Ruling Out the Law

What is the law supposed to do? Listen as Paul writes to the early church at Galatia, therefore the law is or has become our tutor to lead us to Christ so that we might be justified by faith. The law is to sort of guard us as it were and lead us to make sure we end up where we're supposed to be. And where are we supposed to be?

At the foot of the cross. It is to tutor us to the truth that justification comes by faith and not by law. Have you ever walked up to a stranger and asked, if you were to die tonight, why would God let you into heaven? Well, if you've done that, that person probably responded with something like, well, I'm a good person. I've never murdered anyone or committed adultery or robbed a bank. Many people today believe the misconception that being good enough, that keeping the law will get them into heaven. And that's not true. The law is a tutor that points us to our need for the gospel.

And we're going to explore that truth today here on Wisdom for the Heart, as Stephen Davey brings this message called ruling out the law. A man went into Chase National Bank in New York City, and he was going there to get a loan for $600. And so he went to the small loans department and waited in line, was given the papers. He filled all the papers out. The forms were completed and signed and handed them to the teller. The teller paused for a little bit, looking at his $600 loan request, and then said, excuse me for just a moment, and he disappeared and was gone for 10, 12 minutes.

Everyone standing in line was wondering what was going on, and they were growing impatient about the point at which they were going to say something. Suddenly, the teller appeared through the door again, this time with him. The bank president also appeared, and trailing along behind him, other members of the board. The newspaper reporters soon shuffled in and cameras were flashing, and this man found out that there was something rather unusual about his loan request.

The day before, the officers had recognized that the following day would be a time when the small loans department would reach its one billionth mark in loans. So they wanted to make it a special PR event, and they decided as a board that whoever came in, when that moment was reached, that the bank would give him or her what they were asking to borrow as a gift. And so they handed that man a check for $600. I'm sure if you had been him, if I were him, I would have added a zero or two, thinking, no, I really meant $60,000, but $600, no strings attached.

And the president asked if he could have his picture taken with the man, and it was run in the New York newspapers the following day. The bank had chosen, in a sense, to reverse the laws of lending and make this man the recipient instead of a gift. He hadn't earned it. He didn't necessarily deserve it. Chase National Bank said to the man, look, we're going to take your debt and cover it by our account.

We're going to handle it out of our vast resources, and you'll never have to pay anything in return. That gift, of course, not having any strings attached, was not based upon some promise by this man to continue banking with them. I can imagine, though, that for the rest of this man's life, he banked with Chase National Bank. I didn't read of any promise on this man's part to be nice to the president of the bank, although I'm sure that he told everybody what a great guy that president was. I'm sure that the man didn't promise either to bring more clients to do their banking with Chase National Bank, although I'm convinced that for the rest of this man's life he told people about that wonderful bank down the street. All he had to do was receive from the vast billion dollar resources of that bank $600, period.

Is it any wonder that to this day the grace of God still catches us off guard? I want to remind you, though, that Abraham, as we'll see and have seen, is not being offered a measly $600. He was being offered everlasting life and the inheritance of the universe, as we'll see. Imagine the inheritance of the cosmos, the Greek word used.

All there is is Abraham's in Christ. How do you win a gift like that? How do you get in on that? I don't know about you, but you know, all these things where you can win something for free and, you know, Hardy's as in McDonald's, I have never won anything for free. I've gotten a little card that scratched the gray ink off and I've looked underneath supposed to be the prize and it says, Sorry, play again. Sorry, play again. Screw the cop off the bottle.

And it says, Sorry, try again or play again. Never had. The only person I know that really ever won anything significant worth talking about was my father in law. My mom and pop were traveling out to Detroit to see us from Atlanta when we were in school there for a few years and they stopped at a little town on the way up and went in to purchase their lunch and got the card and scratched the ink off. And my father in law actually won a free Atari.

Anybody here old enough to know what an Atari is? I mean, that was the beginning of it all, man. He also won without a free game. He became unbeatable in Pac-Man.

Our vacations would never be the same. My goal was to get close and I never could. He won it. It was free, but not really free.

He had to at least buy his lunch to have a chance to play. But still, that isn't too much of a stretch, I don't think, to think that somebody for a few dollars could win something like that that would be worth more. But inheriting the universe, winning the prize of everlasting life. How do you win that? Well, for the first part of chapter four, as we have seen, Paul has spent most of his time telling us how we do not win it. He has exposed and will expose three different ways that do not gain the gift of eternal life. First of all, we have studied in verses one to eight, you don't win it by completing righteous deeds. He writes in Romans four, verse two, for if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. Secondly, you don't win the prize by conformity to religious ritual, verses nine to 12. Circumcision, you can throw in there baptism or church membership or whatever else you want. Middle part of verse nine, where Paul says Abraham was the father of all who believe without being circumcised that righteousness might be reckoned to them. In other words, it isn't by means of religious ritual. Now third, and we'll study today, Paul will go on to expose the error or the delusion of believing that you can win the prize by keeping religious rules and regulations.

