where we saw this same law given to national Israel on Mount Sinai in the form of the Ten Commandments as a part of the Mosaic Covenant. And then we spent the large portion of our time last week kind of just walking through scripture, looking at each of the Ten Commandments, going backward in redemptive history, seeing those occur before Mount Sinai, and then moving forward in redemptive history and seeing each of those Ten Commandments given as a rule of life for the Christian. And so we talked about last time, kind of the outline of this chapter of the confession was in two big parts. The first one was paragraphs one through five, which was basically the law within that history of redemption. Then the last two paragraphs, paragraph six and seven, and deal with the law in the life of a Christian. And so where we're gonna start off this time is in the middle of that first point on the law and the history of redemption. We're gonna look at paragraph three, which covers, it really explains the ceremonial law that was given as a part of the Mosaic Covenant, which just basically to summarize, it was given so that Israel would understand how God was to be worshiped under that covenant. And then we're gonna look at paragraph four, which gives an explanation of the judicial law or the civil law that was given under the Mosaic Covenant. Basically what we have there is you take this moral law, apply it to a society. So it's case law examples of the fleshing out of this moral law within a particular culture. And then paragraph five is gonna talk about God's moral law being binding on all people of all times, which we kind of got that last week, so we won't spend a lot of time there today. And then we're gonna look at those last two paragraphs dealing with the law and the life of the Christians. Okay, you have all this truth, now how do you actually take it and apply it today? So let's pray and ask for God's help before we jump into paragraph three. Heavenly Father, we come to you in the name of Christ. Lord, we come confessing, Lord, that we, even those of us that have studied this issue, intensely and in-depth, that we don't have every nuance, every fine point worked out, Lord, but that doesn't mean that we can't understand with clarity, Lord, the big broad principles that we have of your law. And Lord, rather than to be discouraged about not understanding all those fine points, Lord, let it be a cause to drive us to further study in those areas, Lord, recognizing that within our culture, within the church now, that this is a much neglected thing, something that's been put aside of how we actually apply your law to all of life. So I pray, Lord, that you would give us grace, that you would correct any misunderstandings that we have, and that you would help us to be a people held captive to the truth of your word, and we're committed to living that out in every sphere of our life. And I pray these things in Christ's name and for his glory, amen. Okay, so paragraph three. So this, really, today what we're gonna see is this redemptive historical look at the threefold division of the law. And so that's what we're gonna follow through in these first three paragraphs. So paragraph three. In addition to this law, so the law spoken of in paragraph two, usually called the moral law, God was pleased to give the people of Israel ceremonial laws containing several typological ordinances. In some ways, these concerned worship by prefiguring Christ, his graces, actions, sufferings, and benefits. In other ways, they revealed various instructions about moral duties. Since all of these ceremonial laws were appointed only until the new order arrived, they are now abolished and taken away by Jesus Christ. As the true Messiah and only lawgiver, he was empowered by the Father to do this. So here we see this paragraph beginning with this distinction between moral and ceremonial law, and then the next paragraph will add that third layer, the judicial law. Before we really flesh out what that means, I think the most important thing is to say, are these biblical categories that we're talking about here? Is this threefold division something that is a biblical paradigm, or is it something that is more of a man-made paradigm? We're gonna demonstrate in a moment, I think, with clarity, this threefold paradigm from scripture. But before we do, I wanna answer kind of another objection that you hear when you start talking about this threefold division of the law. A lot of times what you hear is, well, this was created by the reformers. Basically, no one in the church held this for 1,600 years or so, 1,500 years or so, and then, okay, the reformers basically created this as a part of this man-made system. I want to demonstrate to you not only is this a biblical doctrine, not only is it a reformed doctrine, but it's a historical doctrine as well. And John Calvin said this, he says, We must attend to each of these parts in order to understand how far they do or do not pertain to us. It's a great summary sentence there. But in the first few words, there's something that might be easy to skim over and miss. What does Calvin say? this well-known division. So this was something at the time that wasn't isolated to a few people, wasn't even isolated to Calvin. This is something he can just say, hey, this is the way it is. Everybody knows this about this division of the law. And so at the time of the Reformation, it wasn't something new or novel. This was something that was already well-known at the