Chapter Four

THE IMPETUS FOR THE IMPERATIVES

Many moons ago, when I was a little more svelte and the fast-twitch muscles twitched a little bit faster, I ran cross-country and track. I was either so good or so bad that I tried every event in track at least once. I especially liked distance running. Today, long-distance means running for thirty minutes straight and trying not to empty my inhaler in the process, but back in high school and college I could run for eight or ten or twelve miles and talk the whole way.

One of the things we talked about, I must confess, is how we might trim the day’s workout just a wee bit. I was of the Malachi school of running—no harm in cutting a few corners (Mal. 1:6–8, 13). I specialized in straight lines through rounded parking lots. Some of my friends, however, adhered to the Martin Luther “sin boldly” theory of shortcuts. One time they chopped a long run almost in half by cutting through a couple of muck fields. It seemed like a good idea at the time: eliminate the middle portion of the route by taking a left at the celery farm. But unfortunately there are two problems with running through muck. One, the muck sticks to your legs, making your shortcut rather obvious. And two, it’s almost impossible to run on muck. In the end, the shortcut proved to be quite a long cut and my friends had nothing to show for their crime except dirty shoes.

It’s true in life, as it’s true in running around muck fields, that the right way to go is also the best way to go. When God gives us commands, he means to help us run the race to completion, not to slow us down. In his Reflections on the Psalms, C. S. Lewis pondered how anyone could “delight” in the law of the Lord. Respect, maybe. Assent, perhaps. But how could anyone find the law so exhilarating? And yet, the more he thought about it, the more Lewis came to understand how the psalmist’s delight made sense. “Their delight in the Law,” Lewis observed, “is a delight in having touched firmness; like the pedestrian’s delight in feeling the hard road beneath his feet after a false short cut has long entangled him in muddy fields.”1 The law is good because firmness is good. God cares enough to show us his ways and direct our paths. How awful it would be to inhabit this world, have some idea that there is a God, and yet not know what he desires from us.2 Divine statutes are a gift to us. God gives us law because he loves.

WHAT’S LEFT FOR THE LAW?

Of all the thorny theological issues in the Bible, the most difficult, in my opinion, is the role of the law in the life of the Christian. On the one hand, the Christian is no longer under the law, but under grace (Rom. 6:14; 7:6). The law of Moses was only a temporary tutor, leading us to Christ (Gal. 3:23–26). On the other hand, we know the law is holy, righteous, and good (Rom. 7:12) and that God still expects us to obey his “perfect” and “royal” law (James 1:25; 2:8). The same Paul who says we are not “under the law” (1 Cor. 9:20) also says he is “under the law of Christ” (v. 21). Christians often speak of the three uses of the law. The first is to lead us to Christ by convicting us of sin. The second is to restrain wickedness in the world. The third use is to help us learn the nature of the Lord’s will, acting as a kind of blueprint for holiness. Christians generally agree with the first two points. The controversy is whether the so-called third use is a legitimate, or even primary, purpose of the law.

I’m the pastor at University Reformed Church, which means I support the third use of the law, seeing as how this Calvinist understanding of the law is enshrined in every Reformed confession and catechism. But you don’t have to belong to a confessional Reformed church to believe in the importance of the law in the believer’s life. Some Christians think the law continues to be God’s tool for the promotion of holiness. Other Christians think the law no longer has direct application for New Testament believers. These two sides are not always that far apart. Those who affirm the ongoing importance of the law usually distinguish between the parts of the law that are directly applicable and the parts that can be applied only indirectly. Typically, this has meant that the moral law (e.g., the Ten Commandments) is directly normative, but the civil and judicial aspects of the law point to what is true for all people at all times.3 On the other hand, those who argue that we are not obligated to keep the law are usually quick to clarify that they still think the law contains universally true moral principles.4 Both sides recognize that the law was given in a certain context at a particular moment in redemptive history. And both sides recognize that the law still has something to say about how we live as Christians.5

Part of the confusion in all this is that “law” means different things in the Bible. It can refer to the Old Testament Scriptures, the Torah (i.e., the first five books of the Bible), the Mosaic law, or simply what God requires his people to do.6 So while we are not “under the law” in the sense that we are condemned by the law or bound to the Old Covenant of Moses (2 Cor. 3:6; Heb. 8:13), we are “under law” in so far as we are still obligated to obey our Lord and every expression of his will for our lives (1 Cor. 9:21). The law of God cannot save—that’s legalism. But everything in the Bible is for our edification, that we may be equipped for good works (2 Tim. 3:16–17). So whatever the Bible teaches, we should believe. And whatever it commands—by precept, example, story, or song—we should do.7

THE GRACE OF LAW

That last sentence—we should do what the Bible tells us to do—is obvious to most Christians. But I want to go a step further. I want you to unashamedly love, and not be afraid to land on, the imperatives of Scripture. I know the danger with imperatives is that we end up getting all law and no gospel, making Christianity a religion of good advice instead of good news. If the law is what convicts and condemns and the gospel is what gives grace and forgives, then the only good thing about law is that it can lead us to gospel. But let’s be careful. There is nothing sub-Christian in talking about obedience to God’s commands. There is nothing inherently anti-gospel in being exhorted to keep the imperatives of Scripture. There is nothing ungracious about divine demands. Just the opposite, in fact—there is grace in getting law.

