The Whole Christ

The Whole Christ

I just finished the book by Sinclair Ferguson, “The Whole Christ” (Crossway, 2016).

Ferguson does a great job of defining and explaining the relationship between legalism, antinomianism, and God’s loving grace.

Don’t let these fancy terms bother you. Legalism is simply a term that describes a response toward God that leads to strict, dutiful obedience to God’s commands without a proper understanding of God’s love and grace.

Antinomianism, from the Greek anti (“against/no”) nomos (“law”), is also a term that describes a misinformed response toward God’s love and grace, which results in seeing no need whatsoever in obeying God’s law.

Ferguson is right when he says,

“Antinomianism and legalism are not so much antithetical to each other as they are both antithetical to grace” (p. 156).

 

That is, both the legalistic (law as duty in order to gain God’s favor) and antinomianism (anti law altogether) mindset are both a result of failing to understand God’s nature as gracious.

The problem is not with the law, but with the heart. Union with Jesus Christ leads to a new love for and obedience to the law of God, which Christ now mediates to us in the Spirit.

Christ breaks the bonds of both legalism (the law is no longer divorced from the person of Christ) and antinomianism (we are not divorced from the law, which now comes to us from the hand of Christ and in the empowerment of the Spirit, who writes it in our hearts).

The marriage of duty with delight in Christ is the result of being in union with Christ.

Ferguson goes on,

“We are not divorced from the law (Romans 7) by believing that the commandments do not have binding force, but only by being married to Jesus Christ in union with whom it is our pleasure to fulfill them” (p. 158).

 

“The new-covenant believer never looks at the law without understanding that his relationship to it is the fruit of his union with Christ” (p. 160).

“The law’s condemning character is not the result of anything inherent in the law, but of the evil that is inherent in us” (p. 165).

It’s always been helpful to me to view the original giving of the law at Sinai as a gracious gift from God that would enable the people of Israel to be a light and blessing to the nations.

In other words, God didn’t give the law solely for the purpose of revealing sin. He actually intended for the Israelites to learn to find the law (as God’s word) delightful.

At least some of the Israelites were learning to delight in obedience. The Psalmists express this well,

“His delight is in the law of the Lord” (Ps. 1:2) and “Oh how I love your law” (Ps. 119:97).

 

So, in the NT, when John writes, “The law came by Moses; grace and truth came through Christ (John 1:17),” this contrast is not absolute. Rather, it is comparative.

That is, John is not claiming that the law God gave to Moses was not grace and truth. Rather, in comparison to the law of Moses (which was grace and truth in itself), even more grace and truth has come through Christ.

The author of Hebrews makes a similar argument (see Hebrews 3-4).

This helps us see that the storyline of the Bible is a unified whole in two ways.

First, Christ is the fulfillment of the law in his obedience to it. Second, Christ gives his Spirit to those who are united to him by faith, who then writes the law on our hearts.

It is those who are in Christ and have the blessing of his Spirit who find it delightful to obey God.