time. What I want to do is just give two historical examples, and hopefully you can see it here on the screen. It's kind of packed in small to get it all on one slide. If not, you can look at the sermon notes that I sent out on Signal. Basically, the first one I want to give is from Irenaeus. So he lived from approximately 130 to 202 AD. For some historical background, he was a close associate of Polycarp, who was a close associate of the Apostle John. So that starts to show you kind of the early nature of these statements that we're going to see here. And what you'll see is, I would say he posits at least a two-fold division of the law, if not a full three. It's hard to tell from this quote in his writings, well, did he really lump this judicial and ceremonial law into one group? Which you can kind of see, we can see, okay, that is separate and apart from the moral law, right? We have the moral law that's abiding, and these other two are treated differently. So to group them together is not just crazy and outrageous. So here's what he says, he says, For God at the first, indeed, warning them by means of natural precepts, which from the beginning he had implanted in mankind, that is, by means of the Decalogue, which if anyone does not observe, he has no salvation. Preparing man for this life, the Lord himself did speak in his own person to all alike the words of the Decalogue, and therefore in like manner So that kind of affirms what we heard last week, right? This continuity of the law. Here you saw Irenaeus talking about they were worn by natural precepts. then they were given the law and the Ten Commandments. And then this moral law, summarized in the Decalogue, it actually does, it's not abrogated by Christ, but it's actually extended and increased with Christ and the coming of the gospel. And then it continues. The laws of bondage, however, so here we have these laws that can remain forever described in this moral or natural law, and then he contrasts it with the laws of bondage. He says, these laws of bondage, however, were one by one promulgated to the people by Moses, suited for their instruction or for their punishment as Moses himself declared. and the Lord commanded me at that time to teach you statutes and judgments. These things, therefore, which were given for bondage and assigned for them, he canceled by the new covenant of liberty. So you can kind of see they're maybe not fully fleshed out like we have in the confession, but that's the general framework that the confession puts forth, this group of laws that abides forever, abiding on all people of all time, and these other laws that were abrogated with the coming of Christ. And then we go to Augustine in the fifth century. So here we have again, what's at least a twofold division of the law. He says, for example, thou shall not covet is a moral precept. Thou shall circumcise every male on the eighth day is a symbolic precept. So again, we have this moral precept continuing in this symbolic precept of things that don't continue. And so, not necessarily exactly the same as laid out, you know, thousand years later in the confession, but pretty close to the same framework of the law that we have here. And so I don't think even these early church fathers created this distinction in the law. I think what they did was they recognized it in the pages of Scripture. They saw it both in the Old and the New Testaments. And so not only is this a reformed and historical doctrine, this I think is clearly a biblical doctrine. So what we're going to do is we're just going to walk through and look and say, okay, do we actually see such a division in the pages of Scripture? We're going to start within the Old Testament. So this was part of our Scripture reading this morning. Then Yahweh spoke to you out of the midst of the fire. You heard the sounds of words, but saw no form, there was only a voice. And he declared to you his covenant, which he commanded you to perform, that is the Ten Commandments. And he wrote them on two tablets of stone. And Yahweh commanded me at that time to teach you statutes and rules, that you might do them in the land that you are going over to possess. So what do we see there within that text? actually a division within the law, right? We have a division within the Ten Commandments written by the finger of God on stone and the statutes and the rules that they were to do in the land that they were going over to possess. When you actually look at the structure within Exodus, it actually clearly supports this kind of division. What you see is the Ten Commandments is a summary of the moral law given in Exodus 20. Then in Exodus chapters 21 through 23, you have the civil laws. You have things dealing with slavery, restitution, social justice, festivals, and the like. Then you go to Exodus chapter 25 through 40. And you have ceremonial laws, laws dealing with the tabernacle, the priesthood, those kind of things. So even within Exodus, you see this grouping of these different types of law. When you look further at the Old Testament, you clearly see prophets speaking of some kind of division within the law. For example, we see 1 Samuel 6. 1522, and Samuel said, has Yahweh a greater delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the voice of Yahweh? