Real Repentance Submits to God’s Law; Faith in Christ is Vain When Isolated From That

Many who call Jesus Lord will go to hell for practicing lawlessness. If God’s true grace were not lawful and it was wrong to insist on subjection to His commandments in order to cooperate with the grace which He offers, then a professing Christian could never even really be a hypocrite. Think about it. What actually defines a hypocrite?

Psalm 119:29 says: “Remove from me the way of lying: and grant me thy law graciously.” Those who want to not live a lie must understand and obey God’s law.

Earlier in the same Psalm, we read in Psalm 119:9-11: “Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way? by taking heed thereto according to thy word. With my whole heart have I sought thee: O let me not wander from thy commandments. Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against thee.” Those who seek the true God with their whole hearts long not to wander from His commandments.

We also read in Psalm 119:142: “Thy righteousness is an everlasting righteousness, and thy law is the truth.”

Cheap grace deceivers neglect that something being freely offered does not mean that it is offered unconditionally. A scholarship one receives might offer to pay for everything necessary involved in getting through school. There are still obviously terms which must be complied with, and much work which needs to be done, in order to actually succeed and graduate so that it is not received in vain. There are terms, conditions, and labor involved in believing the Gospel of Christ unto salvation. James chapter 2 and many other passages prove that faith must work according to God’s commandments and ways in order to be a living faith which justifies a person. A living faith always works in line with God’s law which is the truth. The authentic faith of Jesus binds to God’s commandments.

Revelation 14:11-12: “And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name. Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.”

True repentance is exercising a wholehearted intent to get back in line with God’s law. A truly repentant person is intent on cleaning up their moral trash; and they look to God’s law to define that. Those with repentant hearts don’t see the requirement to do what He commands as unreasonable nor interfering with greater priorities that they have. Zaccheus repented in this manner in Luke chapter 19 in order to be called a son of Abraham in truth. Being of Abraham’s natural seed didn’t make him one. Jesus seeks to make people true spiritual sons of Abraham through the grace He offers. His true grace makes it possible for His law to be one’s best friend. Those not under the law’s condemnation are repentant and looking to Jesus’ atonement to justify them. Those who are truly repentant are looking at the law of God as a guide to pleasing Him.

The law was never intended to be a means of earning justification in itself (though many have wrongly sought to use it as such). God’s grace was accounted for as He gave the law to Moses on Mount Sinai. It was available to people then because of the atonement which Jesus would eventually make. People were not saved in a different way in Old Testament times. The Apostles of Christ used Old Testament examples to illustrate salvation by grace through faith for us. God remains a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate Him, and shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love Him and keep His commandments. The Lord will really not hold him guiltless that takes His name in vain. To contend against the Christian’s need to obey God’s law is to endorse and advocate for sin.

1 John 3:4: “Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law.”

Since sin is the transgression of God’s law, no one can truly reckon himself dead to sin and alive to God with Christ without submitting to and embracing the demands of the law. Jesus quoting from the law of God repeatedly when tempted by Satan in the wilderness proves that no one is too spiritual for it (see Matthew 4:1-10). Even though we have been released from the rituals and ceremonies of the Law of Moses, it remains that the principles of morality, of redemption, and of properly relating to God through the chosen Redeemer whom the law also testified of are one hundred percent in force.

The Christians often say: “Do it through Jesus.” But what is the right definition of “it”? Romans 8:4 proves that it is God’s law.

Romans 8:4: “That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit (the Spirit of God).”

The concept of being “Led of the Holy Spirit” is really just Gnosticism when divorced from the principles revealed in the Law of Moses and in the rest of the Bible. In relation, it’s also crazy to think someone’s heart could be right who doesn’t comply with God’s rules externally. You can’t effectively make disciples of a Master whose law is made void. Workers of lawlessness are not walking in a living faith in Christ.

Proverbs 3:5-7: “Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths. Be not wise in thine own eyes: fear the Lord, and depart from evil.”

This shows the true boundary between a living faith which justifies and unbelief which leads to death and condemnation. The proper reference or compass for trusting in the Lord with all one’s heart, not leaning on one’s own understanding, and acknowledging Him in all one’s ways is His law.

The law of God will be used on Judgment Day to prove whether we did, or did not, enter into and continue in a living faith in Christ.

Revelation 22:14: “Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city.”