Presence of Moral Law in the New Testament (2)

Introduction: The Infallible Rule of Scripture Interpretation and the Law's Enduring Obligation

0:03 The following sermon was preached on Sunday evening, November 26, 1995, at the Trinity Baptist Church of Montville, New Jersey. Now let us turn together in our Bibles to one of the two portions that I read in your hearing this morning, but was unable to address by way of exposition. I refer to Romans chapter 7, and I begin the reading in verse 7, Romans 7, verse 7 through 14a.

0:43 What shall we say then? Is the law sin? God forbid, may it never be. How be it? I had not known sin except for...

1:02 ...through the law. For I had not known coveting except the law had said,

1:09 Thou shalt not covet. But sin, finding occasion, wrought in me through the commandment all manner of coveting. For apart from the law, sin is dead. And I was alive apart from the law once.

1:29 But when the commandment came, sin... ...revived, and I died. And the commandment which was unto life, this I found to be unto death.

1:43 For sin, finding occasion through the commandment, beguiled me, and through it slew me. So that the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and righteous, and good. Did then that which is good...

2:04 ...become death unto me? God forbid, may it never be.

2:10 But sin, that it might be shown to be sin, by working death to me through that which is good. That through the commandment, sin might become exceedingly sinful. For we know that the law is spiritual.

2:38 There are few principles of greater importance with respect to a right understanding of the Word of God, the Scriptures, than that principle highlighted in our own confession of faith in the first chapter, dealing with the subject of the Holy Scriptures, where we read in paragraph 9, the infallible rule of interpretation of Scripture is...

3:08 And therefore, when there is a question about the true and full sense of any Scripture, which is not manifold, but one, it must be searched by other places that speak more clearly. And what the framers of our confession are here echoing from the language of the Westminster Confession is that Scripture is its origin. It is its own infallible interpreter. And believing this to be so, I am therefore seeking to lay a solid foundation from the Scriptures

3:50 for our study of a particular section of the Scriptures, namely, the Ten Commandments as delivered not by Moses, but by God Himself on Mount Sinai. And thus far, we have established from the Scriptures the fact that man, as created by God, is under an inescapable obligation to render to God perfect obedience. Perhaps the best summary of the entire teaching of Scripture on this very principle

4:34 is found in the oft-neglected and at places... perhaps somewhat confusing book to many of us in the book of Ecclesiastes, the last couple of verses, Ecclesiastes chapter 12, verses 13 and 14.

4:54 This is the end of the matter. All has been heard. Fear God and keep His commandments, for this is the whole...

5:08 duty of man. For God will bring every work into judgment with every hidden thing, whether it be good or whether it be evil. Keep His commandments, for this is the whole duty of man. And now we are seeking to establish a second basic fact, and it is this, that the obedience which God...

Three Lines of Biblical Argument for the Decalogue's Summary Role

5:38 requires of man is comprehensively summarized in the Ten Commandments. It is not exhaustively delineated, but it is comprehensively summarized in the Ten Commandments. And we have looked at three lines of biblical argument to support that assertion. The first, the unquestionable evidence of the influence...

6:08 of the Ten Commandments upon all men by nature. And I hope now you can recall the two basic texts, Romans 1.32 and Romans 2.14 and 15.

6:22 And secondly, the unusual circumstances surrounding the giving of the Ten Commandments on Mount Sinai. And I hope you could recite all six of those unusual factors with which God surrounded the issue of the Ten Commandments. The first, the unquestionable evidence of the moral law in its summary form, that He might make it plain to His people then and for all subsequent generations that the Ten Commandments are not merely a part of the great body of Mosaic legislation delivered by God at the time of the Exodus, but rather they have a unique place

7:05 in the midst of that great body of righteousness, the revelation, and we looked at those six very clear, evident manifestations of God's underscoring the uniqueness of the Ten Words. And then this morning we began to address the third category of biblical evidence that the obedience God requires of man is comprehensively summarized in the Ten Commandments, and that category is this, the obvious presence of the Ten Commandments in the New Testament as an unchangeable

7:45 and binding standard of righteousness. And we had time only to consider the pivotal passage in the recorded utterances of our Lord Jesus, namely Matthew chapter 5, verses 17 through 20, and then the outworking of the principles enunciated by our Lord in the next two paragraphs in which He expounds the true significance of the sixth and the seventh commandments. Using the illustration of the restored painting,

8:25 He scrapes away all of the dark, cracked varnish. He scrapes away and does a work of restoration so that His hearers might understand that in His kingdom, the standard of righteousness to which He calls His people is one in which the Decalogue stands as an unchanging and binding standard of righteousness, touching the deepest springs of thought, of disposition, of motive, and of desire. Now, surely, if you are a Christian,

9:06 and the words of Jesus have been rightly understood, we should expect that in the unfolding revelatory data, the subsequent books of the New Testament written by the apostles would indicate their sensitivity to the statements of the Lord Jesus. For did He not commission them, go into all the world and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them into the name of the triune God, teaching them to observe whatsoever I have commanded you? And surely, if He set before His own disciples and His apostles

9:50 the abiding relevance of the ten commandments, we should expect that in the apostolic writings there would be an unembarrassed reflection of that fact. And when we turn to the other documents of the New Testament, we are not at all disappointed in our expectation. And now if you will turn with me please to the passage read in your hearing, a most crucial passage in seeking to demonstrate that indeed in the New Testament we have this unchanging and binding standard of righteousness embodied in the ten commandments.

