03 Of The Law of Works and The Law of Faith

OF THE LAW OF WORKS AND THE LAW OF FAITH AS THEY OBTAIN IN THE ECONOMY OF NATURE.

CHAPTER III. 

GOD, in his relations with man, has established three principal economies , in the world. One of these may be designated the Adamic, or natural ; another the Abrahamic or typical; and the other, the Christian, or gracious. The first embraces all concerns between the Creator and the whole of mankind as his creatures. The second comprehends all things relative to the distinction God conferred on Abraham and some of, his descendants in giving to them the land of Canaan for a possession. The third is an economy of grace relating to a special people of every age and nation, designated " a remnant according to the election of grace," and this comprises everything concerning Christ and his church. In all these economies both the law of works and the law of faith have ’been established, each occupying its own appropriate sphere.

Originally, before the fall, the law of faith had no existence in the economy of nature; man was wholly under the, law of works. Regarding him as a moral being, man was necessarily placed under law to his Maker. This law has never been abrogated either in whole or in part. Man, viewed ,simply in his relation to his Creator, was and is, subject to its claims as the rule of his obedience, and to its penalties for every disobedience. The precepts of the law of nature have their fullest codification in the tables which God gave to Moses. These the Lord Jesus reduced to two capital articles, according to which a man is required to love his Creator to the full power of all his faculties, and his neighbour as himself. The reward of obedience is represented in the words, "Thou shalt live ;" and to live in this instance, must be interpreted to be the retention and enjoyment of the state in which man was created. As he originally came from his Creator’s hands, this would be life to him in the highest sense of that word known or desired. For anything beyond this state he could have no natural competency nor desire, and he had no ground of expectation. As there was a perfect congruity between his natural competency for duty and the rule of his obedience, so there was also between his faculties for enjoyment and the state in which he was created. Neither could more have been looked for by him as a reward of his obedience without a commixture of the laws of faith and works, which is never found, respecting the same object. The penalty of disobedience is contained, it may be taken, in the words, " Thou shalt die." What these words mean is, not the destruction, or annihilation, of man’s existence, but the elimination there from of all the true elements of life in the ethical sense of this word. They comprehend the death that is upon man’s existence in this sense now, and whatever there will be of the like kind in the final punishment of the wicked hereafter. The reward, and the penalty of this law in the economy of nature remain. Nothing has been altered. Indeed, about the immutability of the rule and the penalty there is no dispute, or, at most, none worthy of regard ; but it is doubtful whether there is equal clearness, conviction, and general consent about the reward of obedience. However this may be, it is most certain, from repeated testimonies, that the man that performs the requirements of the law shall have his title to live vindicated. " This do," said Jesus to the lawyer, " and thou shalt live,"Luke 10:28. The life spoken of here, as the reward of obedience according to the law of works in the economy of nature, must not be confounded with that eternal life which God promised in Christ before the world began, according to the law of faith, in the economy of grace. Heaven and earth, Christ and Adam, that which is spiritual and that which is natural, do not differ more than these two lives. But it may be objected that it is impossible that any sinful man can, from a universal deficiency, keep the law perfectly, and so entitle himself to a justification before God. This is granted : and, moreover, it is contended that no works of the law can, from the very nature of the thing, justify a sinner at all. By works of law, under the law of works, a righteous man may be vindicated ; but a sinner can never be so justified. While, then, it is clear, and generally known, that no man under the fall can do anything of the kind, and in the degree required of him to constitute a complete obedience to the divine law; it ought to be equally known that, if the self contradictory proposition could be true, namely, that a sinner obeyed the law perfectly, his obedience would avail him nothing for his justification. Nevertheless, the reply of Jesus to the lawyer remains valid and important. If the law continues in force to condemn the transgressor, it is but equal that, if there are any vindicable, as righteous, they should be vindicated, and that the law should remain to vindicate them. This is so ; and, therefore, so far as the law itself is concerned, and the obligation under which, on the principle of works, the Creator Put himself to the creature; man is just as eligible to look for, and enjoy, the reward of a perfect obedience now, on the proper terms, as ever he was. The words, "The man which doeth those things shall live by them," are, indeed,-accepting as a first truth that " The just shall live by faith," a decisive testimony in their way, that the righteousness by which a sinner is justified is revealed to us upon the principle of faith ; but they are also an exact representation of a still existing truth respecting the law of works. It is still a truth, and will be until the end of time, that if a man shall meet the requirements of his Maker’s law at the beginning, he shall be entitled to, and shall enjoy the life that was then possessed. But it is time we proceeded to the consideration of the law of faith as this obtains in the economy of nature ; a branch of truth which, if it may not have the importance of some others, deserves, nevertheless, the most serious attention of all that would understand the Word of God.