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to listen than the fat of rams. So here we have this distinction within the law. There's these underlying moral principles that to obey those is actually better to obey the positive law commandments that were actually commanded to those people within the old covenant. And that's not an isolated text. Hosea 6.6, for I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings. Then Amos 5.21, I hate, I despise your feasts and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies. So I think within the Old Testament, there's this clear distinction of the law, but I think it's one of those things that once you get this side of redemptive history, the benefit of the cross, the benefit of the New Testament writings, you see it with much greater clarity. As I mentioned earlier, it's not that we see all these things perfectly. There's a lot of things to be wrestled and worked out, but I think we see even on this side of the cross, on this side of redemptive history, even a greater clarity of this division of the law. And something we have to keep in mind is our understanding, this Reformed Baptist understanding of the old covenant is, it's a unit. The Mosaic covenant was a unit. that all passed away. But within that Mosaic Covenant, there are things that abide forever, that moral law. And there's things within there that even though they're not abiding, they give us guidance and principles to be able to pull out of those things, right? So when we go back and look at the Mosaic Covenant, we can say, every one of those laws was binding upon the nation of Israel. There was no distinction for them as far as, well, this one doesn't apply or I have to do it in this way. It was like, no, every one of those things applied to those people who it was given, but we're not Israel. So when we read those things, we have to have the right hermeneutical principles to go, okay, now how do we, the church, take those things given to national ethnic Israel, us as the true spiritual Israel, how do we take and apply those things? So that's kind of the point here that we have to get to. And so when we look in the New Testament, I would say we see three different categories of things based on how the New Testament authors apply them. First would be things that are no longer binding. And then secondly, would be things that are binding in their underlying principle. And then third, things that are still binding. So we have not binding, still binding, and things binding in principle. And again, those are not man-made things. Those are just, hey, we're going to observe how the apostles actually took the Old Testament law and applied it. in the new covenant. So first, those things that are no longer binding, those are the ceremonial laws that we've been talking about. So here's a couple of texts, Colossians 2, verses 16 and 17. Therefore, let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath. These are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ. In Hebrews 10.1, for since the law has but a shadow of the good things to come instead of the true form of these realities, it can never, by the same sacrifices that are continually offered every year, make perfect those who draw near. So here clearly we see the apostolic teaching is there's things that existed under the old covenant that are no longer binding. We can't pass judgment on a brother or sister in relation to these things because they're not, they don't apply to us anymore, right? The festivals and new moons and the Sabbaths. And for those of you that were here, we fleshed that out of what it means about Sabbaths and we'll get there when we get to the Sabbath and the Lord's day. And so these laws that are no longer binding, they're grouped in that category that the confession calls ceremonial laws. That's the traditional reformed way to understand that. And so the confession says these things were typological. They were types, they were shadows that pointed forward to the Messiah to come, they pointed forward to Christ. Confession summarizes in this way, it says, in some ways, these concerned worship by prefiguring Christ, his graces, actions, suffering, and benefits. In other ways, they revealed various instructions about moral duties since all these ceremonial laws were appointed only until the new order arrived. They are now abolished and taken away by Jesus Christ. So we're talking about types, which could be summarized this way. There's significant persons, events, and institutions found in the Old Testament that prophetically anticipate New Testament realities. They prophetically are predicting Christ in the gospel and the coming of the new covenant. And so, let's look at a couple of examples here. First Corinthians chapter five, verse seven. Cleanse out the old leaven that you may be a new lump, as you really are unleavened. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed. In Hebrews 5.5. So also Christ did not exalt himself to be made a high priest, but was appointed by him who said to him, you are my son, today I have begotten you. So when we go back and look at the Old Testament, the Passover land, it was a real thing with real significance to national Israel under the Old Covenant. but that reality paled in comparison to the true Passover lamb that was going to come, that was going to be Christ, right? So you see this connection, but how this is this shadow that fades away once the Messiah comes. In the same way, the high priest under the old covenant, they served a real function to those people at that time, but They passed away because now there is a high priest seated at the right hand of God who's always interceding on behalf of his people. And so he's