(Excerpt)
Conviction
of Sin and of Righteousness
Jesus said
of the Comforter, "When He is come, He will reprove the world of sin, and
of righteousness, and of judgment." John 16:8. Of Himself He said, "I
came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance." Mark 2:17.
"They that are whole have no need of the physician, but they that are
sick." A man must feel his need before he will accept help; he must know
his disease before he can apply the remedy. Even so the promise of
righteousness will be utterly unheeded by one who does not realize that he is a
sinner. The first part of the comforting work of the Holy Spirit, therefore, is
to convince men of sin. So "the Scripture hath concluded all under sin,
that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that
believe." "By the law is the knowledge of sin." Rom. 3:20. He
who knows that he is a sinner is in the way to acknowledge it; and "if we
confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to
cleanse us from all unrighteousness." 1Joh.1:9. Thus the law is in the
hands of the Spirit an active agent in inducing men to accept the fullness of
the promise. No one hates the man who has saved his life by pointing out to him
an unknown peril; on the contrary, such an one is regarded as a friend, and is
always remembered with gratitude. Even so will the law be regarded by the one
who has been prompted by its warning voice to flee from the wrath to come. He
will ever say, with the psalmist, "I hate vain thoughts, but Thy law do I
love."
Righteousness
and Life
"If
there had been a law given which could make alive, verily righteousness would
have been of the law."
Gal
3:21 Is the law then against the promises of God? God forbid: for if
there had been a law given which could have given life, verily righteousness
should have been by the law.
This shows
us that righteousness is life. It is no mere formula, no dead theory or dogma,
but is living action. Christ is the life, and He is, therefore, our
righteousness. "The Spirit is life because of righteousness." The law
written on two tables of stone, could not give life, any more than could the
stones on which it was written. All its precepts are perfect, but the flinty
characters can not transform themselves into action. He who receives only the
law in letter, has a "ministration of condemnation," and death. But
"the Word was made flesh." In Christ, the Living Stone, the law is
life and peace. Receiving Him through the "ministration of the
Spirit," we have the life of righteousness, which the law approves. This twenty-first verse shows that the giving
of the law was to emphasize the importance of the promise. All the
circumstances attending the giving of the law,--the trumpet tone, the awful
voice, the quaking earth, the "fire, and blackness, and tempest," the
thunders and lightnings, the bounds about the mount, beyond which it was death
to pass,--all these told that "the law worketh wrath" to "the
children of disobedience." But the very fact that the wrath which the law
works comes only on the children of disobedience, proves that the law is good,
and that "the man that doeth them shall live in them." Did God wish
to discourage the people?--Not by any means. The law must be kept, and the
terrors of Sinai were designed to drive them back to the oath of God, which
four hundred and thirty years before had been given to stand to all people in
all ages as the assurance of righteousness through the crucified and ever-living
Saviour.
All Shut
Up in Prison
Note the
similarity between verses 8 and 22. "The Scripture hath concluded [that
is, shut up] all under sin, that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be
given to them that believe." "The Scripture, foreseeing that God
would justify the heathen through faith, preached before the Gospel unto
Abraham, saying, In thee shall all nations be blessed." We see that the
Gospel is preached by the same thing--the Scripture--that shuts men up under
sin. The word "conclude" means literally "shut up," just as
is given in verse 23. Of course, a person who is shut up by the law is in
prison. In human governments a criminal is shut up as soon as the law can get
hold of him; God's law is everywhere present, and always active, and,
therefore, the instant a man sins he is shut up. This is the condition of all
the world, "for all have sinned," and "there is none righteous,
no, not one." Those disobedient
ones to whom Christ preached in the days of Noah were "in prison."
1Pet.3:19,20.
1Pe
3:19 By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison;
1Pe
3:20 Which sometime were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God
waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that
is, eight souls were saved by water.
But they,
like all other sinners, were "prisoners of hope." Zech.9:12.
Zec
9:12 Turn you to the strong hold, ye prisoners of hope…
God
"hath looked down from the height of His sanctuary; from heaven did the
Lord behold the earth; to hear the groaning of the prisoner; to loose those
that are appointed to death." Ps.102:19,20.
