gospel and law

It's strange how sometimes the preparation that I'm doing and the conversations that I'm having prove to be almost exactly concentric.

It happened again today. And it had to do with the place of 'keeping the law' in the life of the Christian.

There's a subtle, but hugely significant, difference between our 'keeping the law' being understood as the condition of our salvation and its being understood as the consequence of our salvation.

The 'Law' was given to a people already saved.

The people of Israel had already been delivered from the cruel slavery of Egypt by the merciful hand of God. That was grace. They could not help themselves. God did it all.

He insists that that's the case. I saw .. I heard .. I came .. I rescued.

God did it all. It's pretty emphatic. Salvation - getting a people out of the hopeless condition they're in - is a gift of grace, not a reward for goodness. Not because this people had notched up a whole load of brownie points by dutifully keeping the Law: but simply because God chose in his love to save.

The 'Law' came later. The 'Law' was given to a people already saved.

Because they were saved from slavery into something, into significance: they had a role to play, a ministry to fulfil, a calling to pursue, as the people of God who would be by their life together a light for the nations.

They would be set down by God, a saved people, right in the middle of planet earth. Centre stage. There for all the world to see.

This is how life's to be lived, God meant to declare to the watching world. Israel had a job to do for God: not unlike our own. They were called to proclaim good news.

A new life. Life lived by the grace of God, with the presence of God, in the power of God, and for the glory of God.

What does that life look like? Well, he gave them the 'Law'. That's what it looks like, he said.

So keeping the 'Law' is emphatically not the condition of salvation.

But that simple fact doesn't ever mean that the 'Law' becomes irrelevant. Far from it. The 'Law' provides the tracks on which our new life's to be lived. The 'Law' is what a saved life looks like.

The 'Law' as such is the consequence of salvation.

The imperatives follow the indicatives, as I was always taught.

Discipleship follows salvation.

To expound and lay stress on the lordship of our saviour Jesus Christ - as I seek to do - and to summon folk on to the radical life of dsicipleship - as I seek to do - carries with it, unless I'm very careful, the constant danger that the wrong sort of signals are heard.

In other words, what I'm preaching and commending as the consequence of salvation can be easily heard as the ('condemning') condition of salvation.

And I fear that's what may often have happened here. It's a delicate, as well as a difficult, balance to hold.

I came across something very similar in the review I was reading this morning of a book to be published soon. The reviewer was very appreciative of much that had been written in the book, but he had a number of concerns at the way things came across.

This is what he wrote as he rounded off the concerns which he felt -

Fifth and finally, we must do more to plant the plea for sacrificial living more solidly in the soil of gospel grace. Several times [the author] talks about the love of Christ as our motivation for radical discipleship or the power of God and the means for radical discipleship. But I didn’t sense the strong call to obedience was slowly marinated in God’s lavish mercy. I wanted to see sanctification more clearly flowing out of justification.

Now I don’t believe that every command we ever give must include a drawn explanation of the gospel. But in a book-length treatment of such an important topic I would have liked to have seen “all we need to do in obedience to God” growing more manifestly out of “all God’s done for us.”

At times the discipleship model came across as: “Here’s how we need to live. Here’s how we are falling short. Here’s how Christ can help us live the way we ought.” The gospel looks more like a means to obey the law, instead of resting in the gospel as respite from the law.

Further, I wish there was more of an emphasis on what we do when we fall short of radical obedience. How do we get balm for our stricken consciences? Where do we find rest for our sin-sick souls? Just as importantly, I would hope that as [the author] speaks in risky ways in order to challenge us all to shake off nominal Christianity, he would also on occasion speak in such a risky way that he’s charged with antinomianism (Rom.6.1)

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On the whole, I think the motivation for obedience in [his book] would have been more biblical and more balanced if it landed more squarely on the greatness of God’s love for us as opposed to the nature of the world’s great need and our great failures.

"The gospel looks more like a means to obey the law, instead of resting in the gospel as respite from the law."

Is the gospel, as it's heard by those to whom I preach - is the gospel little more than a means to obey the law, or actually a thorough-going respite from the law?

I'm very much exercised over this whole issue, I have to say, in relation to how I preach and proclaim the gospel and how I pastor God's people. Think back to what the reviewer wrote -

I would hope that as [the author] speaks in risky ways in order to challenge us all to shake off nominal Christianity, he would also on occasion speak in such a risky way that he’s charged with antinomianism.

I'm very aware that I do deliberately speak "in risky ways in order to challenge us all to shake off nominal Christianity:" and that's fine and good, and necessary, too, so far as it goes.

But do I "also on occasion speak in such a risky way that [I'm] charged with antinomianism"? I'm not so sure about that.

And if I don't, I've probably not got the balance quite right.

It's a tight-rope! Those of you who pray for your preachers and pastors, pray hard we get this balance right.