a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. So we don't need any more priests, contrary to what the Mormons would tell you, right? That, hey, they have the priest, they have the Aaronic and the Melchizedek priesthood. He said, no, all you have to do is go point them to what the Melchizedek priesthood is. And there's one that has it and he has it forever. So we don't need Joseph Smith or anyone else to have that. And so when the fulfillment came in the inauguration of the new covenant, these ceremonial laws were abolished because they found their foundation and their fulfillment in Christ. So when the anti-type comes, the type passes away. And so I hope what you see when we just look at the ceremonial division, it's not some manmade thing. This is just taking, observing what scripture does and trying to systemize and pull out categories from it. So now let's look at this second category, which is binding and its underlying principles. So this is a judicial law, so binding and underlying principle. 1 Timothy 5, verses 17 through 20. Let the elders who rule well be considered worthy of double honor, especially those who labor in preaching and teaching. So, okay, did Paul just come up with that? This New Testament revelation? Let's see Paul's basis. For the scripture says, you shall not muzzle an ox when it treads out the grain, and the laborer deserves his wages. Do not admit a charge against an elder except on the evidence of two or three witnesses. And for those who persist in sin, rebuke them in the presence of all so that the rest may stand in fear. So here within those short four verses, what Paul has done is taken two texts from the Old Testament law and gave application of them to Christians. To Deuteronomy 24 or 25 verse four, you shall not muscle an ox when it's treading out the grain. In Deuteronomy 19, 15, a single witness shall not suffice against a person for any crime or wrong in connection with any offense that he has committed. Only on the evidence of two or three witnesses shall a charge be established. So the confession summarizes it this way in paragraph four. So again, this is an apostolic use of this Old Testament law that's clearly different from the ceremonial law that Paul says it passed away, right? So Paul's taking these Old Testament laws and saying, okay, we're going to take these case laws given to Old Testament Israel, and we're going to apply them to Christians today under the new covenant. So again, you see this is not some man-made creation. This is only saying, let's observe the hermeneutical principles used by the apostles, and let's use those rather than ones that we wanna create. And so again, we see that the apostles clearly treat these judicial laws differently than the ceremonial laws which passed away. Now, we're gonna look again at Deuteronomy chapter four. This is also part of our scripture reading from earlier. Let's ask ourselves the question, so we had these laws given to national ethnic Israel. if the Bible revealed how the other nations at that time were to see that law, the pagan nations, do you think that might be instructive for us on how we today should view that law? Can you see that connection, right? Okay, go back then, pagan nations, God's gonna tell us how they're supposed to look at this law, and I think we can conclude, hey, if the pagan nations at that time should look at God's law that way, that should be how we view God's law as well. So this is Deuteronomy 4 verses 5 through 8. See, I have taught you statutes and rules as Yahweh my God commanded me, that you should do them in the land that you are entering to take possession of. Again, we've heard this distinction earlier on the difference between statutes and rules and the moral commandments, right? So these are specifically these case laws given to Israel. is keep them and do them, for that will be your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the peoples, who when they hear all these statutes will say, surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people. For what great nation is there that has a God so near to it as Yahweh our God is to us whenever we call upon him? And what great nation is there that has statutes and rules so righteous as all this law that I set before you today? Here we have these laws given to Israel, national Israel in the land. And how does God say that the other nations should look and see these? He says, they should say, surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people. So they're gonna look at God's law and say, man, look at those laws. Those are so wise and so understanding. And then we can look at verse eight and we can say, well, how did God view this law? He says, what great nation is there that has statutes and rules so righteous as all this law that I set before you today? And so when we come to these laws under the old covenant, It's amazing for me today to have Christians basically despise these laws and say, well, the laws that our pagan leaders have come up with, they're fine. We don't need to correct them based upon what God's law has actually said. I mean, what does God's law say? He says, What great nation is there that has statutes and rules so righteous as all this law that I set before you today? So we have these righteous case law examples of God's moral law applied to a particular people at a particular time. That's how we need to look at those and go, okay, now we have these, now how do we come over here and see them within our context, within our society? Hebrews 