SERMON XXXVI.
THE LAW ESTABLISHED THRO’ FAITH.
Discourse II.
Rom. iii. 31.
Do we then make void the law thro’ faith? God forbid! Yea, we establish the law.
1.IT has been shewn in the preceding discourse, which are the most usual ways of making void the law thro’ faith: namely, first, The not preaching it at all, which effectually makes it all void at a stroke: and this under colour of preaching Christ and magnifying the gospel, tho’ it be in truth, destroying both the one and the other: secondly, The teaching (whether directly or indirectly) that faith supersedes the necessity of holiness: that this is less necessary now, or a less degree of it necessary, than before Christ came: that it is less necessary to us, because we believe, than otherwise it would have been: or, that Christian liberty is a liberty from any kind or degree of holiness: (so perverting those great truths, that we are now under the covenant of grace and not of works: that a man is justified by faith, without the works of the law; and that to him that worketh not but believeth, his faith is counted for righteousness:) or, thirdly, The doing this practically; the making void the law in practice tho’ not in principle: the living or acting, as if faith was designed to excuse us from holiness: the allowing ourselves in sin, because we are not under the law, but under grace. It remains to enquire, how we may follow a better pattern, how we may be able to say with the apostle, Do we then make void the law thro’ faith? God forbid! Yea, we establish the law.
2. We do not indeed establish the old ceremonial law: we know that is abolished for ever. Much less do we establish the whole Mosaic dispensation. This, we know, our Lord has nailed to his cross. Nor yet do we so establish the moral law (which it is to be feared, too many do) as if the fulfilling it, the keeping all the commandments, were the condition of our justification. If it were so, surely in his sight, should no man living be justified. But all this being allowed, we still in the apostle’s sense, establish the law, the moral law.
I. 1. We establish the law, first, By our doctrine: by endeavouring to preach it in its whole extent, to explain and inforce every part of it, in the same manner as our great Teacher did, while upon earth. We establish it, by following St. Peter’s advice, If any man speak let him speak as the oracles of God; as the holy men of old moved by the Holy Ghost, spoke and wrote for our instruction, and as the apostles of our blessed Lord, by the direction of the same spirit. We establish it whenever we speak in his name, by keeping back nothing from them that hear; by declaring to them, without any limitation or reserve, the whole counsel of God. And in order the more effectually to establish it, we use herein great plainness of speech. We are not as many that corrupt the word of God, καπηλεύουσι· (as artful men their bad wines) we do not cauponize, mix, adulterate or soften it, to make it suit the taste of the hearers. But as of sincerity, but as of God in the sight of God, speak we in Christ: as having no other aim, than by manifestation of the truth, to commend ourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God.
2. We then by our doctrine establish the law, when we thus openly declare it to all men: and that, in the fulness wherein it is delivered by our blessed Lord and his apostles: when we publish it in the height and depth and length and breadth thereof. We then establish the law, when we declare every part of it, every commandment contained therein, not only in its full literal sense, but likewise in its spiritual meaning: not only with regard to the outward actions, which it either forbids or enjoins: but also with respect to the inward principle, to the thoughts, desires and intents of the heart.
3. And indeed this we do the more diligently, not only because it is of the deepest importance; inasmuch as all the fruit, every word and work, must be only evil continually, if the tree be evil, if the dispositions and tempers of the heart, be not right before God: but likewise, because as important as these things are, they are little considered or understood. So little, that we may truly say of the law too, when taken in its full spiritual meaning, It is a mystery which was hid from ages and generations since the world began. It was utterly hid from the Heathen world. They, with all their boasted wisdom, neither found out God, nor the law of God, not in the letter, much less in the spirit of it. Their foolish hearts were more and more darkened, while professing themselves wise, they became fools. And it was almost equally hid, as to its spiritual meaning, from the bulk of the Jewish nation. Even these who were so ready to declare concerning others, this people that know not the law, is accursed, pronounced their own sentence therein, as being under the same curse, the same dreadful ignorance. Witness our Lord’s continual reproof of the wisest among them, for their gross misinterpretations of it. Witness the supposition almost universally received among them, that they needed only to make clean the outside of the cup: that the paying tythe of mint, anise and cummin, outward exactness would atone for inward unholiness; for the total neglect both of justice and mercy, of faith and the love of God. Yea, so absolutely was the spiritual meaning of the law hidden from the wisest of them, that one of their most eminent Rabbi’s comments thus, on those words of the Psalmist, If I incline unto iniquity with my heart, the Lord will not hear me: that is, saith he, if it be only in my heart, if I do not commit outward wickedness, the Lord will not regard it; he will not punish me, unless I proceed to the outward act!
4. But alas! The law of God, as to its inward spiritual meaning, is not hid from the Jews or Heathens only, but even from what is called the Christian world; at least, from a vast majority of them. The spiritual sense of the commandments of God, is still a mystery to these also. Nor is this observable also in those lands, which are overspread with Romish darkness and ignorance. But this is too sure, that the far greater part, even of those, who are called reformed Christians, are utter strangers at this day to the law of Christ, in the purity and spirituality of it.
5. Hence it is that to this day the Scribes and Pharisees, the men who have the form but not the power of religion, and who are generally wise in their own eyes, and righteous in their own conceits; hearing these things are offended: are deeply offended, when we speak of the religion of the heart, and particularly when we shew, that without this, were we to give all our goods to feed the poor, it would profit us nothing. But offended they must be: for we cannot but speak the truth as it is in Jesus. It is our part, whether they will hear or whether they will forbear, to deliver our own soul. All that is written in the book of God we are to declare, not as pleasing men, but the Lord. We are to declare not only all the promises, but all the threatnings too which we find therein. At the same time that we proclaim all the blessings and privileges, which God hath prepared for his children, we are likewise to teach all the things, whatsoever he hath commanded. And we know, that all these have their use; either for the awakening those that sleep, the instructing the ignorant, the comforting the feeble-minded, or the building up and perfecting of the saints. We know that all scripture, given by inspiration of God, is profitable either for doctrine, or for reproof, either for correction or for instruction in righteousness: and that the man of God, in the process of the work of God in his soul, has need of every part thereof, that he may at length be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works.
6. It is our part, thus to preach Christ, by preaching all things whatsoever he hath revealed. We may indeed without blame, yea, and with a peculiar blessing from God, declare the love of our Lord Jesus Christ. We may speak, in a more especial manner, of the Lord our righteousness. We may expatiate upon the grace of God in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself. We may, at proper opportunities, dwell upon his praise, as bearing the iniquities of us all, as wounded for our transgressions and bruised for our iniquities, that by his stripes we might be healed. But still we should not preach Christ, according to his word, if we were wholly to confine ourselves to this. We are not ourselves clear before God, unless we proclaim him in all his offices. To preach Christ, as a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, is to preach him not only as our great High-priest, taken from among men, and ordained for men, in things pertaining to God; as such, reconciling us to God by his blood, and ever living to make intercession for us: but likewise as the prophet of the Lord, who of God is made unto us wisdom. Who by his word, and his Spirit, is with us always, guiding us into all truth: yea, and as remaining a King for ever; as giving laws to all whom he has bought with his blood: as restoring those to the image of God, whom he had first re-instated in his favour: as reigning in all believing hearts, until he has subdued all things to himself; until he hath utterly cast out all sin, and brought in everlasting righteousness.