We usually think of law leading us to gospel. And this is true—we see God’s standards, see our sin, and then see our need for a Savior. But it’s just as true that gospel leads to law. In Exodus, first God delivered his people from Egypt, then he gave the Ten Commandments. In Romans, Paul expounds on the sovereign free grace and the atoning work of Christ in chapters 1–11, and then in chapters 12–16 he shows us how to live in light of these mercies. In John 4, Christ tells the Samaritan woman about the living water welling up to eternal life, and then he exposes her sin and instructs her to worship God in spirit and truth. I’m not suggesting any kind of rigid evangelistic formula. I simply want to show that the good news of the gospel leads to gracious instructions for obeying God.

THE LAW OF LOVE AND THE LOVE OF LAW

Some Christians make the mistake of pitting love against law, as if the two were mutually exclusive. You either have a religion of love or a religion of law. But such an equation is profoundly unbiblical. For starters, “love” is a command of the law (Deut. 6:5; Lev. 19:18; Matt. 22:36–40). If you enjoin people to love, you are giving them law. Conversely, if you tell them law doesn’t matter, then neither does love, which is the summary of the law.

Furthermore, consider the close connection Jesus makes between love and law. We’ve already seen that for Jesus there is no love for him apart from keeping the law (John 14:15). But he says even more than this. Jesus connects communion with God with keeping commandments. When we keep Christ’s commandments, we love him. And when we love Christ, the Father loves us. And whomever the Father loves, Christ loves and reveals himself to them (John 14:21). So, there is no abiding in Christ’s love apart from keeping Christ’s commandments (John 15:10). Which means there is no fullness of joy apart from the pursuit of holiness (v. 11).

God’s law is an expression of his grace because it is also an expression of his character. Commands show us what God is like, what he prizes, what he detests, what it means to be holy as God is holy. To hate all rules is to hate God himself who ordained his rules to reflect his nature. The law is God’s plan for his sanctified people to enjoy communion with him. That’s why the Psalms are full of declarations of delight regarding God’s commands. Even with the passing of the Mosaic covenant, surely the psalms set an example for us. The happy man delights in the law of the Lord and meditates on it day and night (Ps. 1:2). The precepts and rules of the Lord are sweeter than honey and more to be desired than gold (Ps. 19:10). Yes, the law can incite the natural man to sin (Rom. 7:7–11). But God’s people rejoice in his statutes and behold wondrous things out of his law (Ps. 119:18). They long to be steadfast in keeping his statutes (v. 5). In the eyes of the believer, the law is still true and good; it is our hope, our comfort, and our song.

Let’s not be afraid to land on law—never as the means of meriting justification, but as the proper expression of having received it. It’s not wrong for a sermon to conclude with something we have to do. It’s not inappropriate that our counseling exhort one another to obedience. Legalism is a problem in the church, but so is antinomianism. Granted, I don’t hear anyone saying, “let’s continue in sin that grace may abound” (see Rom. 6:1). That’s the worst form of antinomianism. But strictly speaking, antinomianism simply means no-law, and some Christians have very little place for the law in their pursuit of holiness. One scholar says, about an antinomian pastor from seventeenth-century England, “He believed that the law served a useful purpose in convincing men of their need of a Saviour; nevertheless, he gave it little or no place in the life of a Christian since he held that ‘free grace is the teacher of good works.’”8 Emphasizing free grace is not the problem. The problem is in assuming that good works will invariably flow from nothing but a diligent emphasis on the gospel. Many Christians, including preachers, don’t know what to do with commands and are afraid to talk directly about obedience. The world may think we’re homophobic, but nomophobia (fear of law) may be our bigger problem.

The irony is that if we make every imperative into a command to believe the gospel more fully, we turn the gospel into one more thing we have to get right, and faith becomes the one thing we need to be better at. If only we really believed, obedience would take care of itself. No need for commands or effort. But the Bible does not reason this way. It has no problem with the word “therefore.” Grace, grace, grace, therefore, stop doing this, start doing that, and obey the commands of God. Good works should always be rooted in the good news of Christ’s death and resurrection, but I believe we are expecting too much from the “flow” and not doing enough to teach that obedience to the law—from a willing spirit, as made possible by the Holy Spirit—is the proper response to free grace.

