Use the Law Properly (1 Timothy 1:8-11)

Well, good morning, everyone.

Good to see you today.

We're glad you're here.

Glad you made it here on the highways this morning.

Thankful that the Lord has brought you here.

And we're going to continue on our study of 1 Timothy this morning.

And this morning we're going to see house rule number two, use the law properly.

There's an outline for you.

If you don't have one, maybe raise your hand and it can find its way to you or you can find it.

There's some back here on the countertop back here.

We need one back here.

If anybody wants to grab one or two and send them out.

You'll see there's some blanks to fill in this morning.

I'm going to put you to work a little bit this morning.

You thought this was going to be a day of rest.

The Christian Sabbath.

There's no Christian Sabbath.

It's 2 ,000 years ago.

This would have been the first day of your work week, okay?

And yesterday was the Jewish Sabbath, you know, when you were out skiing or snowing, playing in the snow.

So put you to work a little bit this morning, filling in some blanks.

This morning, again, we're going to return to our study through 1 Timothy, house rules for God's church.

Last Sunday we saw rule number one, very important foundationally in the church, no false doctrine.

Christ is the Lord of the church.

He is the head of his body, the church, and he mediates that lordship

through his word by the power of his spirit.

That's how he brings people into the church through the gospel.

That is also how he builds the church up and matures it through his word.

And as we saw last time, false teachers displace the word of God with their own

fleshly teachings.

The apostle Paul was warning Timothy and charging him that he had to confront false teachers in his

work at Ephesus, and that is where we left off last time.

False teachers had come into that church just as Paul had prophesied, really, back in five years

before with the Ephesian elders.

We saw that in Acts chapter 20, that's recorded, that they're going to come in from the outside and persecute the church, but they're

also from among your own selves, he said.

There will come in false teachers.

So we saw that principle that the church is persecuted from the outside, but it is perverted from the

inside.

So we saw last time, too, that these men, these false teachers, he said,

they are desiring to be teachers of the law without understanding either what they are

saying or the things about which they make confident assertions, and we noted that that's a bad combination.

Not knowing what you're talking about, at the same time making confident assertions.

And not knowing you don't know.

Yeah, that's kind of the first step, right, to knowing that.

But this is how Paul describes them, and they were a danger to the church, and that was one thing Timothy was going to have to

confront as he stayed in Ephesus, as Paul went on to northern Greece

or Macedonia, as he said.

And so he charged him with what he had to do, and he delegated his apostolic

authority to him, and the way these people in these churches were using the

law was not proper, it was not lawful, as we're going to see.

And so this morning we're going to see house rule number two, use the law properly, or as

Paul says, legally.

So before we open our study this morning, let's commit our time to our Lord and ask His blessing.

Our Father, we thank You for Your great grace in our life.

We know that it is because of that grace that we are even able to gather here today.

We know that You gave us that grace in Jesus Christ, and it is through

Him that we can know You.

And so we just praise You for that, and we know that it is by Your same grace that You have brought us here together this morning.

Pray that You would be our teacher, that by Your spirit You would minister Your word to every heart here, that You would

accomplish every purpose that You have, and then we will praise You in His name, Amen.

Well verses 8 through 11 is our passage for this morning as we look at

the proper use.

Of the law.

And it's only natural that after describing these false teachers who were using the law improperly, that Paul would just

take a little time and discuss something about the proper use of the law.

He says in verse 8 through 11, and I'm just going to read through all these verses, it's one sentence in the original Greek

and it's also in many of the translations a single sentence, so I'm just going to read right through it for our reference.

Paul says, now we know that the law is good if one uses it lawfully,

understanding this, that the law is not laid down for the just, but for the lawless and

disobedient, for the ungodly and sinners, for the unholy and profane,

for those who strike their fathers and mothers, for murderers, the sexually immoral,

men who practice homosexuality, enslavers, liars, perjurers,

and whatever else is contrary to sound doctrine, in accordance with the gospel of the glory of the

blessed God with which I have been entrusted.

Well, the first thing we're going to see, and it's there in your outline, the law is good, the law is

good if it is used lawfully.

The Apostle Paul really is probably anticipating people that say, well, you're going to criticize.

The law, Paul?

What do you think?

You think the law is not something good?

And so he has to very carefully deflect that criticism and

say, no, the law is good.

And it's good if you use it lawfully, and it's also good intrinsically

and inherently.

He has to acknowledge that the law is good.

He needs Timothy to know and his readers to know, because remember, this letter is going to be read to the churches, that he

did not have a low view of God's law.

He's going to lift it up to its proper place, but he's also needing to show its proper usage within the

church.

Paul's condemnation was not for the law itself, but for those who wanted to elevate

themselves to be teachers of the law, while at the same time using it for the wrong

purpose.

It all depends on how a person uses the law, Paul says.