If the fall of man gave an occasion for the wrath of God to be revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, so, also, contrariwise, this terrible event afforded an opportunity for , the display of the riches of the goodness and forbearance and long  suffering of God. Moreover, since Adam’s crime and calamity, and the consequent guilt and misery of mankind, God, so to speak, has seized this opportunity to exhibit these excellencies of his nature in every age and nation. All sinners are existing, and are possessing whatever good of existence they have, without a right. It is purely of the Lord’s mercies that all are not consumed. As, therefore, everything that is advantageous in a sinner’s condition under the fall arises from the display of the riches of the goodness forbearance and long-suffering of God, it will be clear, seeing that the exhibition of all or each of these excellencies of the Most High is the extension of undeserved favour, that their manifestation creates a predicament of grace. Let this be clearly apprehended, and then it will become equally clear that, to whatever extent and by whatever means, if any, God may have warranted sinners to look for the manifestation of the riches of any or all of these his excellencies, or of any other similar to them, he has, by such means and so far, introduced into the economy of nature the law of faith in the conduct of affairs between his fallen creatures and himself.

What of favour Adam, as a creature under the natural economy, was warranted to expect from the correspondence he had with his Creator and Governor after his fall, it may be very difficult to say in precise terms ; but that his God had introduced a dispensation of goodness, forbearance, and long-suffering, and that he was led to look for some expressions of these excellencies of his Maker there can be no reasonable doubt. It ’is clear that he might infer from the very words addressed to him in condemnation of his sin that his natural life would be spared for a time, and that the ground should produce what was necessary to meet his bodily wants, albeit that he was to eat his food in sorrow all the days of his life. Whatever the goodness of his Maker warranted him to infer to his advantage here from, this he might believe for and expect from his God; and his posterity have the same things that he had. But in whatever state of doubt the antediluvians may have found themselves relative to any reason or ground to hope in God from the absence of an express promise, all this has been removed from the post-diluvians by the word of the Lord to Noah. Of this distinguished man, after the flood, God made, as it were, a new head of mankind. In the promises he made to this eminent man, in the acceptance of the sacrifices offered by him, in the blessing be pronounced upon him, and in the covenant he made with him, God pledged himself to mankind that he would display his goodness, forbearance, and long-suffering "while the earth remaineth." A state of favour was then established, comprehending the whole race by a covenant of which the rainbow is a token "for perpetual generations," and the law of faith was introduced, as a mode of living, between man and his Maker respecting every good therein promised or all time. What, therefore, is thus promised every man may believe for, pray for, and look for ; and for every good of the kind held and enjoyed every man should render thanksgiving to God ; and should regard himself as being not consumed by the want of what he enjoys from the freely-bestowed favour of his Maker under a dispensation of goodness, forbearance, and long-suffering. What the wise man of the world will look for from the invariability of what he calls the laws of nature, the worshipping man of the world will look for from the unchanging covenant of the God of nature according to the law of faith. Nature, to this man, is God’s creature and subject. From God she received her being. Her laws are her Maker’s modes of management. On him her condition is dependent. By him her destiny is fixed.