2.2 says this, for since the message declared by angels proved to be reliable, and every transgression or disobedience received a just retribution. So how do we see that? What's the writer of Hebrews saying? That all the legal sanctions under the judicial law in the old covenant, they were just. So we actually have case law example of what it means to apply just laws in our society. But so many in the church today wanna neglect that and be like, well, the best you can use is use natural law to be able to go speak to our legislators or to be able to even comment on what kind of laws we should have within our nation. So my understanding is that what we don't do is we don't take this Old Testament case law, plop it up, come over here, and plop it down in America. There'll be people that disagree with me. There'll be people that say that's exactly what we should do. I don't see the apostles doing that. And I think when you really look at this circumstance, you go, okay, we have case laws given to an agrarian society 2,000 years ago. They give us principles that we then take and can apply not just here within America, but we can go to every nation in the world and apply those things. It's much more universal in its application than just taking this specific setting, coming over here and applying it. And so I think there's going to be certain laws when we look at it, there's going to be this one-to-one comparison that go, Yes, this under the old covenant is pretty much exactly what it should look like under the new. And there's going to be other ones that are more like a two to one or a three to one, like a little bit farther away in their directness. I just want to give you a couple of examples. So Exodus 21 verses 25, 22 through 25. When men strive together and hit a pregnant woman so that her children come out, but there is no harm, the one who hit her shall surely be fined as the woman's husband shall impose on him. And he shall pay as the judges determine. But if there is harm, then you shall pay life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, stripe for stripe. So what's this law saying at its core? It's saying that children in the womb should be treated with equal justice for human beings outside of the womb. That's the point. If the woman's injured, that child is injured in the womb, it's the same standard you pay life for life, strife for strife, wound for wound, in exactly the same way that you do with a born person. And so, let's think about our laws within our state. Do they do that? Absolutely not. Not even, they don't even pretend to. And so, can we say that we have godly laws when it comes to how we treat our pre-born in our state. We would have to say no, because there's not equal justice. There's not equal protection. So at the end of the day, this one verse, the underlying principle here, that's all we're going to in asking for our legislators is apply equal justice to our pre-born neighbors. I mean, in fact, our 14th amendment actually grants that, but more importantly, God's law actually commands that. And so, Let me give you an example where I would say there's not quite this one-to-one comparison. Because I think for that one, you can take that, here's this case law, and it should have the exact same application today. But here's another one, Exodus 22 verse 1. So we can say this, even within this example case law, right? were there only two kinds of animals in Israel? I hope we all would recognize, no, that there's more than just oxen and sheep, right? And so, did restitution apply to those other animals? Yes, but do we have all those numbers of how it would have applied? No, we don't have that. We have this example. And why would it be five to one and four to one? Why wouldn't it just be a one to one? Or even elsewhere where you pay 20% back? Well, I think in this case what it is is you've stolen a productive asset, right? So you've stolen something that's not just valuable on itself, but it actually produces income for the person that has it. Right, so in our context, let's say someone steals Heath's work truck. That's different than if they just steal my car that I don't use to actually produce income, right? Because when they take that from Heath, they're actually robbing him of the production that would come from that. And so I think Christians in societies have to figure out, okay, what would we say that number is, right? Because it also seems like even here, there could be this distinction of, well, maybe the ox and the sheep are different because maybe even one of them was harder to steal than the other. We don't have the background of exactly what was going on there, but we do see those principles, so we can take those and apply them today. And so if someone said, well, when it comes to restitution, we should make it exactly this when it comes to sheep and oxen today. Well, I would press back and say, well, we ought to look at our society and how it would actually impact a person here, because that would potentially be different than it would be 2,000 years ago, 3,000 years ago within an agrarian society like national Israel at that point, right? But I think the underlying principle is, hey, when someone steals something, you don't go throw them into prison for years. What you do is you actually make them make restitution to the person that they stole it from. And then you come up with a just formula for what that restitution looks like, right? And then you actually, if they can't pay it, you actually make them an