That little sentence in many translations in English begins with the word now, which is certainly

within the range of meaning of that word, but it also can be translated but, and the word but

has a little stronger contrasty force to it, and I think that's what he's doing.

In contrast to these false teachers, we need to understand the proper use of the law.

And he says, we know.

So certainly Timothy would have been his protege, his student, he had been with him on other ministry

situations, and he would have been well acquainted with Paul's understanding.

Of the law.

And remember that Ephesus is Gentile country, Ephesus is Gentile country, and

probably the bulk of the people there did not have that Old Testament background and grounding that you

would have in a people of a Jewish background, Jewish converse to Christianity.

So they would have been very vulnerable to a misunderstanding or a misteaching or being misled as to

the purpose of the law.

And so his point here is that he's going to straighten that out, and the first thing he says is, even though I'm going to criticize the bad use

of the law, the law intrinsically is good.

He uses a word here that could also be translated useful, useful.

It's a word that means good, excellent in its nature and characteristics, and

therefore it is well adapted to its ends, to what its purpose is.

In other words, it's not just beautiful from the outside, it is functionally good, functionally beautiful as well.

The law is inherently good because God had given it.

It's a reflection of his holy character and nature.

The law is revelation from God, and it's also revelation of God.

You want to know what God is like?

Look at his law.

That's his standard.

That's his holy standard.

If you want to know what a government is like, if you want to know what a nation is like morally, look

at the laws, right?

And certainly you have noticed, even in our own nation, laws that flex and change and year by

year, decade by decade change, may or may not reflect God's standards.

I mean, they used to make laws that protected you from perversion, and then they began to make

laws that protected the perversion.

And then they began to make laws that just didn't protect the perversion, they made laws that promoted the perversion.

And now they're making laws that don't just protect and promote the perversion, they're making laws that impose

the perversion.

But that's human law.

God's law, God's word, does not flex or change because he

doesn't flex or change.

It's a revelation of his character.

It's very well represented in the Old Testament.

Listen to Psalm 19.

In Psalm 19, you're going to hear how the psalmist looks at

the law of God, and he uses all these different terms, law, testimony, precepts, and so on.

But it's not, it's what it looks like from the outside, but also what it does.

And both those things are in view here.

He says, and this is just Psalm 19, 7 through 11, the law of the Lord is

perfect, reviving the soul.

The testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple.

The precepts of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart.

The commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes.

The fear of the Lord is clean, enduring forever.

The rules of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.

More to be desired are they than gold, even much fine gold, sweeter also

than honey and drippings of the honeycomb.

Moreover, by them your servant is warned, in keeping them there is great reward.

So the goodness of the law is both in what it is intrinsically, inherently, it's

beautiful, it's good and so on, it's holy, but it also functionally is good as well.

Paul understood the inherent goodness of the law in Romans 7, 12, and we're

going to be looking at Romans here in just a minute.

So the law is holy and the commandment is holy and righteous and good.

These false teachers are trying to use the law as a means of salvation through their

own works.

This issue of the law is a massive topic in the Bible as you know.

All the way through scripture, the issue of the law, the gospel, even into the New

Testament.

What you have to remember is when you go from the New Testament back to Psalms, you're

transitioning somewhere around a thousand years.

We can flip around in our Bibles real quickly, but you've got to remember that there's about a thousand years between

David's view of the law in Psalm 19 and what these people had done in the first century.

They had built this massive structure, this religious system

to supposedly hedge the law, protect the law, and Jesus comes along

and says, you've brought in the traditions of men and

you're not teaching God's law.

They had built this system to supposedly protect the law.

Really what they were doing, they were making it easier for them to say that we obey the law and are therefore justified.

Then they would impose that on people, this giant burden, and the Lord just rebuked them.

You're imposing that on people and you're not even able to keep it yourselves.

So this issue of the law is a big issue in scripture and it's been a big issue in church history as well all

the way through.

Is the church under the law?

Those kinds of questions.

Now, we could take several weeks and maybe do a fully orbed, systematic theological study of the

law and its relationship to grace or the relationship to the gospel, but we're not going to do that

because you didn't bring your lunch and Jim has to preach later on.

That would be a massive study.

What we're going to do, we're going to be a little more contained and just look at kind of a brief survey of the purpose of the law.

Why did God give the law?

And so that way we can sort of stay in the context of 1 Timothy and how Paul is using it in

this study in 1 Timothy.

So first thing he says, the law is good if it is used lawfully.

Now that's kind of Paul's way.

He's not questioning as to whether or not it is good.

That conditional sentence is a type of condition that actually says it can go either way.

Depends on how you use it.

It's inherently good, but it must be used lawfully.

The second thing he says is the law was not given for the just or righteous.

He says there, understanding this in verse 9, that the law is not laid down for the

just.