The Law's Role in Romans: Exposing Sin and Preparing for the Gospel

10:34 Romans, chapter 7. Now those who were with us last week will remember we had occasion to refer briefly to the great theme of Romans. It is stated in chapter 1, verses 16 and 17, a setting forth of that gospel which is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek, for therein is revealed a righteousness of God from faith unto faith. And then the apostle begins to demonstrate how every segment of humanity

11:16 desperately needs that righteousness of God, that righteousness of which God is the author and provider, a righteousness that satisfies and answers to all of the demands of God's character. And it is that righteousness that is revealed in the gospel. But the gospel will not be good news unless men see and feel in the deepest recesses of their being that they are destitute of that righteousness in themselves and that there is no way that they can attain it of themselves. They must be shut up

12:00 to a righteousness which God has provided and which God confers in Jesus Christ as it is proclaimed in the gospel. And so the apostle from verse 18 of chapter 1 all the way through to chapter 3 and verse 20 corrals the entire human race until he leaves it in the posture described in verses 19 and 20 of chapter 3. Now we know that what things soever the law says, notice the law is speaking, whether we think of it in the more limited sense of the Ten Commandments

12:42 or the entire Old Testament revelation from which he has just been quoting in the previous verses, it is a living word. It doesn't say we know that whatsoever things the law said, but whatsoever things the law is saying. When the scriptures are read, when the scriptures are preached, God is speaking now. We're not considering what he said, but what he is saying.

13:17 Scripture has a mouth and it speaks in the present. It speaks now to them that are under the law that every mouth may be stopped and all the world may be brought under the judgment of God, because by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified in his sight, for through the law comes the knowledge of sin. And there is his summary statement. He has been driving at this one great concern to corral every segment of humanity,

14:01 bring them under the searchlight of the law of God until they stand with their hands over their mouth, nothing to say in their own defense, condemned in the theater of their own consciences, and by the instrumentality of the law brought to the knowledge of sin. Now we could stop right there and show the abiding relevance of the law. It is a law that speaks. It is a law that here and now acts upon the consciences of men and prepares them for the glorious message of the gospel.

14:41 But then he goes on to say in verse 21, But now, apart from the law, a righteousness of God has been manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets, even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ, unto all them that believe. He says, apart from the law, that is, apart from any law works on the part of sinners who stand condemned by that law, a righteousness from God has been revealed. And it has been revealed in conjunction with the person

15:26 and work of Jesus Christ, and it is a righteousness to be received by faith. And then as the apostle expounds various strands of that central truth that he introduces in chapter 3, the great emphasis falls upon the fact that this righteousness that is based upon the work of Jesus Christ is received by faith and faith alone. Chapter 4 emphasizes that latter strand of emphasis demonstrating that in the case of Abraham, in the case of David,

16:10 one man before the giving of the law, another under and after the giving of the law, that all men have always found this righteousness from God in the way of faith, not their own law works and their own performances. And then coming back and underscoring some of the great blessings that flow out of the possession of that salvation in Jesus Christ in the opening 11 verses of chapter 5, he then demonstrates that this great blessing comes to us in a way that parallels

16:55 the very way that sin was originally charged to us and entered the world. That in a sense God sees only two men, Adam and Christ. The first Adam, the second or the last Adam. And as to the one man Adam, sin entered into the world and he standing as the representative head of the whole humanity all fell in him and sinned with him in his first transgression and come under condemnation.

17:30 So in the one man Christ Jesus all whom God has reckoned in him on their behalf he by his perfect obedience verse 19 has secured righteousness for the many. And then he mentions the law coming in alongside that the trespass might abound but where sin abounded, grace did abound more exceedingly. Then he goes on to demonstrate that though this salvation is completely apart from any performance on our part

18:12 it rests totally upon the doing and the dying of another even the one man Christ Jesus and where sin abounds grace in Christ super abounds that this cannot foster a life of care of carelessness and licentiousness and indifference to practical holiness. Some might raise the question well if my salvation does not rest upon my performance then what I do is of no consequence so let me just go on and abound in sin and it will magnify the abounding grace of God. And Paul says no. Chapter 6 this is impossible shall we say

18:55 that we shall continue in sin that grace may abound let it not be God forbid we who are such as have died to sin. Then he demonstrates that the same union with Christ that brings us into possession of his perfect righteousness brings us into the dynamics of his death and resurrection and as surely as he died for sin and to sin and rose in newness of life so we in union with Christ have died to the dominion of sin and have risen to newness of life. And in the midst of that setting he says some very derogatory things about the law.