For as much as Luther derided the misuse of the law, he did not reject the positive role of the law in the believer’s life. The Lutheran Formula of Concord is absolutely right when it says, “We believe, teach, and confess that the preaching of the Law is to be urged with diligence, not only upon the unbelieving and impenitent, but also upon true believers, who are truly converted, regenerate, and justified by faith” (Epitome 6.2). Preachers must preach the law without embarrassment. Parents must insist on obedience without shame. The law can, and should, be urged upon true believers—not to condemn, but to correct and to promote Christlikeness. Both the indicatives of Scripture and the imperatives are from God, for our good, and given in grace.

THE MEDICINE FOR OUR MOTIVATION

One of the reasons why I think Christians get tired of hearing about the law is because they never hear why they should obey the law. The imperatives hit us like a ton of study Bibles because we aren’t given any motivation for keeping God’s commands. Everything boils down to, “God said it, so do it.” Or on the opposite end of the spectrum, some Christians make it sound like gratitude is the only legitimate motivation for obedience: “Look at everything Christ has done for you. Now be thankful and let the good works flow.” These are both true motivations for holiness, but they aren’t the only ones.9

Jesus is the Great Physician, and like any good doctor he writes different prescriptions for different illnesses. The gospel is always the remedy for the guilt of sin, but when it comes to overcoming the presence of sin, Jesus has many doses at his disposal. He knows that personalities and sins and situations all vary. So what might be good motivation for holiness in a certain situation with a particular person facing a specific sin may not be the best prescription for someone else in different circumstances. Jesus has many medicines for our motivation. He is not like a high school athletic trainer who tells everyone to “ice it and take a couple ibuprofen.” He’s not some quack doctor who always prescribes bloodletting. “High cholesterol? Here’s a leach. Overactive bladder? I got a leach for that. Gout? A couple leaches will take the edge off.” The good news is that the Bible is a big, diverse, wise book, and in it you can find a variety of prescriptions to encourage obedience to God’s commands.10

Here are just some of the ways in which the Bible motivates us to pursue holiness:

• Duty. “The end of the matter; all has been heard. Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man” (Eccles. 12:13).
• God knows all and sees all. “For God will bring every deed into judgment, with every secret thing, whether good or evil” (Eccles. 12:14).
• It’s right. “Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right” (Eph. 6:1).
• It’s for our good. “Be careful to obey all these words that I command you, that it may go well with you and with your children after you forever, when you do what is good and right in the sight of the LORD your God.” (Deut. 12:28).
• God’s example. “Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you” (Eph. 4:32).
• Christ’s example. “And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God” (Eph. 5:2).
• Assurance. “Therefore, brothers, be all the more diligent to confirm your calling and election, for if you practice these qualities you will never fall” (2 Pet. 1:10).
• Being effective as a Christian. “For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ” (2 Pet. 1:8).
• Jesus’ return. “Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set on fire and dissolved, and the heavenly bodies will melt as they burn!” (2 Pet. 3:11–12).
• The world is not our home. “Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul” (1 Pet. 2:11).
• To win over our neighbors. “Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation” (1 Pet. 2:12).
• To lift up a nation. “Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people” (Prov. 14:34).
• For the public good. “You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored?” (Matt. 5:13a).
• For the sake of our prayers. “Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered” (1 Pet. 3:7).
• The futility of sin. “And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life?” (Matt. 6:27).
• The folly of sin. “And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it” (Matt. 7:26–27).
• The promise of future grace. “But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you” (Matt. 6:33).
• The promise of future judgment. “Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, ‘Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord’” (Rom. 12:19).
• The fear of future judgment. “For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries” (Heb. 10:26–27).
• The surety of our inheritance. “For you had compassion on those in prison, and you joyfully accepted the plundering of your property, since you knew that you yourselves had a better possession and an abiding one” (Heb. 10:34).
• The communion of the saints. “Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us” (Heb. 12:1).
• The good examples of others. “Remember your leaders, those who spoke to you the word of God. Consider the outcome of their way of life, and imitate their faith” (Heb. 13:7).
• The bad examples of others. “Now these things took place as examples for us, that we might not desire evil as they did” (1 Cor. 10:6).
• We were created for good works. “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them” (Eph. 2:10).
• God is the master and we are his servants. “So you also, when you have done all that you were commanded, say, ‘We are unworthy servants; we have only done what was our duty’” (Luke 17:10).
• The fear of the Lord. “Therefore, knowing the fear of the Lord, we persuade others” (2 Cor. 5:11a).
• The love of the Lord. “Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another” (1 John 4:11).
• To make God manifest. “No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us” (1 John 4:12).
• In gratitude for grace. “I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship” (Rom. 12:1).
• For the glory of God. “Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body” (1 Cor. 6:19–20).
• The character of God. “For I am the LORD your God. Consecrate yourselves therefore, and be holy, for I am holy” (Lev. 11:44a).
• The work of God. “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me” (Ex. 20:2–3).
• To please God. “Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have, for such sacrifices are pleasing to God” (Heb. 13:16).
• To avoid the devil’s snares. “Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and give no opportunity to the devil” (Eph. 4:26–27).
• For an eternal reward. “They are to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share, thus storing up treasure for themselves as a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of that which is truly life” (1 Tim. 6:18–19).
• Because Christ has all authority. “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you” (Matt. 28:18b–20a).
• Love for Christ. “If you love me, you will keep my commandments” (John 14:15).
• Fullness of joy. “If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full” (John 15:10–11).
• To experience God’s favor. “A good man obtains favor from the LORD, but a man of evil devices he condemns” (Prov. 12:2).
• Our union with Christ. “For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin” (Rom. 6:5–6).