indentured servant until they can pay it off. And so then instead of basically someone sitting in prison working for the state, they're actually working to benefit the person that they stole it from and becoming reconciled to them as a part of that process. So, um, That's a lot there, but I hope you start to see, okay, when we come to these laws, there's a lot that has to be thought through that as a Christian culture today, honestly, we haven't done a great job in thinking through how to apply those things. So Sam Waldron summarized it this way. He says, though the judicial law has expired, Yet as an inspired application of the moral law to the civil circumstances of Israel, it reveals many timeless principles of general equity, justice, goodness, and righteousness. As such, it remains relevant not only to modern states, but also to modern churches and Christians. And I found it interesting that Dr. Waldron chose to start with modern states and just assumes that, where most Christians that I would talk to today, they would recognize, well, yes, this law applies to churches and Christians, but their difficulty would actually be taking that and applying it to the state, applying it to the civil magistrate, because we've talked about this a lot, right? That, yes, there's a separation between church and state, a right separation within our nation, right? But what we have to understand is that we have the church, we have the state, and we have the family. We have these three jurisdictions, but they're all underneath God who is on top, right? And so our job as the church is to tell the civil magistrate, this is the standard that God has given you to be able to rule over a nation. These are what just laws look like within a society. So within the church, within the family, we're to be calling out to our civil magistrate saying, this is what justice looks like in our land. So that's the first two categories. The third would be that which is ever binding. And so we've talked about this already. This is what's called the moral or the natural law. So here's how the confession summarizes that in paragraph five. The moral law forever requires obedience of everyone. both those who are justified as well as others. This obligation arises not only because of its content, but also because of the authority of God the creator who gave it. Nor does Christ in any way dissolve this obligation in the gospel. Instead, he greatly strengthens it. So again, we've seen this continuity that we looked at last week with the Mosaic Covenant, with pre-Sinai, and then the Ten Commandments given as a rule of life for the believer. So here the confession makes the statement that this law is binding upon unbelievers and believers alike. And so for the believer, it's given as a rule of life. For the unbeliever, they stand under condemnation of that just law. And so we talked about this, that basically the law for the unbeliever. So if you sit here today as an unbeliever, the law is to serve as a mirror to you. You hold it up like this and you go, what do I look like to you, God? And God says, let's see how you line up against this 10 commandments. Have you ever lied? Have you ever stolen? Have you always worshiped me as you should? Have you always not taken my name in vain? Have you ever committed adultery? Have you ever murdered? Have you ever looked with lust, is the way Jesus fleshes it out? Have you ever hated your brother? And so it serves like a mirror and says, each and every one of us, all of humanity is guilty before a righteous and holy God. So we stand condemned before him. So especially young people, if you sit here today, recognize that's where you're at. If you're outside of Christ today, you sit here condemned by a holy God. His law clearly reveals that to you. And what that should do is, it should weigh on you like a ton of bricks. Like we hear in the Pilgrim's Progress, right? Christian has this burden. It should be like this massive burden for you that What it should do is lead you to Christ. You recognize, here's this law that I can never keep that is God's just and righteous standard, but there is one who kept it. The God-man Jesus Christ kept it for me. and calls me to repent, to turn from my sins, and to trust in His finished work, and then I get credit for that perfect obedience. It gets credited to my account. My sin gets credited to Christ's account so that I am made totally and completely righteous before a thrice holy God and can be reconciled to Him for all eternity. And so, that the primary purpose of the law that we see in scripture is to reveal sin to us, to point us to Christ. But then once we get to Christ, it's not like we go, oh, the law is gone, right? The law then shows us, oh, here's what it looks like to live like Christ. And it's really simple. A lot of people try to pit Christ against the law in this way, but we just have to ask, did Christ obey the law perfectly? We have to say yes. And so if we're trying to live like Christ, then shouldn't we be seeking to obey the law perfectly? I mean, not to be justified, right? And Christ didn't do it to be justified either. But it's silly to pit those two things as if they're somehow against one another. So that's gonna lead us into paragraph six and the role that the law plays in the life of a Christian. As true believers are not under the law as a covenant of works to be justified or condemned by it, yet it is very useful to them and to others as a rule of life that informs them of the will of God and their