statement concerning the purpose of law that every judge or legislator or layman would agree to today in matters civil as well as religious. For whom are our criminal laws laid down? For the law-abiding citizen? No, for the lawless, you say. That is right. But is the law-abiding citizen therefore freed from the requirements of the statute books? Of course not.

The same is true concerning God’s law. It is directed against the lawless, not against the righteous, who are law-abiding citizens of the kingdom of God. But are the citizens of the heavenly kingdom therefore freed from the requirements of that divine code? No.

Furthermore, the law-abiding citizens in any jurisdiction are not the ones who complain about the continuing applicability of the law. To the contrary, they complain about those who break the law without appropriate punishment or other consequences.

Even so in the spiritual realm. The man whose heart is right with God finds no occasion to fight the divine law or urge that it ought to be abolished. Instead, he says with the Psalmist, “O how love I thy law! It is my meditation all the day.” Psalm 119:97.

And if he is overtaken in a fault and falls into sin, he does not excuse his sinful act by arguing that the law has no claim upon him. Rather he confesses that he has broken the law, asks forgiveness and cleansing, and seeks, through divine power, to faithfully obey God.

Objection 19: Seventh day Adventists teach that a man must keep the commandments in order to be saved.

Again we are confronted with a variant of objections already answered. But this so tersely sets forth a mistaken idea regarding Adventist teaching that it is here examined as a separate objection.

To the rich young man who inquired of Christ, “Good Master, what good thing shall I do, that I may have eternal life?” Jesus replied, “If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments.” Matt. 19:16-17. The verses that follow show clearly that Christ was referring specifically to the Ten Commandments.

Too many Christians preach only of accepting Jesus Christ as Savior. But Christianity embraces much more than the saving of a man from his past sins. It has to do with repenting of sin and living a changed life. The new life in Christ consists not only of availing ourselves of Christ’s pardon freely offered, but also doing God’s will in our lives, keeping God’s commandments, and working out our salvation with fear and trembling. (See Matt. 7:21; John 14:15; Rev. 14:12; Phil. 2:12)

Although we do not teach that a man keeps the commandments in order to be saved, we emphatically do teach that a man who has been saved gives evidence of that salvation by keeping the commandments of the Savior who loves him and gave His life to save him. (John 14:15: “If you love me, keep my commandments”; John 15:10: “If you keep My commandments, you will remain in My love, just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and remain in His love.”; James 2:14-26: “faith without works is dead”).

It has been well remarked that although there is no salvation in keeping the law, there is awful condemnation in not keeping it: “Or do you not know that wrongoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who have sex with men, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor slanderers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. And that is what some of you were.” 1 Cor. 6:9-12

Christianity does not free men from the claims of God's law, which our old selves were not been able to fulfill, for then Christianity would be but an opiate and a delusion, leaving the lost sinner in the same unfortunate state as before. No, Christianity is God's plan whereby man can obtain power to keep the laws of heaven. It is the divine scheme by which Christ lives and works within us. (See, Gal. 2:20)

We believe the words of Christ, “if thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments,” but we also believe that the keeping power is a gift from God. We confess that we of our own selves can do nothing, but we believe that we can do things through Jesus Christ who strengthens us. (See, Phil. 4:13)

We accept without reserve the words of our Lord: “I am the vine, you are the branches: he that abides in me, and I in him, the same brings forth much fruit: for without me you can do nothing.” John 15:5. Though we say with Paul, “Work out your own salvation,” we immediately add, as does the apostle, “It is God which works in you both to will and to do of His good pleasure.” Phil. 2:12-13.

Apologetics