Paul is basically going to remove the last prop that people naturally lean on anyway. The belief that they are going to somehow by keeping the rules, whatever the rules may be, rules perhaps they've even made up, that they'll somehow get into heaven. So notice with me now as Paul continues in chapter four, verse 13, for the promise to Abraham or to his descendants that he would be heir of the cosmos was not through the law, but through the righteousness of faith. The key phrase is found in the words, not through the law. The article in the text, the before the law or the law is absent in the Greek text. Thus Paul is speaking of law in general. Law in general around the world that corresponds by its truth and objectivity to the nature and character of God. And this was important by the way, because the Gentiles might've come to this thing thinking, well, we didn't get the law to begin with, so we're really out to lunch.

What are we going to depend on? Only the Jews had that. Nobody would say they'd been perfect.

They've missed the mark somewhere. Paul writes, Abraham and everybody else has been given in verse 13, the inheritance of the world, the universe, not by keeping the law, but through, he says in the text, through the righteousness of faith. That is the righteousness of Christ imputed to the account of the sinner who places our faith in God's redemptive plan in person. Now, Paul is going to go on to say in these next few phrases that if you're going to trust in the law, you need to understand a couple of very important things about the law. Number one, those who trust in the law refused then the free gift. He writes in verse 14, for if those who are of the law are heirs, faith is made void and the promise is nullified. In other words, if God promises the inheritance to those apart from the works of the law, it isn't given then to those who try to keep the law and those who try to keep the law are nullifying the fact that God has just promised it's a free gift.

You cannot accept a free gift and at the same time say, I'm going to work for it. You don't understand. I suppose by way of another illustration that I told you that after the services today, I was going to go out to where my truck is parked just off the administration building. It's really the only good looking truck in the parking lot. You'll see it.

It's blue. And I said, I'm going to give it away as a free gift. And so, you know, two or three people show up. No, it'd be thousands of people would show up because they'd want that truck. And I just watch everybody for a minute and I'd pick somebody out and I'd hold my keys out. I'd say, I'm going to pick you and this truck is a free gift to you.

They'd be stunned, of course, change their life forever. But as they're reaching out for the keys, suppose I pulled them back and I said, now, are you a member of this church? No. Have you ever been baptized? No. Are you involved in some kind of ministry at this church? No.

Do you give financially to this church? No. Why do you give that person my truck? Huh? You're afraid to say it, aren't you?

No, I wouldn't know. Well, I, you know, made a promise, but it'd be awfully tough. Let me tell you that they give them the truck. Well, if I gave him the truck on the basis of those things that he or she promised to do, the truck would not be free. It'd be earned. My requirements of those religious activities, which are all wonderful, would nullify the promise of a free gift.

It'd make it void. That's Paul's point here. And I want you to listen very carefully. You cannot accept the free gift of salvation and at the same time try to pay for it. That means, ladies and gentlemen, the implication of that, according to what Paul has just said, is that there are millions of people in our own country who are unsaved, who think they are saved, but have been deceived because they think they have received it. And at the same time, they're trying to pay for it. And Paul says that if the promise is given by the law, it's nullified, it's made void.

You can only get it for free. I want you to listen to what the late pastor and Bible expositor Donald Gray Barnhouse said about people who believe they're saved but who in fact have been deceived by mixing grace with works. There is a category of people who will be absent from heaven and who perhaps will be the angriest at their exclusion. These are those who say that they believe that Jesus Christ is God, that salvation is by His death upon the cross, who believe in miracles and in the inspiration of Scripture, but who add some condition to salvation other than that of unmerited grace. There are those who are orthodox as to the person and work of Christ who add, for example, that in addition to faith one must observe Saturday as the Sabbath. There are still others who are orthodox as to the person and work of Christ but who hold that the waters of baptism take away original sin. I believe, Barnhouse wrote, that the church is honeycombed with such false believers who have adopted a mental attitude of acceptance of the orthodox position of the person of Christ and the fact that He is the one and only Savior but who in fact refuse to turn away from everything that is of the flesh and of the law in order to be saved by Christ alone. These constitute perhaps the greatest number of the tares which resemble true wheat of the real children of the kingdom of God.