Here a question of some importance may justly claim a little consideration. May anyone that, according to his own consciousness, is not actuated by Christian principle, worship God acceptably by prayer and thanksgiving without any reference to Christ? By some, and of these there are that are very far from being vulgar and unlearned men, the negative of this question is strongly asserted, and the assertion is not made in a merely passing peremptory utterance, but is supported, as best it may be, by much argument and appeal to Scripture. Good Mr. Romaine said, “Until Christ’s righteousness be imputed to you by faith, your prayers are an abomination, and your fancied good works are nothing but sin." A little further on he added, " We doubt not but the best of them works done before the grace of Christ are only so many splendid sins." Mr. Haldane, in his consideration of the case of Cornelius at the end of his generally excellent Commentary on the Romans, has cited these words with approbation, and used them to assist his proof that the centurion was a godly man in the spiritual acceptation of that term.

Now if there are men who present their repentance, and prayers, and thanksgivings, or any other acts of worship, as a meritorious consideration, or as an economical means, for the acquirement of pardon and righteousness, or of any other blessing of salvation, they unquestionably commit a blunder and a crime. A blunder, because they introduce the law of works into that part of the economy of grace where it has no place whatever; and because it is evident that these things cannot possess in equity any meritorious character, nor be the economical means of acquiring anything at all. A crime, because they, in effect, contradict the testimony of God about, and trample under foot the provision he has made for, the justification and salvation of a sinner. If Mr. Romaine had the notions of such men in view, he was undoubtedly correct in saying that their prayers and good works were “only ; so many splendid sins." But it is very questionable whether these were the persons whom he had in view, while it is very certain that he has not been so understood, at least, by Mr. Haldane. If then Mr. Romaine meant absolutely what Mr. Haldane has taken him to mean-namely, that all acts of worship "done before the grace of Christ, are only so many splendid sins," and that they are such "because they flow from an unregenerate heart," as he says, it remains to be enquired, Are these things so?

Mr. Haldane-and we may take him to be a representative man on the opinion in question-says: " Did ever the prayers and the alms of an unbeliever go up before God for a memorial ? " Is not the sacrifice of the wicked an abomination to the Lord?" We may reply to these questions by asking, Could Mr. Haldane, can those who adopt his opinions, have forgotten that God accepted the humility of Ahab, and, in consequence, averted from his house during his lifetime the evil that had been threatened thereon by the mouth of Elijah ? Or that Nebuchadnezzar was counseled by Daniel to break off his sins by righteousness, and his iniquities by showing mercy to the poor, with the hope that such a course might be acceptable to God, in order to the lengthening of his, the king’s, tranquility? Or that the idolatrous Ninevites by repentance found such acceptance with God as to avert the doom of their city ? Or that the mariners in the storm prayed, when they cast Jonah overboard, and found acceptance ? Or that Peter exhorted Simon the sorcerer to pray God if perhaps the thought of his heart might be forgiven to. him ? Were not all these unbelievers-or, at least, were any of them believers, in the complete sense of that term, in its relation to Christ? Had some of them the least inkling of the Messiah at all ? Was Nebuchadnezzar taught to pray by the Messiah, or Son by Jesus Christ ? The , Ninevites believed God, but had their faith any reference to the Saviour of sinners ? Was the worship mentioned in either of these cases spiritual in its nature, or did it at all relate to spiritual things? Those that have not the perspicacity to see a distinction between an- acceptable homage rendered to God in reference to things that are natural, and to those things that are spiritual, cannot understand the Scriptures. Neither can they that are unable to distinguish between an unqualified acceptance with God in righteousness, whether under law or under grace, and a qualified acceptance with him Under a dispensation of longsuffering. If the question were whether the worship of a sinner is accepted absolutely on the ground of its natural acceptableness, as that of Adam was in his primitive purity, there could be no doubt about the answer. Or if it were whether a worship rendered with an object that is not warranted by any revelation that God has made, as that of doing any legal works for justification from sin to life eternal, the answer would be equally certain. But it is neither of these. It is whether a sinner can render an acceptable worship to his Maker and Preserver relative to things that are temporal, without, on the one hand, imagining that he will entitle himself to be dealt with according to what in a like case would be due from the Creator to a sinless creature; or, on the other hand, according to the right acquired by the righteousness of Christ for them that are justified. Whether, in a word, considering that though a sinner, God his Creator, under a dispensation of longsuffering, has extended favour to him, and given promise of its continuance, he may, and should, give thanks for the good he possesses, and pray for the fulfillment of the promise in future. He that doubts, let him learn. In all acceptable worship the worshipper will call upon God in truth." What he knows to be true of God and of himself will be his guide in his confessions, supplications, and thanksgivings. This it is that will govern his sentiments, regulate his expressions, and guide his life. Little or much may be comprehended herein; but what there is will be true.

