I love the title of this section of the Marrow: “Slavish Fear and Servile Hope Not the Springs of True Obedience.” It is taken from the question that Nomista asks at the beginning of this section: “But stay, sir, I pray you, would you not have believers to eschew evil and do good, for fear of hell, or for hope of heaven?” I love Evangelista’s responses in this section:
No indeed, I would not have any believer to do either the one or the other; for so far forth as they do so, their obedience is but slavish. And therefore though, when they first awakened and convinced of their misery, and set foot forward to go on in the way of life, they, with the prodigal, would be hired servants; yet when, by the eyes of faith, they see the mercy and indulgence of their heavenly Father in Christ, running to meet them and embrace them; I would have them, with him, to talk no more of being hired servants (Luke 16). I would have them so to wrestle against doubting, and so to exercise their faith as to believe, that they are by Christ ‘delivered from the hands of their enemies,’ both the law, sin, wrath, death, the devil, and hell, ‘that they may serve the Lord without fear, in holiness and righteousness all the days of their lives’ (Luke 1:74, 75). I would have them so to believe God’s love to them in Christ, as that thereby they may be constrained to obedience. (p. 216).
And therefore you are not to conceive of that reward which the Scripture speaks of, as if it were the wages of a servant, but as it is the inheritance of sons. And when the Scripture seemeth to induce believers to obedience, by promising this reward, you are to conceive that the Lord speaks to believers as a father does to his young son, Do this or that and then I will love thee; whereas we know, that the father loveth the son first, and so does God; and therefore this is the voice of believers, ‘We love him, because he first loved us’ (1 John 4:19). (p. 217)
These comments are based on what the Bible teaches us with regard to our relationship to God in Christ. Because of the work of Christ, we are no longer slaves but sons through adoption!:
Gal. 4:4 But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, 5 to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. 6 And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!” 7 So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God.
Because we have already been made sons by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone, we can walk in obedience to our Heavenly Father with true love and thankfulness to Him. One of my favorite lines in the Belgic Confession of Faith makes this point when it talks about sanctification and good works. It says:
We believe that this true faith, being wrought in man by hearing of the Word of God and the operation of the Holy Spirit, regenerates him and makes him a new man, causing him to live a new life, and freeing him from the bondage of sin. Therefore, it is so far from being true that this justifying faith makes men remiss in a pious and holy life, that on the contrary without it they would never do anything out of love to God, but only out of self-love or fear of damnation. Therefore, it is impossible that this holy faith to be unfruitful in man. . . (Belgic Confession of Faith, Article 24; emphasis mine).
As the confession says, without a proper understanding of justification by faith alone we cannot do anything out of love for God. The gospel frees us up to love God with all of our heart, mind, soul and strength. The problem is that we struggle with this concept in a similar way that orphans may have a hard time believing that their adopted parents truly do love them. Some orphans may test their parents love by acting up or they might feel that they need to still earn their parents approval in order to be sure that they won’t be given up for adoption again. Or they might run away because they have too hard of a time believing it’s true. This is what the Gospel is like. It seems too good to be true. But one of the most comforting lines in the Bible is this: “He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?” (Rom. 8:32). We have to always be reminded that God does love us in Christ and that nothing will ever separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord (Rom. 8:39). These promises assure us of our adoption. They tell us that in Christ we do not have a servile hope but that we are “born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time” (1 Pet. 1:3-5). The more we hear this preached to us the more we will walk in obedience and love for God, because the Spirit confirms this truth in our hearts and causes us to walk in God’s ways as his own dear children (Ezek. 36:26-27). The more we understand our irrevocable adoption by grace and the eternal love of God for us in Christ, the more we long to show gratitude by becoming who we already are in Christ. John says a similar thing to us:
1 John 3:1 See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are. The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know him. 2 Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is. 3 And everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure.
So all this to say, walk in obedience to God because you are already a child of God in Christ, by grace through faith. And if you struggle to believe this or sense a slavish fear in your heart, find a church where this Gospel is preached every week and you’ll find the freedom to love and obey God in gratitude. Any thoughts?
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The Bible is divided into law and gospel.
Which of these parts functions as the means of grace?
It seems to me that both of these parts work together as a means of grace, so that the Word of God as a whole is a means of grace, especially when it is preached. The law drives us outside of ourselves to Christ alone for salvation and apart from the gospel declaring to us the salvation offered in Christ we have no hope. On the other hand without the law, the gospel makes no sense.
Louis Berkhof puts it well: “The law comprises everything in Scripture which is a revelation of God’s will in the form of command or prohibition, while the gospel embraces everything, whether it be in the Old Testament or in the New, that pertains to the work of reconciliation and that proclaims the seeking and redeeming love of God in Christ Jesus. And each one of these two parts has its own proper function in the economy of grace. The law seeks to awaken in the heart of man contrition on account of sin, while the gospel aims at the awakening of saving faith in Jesus Christ. The work of the law is in a sense preparatory to that of the gospel. It deepens the consciousness of sin and thus makes the sinner aware of the need of redemption. Both are subservient to the same end, and both are indispensable parts of the means of grace” (Systematic Theology, 612).
I know you didn’t quote everything that Berkhof says on the matter, but do you think the law serves as means of grace in its third use (training in righteousness) as well as in the first use (drive to Christ)?
Two things in response:
I would refer to my earlier posts interacting with the thread between Mike and Austin with respect to fear. But I would preface those posts with this statement. I think we need to distinguish, again, between “law” and the “law of Christ.” That is first. At the least, defining the law of Christ is necessary for any discussion of the “fear factor.” It appears to me that almost without exception, and certainly in each pivotal passage regarding the works of the law in Galatians, Paul uses the term law or works of the law as a “law unit” and in terms of Moses and Sinai. The law of Christ should be distinctly eschatalogically different, and superior, especially experimentally, as we will find in my comments on my earlier posts. Under the law of Christ, fear is cast out by the very nature of it, as appropriated by the believer.
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