Okay, what does he mean by that?

Not laid down for the just, well, or the righteous.

Now there may be a little bit of sarcasm here because we also know that there's no such thing as a righteous man, right?

Everybody is unjust by nature.

Those that think they are just cannot be saved until they acknowledge the fact that they are

not righteous before God.

Jesus himself told the Pharisees and the scribes in Luke 5 31, he said, those who are well have no

need of a physician, but those who are sick, I have not come to call the righteous but

sinners to repentance.

Now who's he talking to?

He's talking to sinners.

And so there is some, a little bit of maybe sarcasm there in this type of approach.

But basically this is what Paul is saying.

It's not given for the just.

The law was given and we're going to see from the second part of 9 through 10, the law

was given to restrain sin, to restrain sin.

Who are the unjust?

Well, Paul in 9b through 10, he really is echoing the 10

commandments there.

This would have been a real obvious reference to the 10 commandments

and both of the tables of the law, the first table commandments dealing with the relationship

to God and the second table with people.

And so he says here, and notice what he says, he uses this terminology, these adjectives.

Each one of them is a descriptive term and then it tells you something about what it results in.

He says, the law is not laid down for the just, but for the lawless and

disobedient.

Again, echoing the 10 commandments.

For the lawless and disobedient, now the people who are lawless means they have no law, they don't care about the law,

they have no standards.

And that produces disobedience or rebellion against God.

And then he says it's for the ungodly and sinners.

These are people that have no regard for anything sacred, no regard for anything holy.

Everything is profane or natural or earthy.

Of course, that results in sin or them being sinners.

They have no regard for anything holy because they have no regard for God.

And then he says for the unholy and profane, very much the same thing.

They're indifferent to anything that is right.

There's no such thing as right or wrong or they take it upon themselves to determine what is right or wrong.

And that produces profane behavior.

They basically stomp on and destroy anything that is from God.

These things relate to their relationship to God as the first table of the law does.

Now in the second set of sins, it corresponds with the second table of the law, those dealing with our relationships to

other people.

He says for those who strike their fathers and mothers,

fifth commandment, honor your fathers and mothers.

That certainly is a violation of that.

He then says for murderers, sixth commandment, do no murder.

The sexually immoral, he says, this is a violation of the seventh commandment, the prohibition

against adultery or sexual activity outside of marriage.

Paul actually uses the Greek noun pornos.

Guess which word we get from that?

Absolutely transliterated right into our language.

Any type of sexual sin, men play all kinds of word games and they can

call it whatever they want.

They can describe it however they want.

Paul through the spirit of God calls it pornos.

That's where we get that word.

Sexual activity outside of God's marriage.

You know, in Genesis, God defined male, he defined female, and he

created marriage and defines marriage.

And he defined the intimate relationship between a man and a woman within marriage.

And he confined that to marriage.

That created freedom in many other areas of life.

What do you see nowadays?

The exact opposite.

No rules for sexual activity.

We don't want to be confined in that area.

We want to be able to define it however we want, people say.

There's no rules, no limitations on anything.

And they want to restrict and confine behavior in a whole lot of other areas, do they not?

Absolutely have taken God's created order and turned it upside down.

Well, he goes on and he says, men who practice homosexuality, this also would have been a

violation, is a violation of the seventh commandment.

Enslavers, people who enslave other people, steal other people in order to slave them, that's a violation of the eighth

commandment, thou shalt not steal.

Violation of the ninth commandment, liars, perjurers, don't bear false witness against your

neighbor or anybody else, don't lie.

And then, in case somebody is listening and they're sort of ticking things off and they say, okay, that's

not me, that's, no, no, that's not me, that's not me.

Paul just casts a really big net and he just encompasses everybody and wraps them up in this net when he

says, and whatever else is contrary to sound doctrine.

So if you think you escaped Paul's little list here, you didn't, none of us do.

It's a very wide net he casts.

So people have also noted, students have noticed that the tenth commandment against coveting is not

mentioned here, or something that doesn't fit that category.

Well, certainly whatever else is contrary to sound doctrine encompasses coveting.

And if you want to know something about Paul's view of coveting, go to the end of 1 Timothy, read chapter

6, verses 9 and 10, and Paul is exhorting people with wealth in the church in that

area.

So he definitely understands coveting, he understands that it's part of the picture, but he just wraps it all up in one big

package by saying, anything else contrary to sound doctrine.

This word sound is used repeatedly by Paul in all three of these pastoral letters.

It's a word that's, that from the Greek word is, hougaino, okay?

Now I try to not get down too much into

the Greeky, squeaky, geeky kind of stuff here, but this is a word that you would recognize.

We have it in our language, hougaino, and the word hygiene, we get that from this, hygiene.

And you also have to be careful that you don't take a contemporary meaning and sort of try to read it back into, you have to

understand the word as it's being used.

