Law & Gospel: An Indispensable Distinction for the Welfare of the Soul
Before he became the Father of the Reformation, Martin Luther was once asked, “Brother Martin, do you love God?” His response was, “Love God? You ask me if I love God? Sometimes I hate God. I see Christ as a consuming judge who is simply looking at me to evaluate me and to visit affliction upon me.”
Well, at least he was honest.
Luther’s hatred of God and misconception of Christ may seem strange to us, especially for a monk, but it was inextricably linked to the faulty theology and false doctrines of Roman Catholicism, most pointedly, the Roman church’s failure to distinguish between Law and Gospel.
In his treatise on the subject, John Colquhoun writes, “As a man’s ignorance of the difference between the law and the gospel is inexpressibly hurtful to him, so his being able to distinguish aright between them must be of unspeakable advantage to him. It is an attainment in which the present and future welfare of his soul is deeply concerned.”
Perhaps you’re reading this and wondering, How in the world could this have any bearing on my day-to-day life? It seems like a topic for the intellectuals and theologians to tackle, not a layperson like me. Friend, this could not be further from the truth! Law/Gospel distinction is vital to the faith, holiness, joy, and comfort of every Christian, not just the ones who get paid to read all day. If we do not know the difference between Law and Gospel, we will undoubtedly confuse the two, and the result will be a distressing and contradictory experience of both bondage and liberty, despair and hope, death and life — a burden impossible to bear.
Without these categories, we are in perpetual danger of founding our hope and assurance, either in part or in whole, upon our own performance instead of building upon the sure, steady, solid rock of Jesus Christ. Our souls will fall victim to anxiety and despondency, and our spirits will be bereft of the consolation that comes only when one is enabled to rely with sure and settled confidence on the perfect righteousness of Christ in his or her stead.
But with these distinctions in place, under the guiding influence of the Holy Spirit, we are enabled to better perceive the glory of God’s plan of redemption; we have the wisdom to discern the harmony between passages of Scripture that appear contradictory to one another; we are able to test spirits and doctrines to determine whether they are from God; we have the ability to quiet our troubled consciences in seasons of doubt and distress; and we have the joy of purposeful progression in the faith, in Christlikeness, and in unshakeable, blood-bought, Jesus-wrought, Gospel-rooted assurance.
Sounds pretty good to me.
So, we must begin with two basic questions: What is the Law? and What is the Gospel? Let’s start with the first one. In Colquhoun’s words, the Law is “the declared will of God, directing and obliging mankind to do that which pleases him and to abstain from that which displeases Him.” In simpler terms, the Law is what God requires of us for righteousness. It is, inherently, an obligation. When you’re reading a passage of Scripture (Old Testament or New) that is speaking about something you must do, it is Law. The Gospel, however, is what God graciously provides for us for righteousness. It is, inherently, a proclamation. When you read a passage of Scripture that speaks about what has been done for you by Christ, it is Gospel. Colquhoun defines the Gospel as “the joyful tidings of a free salvation through Jesus Christ to sinners of mankind.”
The Law says to us, “Do this, and live.” The Gospel says, “Jesus has done it, now live in Him.” The Law demands everything and provides nothing, while the Gospel demands nothing and provides everything. The Law cannot provide salvation, nor can it produce sanctification; it simply shows us our sin and our need of a Savior. The Gospel both provides salvation and produces sanctification, and it does it all through faith in the Savior, Jesus Christ. Maybe this seems fairly elementary, but we must remember that, at heart, we are transactional beings. We have a legal frame; the Law makes sense to us. It is the Gospel that seems ridiculous. Deep down, our default position will always be to approach the Lord with handfuls of filthy rags instead of with the open, empty hands of a beggar. So when it comes to Law/Gospel distinction, we are more often than not prone to mixing the two rather than keeping them separate.
Now, why is this a problem? So we got a little Law in our Gospel, big deal! Actually, it is a big deal because when we mix the two we end up ruining both. The moment we begin to dilute, or, more pointedly, adulterate the Gospel with the Law and vice versa, we lose it all. Let me explain. The Gospel comes to us freely by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone; it is not demanding, nor does it require anything from us besides the faith which God has already given. To present the Gospel as merely the removal of sin apart from the imputation of righteousness, to act as though we must add to the works of Christ is to present a half-gospel, which is really no gospel at all. When we add Law to Gospel, we destroy the joy, the comfort, and the peace God offers us in the good news of Christ for us, and thereby negate what He accomplished — the fulfilling of the Law — to be able to give us those things.
The Law, however, is exacting and demands perfection; it is not gracious, nor does it allow us the freedom to soften or relax any of Scripture’s commands in order to comfort ourselves with subjective notions of our own “goodness.” The Law, in its essence, is a transcript of God’s holiness. When we present the commands of Scripture as achievable, not only do we downplay the pure, awe-inspiring, fear-inducing, absolute holiness of the Almighty God, we also place unbearable burdens upon ourselves and others. God’s Law is all or nothing. Perfection or condemnation. We need look no further than the apostle Paul’s words in his letter to the Romans to understand that before the Law, all are laid low:
“None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one… For by works of the law no human being will be justified in [God’s] sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin” (Romans 3:10–12, 20).