Wow. Could it be true? Consider how many people will stand before the Lord one day on that day of judgment and be cast into hell who first remind Him that they prophesied and did miracles and wonders and served in the name of Jesus Christ. But there will be those perhaps that among that group who are self-deceived in thinking that by prophesying and by serving and by doing miracles and by living in the name of Christ they have somehow earned, merited heaven.

All are deceived. And Jesus will say, I never knew you. Verse 14, of those who are of the law are heirs. Faith is made void and the promise is nullified. Secondly, Paul will continue not only is trusting in the law a nullifying act of the free gift, but trusting in the law requires a penalty for lawbreakers.

And this is the logic of this master theologian. Notice what he says in verse 15. He writes, for the law brings about wrath, but where there is no law, neither is there violation. Now, we're going to get to what he means in a minute, but let me tell you what he doesn't mean. He doesn't mean here that without a record of law, there's no such thing as sin. What he means is that without a record of law, there's no violation according to that law.

In other words, let me illustrate it this way. A number of years ago, I was traveling on the Autobahn in Europe with some missionaries traveling well over 100 miles an hour thinking to myself, this is the way to travel. And we were passed by the way by cars and guys on motorcycles like we were standing still.

It's amazing. None of us broke the law. The law is not stated on the Autobahn as to speed limit.

A few years ago, I was on a Harley Davidson in Africa and I was racing down that dirt airstrip used by the missionary pilots nudging that bike up to nearly 60 miles an hour without a helmet on. I did not break the law. I was idiotic, but I did not break any law because there's no helmet law in West Africa. The Jewish reader here is depending on getting into heaven because he happens to know the law.

Paul's point is that you guys have it. You have the speed limit. You have the helmet law.

You know what God requires of your heart. You've got the law and you think you're going to keep all of the law. Well, listen, he says in effect, that law which you are depending upon for salvation is actually going to turn around and condemn you because you have broken it. The Jew wasn't supposed to hope in the law. That wasn't their prop.

That wasn't their hope. How foolish the thing they hoped in would condemn them because they had broken it. What is the law supposed to do? Listen, as Paul writes to the early church at Galatia, therefore the law is or has become our tutor to lead us to Christ so that we might be justified by faith. Well, what's the purpose of the law? The law is to sort of guard us as it were and lead us to make sure we end up where we're supposed to be. And where are we supposed to be?

At the foot of the cross. It is to tutor us to the truth that justification comes by faith and not by law. Law, ladies and gentlemen, cannot cleanse your guilt.

It can only reveal to you that you're guilty. The law can't dispense mercy. It can just tell you you need mercy. The law can't save.

It is only a tutor showing you the need that you have for a savior. The law is like a hallway mirror and you walk by and you look at it and you stop and you realize you've got to clean something on your face or comb your hair or straighten your shirt or blouse or jacket or whatever. But that mirror will never reach out and help you. It'll never comb your hair or fix your blouse or jacket or straighten your tie.

Can't do that. It can only reveal to you that you're a mess and you need help. The law is like the bathroom scales. Now, I know I'm meddling here at this particular illustration, but those scales will never do anything but tell you what you need to do.

They'll never help you. The law is an X-ray machine. It can only reveal the disease. It can only show you the broken parts. Can't heal you.

Now for the good news. Now in the closing argument, this great attorney like man comes to the summation of his argument in verse 16 and says, for this reason, in other words, based on everything that we have studied and everything that you have seen and heard, everything I've just explained regarding the inability of righteous deeds and religious ritual and rules and regulations of law being unable to save, for that reason, he goes on to say this. Look at the text.

It is by what? It is by faith in order that it may be in accordance with what? Grace.

So that the promise will be guaranteed to all the descendants, not only to those who are of the law, but also to those who are of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all. In other words, law is overruled by three wonderful truths. Those are the three words I just emphasize.

You want to underline them in your text. The first is the word faith. That is trusting in what Christ alone can do for you. The other word is grace. That is receiving, though undeserving, the merit of Christ on your behalf. And the third word is promise. That is believing that which Christ guarantees for you.

So salvation is that simple. It is by means of faith in the gracious promise of a God who guarantees His Word. That word promise there, I thought about spending an entire session on that. It's a wonderful word.

Let me just quickly touch on it. There are at least two Greek words for promise. It's a wonderful thing about the Greek language is it is so expressive. There are some very expressive words in the Greek language for this one English word promise.