It may be that the accepted worshipper has no more knowledge of God and of himself than the light of nature teaches a savage, and that he has never had a thought carried beyond natural things in his worship ; or it may be that, though he has not equaled, he has emulated Paul in his understanding of spiritual things, his desire after them, his delight in them, and in his devotion to God. However this may be, in either, in every case of true worship, God is ’’nigh to" the worshippers. "Nigh to all that call upon him in truth," whether they be penitent Ninevites, devout Romans, or believers in Christ of any age and nation. Nigh to manifest himself to them appropriately, and to, accept their worship according to its character, whether it be that of natural or spiritual men.

Again, in all true worship the worshipper will call on the name of the Lord ; that is, he will worship God, not as an unknown or unappreciated abstraction, but as bearing some appropriate designation in his relation to him, and one that he will know how to value. Thus, when Abraham built an altar he called upon the name of the Lord; so did Isaac; and so did David when he offered to God the sacrifice of thanksgiving. Some appropriative descriptive title under which God had manifested and magnified himself would, in each case, occupy the mind of the worshipper, and afford at once a reason and a vehicle for his worship. But when some Athenians built an altar, they consecrated it to the unknown God. Herein there was no acceptable worship, for there was no knowledge, which is essential to a calling upon God in truth. A difference is represented by these instances that, it is to be feared, still exists, and extends far more widely than is commonly credited. Under what name that God will acknowledge do many, denominated Christian, call upon the Lord? To how many is God an absolute abstraction? To how many is he a wholly unknown God? To how many is he an altogether anonymous God? But to those who do know him, his name will be some definite and instructive designation under which he has been pleased to make himself known to men, not only as the Supreme Being, but as the true object of worship in any given condition of the worshipper. Different persons will call on the Lord under various names, such as may seem to them the most fitting for the occasion. In prayer they will call on the Lord under that name that will appear to them most to warrant and encourage their supplication in the peculiar need that may press on them; and in thanksgiving they will render praise to the Lord under that name that shall appear to them to be made illustrious by the favour vouchsafed and enjoyed. But it will be evident that the true knowledge of God, without which there can be no acceptable worship, will vary much in its extent in different persons. Such as have never had the light of revelation can have known no more than nature teaches; and many such, alas! There are now. Many that have the Scriptures in their hands are without that Divine teaching by which alone a man can attain to the higher branches of the knowledge of the Lord, the highest of all the sciences. What, then, is the amount of this knowledge that is required to be possessed by any one to qualify him to render an acceptable service to God? Suppose a man approaches the sanctuary who, while reverently regarding the Bible in his hand as the Book of God, is conscious that he is not "born of the Spirit," that he " remains a "natural man," and that he does not know "" the things of the Spirit of God;" is he, as a worshipper, to be prohibited from entering ? Or, suppose a man to come to the entrance of God’s house that has no more knowledge of God than that heathen poet had who wrote the line, " For we are also his offspring;" is the door to be shut against him as a worshipper? If so, why so? By what law is it enacted that if a man knows not God, and therefore cannot worship him as his Redeemer and Saviour, he must not render to his Maker and Preserver such homage as he can? As a fact, men in different states and under great diversity of circumstances have worshipped, and do worship, God acceptably. Adam, in his primitive purity, and the Jews that outwardly kept the commandments and ordinances given to them by Moses, rendered to God an acceptable service. Christians that worship God by faith in Jesus Christ are without doubt accepted. About these there will be no question. But here is a man that has fallen in Adam, and who, in the sight of God, is without holiness, righteousness, and goodness. He is not a Jew, nor has he the hopes or fears of one, nor does he worship as one. Neither is he a Christian, in the sense that a man is one who has a consciousness of a change wrought in him by the Holy Ghost, whereby he is created anew in the image of Christ ; nevertheless, he is a worshipper of God. He receives the Scriptures as the Word of God. He accepts the historical testimony of the Lord Jesus though he is a stranger to the spiritual power of the Gospel. He holds himself to be amenable to the divine law. He recognizes that it is in God he lives, moves, and has his being, and all his well-being. He worshipfully acknowledges God as the Governor of the creatures, and he prays and gives thanks accordingly for the blessings of divine goodness. Is the worship of such a man acceptable to God? If not-why not?

