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Confusing “Law” and “Gospel”?

Posted on 07. Dec, 2009 by Mark Jones in Book Reviews

Perhaps you have heard people speak of the law and the gospel in different ways? Some are rather dogmatic about their opinion being the only right opinion.  In connection with this, I often hear the law-gospel distinction described in the following way:  indicative = gospel & imperative = law.  Or, the gospel = justification; it is an announcement that our sins have been forgiven and that we stand accepted before God through the death and resurrection of Christ; the gospel is totally outside of us, so the argument goes.  Or, again, “done” (gospel) and “do” (law).  I want to offer some comments on this type of thinking because I’m becoming increasingly persuaded that there is a great deal of confusion surrounding this issue.

In the first place, I am not comfortable with how some use the terms “law” and “gospel”.  Some admit that they use these terms not in their precise biblical sense, but rather as “systematic” categories.  A few may even be so bold to agree that the Torah contains both “law” and “gospel”.  To insist that the “gospel” equals “done” and the “law” equals “do” invites confusion for any serious student of the Bible.  This antithesis causes a host of problems when read back into Scripture, particularly since Paul has a version of law-gospel that bears little resemblance to the  “Lutheran” antithesis.

The Reformed have historically taught that the gospel both promises and commands.  To say that all imperatives are strictly law reflects an Antinomian position, at least historically.  Samuel Rutherford’s work, “Spirituall Antichrist”, highlights the various tendencies among Antinomian writers of the seventeenth century.  One way to explain what’s at stake in this debate would be to evaluate the contention that the gospel persuades rather than commands.  Rutherford was adamant that the gospel persuades and commands.  Consider the following:

“The Gospel (according to Robert Towne) perswades rather then commands.  But say we, it both commands, (as the Law doth) and with a more strong obligation of the constraining love of Christ…so here be no differences at all” (Spirituall Antichrist, II.122).

Elsewhere Rutherford argues that the law and the gospel require the same obedience (Pt. II.7).  Indeed, “positively”, they are not contrary to one another.  “Perfect obedience, which the Law requireth, and imperfect obedience which the Gospel accepteth are but graduall differences” (II.8).  Moreover, “the Gospel abateth nothing of the height of perfection, in commanding what ever the law commandeth in the same perfection….In acceptation of grace, the Gospel accepteth lesse than the law, but commandeth no lesse” (Pt. II.8).  Incidentally, Rutherford, like Turretin, affirms that good works are necessary for salvation.

Of course, Rutherford was aware of a common cry of the Antinomians, a cry that one often hears today:

(Antinomian): “Yee confound Law and Gospel, and runne on that common error, that the Gospel is conditionall …”

Answer: “It is a new heresie of Antinomians to deny a conditionall Gospel….2. Remission is but one of the promised mercies of the Gospel” (II.63).

I should note that Rutherford was not extreme in his day and William Perkins (see his commentary on Galatians) and John Owen (see Works, III.604-10) echoed similar sentiments.  It is one thing to find authors that speak about distinguishing between law and gospel, but it is quite another thing to understand how these concepts function within their system of thought.

Now, one has to applaud the intentions of the Lutherans and those who agree with how they commonly distinguish between law and gospel.  We should always be zealous to protect justification by faith alone.  My contentions have not so much to do with how this concept relates to justification, but what we mean by the terms “law” and “gospel”.  Sure, the law drives the unconverted to find salvation in Christ, but what about those who are in Christ?

Paul sometimes speaks negatively of the Torah; he shows its impotence apart from the Spirit to give the life it promises.  Some versions of the law-gospel antithesis seem make a mess of Paul’s own antitheses.  For example, in Romans 7 the law is placed on the “Spirit” (not the “flesh”) side of the Spirit-flesh antithesis.  Sin leads to condemnation because the law exposes us as sinners.  But in chapter 8 the law becomes a liberating, not condemning, power because of the Spirit.  So, when we come to Romans 8:13 do we call it “law” or “gospel”.  I think the answer is obvious.  But, I’m not so sure some of my Reformed brothers would come to the same conclusion as I would!

I would also note that Paul often does not place “law” on the expected side of the antithesis (1 Cor. 7:19).  The law in the New Covenant becomes a quickening power that, by the Spirit, sets us free from sin and death (Rom. 8:1-4).

Rutherford realized, as did his contemporaries, that command and promise are sometimes inextricably intertwined with one another (see again Rom. 8:13; life is promised to those who mortify the sinful nature by the Spirit).  But, whatever the case, the promises, as well as the commands, fall under the rubric of Paul’s “gospel”.