duty. It directs and obligates them to live according to its precepts. It also exposes the sinful corruptions of their nature's hearts and lives. As they examine themselves in light of the law, they come to further conviction of humiliation for and hatred of sin. along with a clear view of their need for Christ and the perfection of his obedience. The law is also useful to the regenerate, to restrain their corruptions because it forbids sin. The punishment threatened by the law shows them what even their sins deserve and what troubles they may expect in this life due to their sin. And so this paragraph makes it crystal clear that we're not under the moral law as a covenant of works. We're saved by Christ, but we're under the law as a rule of obedience. It's what it means to love him. We already have Christ's perfect obedience imputed to us. This is why on the cross, he could say, it is finished. And so it's in this, case that Paul can say in Romans 6.14, for sin will have no dominion over you since you are not under the law but under grace. That's one of those that's greatly misunderstood by people. What they want to do is, well, you're not under the law, so basically you become an antinomian where you don't have to obey what God's law has said. We're not under the law to be accepted for God, but there's a true sense that we are under the law as a standard. It's what it means to actually be Christ-like. So that's why Paul can also say in Romans 3.31, do we then overthrow the law by faith? By no means. On the contrary, we uphold the law. So there you can see this dichotomy. You have to look and see, what is Paul saying there? What is he trying to communicate when he's talking about the law? And this makes sense to us, right? When you go back and look, what are some of the truths of the new covenant, right? In the new covenant, we're given the gift of faith. When we go back and look at Jeremiah 31, And one of the things that we also see is that in the new covenant, God's law is written upon our hearts. Jeremiah 31, 33, for this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days declares Yahweh. I will put my law within them and I will write it on their hearts and I will be their God and they shall be my people. And you go back and look at the context. I don't think there could be any question which law Jeremiah is talking about. He's talking about the same law that God wrote with his finger on those tablets of stone is now written on the tablets of the human heart. And so, Now, we actually love, we want to obey God's law. That's what it means to have it written upon our hearts, that it's a delight for us to obey. That's why Jesus can say in John 14, 15, if you love me, you will what? You will keep my commandments. So again, there's not some, love and keeping of the commandments are not doing this. They go hand in hand together. Yes, if you love Jesus, it's because you've been born again. And a part of that new birth is you've had that law written upon your heart and you've been indwelled with the Spirit. And what does the Spirit want you to do? The Spirit wants you to walk in obedience to what God has commanded. And so that's how you know that you love Jesus, that you desire, and now you've been enabled to actually walk in obedience to what God has commanded. Thomas Adams summarized it this way, he says, the law, though it has no power to condemn us, has the power to command us. So therefore us in Christ, not condemned, but still commanded. Then Will Metzger says, the law sends us to the gospel so that we may be justified. So we've already seen that, right? The law is this mirror that tells us, you can't do this on your own. You need to go over here to the gospel to be justified. And he continues, the gospel sends us to the law to find out what our duty is now that we are justified. It's not that, you know, boom, zap. We know how to flesh out the obedience of God's law in every area of our life once we're saved. We have this desire, but this is why he gave us his word that we can go, let's look at all these examples that we have of what it means to actually live out the Christian life in all of our life. The confession gives numerous purposes of God's law for the Christian. I'm just going to just kind of machine gun these for us. It says, first of all, it informs us of the will of God and our duty. So it tells us how we're to love God. It tells us how we're to love our neighbor. Next, it exposes the sinful corruptions of our nature's hearts and lives. As Hebrews 4.12 says, for the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing through the division of soul and spirit, of joints and marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. Even in Christ, we don't always think rightly. Often we don't think rightly. So we go right here to have the law word pierce us and say, no, this is where you're erring. You need to, by God's grace, get back on this path. Next, it provides us with a clearer view of our need for Christ and the perfection of his obedience. So what happens is we get saved. We're growing in Christ's likeness. What can happen is if we start comparing ourselves with who we used to be, I mean, should we expect to see growth? Absolutely. we start comparing ourself with this person back here, or maybe our neighbor, what can happen? We can get proud, and we can get puffed up, man, look how well I'm doing in this, right? But not to discourage us, but just to frame it rightly. When we go to his word, we see, man, we're not doing