But it's very easy to see this word is being used by Paul in the same way that we would use it.

It's used elsewhere in the New Testament to speak of physical health, but here and elsewhere it describes the word of God, that

which is healthy, that which is not contaminated from something else, that which is purely the word of God.

This was a huge issue, as you know, back in the Reformation.

Catholic Church would say, sure, salvation's by grace, sure, salvation by faith, sure, Christ,

sure, the word of God in Scripture.

Except the Reformers said, wait a minute, only, only faith, only

Scripture, Scripture alone, Christ alone, faith alone, grace alone, and that

created the dividing point.

It's easy to pile on all kinds of things to what Scripture teaches and say,

well, sure, we teach and preach the word of God, but do you teach it uncontaminated?

That's the key.

And as you know, Paul was a very gentle person, and even to the Galatian Christians, he talks

about how gentle he was when he was with them, like a nursing mother.

But you also know that Paul, when it came to defending the gospel, the purity of the gospel, he was about as gentle as a sledgehammer.

And he did the same thing to the, to the Galatian Christians.

He really castigated them for allowing the gospel to be contaminated.

So he says, whatever else is contrary to sound doctrine.

Every New Testament church, if it's worthy of the definition, must have

sound doctrine or its people will not be spiritually sound or healthy.

It's just axiomatic.

It's fundamental.

Well, the law was given then to restrain sin, all these

sins.

It was also given to reveal the holiness of God.

And again, we're not going to be doing a fully orbed systematic theology of the law, but just enough for us to see

how Paul is referring to this here and what he means by this.

In Leviticus chapter 20, verses 7 and 8, God says to the Israelites, consecrate

yourselves therefore and be holy for I am the Lord.

It's actually the word Yahweh.

I am Yahweh, your God.

Keep my statutes and do them.

I am Yahweh who sanctifies you.

So you can see the sanctifying or restraining purpose of the law.

It reveals the holiness of God.

He wants his people to be holy.

And then it's also given to generate an awareness of our sins.

And we're going to just survey just a little bit of what Paul taught in Romans.

Romans, of course, is Paul's great theological treatise on justification by faith alone.

And so that would be the go -to place.

But we want to just sort of just do a brief survey here to generate an awareness of our sin.

In chapter 3, verses 19 and 20, Paul says, now we know that whatever the

law says, it speaks to those who are under the law so that every mouth may be

stopped and the whole world may be held accountable to God.

For by the works of the law, no human being will be justified in his sight since through the law

comes knowledge of sin.

Very important concept there.

Through the law comes knowledge of sin.

God gave his law to generate an awareness of our sin and also to produce a sense of.

Guilt.

The whole world wants to have emotional freedom, wants to feel emotionally good.

In the church, God wants to produce guilt, okay?

He wants to infect us with the bad news of our guilt before the good news of his

grace is going to have any meaning at all.

And so that's one of the purposes of the law, generate an awareness of our sin, produce a sense of guilt.

It's also given to stir up more sin within us.

This is Romans chapter 5.

And I encourage you to go back through these passages and look at all these verses in their context, be a Berean,

and you will see what Paul is arguing here, to stir up more sin within us.

In chapter 5, Paul says in verse 20,.

Now the law came in to increase the trespass.

But where sin increased, grace abounded all the more.

So that as sin reigned in death, grace also might reign through righteousness, leading to eternal life through

Jesus Christ our Lord.

The law came in to increase trespass.

That seems a little bit counterintuitive.

Wait a minute.

You mean God gave the law to stir up more sin within us?

Yes, exactly right.

That's what he did and that's what it's supposed to have, but for a really good purpose.

And interesting there in that verse, the law came in.

Paul uses a word there that means to come in alongside, to come in alongside.

Alongside of what?

The Abrahamic covenant had already been given.

The Abrahamic covenant is the great covenant in scripture that was given to Abraham

and it was given four centuries plus before the law was given.

So the law came in to accommodate the Abrahamic covenant in the sense

that the Abrahamic covenant didn't deal with men's sins.

It's the promises of God through the Messiah who would come through the seed of David.

But the law had to come in to accomplish these things and to convict people of their sin, to stir up guilt and

to stir up more sin within us.

So that's what he means by came in, came alongside to increase the trespass.

Well, it also came in to show us the source of sin, produce guilt, stir up

more sin within us to show us that the source of sin is within us.

Again, this is Romans chapter seven.

If you look at, oh, let's start with verse seven.

What shall we then say, Paul says?

That the law is sin?

By no means.

If it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin.

For I would not have known what it is to covet.

See, Paul's very well aware of covetousness in scripture.

Here it is right here.

If the law had not said, you shall not covet.

But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all

kinds of covetousness.

For apart from the law, sin lies dead.

I was once alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin came alive and I died.