Psa
102:19 For he hath looked down from the height of his sanctuary; from
heaven did the LORD behold the earth;
Psa
102:20 To hear the groaning of the prisoner; to loose those that are
appointed to death
Christ is given "for a covenant of the
people, for a light of the Gentiles; to open the blind eyes, to bring out the
prisoners from the prison, and them that sit in darkness out of the prison
house." Is.42:6,7. Let me speak
from personal experience to the sinner who does not yet know the joy and
freedom of the Lord. Some day, if not
already, you will be sharply convicted of sin by the Spirit of God. You may
have been full of doubts and quibbles, of ready answers and self-defense, but
then you will have nothing to say. You will then have no doubt about the
reality of God and the Holy Spirit, and will need no argument to assure you of
it; for you will know the voice of God speaking to your soul, and will feel, as
did ancient Israel, "Let not God speak with us, lest we die." Then
you will know what it is to be shut up in prison,--in a prison whose walls seem
to close on you, not only barring all escape, but seeming to suffocate you. The
tales of people condemned to be buried alive with a heavy stone upon them, will
seem very vivid and real to you, as you feel the tables of the law crushing out
your life, and a hand of marble seems to be breaking your very heart. Then it
will give you joy to remember that you are shut up for the sole purpose that
"the promise by faith of Jesus Christ" might be accepted by you. As
soon as you lay hold of that promise,--the key that will unlock any door in
Doubting Castle,--the prison doors will fly open, and you can say, "Our
soul is escaped as a bird out of the snare of the fowlers; the snare is broken,
and we are escaped." Ps. 124:7.
Under the
Law, Under Sin
We have just read that the Scripture hath
shut up all under sin, that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given
to them that believe. Before faith came, we were kept in ward under the law,
shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed. We know that
whatsoever is not of faith is sin (Rom.14:23); therefore, to be under the law
is identical with being under sin. We are under the law solely because we are
under sin. The grace of God brings salvation from sin, so that when we accept
God's grace we are no longer under the law, because we are freed from sin.
Those who are under the law, therefore, are the transgressors of the law. The
righteous are not under it, but are walking in it.
The Law a
Jailer, a Taskmaster
"So
that the law hath been our tutor unto Christ, that we might be justified by
faith." The words "to bring us" are marked both in the old
version and the new as having been added to the text, so we have dropped them
out. It really makes no material difference with the sense whether they are
retained or omitted. It will be noticed also that the new version has
"tutor" in the place of "schoolmaster." This is better, but
the sense is still better conveyed by the word that
is used in
the German and Scandinavian translations, which signifies "master of a
house of correction." The single word in our language corresponding to it
would be jailer. The Greek word is the word which we have in English as
"pedagogue." The paidagogos was the slave who accompanied the boys to
school to see that they did not play truant. If they attempted to run away, he
would bring them back, and had authority even to beat them to keep them in the
way. The word has come to be used as meaning "schoolmaster," although
the Greek word has not at all the idea of a schoolmaster.
"Taskmaster" would be better. The idea here is rather that of a guard
who accompanies a prisoner who is allowed to walk about outside the prison
walls. The prisoner, although nominally at large, is really deprived of his
liberty just the same as though he were actually in a cell. The fact is that
all who do not believe are "under sin," "shut up"
"under the law," and that, therefore, the law acts as their jailer.
It is that that shuts them in, and will not let them off; the guilty can not
escape in their guilt. God is merciful and gracious, but He will not clear the
guilty. Ex.34:6,7. That is, He will not lie, by calling evil good; but He
provides a way by which the guilty may lose their guilt. Then the law will no
longer be against them, will no longer shut them up, and they can walk at
liberty.
Only One
Door
Christ
says, "I am the door." John 10:7,9.
Joh
10:7 Then said Jesus unto them again, Verily, verily, I say unto you, I
am the door of the sheep.
Joh
10:9 I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and
shall go in and out, and find pasture.
He is also the sheepfold and the Shepherd. Men
fancy that when they are outside the fold they are free, and that to come into
the fold would mean a curtailing of their liberty; but it is exactly the
reverse. The fold of Christ is "a large place," while unbelief is a
narrow prison. The sinner can have but a narrow range of thought; the true
"free thinker" is the one who comprehends with all saints what is the
length, and breadth, and depth, and height of the love of Christ, which passeth
knowledge. Outside of Christ is bondage; in Him alone is there freedom. Outside
of Christ, the man is in prison, "holden with the cords of his sins."
Prov.5:22. "The strength of sin is the law." It is the law that
declares him to be a sinner, and makes him conscious of his condition. "By
the law is the knowledge of sin;" and "sin is not imputed when there
is no law." Rom.3:20; 5:13. The law really forms the sinner's prison
walls. They close in on him, making him feel uncomfortable, oppressing him with
a sense of sin, as though they would press his life out. In vain he makes
frantic efforts to escape. Those commandments stand as firm as the everlasting
hills. Whichever way he turns he finds a commandment which says to him,
"You can find no freedom by me, for you have sinned." If he seeks to
make friends with the law, and promises to keep it, he is no better off, for
his sin still remains. It goads him and drives him to the only way of
escape--"the promise by faith of Jesus Christ." In Christ he is made
"free indeed," for in Christ he is made the righteousness of God. In
Christ is "the perfect law of liberty."
The Glad
Tidings
By E. J.
WAGGONER
(Excerpt- To be continued)
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