19:39 He says that we are no longer under law but under grace. Verse 14 of chapter 6 and then he goes on in chapter 7 to say we not only died to sin in union with Christ but in union with Christ we have even died to the law. And he states that in chapter 7 verses 1 through 6 we died to the law the summary verses 5 and 6 when we were in the flesh the sinful passions which were through the law wrought in our members to bring forth fruit unto death but now we have been discharged from the law

20:24 having died to that wherein we were held. We've died to the law. As far as the law is concerned it has nothing more to say to us than a dead man has to say than it has to say to a dead man. It doesn't say the law died but we died to the law.

20:45 Well that's not a very flattering thing. He says in the early chapters that through the law we've been brought to the knowledge of sin now we have a salvation that in no way is based upon our law works but is based totally upon the work of another even Jesus Christ the life of his perfect obedience his propitiatory death by which he turned away the wrath of God and when we have laid hold of him by faith we are so united to him that we have died to sin it no longer has lordship over us and we have also died to the law. Well after saying all of those things

Paul's Personal Experience with the Law (Romans 7:7-14): The Law is Holy, Righteous, and Good

21:27 then the question is raised in verse 7 what shall we say then is the law sin? You see he has said such apparently derogatory things about the law that the question is raised well is the law sin then? If it's such a bad thing that we in union with Christ died to it is the law sin? And notice his answer may it never be God forbid and now he's going to tell us what the law's function was in this whole business of his being brought to possess the salvation that in one sense is totally apart from the law and yet is the salvation that came to him

22:12 as the law did a specific work in his own heart and in his own conscience now let's follow as he unfolds his own experience how be it I had not known sin except through the law now as Paul's saying he didn't have an intellectual conception of sin of course not he was a Pharisee he was forever engaging in various religious activities which ostensibly were to help him to be pure from sin ceremonial washings faithfulness to all of the Levitical requirements of the Old Testament law he said touching the law

22:56 in all of its various dimensions of demands I was blameless I kept all the feasts I did what an Orthodox Jew who was a Pharisee of the Pharisees was expected to do so he had an intellectual concept of sin but what he is saying here has to do with his felt conscious religious experience he says I had not known sin I would not have had a felt experiential awareness of what sin was except through the law and then he gets specific for I had not known coveting or lust

23:39 except the law had said you shall not covet but sin finding occasion finding a foothold a basis of operation wrought in me through that particular commandment all manner of coveting for apart from the law sin is dead he is saying as far as my own awareness and consciousness of having a heart that was a sink hole of inordinate desires and lust and coveting I had no consciousness of this sin was as good as a dead

24:23 principle to me as long as I was going through all of my Pharisaic rituals and keeping all the rules and traditions of my fathers I thought for sure I'd bust heaven wide open on the basis of who I was by my bloodlines and what I was doing as a Hebrew of the Hebrew a Pharisee of the Pharisees touching the law blameless this is his own testimony in Philippians chapter 3 sin in that sense was a dead issue to him in his felt religious experience and I was alive that is in my own eyes and in my own judgment apart from the law of once but when the commandment came

25:06 when that tenth commandment by the blessing and power of the Holy Spirit pierced beneath the surface of mere religiosity and form and ritual praying prayers by rote going through the motions when the commandment broke through the veneer of his proper reformed Baptist orthodoxy and showed him what he really was what happened he says but when the commandment came sin revived and I died and the commandment which was unto life the commandment which marks out

25:51 the way of blessedness and covenantal life and blessing this I found to be unto death for sin finding occasion through the commandment beguiled me and through it slew me I came to the realization that I have within me a horrible wretched sinkhole of a human heart that is a seething cauldron of all kinds of inordinate desires and lusts and once I understood by the Spirit's application of the tenth commandment to my conscience with power the very application of the thou shalt not

26:34 stirred up and caused even more fomenting of that sinkhole of pollution within my own breast now in the light of all that what's he going to say about the law look at verse 12 so that the law is holy and the commandment that tenth commandment in particular holy and the entirety of the decalogue is holy righteous and good did then that which is good

27:18 become death to me may it never be the problem was not with the law it was with me but sin that it might be shown to be sin by working death to me through that which is good that is through the commandment sin might become in my own eyes in my own consciousness in my own egg not a word that mummy and daddy talked about not a word that the preacher and the Sunday school teacher talked about to me in my gut in my very

The Law's Role in Paul's Conversion: Prying Loose from Self-Righteousness

28:02 an exceedingly sinful reality for we know that sin is not a sin we know that the law is spiritual that I am carnal soul under sin now why do I bring this passage forward to demonstrate that in the New Testament the ten commandments are clearly set before us as an unchanging and binding standard of righteousness listen carefully how did God arrest this proud Pharisee you know the account of the conversion

28:47 of Saul of Tarsus don't you it first is set before us in Acts chapter 9 perhaps the life of Stephen and particularly the death of Stephen we know Saul of Tarsus was present they laid the garments down at his feet he was consenting in the decision that he should be stoned to death perhaps it was then that conscience began to be active we don't know but when the Lord arrested him on the road to Damascus he says Saul it is hard for you to kick against the goads and he is arrested by a revelation of Jesus Christ from heaven he beholds a revelation of

29:32 the glorified Christ he is arrested by the very voice of Christ he is sent off by the direction of the word of Christ and after three days God sends a humble disciple of Christ by the name of Jesus by the name of Ananias to minister to him and through his instrumentality to be baptized and to have his sight received knowing then at that point he had obviously come to faith in Jesus Christ it is my conviction and shared by many others that it is in those three days that the man arrested by a direct revelation from heaven was not converted to the point of repudiating

30:15 his own righteousness even by a direct revelation of Jesus Christ God did in him what he describes here God worked him over with his holy law and in particular the tenth commandment until this man saw that underneath all of the layers of his impeccable Jewish bloodlines under all the layers of his impeccable Jewish and pharisaic credentials activities and relationships there was a heart that was a sinkhole of every foul

30:59 and evil desire and that in the light of what he was in his heart he stood naked and exposed and liable to the fierceness of the wrath of almighty God and he was proved prepared to learn that there is a righteousness apart from the law a righteousness that is to be found one hundred percent in the doing and the dying of Jesus Christ and therefore he could say as he does in Philippians 3 but what things were gained to me these I count loss for Christ

31:44 yea doubtless I count all things but loss for the exceeding the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord for whom I have suffered the loss of all things and count them but refuse that I may gain Christ and be found in him not having my own righteousness which is of the law but the righteousness which is by faith in Jesus Christ God had to work him over with his unchanging binding standard of righteousness even his holy law to bring this man

32:28 to the place where he was prepared to throw himself totally and without reserve upon the righteousness wrought by another and looking back upon it he is so grateful for the instrument that gives God use to pry him loose from his fatal marriage to his own righteousness had he remained married to his own righteousness he would have sunk into hell with it and what was it that pried him loose from that union to his own righteousness he said it was God's holy law

33:11 and so he describes that law as holy the commandment holy righteous good verse 14 the law is spiritual you see whatever glorious discoveries he had of Christ it did not leave him demeaning the law of God and in this case clearly the decalogue and he focuses in particular upon one of those commandments he does not depreciate he does not denigrate the law much less say and now that I have come into this glorious possession of an alien righteousness

33:56 I see that there is nothing to say about the law but to bad mouth it no he speaks in these terms to quote professor Murray the law is holy the commandment holy and righteous and good the law itself and its concrete stipulations is holy the commandment reflects specifically on that one mentioned in verse 7 thou shalt not covet but the proposition that it is holy just and good applies to every commandment as holy just and good it reflects the character of God and is the transcript of his perfection it bears the imprint of its author

34:41 this we shall see is stated expressly in different terms the law is spiritual as holy the commandment reflects the transcendent purity of God and demands of us the correspondent consecration and purity the law as righteous reflects the equity of God and exacts in us the same equity and sanctions nothing but that which is equitable and as good it promotes man's highest well-being and thus expresses the goodness of God and then in commenting on

35:25 the thought that the law is spiritual Professor Murray demonstrates to my satisfaction and I believe irrefutably that the term Paul uses spiritual throughout his writings in four or five other references refers to that which is of the Holy the law then is of God and because it is of God it reflects the very characters and properties of his being holy and righteous and good that was the apostles experience with the law and you see

The Believer's Delight in the Law (Romans 7:22-25): Serving with the Mind

36:10 when the law began to work on him and brought him to the place where he was to possess the righteousness of another apart from his own works of the law he does not upon reflection say and now that the law has accomplished that purpose of plague on it let me be done with it I have died to the law I have nothing more to do with it for if you look in this very chapter where in the next section in verse 1 to the Bible you will find that there

36:54 is sin for the law and so the law is the presence of sin that is in the house of God but what the law is is in the house of God is the In the law of God, after the inward man. I delight in the law of God, after the inward man.

37:32 The word could be translated, I joyfully agree with the law, after the inward man.

37:44 Suneidomai, for you Greek students. Soon with, I joyfully agree with the law, after my inward man. All of its expansive, holy, righteous, just, and good demands and directives from my inner being. I delight in it.

38:10 Verse 25, I thank God through Jesus Christ, our Lord. So then I of myself with the Lord. With the mind, that is with my internal renewed being, indeed, serve.

38:29 Oh wait a minute, Paul thought you said in the earlier verses, that we've been discharged from the law, having died to the law. Ah, but you notice I didn't quote the last part of verse 6. So that we serve in newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the mind. So that we serve in newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the mind.

38:53 And now he says, I myself with the mind, indeed, serve. And he uses the verb, which means to serve as a bondslayer, with the heart,

39:10 that is engaged totally with the will of my master as the rule of my life. And he doesn't say it with sorrow.

