The Royal Law Pt 5

The Perpetuity of the Royal Law

Or, The Ten Commandments Not Abolished. Advent and Sabbath Tract, No. 4.

By J. N. ANDREWS

Continued….

Having shown conclusively that the law of God was neither abolished by the teaching nor by the death of the Son of God, we will now examine the third question:-

3. Was the law of God abolished by the apostles? 

It may seem to some individuals that this last question is propounded in a singular form. But if the law of God was not abolished by the teaching nor yet by the death of the Son of God, it follows that if abolished at all, it must have been by the apostles. Many have asserted that the apostles re-enacted nine of the ten commandments, to take the place of the ten which ceased at Christ's death: but as we have shown that the Son of God offered himself up as the great Propitiation for the transgression of the law, and not as the means of its abolition, it follows that the ten commandments must be abolished by the apostles, before they could re-enact one of them. It is no more absurd to speak of the apostles' abolishing the ten commandments than it is to speak of their re-enacting nine of them. And if it seem absurd to any individual to believe that the apostles abolished the ten commandments and then re-enacted nine of them, we ask them to consider whether the doctrine which represents the infinite Law-giver as doing this very thing, is not a still greater absurdity? 

If the apostles abolished the law of God, who gave them authority? The Son of God indeed commissioned them to teach all things whatsoever he had commanded them; but we have seen, in all his teaching to them, that he maintained the immutability of his Father's law, so that from their divine Master they never received such a commission. If they taught as he taught, we shall find them setting forth the perpetuity and immutability of the law of God. And that they did speak the same doctrine which their Lord had taught them, we have divine assurance. John14:26. If the apostles abolished the law, they must have done it in the very epistles in which, according to some of our opponents, they re-enacted nine of the commandments for the gospel dispensation. These epistles were written not far from A. D. 60; so that if the law of God was abolished by the apostles, it was abolished about thirty years after the crucifixion.

We have presented the question in this form, that attention might be called to the folly of those teachers who represent the apostles as legislating upon the law of God. A single testimony from the apostle James ought to make those blush for shame who represent the apostles as abolishing the law of God, or as reenacting a part of it, to take the place of the original code. "There is one Lawgiver who is able to save and to destroy." James 4:12. From the preceding verse it is certain that James thus designates Him who gave the law in person at the first; that law, the authority of which he so distinctly recognizes in chapter 1:25; 2:8-12. According to James, there is but one such being in the universe; namely, the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only wise God. It is therefore the height of absurdity to represent the apostles as amending, abolishing, or re-enacting the law of God. The twelve apostles never yet attempted to dethrone the one Law-giver, or to usurp any of his prerogatives. 

To be continued…..