Made Righteous By Faith Series

3:19

“Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those under the law…”

The law. What is your idea of “the law” as mentioned by New Testament writers? Moses? Ten Commandments? Exodus through Deuteronomy? Let’s look. Jesus for the most part spoke of the law as that portion of what we call the Old Testament that was written by Moses. When he wanted to go beyond Moses He spoke of the “law and the prophets” as two separate entities. Once however He did refer to one of the Psalms, 82, as the law.

207

So it was already acceptable in Jesus’ day to lump those two ideas together, as in John 12:34, when the people challenged one of Jesus’ statements. They said, “We have heard from the law that the Christ remains forever…” Of course Jesus talked often of being lifted up, which meant He was going to die and not fulfill what the law said.

But where is such a statement about Messiah? Micah 4:7 speaks of a day when the Lord will reign in Zion forever. That was their belief, and it was true. But the point here is that Jews spoke of the prophet Micah as being a part of “the law.”

Paul uses the word law more than anyone in the New Testament. Over seventy times in the book of Romans itself, and nearly fifty times in the rest of his writings. Generally he speaks of Moses when he brings up the subject. But not always.

1 Corinthians 14 addresses the crisis of women attempting to take men’s positions in church. Paul quotes from Genesis but calls Genesis the law. So we see it is the heart of God we are talking about when we speak of law. Not a law that came from Moses, but from God.

And here you will note that Paul has just quoted the Psalms and a prophet in his indictments against sinners, following up with this verse 19, “whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law.”

So we must interpret “law” a little more broadly than what happened up on Mt. Sinai. God has always had a desire in His heart for men to conform to Him. That did not change at Sinai, and it didn’t change at Calvary.

What happened at Sinai was the written revelation of what God wants. What happened at Calvary was the end of an era, and the beginning of a new way of obeying God, namely God writing His own ways on our hearts. The law lives. The written law died, nailed to the cross, but the will of God, the law, is nailed to our hearts. Don’t think for a moment that God

208

has gone soft on sin or changed His mind about Who He is and what he wants from us. The moral law stands. The ceremonial sacrificial law is already fulfilled in Christ.

And so we say to the Jews, you have just been indicted. The law speaks to you. David speaks to you as well as Moses. Solomon and Isaiah join their voices. Guilty, is the verdict!

But wait. That’s not how verse 19 continues. “… that every mouth may be stopped…”

Oh, every Jewish mouth must be stopped. No, read on… “… and all the world may become guilty before God.”

Guilty. Accountable. Hupodikos, under justice. Under judgment. Remember Paul’s teaching in chapter 2, “When Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do the things in the law… these are a law unto themselves.” Where does all true law originate? From God. The law is inside all of us, Jew or Gentile, and we all broke it.

The indictments are in. The witnesses have all spoken. Paul says the verdict is guilty as charged. Thank God the letter does not end there, but one more summation of the case and restatement of the verdict in verse 20:

3:20

“Therefore by the deeds of the law no flesh will be justified in His sight…”

In conclusion, says the prosecuting attorney, based on all the facts I have brought before you regarding human nature, the human conscience, the equality of Jew and Gentile in terms of their breaking of God’s commands,

209

I offer this one final statement. And his words have the authority of Christ Himself, whose apostle he was:

By doing good things, yes, even the good things in your heart and in the book, no flesh will be justified. You can’t do in your human nature all that God says you are to do, no matter how hard you try. You’ll never approach His holiness in fallen flesh. You can’t reach Him on your own. No justification is possible. You cannot be right with God based on keeping the rules.