More On The Law

More On The Law

I read, with interest, a quote regarding law from a very unlikely source; Bob Dylan. He said, “If you choose to live outside the law, you must follow the law more stringently than anyone else.” In this particular case he was speaking of civil law, and he’s absolutely correct.

An example of this is someone who decides to drive after having a few drinks, or smoking some pot. They follow the laws of the road strictly by driving below the speed limit, coming to a complete stop at stop signs, and so forth. The reason is they do not want to get caught violating the one law they chose to disregard: driving under the influence.

This process is flawed from the beginning. Because of their impaired state they cannot successfully adhere to the remaining laws even though they try very hard. There is a similar thing that occurs with someone trying to obey The Law of Moses.

If a person chooses to try to obtain their righteousness by keeping The Law, we already know from scripture that they will fail. However, people still try and fall victim to becoming the judge of others in the process. If you attempt to keep The Law by your own power and realize that you missed it in a particular area, you become aware of everyone else that fails in the same area. Not only do you notice it, you become very critical of them by pointing out their sin to others, and possibly even to them directly.

This is one of the reasons the scribes and Pharisees were such vicious people. They knew in their hearts they were living beneath God’s standards, but they attacked anyone who outwardly violated The Law. This is a defense mechanism. If you can deflect the attention away from yourself no one will pay attention to your shortcomings.

This is why they despised Jesus. He always saw through their smoke screen of accusation and spoke directly to the sin in their own heart.

What are we to do? First of all we must admit that we are not capable of keeping The Law. When we acknowledge it in ourselves we can then accept the reality that no one else can keep it either. Then we must accept, by faith, the salvation provided for us by grace through Christ. At that point we become ambassadors to share this Good News with others.

Let us lay aside a critical spirit and embrace those we meet today with the love of God that has come to us through Jesus. Let’s be redemptive in our approach to relationships so others can experience a restored relationship with Father.