near as well as what we thought we should do, and what's that supposed to do? It's supposed to point us back to Christ, and the gospel, and his enabling of our obedience. Next, it restrains our corruption because it forbids sin. So what the Confession is saying is that we get to see what Scripture says about the earthly consequences of our sin, and then hopefully that helps persuade us, no, don't go down this path, right, like when we see For example, Proverbs 7, going down the path of the forbidden woman. Where does this end? It ends in destruction. We need to understand that. Men, when you turn on your computer and you start down that path, you need to know where that path is going. It's the grace of God to remind us, to tell us. Next, it shows us God's approval of obedience and blessing we may expect when we keep it. Again, it's not as a covenant of works. It's not that you do this and God gives you this. What God's word tells us is these general principles of obedience for blessing him. I think we can all recognize that we've seen people walking in disobedience to God. And often it doesn't go well for them. It doesn't mean that there are not billionaires out there who are God haters, right? We're talking about generalities here. I mean, generally speaking, man, people that are disobedient to God, things just go horribly for them. And even when you look at those billionaires, what do you find? I don't know, I can't think of any off the top of my head that are actually still married. You know, like you look at all those things, yes, they have a lot of money, but in many ways their lives are a wreck. So you can think of it in this way, that the law is not a ladder for us to climb. What it is, is it provides tracks for us. God says, here is this path that will go well for you. My son, my daughter, walk on this path. Let it go well with you. And then it says, when you start talking about God's law in this way, that's about the first thing you hear is, man, you guys are just legalists. you know, talking about these things. And you can be patient and correct that, right? No, if what you mean by a legalist is that you think we're saved by this, then you're talking nonsense. That's not clearly what we mean. But does that mean that God actually has given us a law that we're to keep, and it's not arbitrary and up to us? And most Christians are going to agree with that. They're just not gonna have a framework to be able to tell you, right? If you said, well, is it wrong for a Christian to murder? Oh yeah, that's wrong. they're gonna have a list of things that they just know, but it's not gonna be because they're careful exegetes of God's word, it's just gonna be, well, this is what I've grown up knowing, this is what I've heard within the church. And so, now we come to the last paragraph, paragraph seven. This gives us just a wonderful summary of God's law and its relation to the Christian. It says, These uses of the law are not contrary to the grace of the gospel, but are in sweet harmony with it, for the Spirit of Christ subdues and enables the human will to do freely and cheerfully what the will of God, as revealed in the law, requires. Sam Waldron says this in this paragraph, he says, the final comment of the confession on the inherent obligation of the law of God is that the law and the gospel do not conflict. Rather, the grace of the gospel and the spirit of Christ enable us to do freely and cheerfully what God has revealed in the law. How could the law and the gospel conflict? The very purpose of the gospel is to deliver men from lawlessness and cause them to obey the law of God. So I began last week with this quote from John Piper. In summary it says, My heart's desire is that we've gone through last week and this week is we've fleshed out in greater detail what God's law says, this framework for actually being able to come to the scriptures and determine, okay, how do I take these things and apply them in my life, in my family, in the church, and in society? I hope that we have a greater understanding for that. I hope it gives us a greater love for that. And I hope it doesn't end just with head knowledge in these things. I hope that it really drives us to go, man, I want to be a more Christ-like people. And it's not some generic feeling thing. It's not just putting my little WWJD bracelet on, but it's going, okay, this, this is where I find out. What would Jesus do? Because I can look at what he did, not just in the New Testament, but I can look back at this word that he gave in the Old. It's not some kind of separate dichotomy, right? That's what people in our society think, oh, God of the Old Testament, wicked bad God, right? God of the New Testament, good, Jesus. Well, no, what we have is the same triune God that we have in the New is the same one that we have in the Old, the same one that gave this Mosaic law that we've been talking about today. I hope that that was helpful for you. Let me pray for us, and then we'll have the privilege of celebrating the Lord's Supper. Father, I do come in the name of Christ. Lord, I pray that today my words were clear. Lord, I pray that they would lead to each one of us having a greater understanding, a greater love for your law word. And Lord, I pray that you would give us wisdom as we seek, Lord, to work these things out. within each of those spheres of our lives. It would help us to be a humble people, but a people firmly committed to your law. And I pray these things in Christ's name and for his glory, amen.