It is only when the bar of the Law is unreachable, when it is raised back to its proper position, that we realize our need for the Gospel. And it is only when we are heavy-laden by the full weight of the Law that the offer of Gospel rest makes sense. Jesus Himself put the full weight of the Law upon those who thought they could carry it, but He compassionately and freely offered the Gospel to those who knew they couldn’t. Let’s look at two examples of this:
“And behold, a lawyer stood up to put him to the test, saying, ‘Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?’ He said to him, ‘What is written in the Law? How do you read it?’ And he answered, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.’ And he said to him, ‘You have answered correctly; do this, and you will live’” (Luke 10:25–28).
“And behold, a woman of the city, who was a sinner, when she learned that [Jesus] was reclining at table in the Pharisee’s house, brought an alabaster flask of ointment, and standing behind him at his feet, weeping, she began to wet his feet with her tears and wiped them with the hair of her head and kissed his feet and anointed them with the ointment… And he said to the woman, ‘Your faith has saved you; go in peace’” (Luke 7:37–38, 50).
Confused? On the one hand we have Jesus saying that in order to inherit eternal life, we must do the Law. Then on the other He says that it is faith that saves us … so which is it? Is Jesus schizophrenic? Hardly. He is an expert Teacher employing the Law in the way it was meant to be used all along — to crush us in our sin and drive us to our Savior. The lawyer thought he could be righteous by accomplishing the Law, so Jesus piled it on. But when dealing with people like the sinful woman, who was acutely aware of her unrighteousness, Jesus emphasized belief. There is no contradiction here; the keeping of the Law — personally, perpetually, and perfectly — is indeed required for eternal life. But the crucial difference between the lawyer and the sinful woman is to whom they were looking to keep it.
Okay, you may be thinking, I get that the Law doesn’t factor into my salvation, but what about my sanctification? Surely you’re not suggesting that obedience doesn’t matter? Not at all! For Christians, the Law is still a guide for living, but it’s how our obedience to it is produced that tends to get muddied without a proper Law/Gospel distinction. Let’s pretend you’re reading your Bible and you turn to Jesus’s summation of the entire Law and all of its requirements in Matthew 22:37–40: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.”
If your first response to Jesus’s words is to start making a list of things you’re going to do to love God and your neighbor better, then you’ve already missed the point. Jesus’s words ought to bring you to your knees because any honest Christian should take one look at their life in light of these two requirements and immediately realize how deeply they’ve failed. Being told or telling ourselves we should be living up to the requirements of a Law that is impossible to keep can only produce constant frustration and despair. If Christianity (and that includes sanctification) were a natural process, then motivating ourselves in the flesh would make sense. But it isn’t. Paul says as much to the Galatians: “Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh?” (Galatians 3:3).
If we’re being called to obey the Law, then we must be called to obey it in its fullest, perfect, and most exacting form, including our motives, our heart, all of it so that we don’t make the mistake of thinking it is achievable. Then and only then is the way to true, heartfelt, joyful obedience laid before us. This is the first step along the path to obedience: We’ve read God’s Law and our consciences are pricked by its unyielding demands. Now we’ve made way for the balm of the Gospel to come flooding in, soothing our souls with the peace, joy, and assurance that comes from knowing that Jesus loved God with all of His heart, soul, and mind, and loved His neighbor (that’s you and me!) as Himself absolutely perfectly so that He could wipe away our record of sin and freely give us His record of righteousness. This, beloved, is the good news.
So we come to the final piece of our Christian obedience puzzle, and it’s an important one: gratitude. Once you understand your total and utter failure and are united to Christ by faith, then you are freed to obey (albeit imperfectly), not out of fear of your inevitable failures, or self-righteousness, or a sense of having to earn something, but out of gratitude. Gospel gratitude is the single most effective motivator for joyful obedience in the Christian life. Think about it: When was the last time you really enjoyed doing something for someone? Was it when you had to or you’d get in trouble? Was it when you were threatened to do it? Was it when you were afraid you’d upset the person and they’d be angry with you? Not likely. Our hearts are most happy doing things for others when we do those things from a sense of gratitude for the person and what they have done for us, not in a transactional sense, but out of love.
Do you want to be an effective Christian? Do you want to obey God joyfully and from a heart of love and gratitude? Do you crave the steadiness and surety of a soul consoled and comforted by its irrevocable status in Jesus Christ, the Savior? Then allow God’s Law to utterly destroy any confidence you may be holding on to in your own sufficiency. Allow it to arouse consciousness of your sin and the depths of your depravity so that your soul might be prepared for the Gospel. For those whom the Law has instructed in the truth that they are not and cannot be commended to God by their works welcome all the more eagerly the hope of salvation offered to them through faith in Jesus Christ!
God’s Law is good in that it reveals to us what righteousness looks like, it shows us what is good for our neighbor, and it continually exposes our sin so that we might be driven to a life of repentance, but it has no place in our consciences before the judgment seat of God, neither can it produce holiness in our lives. The Law discovers our disease, but only the Gospel can provide the remedy. Beloved, in the face of God’s perfect and holy Law we ought to be far more troubled than we are, but in the light of God’s good and gracious Gospel, we can be far more encouraged than we ever thought possible. May we simultaneously uphold the Law and declare the Gospel, keeping both in their proper spheres, so that the two might function as they were intended to for the welfare of our souls.