One is the word huposkesis. It is the word which refers to a promise based upon conditions. It's a promise based upon something in return. It's the person who says, I promise to do this if you will promise to do that.

That's not the word used here, of course. God did not tell Abraham, I promise to do this for you if you promise to do that. The other word for promise is the word epangelia, which is the word for an unconditional promise that emanates simply from the goodness of the heart of the person who is making the promise. And that is the word used in verse 16. And also you could circle the word in verse 13 as well where he talks about the promise to Abraham.

It is the same word. In other words, the promise of salvation is unconditional. It is delivered simply because of the goodness of the heart of God. And the question would be then, can God fail to keep his word? If a promise is only as good, even the unconditional one, of the character of the one giving it, how secure are we in God's promise to us? We are as secure as his character. And how secure is that? We are entirely, eternally secure. It isn't based on my response after I receive it.

It is based upon the goodness of his character. I usually have a little fun at wedding rehearsals that I conduct. I change the words around a little bit as I have them work through them, just, you know, to have a little fun, but also to make a point that I hope they come back to and remember.

I did one some time ago and I was having the bride repeat after me as we practiced on the stage. I, Monica, take you, Tim. And I get down there to that part where it's supposed to be for richer or for poorer. And I'll say for richer or for richer. And of course, everybody sort of chuckles and the bride looks at me like, you know, did I lose my place?

And I want them to laugh a little bit because later in life, it might not be funny. They might be as poor as dirt, but the promise is just that it means there aren't any loopholes. The width of the spectrum from riches to poverty, my vow remains the same. Repeat after me, I would say for better or for worse. Some women say later, but I didn't know I'd get this worse. You know, that's the breadth of that spectrum.

Does it matter? Just remember the secret I read this past week of one woman's success. Roderick McFarland's grandmother on her fiftieth wedding anniversary was asked about her secret. And she said, Well, on my wedding day, I decided to choose 10 of my husband's faults, which for the sake of our marriage, I would overlook.

I like this woman a lot. One of the guests asked her to name the faults. Typical.

She replied, To tell you the truth, I never did get around to writing them down. But whenever my husband did something that made me hopping mad, I would say to myself, Lucky for him, that's one of the 10. I believe every wife ought to do that. Amen. Amen.

That was a bass sounding Amen. The vows that you made in front of some church or chapel are vows that you intended to keep. That's why you you might have rented your tuxedo and you might have rented those really shiny black shoes, but you did not rent your wedding ring.

You don't rent those. But Abraham and every one of you have been given a promise by God who will never break his word. It doesn't depend upon your natural birth. Paul has explained that in chapter four, but your spiritual birth. It isn't a matter of national heritage, but spiritual inheritance. It is not something you are born into. It is something you are born again into. It is not the gospel of race.

It is the gospel of grace. Do you think for a minute that the grace of Chase National Bank, who gave to that unsuspecting customer that particular day, do you think for a minute that they struggled over that amount of money to give to that man? I guarantee you they did it without breaking a sweat.

They would spend more on that 10 times that a year just in giving gifts away to people who client with them. My friend, do you think that God put heaven's reservoir at risk when he erased your debt of sin? Do you think for a moment that you had so much to be forgiven that God really stretched the limits of his grace in order to forgive you?

No. His grace is great enough and deep enough to cover everything about you, not only at that moment of salvation, but for the rest of your life. It is a vast ocean and we are but drops in it, as it were. You see, the promise does not depend upon the one receiving it. It depends upon the one giving it. And for those of us who have received by faith the promise independently of righteous deeds in our hands, independently of religious rituals that we have done to our bodies or with our bodies, independently of anything related to what he has just talked about in terms of rules and regulations of law, we have simply come and by his deep unfathomable grace he has handed to you someone who is deeply in debt to sin, the gift that erased all of the liability and freed your soul and poured into your bankrupted heart the riches of his glory and his righteousness and his love. Do you want to try to get in by keeping the law?

Go ahead. You nullify the promise and in the end you'll be shown that you couldn't keep it and you didn't keep it. Instead, Paul summarizes, just receive the gift by faith, this vast promise of God, the unconditional gift of grace through faith which overrules the law. God's grace actually made a way possible for us as we believe his promises, simply by faith. If you haven't done so, respond in faith to that gospel today. You're listening to Wisdom for the Heart with Stephen Davey.

Today's lesson is called Ruling Out the Law. If you need help understanding the gospel, we have a presentation on our website and our smartphone app called God's Wisdom for Your Heart. You'll find us online at wisdomonline.org.

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