Those that deny the acceptableness of such a man’s worship, rely on, what we think to be a misinterpretation of some Scriptures; notably that inProverbs 15:8, “The sacrifice of the wicked is an abomination to the Lord." But can their interpretation of this Scripture be the true one? If so, carried to its legitimate issue, it will follow that every soul of man not justified by the righteousness of Christ, that offers a sacrifice of prayer or thanksgiving to God will add wickedness to sin. Does such a proposition need a refutation? May it not be that the wicked person spoken of here is one that adds hypocrisy in his worship to all his other forms of wickedness? Would not this interpretation meet every difficulty? Is it not the true one?

Another Scripture that is relied on, we believe, in support of the un acceptableness of such worship as a man of the world can render to God, is that inHebrews 11:6: "But without faith it is impossible to please him ; for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is the rewarder of them that diligently seek him." Those who support their view by this Scripture contend that the faith spoken of here is identical with that by which a sinner believes with the heart in Christ unto righteousness. But this is begging a great question, and one which must be brought under consideration later on. ’It will be enough here to say that this view is disputed. The worshipping man of the world we have briefly sketched answers every requirement of this text. He believes that God is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him, and he seeks him accordingly. What more is demanded?

Let but the truth taught in the Scripture on this subject be apprehended and accepted, namely, that God after the fall of man, without, any reference to Christ, introduced into the economy of nature a dispensation of long-suffering, created a predicament of grace, and imported into the relations between himself and his fallen creatures, the law of faith for temporal purposes, then all will be set right. Men of the world will then see that, if they cannot worship God as Christians, they are not utterly excluded from the sanctuary; but that they have the privilege to pray for such blessings as the Lord has promised to give them, and that they are under the obligations created by Divine favour to give thanks for all the good they enjoy. Those that doubt the obligation and the privilege of such men to worship God at all, will then feel, it is to be hoped with pleasure; that their ground is completely taken from under them; and that they may invite their fellow men, nevertheless for that these may now lie under an entire disqualification from worshipping God as their Redeemer and Saviour, to unite with them in doing homage to the Most High as the Maker and Preserver of all. Then too, those that have heretofore encouraged and exhort such men to acknowledge God, often it may be feared with no sounder arguments than the promptings of their own good-nature have supplied, will emerge from the confusion of their uncertainty and will speak with such a confidence as is inspired by the clear guidance of the true reason for urging a right thing to be done. My apology for having pursued this subject to this great length, is a conviction that without such a discrimination of things that differ, no clear understanding of a great part of the Word of God is possible.