II.

"For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death."-ROм. viii. 2.

WE

E have seen that "therefore" looks forward as well as backward in this Epistle. "There is, therefore, now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, for the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death"-no condemnation, because I have been made free; I cannot be condemned, because I have been justified.

The sentence in the first verse, "Who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit," belongs to the fourth verse. And I would just say, in passing, that there it is not conditional, but descriptive of those who are in Jesus Christ. When one who was a poor sinner is united to Christ by faith, he becomes a living member of His mystical body; and this is the description given of such a man: "He walks not after the flesh, but after the Spirit." If any man is walking after the flesh, he is not in Christ. A mere profession of religion does not save, "though he may speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and have faith so as to remove mountains." Still, if he walks after the flesh, he is not in Christ Jesus. He is but as "sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal."

Our text then supplies us with a further Divine, unanswerable and triumphant reason why "there is now no condemnation," or ever can be. "For the law of the Spirit

of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death." Mark that little word, "me"; see how he changes from the third person to the first. In the first verse it was 66 them," but when he comes to speak of the glorious liberty of the children of God, he puts in his own name, and claims the privilege for himself: "Hath made me free from the law of sin and death." "He loved me and gave Himself for me"; this is the appropriating faith that gives power. It is as if there were no third party to interfere only Jesus and me.

We have now to consider what the Apostle means by "the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus," and also what He means by the "law of sin and death," from which "the law of the Spirit of life had made him free." May the great Spirit teach us.

The whole plan of salvation, the Gospel mystery of Grace, is contained in this verse. It is marvellous in how many ways the Lord is pleased to teach us His truth. The word of God is like a prism, reflecting many different aspects of it, but the truth is always the same.

I take it that the "Spirit of life" is Jehovah Himself, the living and eternal Spirit. All life comes from Him, all grace flows from Him; all salvation, all spiritual power, all Divine love emanates from Him, for He is love.

“The law of the Spirit of life" is spoken of in Isaiah li. 4Hearken unto Me, My people; and give ear unto Me, O My nation: for a law shall proceed from Me, and I will make My judgment to rest for a light of the people. My righteousness is near; My salvation is gone forth, and Mine arms shall judge the people: the isles shall wait upon Me, and on Mine arm shall they trust." The law here spoken of is the covenant of grace, and it is here said to be in Christ Jesus, because fulfilled in Him, ratified, sealed, and delivered in His blood-therefore called

"the blood of the everlasting covenant" (Heb. xiii. 20)and set forth and proclaimed in His Word. It is the law of love and life proceeding from God, being the Spirit of life; the law of pardon, the law of full and free salvation, the law of peace. Christ Himself proclaimed this law in the synagogue of Nazareth (Luke iv. 18). This royal law of perfect love is the Gospel of the Grace of God. And it is the prerogative of the Holy Spirit to reveal it, and communicate its fulness to the soul of the believer in Jesus Christ. It is the law of our Father, who, having set forth Christ to be a propitiation through faith in His blood, is just and the Justifier of Him that believeth on Jesus, and is "able to make all grace abound towards us, that we, always having all sufficiency in all things, may abound unto every good work" (2 Cor. ix. 8).

Sometimes it is called "the perfect law of liberty," because it is the law whereby Christ makes the pardoned sinner free; cancelling his condemnation, and translating him out of darkness into God's marvellous light, investing him with the righteousness of God, and making him accepted in the Beloved."

Sometimes it is called "the royal law," because it is the law of a royal King. How sovereign and glorious it is! proclaiming "peace, peace, to him that is far off, and to him that is nigh."

Sometimes it is called "the law of righteousness," for it is founded in righteousness, it goes forth in righteousness, it bestows righteousness, it emancipates the soul, and it establishes the believer in the way of the righteousness it reveals, consummates, and proclaims. And its Divine Author shall never fail or be discouraged until He has established righteousness on the earth, and "the isles shall wait for His law."

Sometimes it is called "the law of truth"; "Thy law is

the truth"; we may rest our souls upon it; it can never alter or fail us.

Sometimes it is spoken of as the law of love. "And love worketh no ill to its neighbours; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law." And it is "in Christ Jesus"; that is, it is fulfilled and secured in Him. Christ is the centre and circumference of its fulness, of its power, and its efficacy. It is the law He came down from Heaven to fulfil, and of which He speaks in Psalm xl. 8, "I delight to do Thy will, O my God: yea, Thy law is within my heart." "By the which will we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ, once for all." This is "the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus," and He fulfilled it in fulfilling all righteousness for us, making reconciliation for our iniquity, and offering an all-sufficient atonement for our sins, "that, being justified by His blood, we might be saved from wrath through Him," abolishing death by His own death in our stead, ransoming us from the power of the grave in His resurrection, uniting us to Himself in the power of His own endless life as heirs of God and joint heirs with Himself, and praying the Father to send us another Comforter, even His own Holy Spirit, to dwell in us, to lead us into all truth, to unite us to Himself and to each other, to seal us with His name and be evermore within us a well of living water, springing up into everlasting life, sanctifying, quickening, reviving, revealing, comforting us, and receiving of the things of the Lord Jesus Christ, and showing them unto us. This, verily, is the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus, undertaken and fulfilled by Christ, and then proclaimed to us in the Word of God with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven, the law of love and grace, union with Christ by faith and eternal fellowship with Him and His. This is the truth of which the Lord spake when He said to His disciples, "Ye shall know the truth,

and the truth shall make you free," "the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus, which hath made me free from the law of sin and death."

We may now inquire what the Apostle means by the "law of sin and death," from which the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made us free. There is a double reference here. First the Apostle evidently intends the moral law, i.e., the Ten Commandments given on Sinai, the transgressions against which involve us in condemnation and death, for it is written, "Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them" (Gal. ii. 10). That this law is meant will appear evident by a reference to 2 Corinthians. iii. 7, 9, where the Apostle is contrasting the law written and graven on stones with the ministration of the Gospel of the Grace of God. This law he calls "the ministration of death" (ver. 7), and again (ver. 9) "the ministration of condemnation." Life cannot come to a sinful man by means of the law which he has broken. It is written, "If righteousness come by the law, Christ is dead in vain" (literally, without a cause) (Gal. ii. 21). Moreover, a moment's consideration may convince us that God never intended the justification of those to whom the law was given by means of their observance of it, for they were sinners already, and "the law was added because of transgressions" (Gal. iii. 19). "The law entered that the offence might abound" (Rom. v. 20). Alas for the corruption of human hearts which the restraints of a law which was holy, and just, and good, could only serve to aggravate and develop!

But the Apostle is evidently referring in the Second place to this corrupt law of sin in our members, which renders our obedience to the moral law impossible. He had been writing of this in the previous chapter. "I delight," said he, "in the law of God after the inward man: