Reconciling Law and Gospel
Monday, January 27, 2014 6:5
Reconciling Law and Gospel
9 AM
Some Law and Gospel Research -
The Gospel As Distinguished From The Law:
The purpose and effect of the law was to kill. So far as the work of salvation is concerned, this is true of the law in all its forms, whether the moral law as revealed in the Scriptures, or as written in the heart, or as the Mosaic law. In all these forms it was designed to bring people to the knowledge of sin and helplessness; to produce a sense of guilt and misery, and a longing for redemption, and thus lead us to Christ (Galatians 3:24). This was something necessary, and therefore glorious. But how can it compare with the Gospel? How can that which only makes us know that we are sinful and condemned be compared with what delivers us from sin and condemnation? This is the idea which the apostle expands, and, as it were with exultation, turns over as though he could not let it go, in 2 Corinthians 3:7-11.
An Exposition of the Second Epistle to the Corinthians ~Charles Hodge.
From the fact that Christ came in bodily form and possessed all that God is, we have received grace.
And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. (John bore witness about him, and cried out, “This was he of whom I said, ‘He who comes after me ranks before me, because he was before me.’”) For from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. No one has ever seen God; the only God, who is at the Father’s side, he has made him known. John 1:14-18
This contrasts law and grace. For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.
John 1:17 (ESV) c.f. Romans 5:21
Some Contrasts Between The Two:
which has come to you, as indeed in the whole world it is bearing fruit and increasing—as it also does among you, since the day you heard it and understood the grace of God in truth…John 1:14-18
…yet we know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, so we also have believed in Christ Jesus, in order to be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law, because by works of the law no one will be justified.
I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.
I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness were through the law, then Christ died for no purpose.
For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me.
1 Corinthians 15:3-8 (ESV)
Start again next time with Romans 5:12
Rabbit In Gouache