As exhausting as this list might be, it could easily be doubled or tripled. God doesn’t command obedience “just cuz.” He gives us dozens of specific reasons to be holy. God can prescribe many different medicines for motivation. If you’re struggling with pornography, he might call to mind your identity in Christ or admonish you that the sexually immoral will not inherit the kingdom of God. If you are fighting pride, God might assure you that he gives grace to the humble or remind you that you follow a crucified Messiah. He can highlight your adoption, justification, reconciliation, or union with Christ. God can stir you up to love and good deeds with warnings and promises, with love and fear, with positive or negative examples. He can remind you of who you are, or who you were, or who you are becoming. God can appeal to your good, the good of others, or his own glory. You could probably find a hundred biblical reasons to be holy. And the sooner we explore and apply those reasons, the more equipped we’ll be to fight sin, the more eager to make every effort to be more like Christ, and the more ready to say with the apostle John, “his commandments are not burdensome” (1 John 5:3).

1C. S. Lewis, Reflections on the Psalms (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1958), 62.

2This line comes from my friend and PCA pastor Jason Helopolous.

3See Westminster Confession 19:2–4, which uses the phrase “general equity” to describe what I call “pointing.” Similarly, Calvin says “the whole cultus of the law, taken literally and not as shadows and figures corresponding to the truth, will be utterly ridiculous” (Institutes 2.7.1).

4See Thomas R. Schreiner, 40 Questions about Christians and Biblical Law (Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel, 2010), 99: “Strictly speaking, the idea that believers are under the third use of the law is mistaken, for we have seen that the entire [Mosaic] law is abolished for believers. Still, the notion is not entirely wrong since Paul’s teaching is filled with exhortations that call upon believers to live in a way that pleases God. . . . Even though the Old Testament law is not literally binding upon believers, we see principles and patterns and moral norms that still apply to us today since the Old Testament is the word of God.” See also Douglas J. Moo, The Epistle to the Romans (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1996), 415–416.

5See, for example, Willem VanGemeren’s response to Douglas Moo in Five Views on Law and Gospel (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1999), 378–379.

6Schreiner, 40 Questions, 19–23.

7See John M. Frame, The Doctrine of the Christian Life (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R, 2008), 178. Of course, to understand what the Bible commands for us today we need to pay attention to the flow of redemptive history, cultural context, and the difference between description and prescription.

8Peter Toon, The Emergence of Hyper-Calvinism in English Nonconformity 1689–1765 (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 1967), 54. The line is in reference to Tobias Crisp (1600–1643).

9I’ll say more about this topic in chapter 6, in particular, how God uses the gospel and his promises to empower our pursuit of holiness.

10For example, the Heidelberg Catechism gives four reasons for doing good: to show we are thankful for what God has done, so he may be praised through us, so we may be assured of our faith by its fruits, and so that by our godly living our neighbors may be won over to Christ (Q/A 86). Likewise, John Owen mentions several gospel grounds for our obedience: good works are necessary because God has appointed them; our holiness is one special end of God’s love which is meant to redound to God’s glory; our obedience brings God glory and honor; it brings us honor and peace and makes us useful to God; it benefits the world by convicting sinners, converting others, benefiting society; it testifies that we are justified and is a pledge of our adoption; it is a means of our thankfulness (Communion with the Triune God, ed. Kelly M. Kapic and Justin Taylor [Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2007], 303–309). Francis Turretin lists five “principal motives to sanctification,” all of which can be derived from Christ’s death: the foulness of sin, God’s hatred of sin, the unspeakable love of Christ, the right Christ has over us, and “that being dead to sin we should live unto righteousness” (Institutes of Elenctic Theology, trans. George Musgrave Giger, ed. James T. Dennison, Jr., 3 vols. [Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R, 1994], 2:692).