"I DELIGHT IN THE LAW OF GOD"

"I DELIGHT IN THE LAW OF GOD"
Romans 7:22

Don Fortner


Because we believe that salvation is in Christ alone, altogether a work of God's pure, free, sovereign, immutable grace, and because we refuse to be brought under the irksome yoke of bondage to the law, we are often accused of being antinomians, people who are against, or opposed to, the law of God. The charge is totally slanderous and without foundation. God's people are not rebel's to God's law. We love the law of God. It is holy, just and good. We simply acknowledge our sinfulness and complete inability to obey the law. Trusting Christ as our Lord and Savior, we do not live by the rule of the law. We live by the rule of grace and love. But no believer lives in rebellion to the law of God.

l. We are saved by grace alone, without the works of the law (Rom. 3:20, 28; Gal. 2:16; Eph. 2:8-9; II Tim. 1:9).

2. Our standing and acceptance with God is entirely in Christ. We are "accepted in the Beloved". God accepts us in Christ alone, only for his sake and only through the merits of his righteousness and shed blood. Our salvation is altogether in Christ our Substitute. He performed the work. Neither our righteousness nor our sins in any way affect our relationship with God (Rom. 5:18-21). Our acceptance with God in Christ is an eternal and an immutable acceptance. It never varies. 3. Every believer is completely free from the law of God in Christ (Rom. 6:14; 7:1, 4; 8:1; 10:4). We are free from the law's curse and condemnation, free from the law's rituals and ceremonies, and free from the law's rule. Our lives are not motivated, ruled and governed by the Mosaic law. And our lives are not subject to the laws of human religion, custom and tradition (Col. 2:16-23). I will defend to my death the liberty of every believer to live in this world, being ruled only by his own conscience and his love for Christ in all matters of indifference. We will not be subject to the rules which self-righteous religionists endeavor to impose upon us.

4. But you can be sure of this fact: Any professed believer who lives in wilful violation of and rebellion to the moral law of God is lost. His profession of faith is a false profession, nothing more than a pretentious show of hypocrisy. All true believers "delight in the law of God after the inward man."

Don Fortner is pastor of
Grace Baptist Church
Danville, KY