The very commandment that promised life proved to be death to me.

For sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it killed.

Me.

So not only does it produce a sense of our guilt, does it stir up more sin within us, it shows us that the source of

sin is within us and, gee, that sin produces our death.

The wages of sin is death.

And H, and to show us the sinfulness of sin.

Paul here is, and you should work through this yourself, it's an amazing thing.

It's almost, again, it's counterintuitive.

Wait a minute, the law stirs up more sin?

Yes it does.

That's why it's so absurd that somebody could think they could be saved by the law.

All that does is stir up more sin in you and show you that you cannot be saved by keeping.

The law.

He says in verse 14, we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of flesh.

The responsibility always, it's not the law that can't save, that's inadequate in some way, it's the sin

that lies within each one of us.

So the law was given to restrain sin, to reveal the holiness of God, to generate an awareness of

our sin, to produce a sense of our guilt, to stir up more sin within us, to show us that the source of

sin is within us, and that sin kills us, and to show us the sinfulness of sin.

And another thing Paul says in Galatians 3, to be our temporary guardian,

to be our temporary guardian.

This is a very important concept.

It shows you not only what the law, one thing the law was intended to do, but also the temporary nature of it.

In Galatians chapter 3, starting in verse 19, Paul says, why

then the law?

Why'd the law come?

It was added because of transgressions, again it was added to complement the

Abrahamic covenant, but it was added temporarily.

Why then the law?

It was added because of transgressions until the offspring should come to whom the promise had been

made.

And it was put in place through angels by an intermediary, speaking of Sinai and the days after that when the

law came to the people.

When you see that word until in scripture, that tells you there's an end point to something.

It came in until.

Very important little exegetical clue there in the context, speaking of the

law.

And it says, is the law then contrary to the promises of God, the promises of the covenant?

Certainly not.

For if a law had been given that could give life, then righteousness would indeed

be by.

The law.

It's part of his whole argument.

But scripture imprisoned everything under sin so that the promise by faith in

Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe.

Now before faith came, we were held captive under the law, imprisoned until the coming faith would be

revealed.

So then the law was our guardian until Christ came in order that we might be justified by

faith.

This word guardian here, the purpose of the law, is a word that's very

interesting.

And Paul here, he's relying on the people reading this to understand the cultural background of

this word.

In the ancient Greco -Roman world, the Romans, who admired the Greek culture very much, often had

Roman or Greek slaves in their household.

And they would appoint one of their Greek slaves to be a guardian

over some of their young boys.

A dictionary of Greek and Roman antiquities describes it like this.

The word, the Greek word is pedagogos, okay?

And it says the office of tutor, they call it.

It really wasn't quite a teacher but more of a guardian.

It says this man, this slave in the family was assigned to, or the children

were assigned to one of the most trustworthy of the slaves.

This is the pedagogos slave.

The sons of the master were committed to his care on attaining their sixth or seventh year.

Their previous education would have been conducted by females.

They remained with the tutor until they attained the age of puberty.

His duty was rather to guard them from evil, both physical and moral.

He went with them to and from the school or the gymnasium.

He accompanied them out of doors on all occasions.

He was responsible for their personal safety and for their avoidance of bad company.

They had teachers who taught them various skills in music, mathematics, and so on.

But this guardian was more somebody who was to keep care of them, to guard them, keep them away from evil,

and to protect them.

He even carried their books, their instruments, whatever they needed to study with the other teachers who taught

them.

Paul says the law was like this.

And it was there to keep us under guardianship temporarily

until we came to faith, to lead us to faith in Christ.

That's J.

To be a temporary guardian and to lead us to faith in Christ.

So before a person trusts Christ through faith, they are under the law.

The passage says imprisoned, held captive.

So the Christian, Paul elsewhere, and again in Romans chapter 6, he tells us you

are not under law but under grace.

And the reason he gives that is developed in chapter 7, again in Romans.

You have died to the law.

He sort of circles back up to what he said in chapter 6.

If you're baptized into Christ, you're baptized into his death.

You're united in his death through spirit baptism.

You've died to the law, therefore you're not under the law.

Somebody that's dead is out from under law.

And he uses that illustration of marriage to show that.

So the law has those purposes.

It has a restraining use, it has a condemning use, and it has a sanctifying use.

We are not sanctified by keeping the law, but the sanctifying purpose of the law in the big picture

is to move us to faith in Jesus Christ.

Because he'll do what the law cannot do, and that is save us from our sins.

Number four in your outline there, Roman numeral 4, the law can't do what the gospel can do.

All of that law breaking, all of the sin described here, all of the sin, it's like a deadly

disease that infects the body and it metastasizes, it spreads throughout every organ, every cell,

every non -physical aspect of our person, our heart, our mind, all

of our thought processes are infected by sin and eaten up and killed.

Sin is a deadly disease.