39:22 His sorrows of remaining sin in his being, this other law, that is present with him, a different law in his members, warring against the law of his mind, he cannot in practice fully work out all that he needs to work out, of perfect obedience to the law of God, in all of its searching, broad, expansive demands, touching not actions and words and deeds, but desires,

40:03 and motives and thoughts and intentions of the heart, that law that exposed him and searched him, he not rejoicing, he delights in it, he serves it, in terms of its power to condemn him. He is dead to it, in terms of its power to bring him into bondage. He is dead to it, in terms of its saying, this do and thou shalt live,

40:44 but in terms of it being a changeless, binding standard of righteousness, he is its slave. That's what he says. His self with the mind indeed do serve, though he does it with all the joy and the liberty of an adopted son. I can't understand that.

41:16 You get converted and you will. You see, the law and bondage, the natural mind can understand. The law thrown out, and a salvation that leaves men free to sin with abandonment that grace may abound, the carnal mind can understand that. But a law that exposed me for what I was, and showed me to be the vile, foul, polluted, guilty, wrath deserving sinner I am, now becoming my friend.

41:55 That law, that I love, and delight in, and which from the depths of my being I serve as willing bond slave. Only grace can teach a man to bring those two things together in the same heart. But that's what it did for the Apostle Paul. And that's what it will do for you, if you are a truly converted man or woman.

Two Kinds of People: Romans 8:7 vs. Romans 7:22

42:25 You see everyone sitting here this night, and I didn't know how else to put it but this. You are either a Romans 8-7 man, or you're a Romans 7-22 man. You're either a Romans 8-7 woman, or a Romans 7-22 woman. You're either a Romans 8-7 boy or girl, or a Romans 7-22 boy or girl.

42:53 What do I mean by that? Look at Romans 8-7. The mind of the flesh, that is the prevailing, predisposition of everyone who is a stranger to the regenerating work of God, whose heart has never been transformed by the grace of God, who has never been brought into union with Christ. The mind of the flesh is what?

43:16 Enmity against God. Everyone by nature is God's enemy. He doesn't want God to be God. He wants to be God.

43:26 Everyone, boy, girl, man, woman, black, white, yellow, green, it matters not! It matters not! It matters not! We are born with a disposition that is one massive clenched fist in the face of God.

43:38 I'll do what I want to do. I'll run my life! I'm worthy to serve myself by my own ru...

43:48 Carnal mind is enmity against God. Now notice how this manifests itself for...

43:54 Here's the proof positive. It is not subject to the law of God. It's enmity itself. It is enmity itself.

44:05 It is subordinate to the law of God. It sees God's thou shalt's and thou shalt not, and when it begins to understand the extent of them, it says, if God says thou shalt not, I will. If God says thou shalt, I will. If for no other reason than God makes the prohibition or God gives the command.

44:29 The carnal mind is enmity against God. It is not subject to the law of God. Neither indeed can it. There's total depravity, enmity against God.

44:41 There's total inability. Not subject to the law of God. Neither indeed can it be. Now that's what we all are by nature.

44:51 That's what Paul was by nature. What did he become by grace? He'd become a Roman 722 man. I delight in the law of God after the inward man.

45:02 How did he come to delight in that? With respect to it. He came to delight in the law of God after the inward man, which he once was not subject because his relationship to the God of the law was radically transformed in his dealings with God through Jesus Christ. When he came into the possession of the salvation of God in Jesus Christ from the enemy of God, he becomes the son of God.

45:28 He becomes the friend of God. He becomes the covenant subject of God and loving God. He now loves his law. And he says, I love you.

45:37 I love you. And he says, I am one who delights in the law of God after the inward man. Now which are you? Which are you?

45:51 Are you a Romans 8, 7 man, woman, boy or girl or a Romans 722 man, woman, boy or girl? It can't be both. Yes, you may have to say with Paul, I see another law warring against the law of my mind. But at least you can say I know what it means.

46:11 I want to be dead. I want to be alive. I want to be healthy. what the prevailing bent of my mind, the disposition of my soul is.

46:16 It is an honest, sincere desire to be conformed in the totality of my being to God's holy law from the inside out. Though I mourn and grieve and at times must cry wretched man that I am, I fall so far short of what I know I ought to be as delineated by the law. What I desire to be as determined by my renewed being. I can honestly say I still delight and I still desire in spite of the battle, in spite of the warfare.

46:58 You see, Paul knew nothing of this warfare before he was a Christian. He looked at the law like, as we saw this morning, people would have looked at that Rembrandt. All covered with soot and grease and dark and varnish. And all you see is a few little outlines of external behavior.

47:18 And as long as your life matches up to that, you pat yourself on the back and say, I believe in Jesus, everything's well, I live a decent life, if I die I'll go to heaven. No, no, my friend. No, no. If you don't know the struggle of the latter part of Romans 7, you've never been slain by the law.