All of this is to suggest that I do not view the biblical gospel as synonymous with justification.  It certainly includes justification, but it is not limited to justification.  Christ died for my sins (1 Cor. 15:3), which includes not only its illegal character (Rom. 1-3), but also its enslaving power (Rom. 6).

Thus, I would say that the gospel includes not only what Christ has done for us, but also what Christ does in us, namely, by forming us into the image of God (Rom. 8:29).  This seems to be a central concern of Paul’s throughout his letters.  Thankfully, the gospel includes God’s work in me (Eph. 2:10; Phil. 2:12-13).

The antithesis between law and gospel is not an end in itself.  This antithesis entered because of sin.  But, as Richard Gaffin has noted,

“The gospel is to the end of removing an absolute law-gospel antithesis in the life of the believer.  How so? Briefly, apart from the gospel and outside of Christ the law is my enemy and condemns me.  Why? Because God is my enemy and condemns me.  But with the gospel and in Christ, united to him by faith, the law is no longer my enemy but my friend.  Why? Because now God is no longer my enemy but my friend, and the law, his will, the law in its moral core, as reflective of his character and of concerns eternally inherent in his own person and so of what pleases him, is now my friendly guide for life in fellowship with God” (By Faith, Not by Sight, 103).

I think Ursinus, in his commentary on the Heidelberg Catechism (p. 105), illustrates just how problematic certain versions of the law-gospel antithesis can be when he considers whether a commandment belongs to the gospel.  He writes:

“Objection. There is no precept, or commandment belonging to the gospel, but to the law. The preaching of repentance is a precept. Therefore the preaching of repentance does not belong to the gospel, but to the law.

Answer. We deny the major, if it is taken generally; for this precept is peculiar to the gospel, which commands us to believe, to embrace the benefits of Christ, and to commence new obedience, or that righteousness which the law requires. If it be objected that the law also commands us to believe in God, we reply that it does this only in general, by requiring us to give credit to all the divine promises, precepts and denunciations, and that with a threatening of punishment, unless we do it. But the gospel commands us expressly and particularly to embrace, by faith, the promise of grace; and also exhorts us by the Holy Spirit, and by the Word, to walk worthy of our heavenly calling. This however it does only in general, not specifying any duty in particular, saying thou shalt do this, or that, but it leaves this to the law; as, on the contrary, it does not say in general, believe all the promises of God, leaving this to the law; but it says in particular, Believe this promise; fly to Christ, and thy sins shall be forgiven thee.”

Some time ago I spoke with a Seminarian who had a rather wooden view of the “law-gospel” antithesis and asked him what he thought about the Sermon on the Mount.  It appeared, to use a phrase from T. David Gordon, “that he was entirely flummoxed by it”; indeed, “I would like to think that he was, at some level, aware of his incapacity to make any sense of it.”  This student used the law-gospel antithesis as a pedagogical tool that he brought to every text; but, when he came to Rom. 8:13 he wasn’t quite sure how to divide the text up given his hermeneutical assumptions.

I understand that many have been zealous to protect the graciousness of God’s saving purposes towards his people, but I am not entirely convinced that narrowing the meaning of “gospel” will prove helpful in the long run.  Many good men in our tradition make this clear; and I’d like to think – in fact, I’m sure this is the case – that this is because God’s Word makes this clear.

Besides that which I’ve mentioned above, let me emphasize the importance of maintaining the indicative-imperative structure of theology, which we see clearly delineated in Scripture (Ex. 20; Rom. 1ff.; Eph. 1-6; 1 Peter 1ff.).  But this structure falls within the context of “gospel” preaching.  To preach the gospel is to preach of Christ’s death and resurrection as the basis/ground for both our justification and our Spirit-wrought obedience.  Some might admit that they distinguish between the broader and narrower uses of the term, but, as I said above, this can be very confusing, and the emphasis among some today seems to be on the “narrow” understanding of the terms, which happens to be the less biblical way of looking at the law and the gospel (terms that in the NT are generally used to speak of redemptive-historical contrasts).

The final word from William Perkins:

“The Gospel, as it teacheth what is to be done, so it hath also the efficacy of the Holy Ghost adjoined to it, by whom being regenerated we have strength both to believe the Gospel and to perform those things which it commandeth” (Art of Prophesying VII, [Abingdon, 1970], 341-342).

Tags: commands, covenant, gospel, justification, law, promises