And I always get a kick out of people that think they have free will.

Their will, is your will somehow separated from your heart?

Remember what Jeremiah said about the heart of man?

Desperately wicked and deceitful.

Our immaterial being is absolutely contaminated with sin.

If it's your heart, your mind, your thought processes, all of it, you can't disconnect the will of man, what does

it do?

Orbit around you like some kind of a planet, an orb, disconnected and absolutely pure from the rest of your

immaterial being?

No, the will is just as contaminated by sin as every other aspect of our being.

That's just the way it is.

That's what scripture teaches.

And the law can't save you from that, only Christ.

Paul goes on in 10b and he says,

whatever else is contrary to sound doctrine in accordance with the gospel of the glory of the

blessed God with which I have been entrusted.

The gospel is sound or healthy doctrine.

Romans 1 16, Paul said, I am not ashamed of the gospel for it is the power of God unto salvation.

Okay, 2 Timothy 3 16, he just encompasses all of scripture.

All scripture is God breathed and profitable.

So in those categories, of course, the law is part of God's word.

It has a profit to it, but you can't use it for what it wasn't designed to use, to be used

for.

It cannot save.

But what the gospel does do, the gospel glorifies God in verse 11.

He calls it the gospel of the glory of the blessed God.

It not only glorifies God, it is from God and the gospel also

is our sacred trust.

He ends that passage by saying, the glory of the blessed God, the gospel of the glory of the

blessed God with which I have been entrusted.

Paul understood the word of God and the gospel is a sacred trust.

He understood it.

He wants to pass that on to Timothy.

And of course, it needs to be passed on to us as well.

The church is one generation, they say, away from extinction.

We have the baton, we have the gospel, and we need to pass it on to

others.

So the law is good if it is used lawfully.

The law was not given for the just, but for the unjust to restrain sin, to reveal the

holiness of God, to generate our awareness of our sin, to produce a sense of our guilt, to stir up more sin

within us, drive us to the cross, to show us that the source of sin is within us and

that sin kills, to show the sinfulness of sin, to be our temporary guardian, to

lead us to faith in Jesus Christ.

The law cannot save.

It cannot.

Only the gospel of Jesus Christ can.

Now, if we could hold questions maybe for next time, I wanted to

present an illustration of the proper use of the law.

Now, Peter Hammond has agreed to come and do that because he's teaching a

class in evangelism, Way of the Master.

And he's going to talk about the proper use of the law, how it's done.

And he wants me to be the unregenerate guinea pig.

So I'll… – Thanks, Jeff.

So we're going to have a conversation as if we just met in some sort of environment, perhaps

out in the real world out there.

And I would want to start the conversation with something, be a good over and over.

Nice to meet you.

My name is Peter.

– Hi, Peter.

Good to meet you.

My name is Jeff. – Jeff.

Nice to meet you, Jeff.

So, wow, snow on the ground already, isn't it?

– Yeah, yeah.

So, Jeff, I'm curious, you know, we've got a few minutes to hang out here.

I'm curious, what do you think happens when we die, Jeff?

– Well, I mean, I, you know, hadn't thought that much about it.

I mean, it's probably, you know, maybe nothing.

Maybe we just slide into oblivion or I don't know, you know.

I mean, it depends on how hard, you know, a person tries or….

– Oh, so kind of like about doing good?

– Well, yeah, yeah.

I mean, you know.

– So would it be okay to ask you, do you consider yourself to be a good person?

– I'm as good as, you know, most, I guess.

– Okay, well, I'm curious, in your lifetime, how many lies do you think you've told, Jeff?

– Whew, before the age of seven?

Probably a lot, yeah.

Probably, oh yeah, I've told a lot.

– So what would you call somebody that's told lies?

– What would I call them?

I'd call them a liar.

– Okay, all right.

So in your lifetime, have you ever stolen anything?

Even if it was small.

Now remember, you did just tell me you were a liar.

So if you could be truthful about this, I'd appreciate it.

– Well, I mean like something like a paper clip out of the office, something like that.

– Regardless of its size, have you ever stolen anything?

– Yeah, sure, I've stolen.

– Okay, so what do you call somebody who steals things?

– I would call them a thief.

– Okay.

– They stole from me.

– Yeah, so….

– That's worse than if they stole from somebody else.

They steal from me, they're a thief.

– So what would that make you then?

– Well, I guess that would kind of put me in the category of being a thief.

– No, it wouldn't.

It would make you a lying thief.

– Ah.

– Yeah, yeah.

Have you ever used God's name as a cuss word?

Ever used His name in vain?

– Yeah.

– Okay, it's called blasphemy, very serious.

– Yeah, but I had a right to.

I mean it was really bad what happened.

– Well, it's very serious.

In the Old Testament, you know they actually used to stone people to death for that.