47:36 Your native enmity has never been discovered, let alone subdued. It's lying there beneath the surface. It's lying on the surface of your own consciousness.

47:47 You congratulate yourself, as Paul did. May God have mercy on you and bring you to the place where you see. And if God is pleased to use the preaching of the law in these coming weeks, we shall bless him for all eternity that you too would have to say with Paul, I was alive apart from the law once. I thought all was well.

48:11 My life was reasonably respectable and I was orthodox in my opinion. And there was enough of Christ to make me feel comfortable. But there was nothing of what we've read tonight. Sin exceedingly sinful, if it were such to you.

48:29 Where is your daily repentance? Where is at times your hourly repentance? Where is your brokenness over attitudes and thoughts and desires, known only to you and God, when you're not even broken over deeds that your wife and your kids can see? Don't try to repent.

48:48 Tell me any man or woman is broken over his secret thoughts, who won't be broken over his angry words, over his hasty deeds, over his selfish acts in his family. Don't tell me that man mourns in secret for his thoughts, who won't even mourn publicly for his open sins before his family.

49:13 And I fear there are some of you in that category.

49:18 You children, with all of the props you have, from a godly home and Christian education, whether administered in the home or in a Christian school, and Sunday school and church, and associations with shared values, how easy it would be for you kids to be self-deceived, to think because you're respectable and nice and kind, in virtue of all of that pressure brought to bear upon you, all must be well. I ask you kids, have you seen that left, left to yourself? You could be as vile and foul as any kid born and reared in a ghetto, in a single parent family,

50:02 born in illegitimacy, never knew who his father was, abandoned by his mother, or shunted from one place to another while she pursued her other relationships and her drugs, brought up in a context of violence and cursing. Do you kids really believe that as foul a little child as that little product of the ghetto is, you could be, but for the grace of God? Do you really believe the potential is there in your heart for you to have the dirtiest mouth of any kid on the block? To have the most violent resistance to the authority of your parents of any kid in the school?

The Law's Righteous Ordinance Fulfilled in Believers (Romans 8:1-4)

50:46 Have you seen your heart? That's the great issue. Very quickly then, as a confirming word, we go right down into chapter 8 and notice how again,

51:03 the great apostle who has told us that in Christ there is no condemnation. Chapter 8, verse 1. There is therefore now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and of death.

51:24 And God's holy law outside of Christ is nothing but a law of sin and death to any man. For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh, that the ordinance of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. What is He saying? He's saying in verse 2 that the law of the spirit of life in Christ has made me free from the law of sin and death.

52:00 What? What the law could not do. What could the law not do? The law could show me my sin, but it had no power to cleanse me from my sin.

52:09 The law could show me how bound I was to sin, but it had no power to liberate me. The law could show me what God expected, but it had no power to motivate me to want to give Him what was expected of me. That's what the law could not do. And what was the problem?

52:27 Not with the law, but it was weak through the flesh. That is, our sinful nature rendered us impotent to live to the standard of the law. The law can point to what we ought to do and show us where we've not done it and condemn us for not doing it, but it has no power to forgive us, no power to liberate us from our bondage to sin, no power to motivate us to a life of obedience to God. The law could not do, it could not do that in that it was weak through the flesh.

53:05 Here's the gospel. God sending His own Son, and look how careful the language is, not in sinful flesh. No. Our Lord Jesus came as close to us and our condition as He could come without being stained by our sin.

53:23 God sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh. He came into our human condition, He came into it really and truly taking to Himself a true human soul and body. In this present condition He was no stranger to sorrow and grief and pain and suffering. God sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh.

53:58 In whose flesh? In the flesh of His own dear Son. God brought, brought His judgment down upon His Son. He condemned sin in the flesh of His own Son.

54:12 He vented His holy wrath upon His Son. His Son tasted death. The wages of sin is death. And why did He do that?

54:24 That we might be forgiven. Yes. That we might have our sins blotted out by the expiatory sacrifice, by the sacrifice of Christ, by the propitiatory work in which He turned away the wrath of God. Yes.

54:41 But there's another purpose for which He did this. Look at verse 4. This was all done, you Greek students, a hena clause of purpose in order that the dikioma, the righteous standard of the law, might be fulfilled, not for us in Jesus Christ, our representative and federalist, the head. I read a commentator who tried to make the text say that.

55:09 I said, shame on you, sir, that the righteous ordinance or standard of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. You see, no one comes into a saving embrace of Christ crucified who is not, at one and the same time, brought into a vital relation with God the Holy Spirit, the Spirit who regenerates Him, the Spirit of adoption who is given to every believer. And now the Spirit dwelling in Him gives Him the power to do what?