I'm glad they don't do that anymore because I would have been stoned to death many times over.

And Jeff, I appreciate your honesty right now.

I've got one more question to you.

This is something that really convicted me.

– I guess I'm an honest liar because you just….

– Jesus said that if you….

You know it's said of old, if you commit adultery….

Or if you commit adultery, that even if you look at another person,

you've committed adultery in your heart, lusted after somebody.

Have you ever lusted after somebody else?

– Yeah, but she, you know, I mean, she's walking around with that dress like that.

I mean, what do you expect?

– Okay, we don't need examples.

We don't need examples.

– You know the thing.

– All right, so I just want to do a summary right now.

This is not me judging you, Jeff.

This is you admitting that you're a lying,

thieving, blasphemous, adulterate heart.

And let's say today was the day that you died and you stood before God and he opened up the books in your whole life.

Everything you've ever said, everything you've ever done, everything you've ever even thought.

And he judged you by his good and perfect law.

Would he find you innocent or guilty of breaking his law?

– I'd be guilty.

– You would be guilty.

So then, as a good and righteous judge, should he send you to heaven or should he send you to hell for breaking

his law?

– He should send me to hell.

– Okay, so Jeff, here's my question.

Does that concern you?

– Yes, it does.

– And rightly it should, rightly it should.

Now, do you know what this judgeful, this wrathful God, who is also

loving and merciful, did for guilty sinners like you and I so that we could be saved from the wrath to come?

– Didn't he give us the law so we know how to live?

– No, we've already found out that you've broken the law, right?

Haven't you?

– Yeah, that wouldn't do me any good, would it?

– So here's what he did.

2 ,000 years ago, he sent his son, Jesus Christ, to be born here on earth.

He was born miraculously of a virgin.

He lived a perfect life.

He never sinned, not even once.

The laws that we've broken again and again and again, he did perfectly.

And then he went to something called the cross, where as he was on that cross,

God the Father showed up, and he poured out his wrath on Jesus Christ for your lies,

for your thieving, for your blasphemy, for my lies, for my thieving, for blasphemy, for every sin I've ever done and every sin

I ever will do.

Jesus took the wrath of God on the cross, and right before he died, he said three very important

words.

Do you know what they were?

It is finished.

The debt has been paid.

And then he died.

He was buried in a tomb.

And then something miraculous happened three days later.

Do you know what it was?

Was that the resurrection?

Yes.

He came back from the dead.

For real?

That really happened?

Yes.

It proved that he was who he said he was, God himself, and that he could do what he said he did when he said,

it is finished.

The debt has been paid.

Only God could do that.

And he was seen by his disciples.

He was seen by 500 people over the course of 40 days.

And right now, and he ascended into heaven.

And right now, he is seated at the right hand of the Father.

And he wants you to know this good news.

He's making you a free offer.

He says, if you will repent, that's to have a change of mind.

It's to turn.

You're going towards your sin.

You turn away from it.

You go to the Lord.

And you repent, and you put your faith and trust in him.

He makes you a promise.

He says, you will be saved from the wrath to come.

That's a promise by living God.

God cannot break his promises.

That's good news.

It is good news.

Well, thank you for sharing that with me.

I'm happy to.

Do you have any questions?

No, I'm going to definitely think about that, though.

All right, Jeff.

Thank you, Peter.

You have yourself a blessed day.

You too.

I'll be praying for you.

Thank you.

I appreciate that.

Proper use of the law.

We have a few minutes.

Are there any questions?

Again, this is a huge topic.

And even to this day, people are struggling over the law of

the law.

And as Peter said, it's an odd thing.

You've probably experienced this with people.

I have a lot of times.

You know, you maybe talk about spiritual things.

And they go, well, I keep the law.

It's, what is it, the natural default religion of man or something?

Wants to self -justify.

And that is a proper use of the law.

Yes,

right.

Wrong presupposition.

We don't have to prove anything.

Do you believe in a stop sign?

No.

Does that change it?

No.

I mean, you could go down a list with that person.

And rejection changes nothing in any area of life, right?

That's how I would approach it.

Does that make sense, Peter?

I mean, people, well, I don't believe that.

Well, I don't believe in cancer.

Therefore, I'll never get it.

I don't believe in having a car.

I mean, you can take thousands of things in everyday life that are realities.

And rejecting them changes nothing.

That's how I would approach it with that person.

Did science...

We work together.

Yeah, sure.

Yeah, you can do that.

Yes, true.

Science is always consistent with scripture.

But,

right.

It's like you're saying, well, we don't, I don't, that's circular reasoning.

Right.

And there's nothing wrong with circular reasoning if the circle starts with God's word.

So, not my problem.

Not my problem.

Their problem is not with me or my logic.

Their problem is with God and His word.

And you have to just dump it right back in their lap.