55:53 To pursue a life in conformity to the law of God, to pursue a life of evangelical law keeping. And Jesus Christ was sent by the Father, and the Father condemned sin in the flesh of His Son in order that the righteous ordinance, the righteous standard of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. And you will notice here that fulfilling the righteous ordinance of the law and walking after the Spirit are not set as enemies,

56:38 but as concurrent realities. So any notion, if I'm just filled with the Spirit and walk after the Spirit, I don't need any law. If you are indwelt by the Spirit, He gives you the power and the desire and a measure of ability to walk after the standard of the law of God. For in the New Covenant, as we'll see in a subsequent study, what is one of God's commitments?

57:13 He said, I will not write my law on tables of stone, but I'll write my law in their hearts. And what does that mean? That means that God so changes us internally that we have a disposition of affinity toward His law. And we can say in the language of Psalm 40 and verse 8, I delight to do thy will, O my God.

57:40 I delight to have my life conformed to the external standard of Your precepts. Yea, thy law is within my heart. There is an internal desire and motivation that moves me in the direction of obedience to You. You see, the apostle does not in any way have the notion that though he says some rather negative things about the law in conjunction with the ground of our acceptance before God, the place of the law in condemning us, galling us to sin, in those dimensions we are not under law, we are dead to sin, we are dead to the law.

The Decalogue as a Gracious Rule of Life (Romans 13:8-10)

58:24 But in terms of the law, in terms of the Ten Commandments as an abiding and binding standard of righteousness, the very work of God that makes us dead to the law as a condemnation, a condemning law, makes us alive in Christ Jesus that we may walk by that law as a gracious rule of life, out of love to Christ and in the power of the Holy Spirit. And therefore it should not surprise us that when we come to the practical part of the epistle, the more intensely practical, Paul is not at all ashamed to bring in the Decalogue to guide the consciences of believers

59:09 and this is the last passage we look at briefly, Romans 13, having summoned the believers in chapter 12, verses 1 and 2, to present themselves a living sacrifice to God, to undergo a process of transformation of their minds. He then calls upon them to live out such a life in the fellowship of the church, in the exercise of their various individual gifts, verses 3 through 8, and then verses 9 through the end of the chapter, chapter 12. Here he gives directives as to how they are to live out their life in mutual love. Chapter 13, 1 to 7,

59:53 how they are to live out their life as good citizens in the state. And now in chapter 13, 8 through 10, how they are to live in relationship to their fellow men in general. Owe no man anything save to love one another, for he who loves his neighbor, now notice, hath fulfilled the law. Now why in the world would he say has fulfilled the law if the law has nothing to say to us.

60:23 If the law is not an abiding standard, why be concerned whether I fulfill it or don't. I frankly don't lose one wink of sleep over whether or not I'm keeping the laws of the country of Afghanistan. I don't even know them. I'm blissfully ignorant of them.

60:43 Why? Because they have nothing to say to me.

60:48 You follow? You're blissfully ignorant and indifferent to the laws of Pakistan. You don't live there.

60:56 You see, if the law did not still have a commanding, binding authority over believers, why be concerned with whether we're fulfilling it or not?

61:08 It's ludicrous. But Paul assumes that these people who with him can say, Yes, Paul, we too delight in the law of God after the inward man. And we know that God sent His Son and condemned sin in the flesh, that the ordinance, the righteous standard of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. And we do desire to walk in the light of the law.

61:34 And we know that the summary of the second table of the law is to love your neighbor as yourself. So he says, The man walking, whom so in love hath fulfilled the law for this. Now look, Thou shalt not commit adultery. Uh-oh, Paul, you backslid.

61:52 You're quoting from the Ten Commandments. Don't you know they've got nothing to say to believers under the new covenant? Didn't you say a few minutes ago, We're dead to the law, and now you dragged it out of the grave. He stripped off his grave clothes, and you're standing this corpse in front of us.

62:17 He said, Yes, you're being ludicrous. There's a time to answer fools according to their folly, lest they be wise in their own conceits.

62:24 No, he says, For this thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not kill. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not covet.

62:35 And if there be any other commandment, and he knows there were, he knows that he didn't complete the whole of the Decalogue. It is summed up, not cancelled, negated, supplanted, it is summed up in this word, namely, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. And if you love your neighbor, what will be the fruit of it? Love works no ill to his neighbor.

63:03 How do I know what is ill to my neighbor?

63:09 I know that by the light of the law.

63:14 Love does not desire to work ill to his neighbor. Love desires one neighbor's good. But what is my neighbor's good? God, respect the sanctity of his life.

63:30 Thou shalt not kill. Respect the sanctity of his wife. Thou shalt not commit adultery. Respect the sanctity of his property.

63:40 Thou shalt not steal. Respect the sanctity of his name and reputation. Thou shalt not bear false witness. And respect the sanctity of what God has entrusted to him in his sovereignty, and is not, given to you, thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife, neither his car nor his house, his donkey, etc. And when you love your neighbor, the law becomes love's eyes. And you know you're working

64:09 no ill to your neighbor when you're relating to your neighbor according to the law of God. Therefore, he says, love is not the negation, the cancellation, the replacement, the supplanting. Love is the fulfillment of the law. When the grace of love worked in me by the Holy Spirit, for the fruit of the spirit is love. When it works so that I do not work ill to my neighbor,

64:38 i.e. I relate to my neighbor according to the commandments of God, I am evangelically fulfilling the law. You see, love and law are two different things.

64:52 Love is movement. Motive, law is directive. The old Puritan was right when he said, law is love's eyes, and without it, love is blind.

65:06 And I like to add this couplet, love is law's heart, and without it, law is dead.

65:15 To have mere commandment without love is a dead letter. To have love without directive is to be left at the mercy of my own whim. To have the law as the eyes of love is to walk in the way Christ died that His people might walk.

Conclusion: The Unalterable Authority of the Decalogue and a Call to Self-Examination

65:39 Now you say, Pastor, I'm not quite sure why I've taken all this time to lay all this groundwork. I hope you begin to see why. That when we begin to actually take up those ten words spoken by God and not by Moses,

65:55 there won't be a one of you who will be able to slip out from under the power and pressure of the unalterable binding authority of the Decalon. Because you say, well, we live in a different epoch. The law came by Moses. Grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.

66:16 Scripture says that we're dead to the law. The Scripture says this. The Scripture says that. Well, whatever those denigrating passages seem to teach, I trust you've had enough to get through to your conscience in these expositions that you will not be able to wiggle out from under the pressure of those ten words spoken by the living God that represent the unchangeable standard of righteousness until the second coming of the Lord Jesus Christ.

66:57 And if you're here tonight and being honest with the things that I sought to describe, you have to say, Pastor Martin, I cannot say that I, from my heart, love the law of God. I cannot say that sin has ever been anything more to me than a word that was associated with a few external deeds and acts and words. I can't enter into what Paul talked about. The commandment came.

67:27 Sin revived. I died. My friend, don't congratulate yourself. You are in a fool's paradise that if it is not dismantled by the Spirit and the Word of God and the law and the gospel now, it will be dismantled in the day of judgment.

67:47 Cry to God that He'd help you to know your true state. And dear child of God, do you see why we dare not discard the Ten Commandments as a rule of life? Jesus established their place in His kingdom of grace in Matthew 5, 17, through 20, the Apostle Paul expounded the true Christian perspective on the law, both in conversion and in the Christian life. And may God grant that in the days to come we may be able to say with increasing conviction and understanding, Oh, how love I thy law.

68:29 It is my meditation. I esteem all of thy precepts concerning all things to be right. And I hate every false way. Let us pray.

Prayer: Confession, Mercy, and Renewed Appreciation for Christ and the Law

68:49 Our Father, we stand in Your holy presence conscious that we have times without number violated Your holy law. And that there is not a one of us who does not deserve in this very moment to be in that horrible place where the rich man was sent, when he died, awaiting the day of judgment to have our doomed spirits united to our bodies, only to hear the sentence depart from me, you cursed ones, into everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels.

69:34 Oh God, we thank You we're not in hell tonight. We confess that it would be right that that should be so. Oh, have mercy, have mercy upon those who, like the apostle, have never seen the horrible sinkhole of iniquity that is their own heart. We pray, Lord, that You, by Your holy law, will discover to many the reality, the depth, and the extent of their guilt, their pollution, their bondage, that they might desperately long for the liberty, the forgiveness, the righteousness that is freely offered

70:18 to all in the gospel. Oh God, in mercy, deal with many. And for Your dear people, how we pray that in the coming days You will give us a renewed appreciation of what it meant for our Lord Jesus to come into our condition made under the law and fully to keep that law through every second of His birth, brief life, never once to deviate in thought or motive or desire, never to feel an unholy impulse, never to have uttered an untrue or unkind word. Oh God, we marvel at the sinlessness of our Savior.

71:04 And then we thank You for His willingness to go to the cross and there to bear the full brunt of all of Your unleashed fury again. And we thank You for Your grace against our numberless sins. Oh, make Him exceedingly precious to us in the days to come. We pray that You would hone our consciences.

71:26 We confess, Lord, that as iniquity abounds, it is so easy not only for our love to grow cold, but for our consciences to grow dull. And we look upon things that ought to shock us in others, and before long we begin to indulge them ourselves without doubt. Have mercy upon us. Sensitize our consciences, we pray.

71:51 Increase our holy delight in Your holy law and fill us with Your Spirit that we may run in the way of Your commandments. Hear then our prayers. Dismiss us with Your blessing resting upon us. Thank You for this day in Your courts.

72:08 Thank You for the Lord's Day Sabbath. While our fellow countrymen go in the way of the Lord, go in their holiday madness, glutting them all, spending money they do not have, glued to their television sets, watching overgrown boys bang each other's heads. Lord, we thank You for Your mercy that we've been here in Your courts, amongst Your people. O God, blessed be Your holy name for Your saving mercy.

72:42 Dismiss us now with Your blessing we pray in Jesus' name. Amen.