Ultimately, they're going to stand before God, whether they believe in Him or not.

Read Revelation chapter 20, verses 11 and following, the great white throne judgment.

Those people are standing there and they're not saying a word.

But they're standing there.

Heaven and earth has passed away.

It's gone.

They're standing there with a resurrected body and an eternal lake of fire out in front of them.

They're not allowed to say a word.

They just go from there with their resurrected body into a lake of fire.

The ocean, the earth, gave up its dead and they can resist God all they want.

But ultimately, they're going to stand before God someday.

So, that's kind of how I would approach that.

I'm not obligated to convince that person.

I'm not.

The Holy Spirit does that.

Our obligation is to preach the word, share the word, proclaim the gospel.

And the gospel is the power of God unto salvation.

Right?

Sure.

Right.

Sure.

Oh, I would agree.

Everybody has presuppositions.

And I think the argument between what's called presuppositional apologetics and

evidential apologetics, sometimes that's a bit of a non -issue.

Well, the simple issue is, what are we commanded to do by God?

Preach the word, teach the word, proclaim the gospel.

And therein lies the power of God unto salvation.

Now, sure, we're going to encounter all kinds of people.

I've had conversations with everybody from, I mean, I worked in the world in construction.

And a lot of those guys, they're not interested in hearing anything logical or spiritual.

And they'll tell you exactly what they think.

So, you have to maybe approach them a different way.

I've also engaged graduate philosophy students who, I mean, they know

all the philosophy and all of the arguments and all the rest.

To me, it's irrelevant.

We are to share the gospel with them.

And yes, there is such a thing as circular reasoning.

And in logic, that is a logical fallacy, or it can be.

But when it starts with the word of God, it's definitely where we start.

At least that's where I would start.

So,

sure,

sure.

Yeah, and, you know, yeah, exactly.

Paul was a Jewish rabbi.

I mean, he could go toe -to -toe with any Jewish Old Testament scholar in his day.

What did he do in Athens?

He didn't appeal to the Old Testament.

He appealed to what?

Creation.

Read Acts 17.

What's that?

Yeah.

I mean, if you want to deny the created order that there is such a thing as creation, sometimes you get to

a point where, you know, you're done talking.

And, again, what is our obligation before the Lord?

To share the gospel, to do what we can.

Of course, it depends on who we're talking to.

If we're talking to a five or six -year -old, or we're talking to an adult, or we're talking to...

We need to try to approach them in the way of the master.

That person is saying to you, I keep the law.

And then the response is, okay, as he walked you through, do you really?

And it proves them to not be a keeper of the law.

And it's just a way to kind of get down to where that person is and to point it out to them, you know?

And it really is using their own argument to show them that they're not.

So,

right.

Yeah.

It's also important to remember that when we share the gospel in however, whatever form it takes,

hopefully it'll be scriptural.

We have a powerful ally in the Spirit of God.

You're not by yourself.

Apart from the Spirit of God, remember, theologians call it the concomitant working of

word and spirit.

Always together.

Always together.

Always the word and the spirit.

Without the Spirit's ministry to bring conviction, just like we saw, and to convince

that person, there's not going to be salvation.

You could give the best presentation on the planet and two people sitting right next to each other.

One of them is saved and the other one says, right over their head, I'm out of here.

That's nonsense.

It's the Spirit of the Lord that brings that conviction, that illumines the truth to that person.

So, we have a powerful ally.

And so, I hope, again, this is a massive topic and we

could spend more time.

And are there any other questions?

Maybe we could talk about it more a little bit next time.

There'll be some more time probably next time.

Yes, sir.

Absolutely.

Yeah,

yeah.

I think, and as Paul fully believed and taught, we can't

allow anything to be added to the gospel.

He was really a stickler about the purity of the gospel, faith alone, in Christ alone, by God's grace alone, and so on.

Before we dismiss, I wanted to remind us all, not applicable for today, if we're here and done before

20 after, there's a Sunday school class that meets out there and they don't have real good soundproofing.

And so, I was asked to remind us all, if we could, before 20 after, if we're done, if we could stay in

here before we go out there.

Most churches, it's the adults telling the kids to be quiet in the hallways, you know.

We do things a little different here, you know.

But anyway, appreciate your paying attention to that.

Well, let's pray before we go.

Our Father, we thank you for your grace in our lives and for the reminder that your Word is powerful, it's

sharper than any two -edged sword.

It's able to cut clear down into the very heart and mind of people.

And that your gospel, your Word is pure, and it accomplishes every purpose for which you send it

forth.

Help us, Father, to always live that truth out in our lives.

Thank you for each one here today, for each family represented.

And for our worship service now, we ask, Father, that you would give us great joy as we worship you.

Be with each one who ministers to us through music and or through preaching.

Give them just encouragement and strength and help us to fellowship with one another

through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

Amen.