he Law by which God rules us, is as dear to Him as the Gospel by which He saves us.
William Secker
A Puritan Golden Treasury
Ignorance of the nature and design of the law is at the bottom of most religious mistakes. This is the root of self-righteousness . . . The grace of God, received by faith, will dispose us to obedience in general; but, through remaining darkness and ignorance, we are much at a loss as to particulars. We are therefore sent to the law, that we may learn how to walk worthy of God, who has called us to his kingdom and glory; and every precept has its proper place and use.
John Newton
The Works of John Newton/Vol. 1
Whenever an antithesis is set up between love and law, and love is regarded as self-directive and self-instructing, then the basis is laid for all that today confronts us in what is called the "new morality" . . . we find that, according to Paul, there is no realm of human relationship in which the law as the law of God does not wield its authority, and the reason is that it is the law of God.
John Murray
Collected Writings of John Murray/Vol. 4
The proud have forged a lie against me, but I will keep Your precepts with my whole heart. Their heart is as fat as grease, but I delight in Your law.
Psalm 119:69-70
The heart is like a dark cellar, full of lizards, cockroaches, beetles, and all kinds of reptiles and insects, which in the dark we see not. But the law takes down the shutters and lets in the light, and we see the evil.
Charles Spurgeon
Spurgeon at his Best
The law is the light and the commandment the lantern.
William Austin
A Puritan Golden Treasury
In which case, having shaken us out of our self-righteousness, and reduced us to a happy necessity of closing with the righteousness of Christ; the law has still another and a farther use, no less momentous: for, thirdly, it from that moment forward stands as the great rule of our practical walk and conversation: seeing a true believer is not without law (anomos, a lawless person) towards God; but is ennomos, within the bond of the love of Christ; not exempted from its control, as the standard of moral action; though delivered from its power and execration as a covenant of works.
Augustus Toplady
Unsound Doctrines
He that delights in God's law, is often thinking of it; what a man delights in, his thoughts are still running upon; he that delights in money, his mind is taken up with it . . . thus if there be a delight in the things of God, the mind will be still musing upon them . . . Where there is a delight in the law of God, the mind is wholly busied about it.
Thomas Watson
The Sermons of Thomas Watson
Do we then make void the law through faith? Certainly not! On the contrary, we establish the law.
Romans 3:31
The source and basis of God's moral law is His own moral character; which is necessary and immutable . . . And here we may add, that the Bible nowhere indicates such a relaxation of the believer's law of living. David, a justified person, represents the rule by which he regulated himself, as "perfect," "pure," and "right," and "very righteous."
R.L. Dabney
Systematic Theology
See here a sentence worthy to be weighed of us, when David calleth the commandments of God his "counselors." For, in the first place, he meaneth that he might scorn all the wisdom of the most able and most expert men in the world, since he was conducted by the word of God, and governed thereby. In the second place, he meaneth that when he shall be so governed by the word of God, he would not only be truly wise, but that it would be as if he had all the wisdom of all the men in the world, yea, and a great deal more [Comment on Psalm 119:24].
John Calvin
As Quoted in Spurgeon's Treasury of David
This law, moreover, demands instant and absolute obedience, not only from all classes of Christians, but also in every sphere of human life equally. A Christian is just as much under obligation to obey God's will in the most secular of his daily businesses as he is in his closet or at the communion table. He has no right to separate his life into two realms, and acknowledge different moral codes in each respectively to
say the Bible is a good rule for Sunday, but this is a week-day question; or the Scriptures are the right rule in matters of religion, but this is a question of business or politics. God reigns over all everywhere. His will is the supreme law in all relations and actions. His inspired Word, loyally read, will inform us of his will in every relation and act of life, secular as well as religious; and the man is a traitor who refuses to walk therein with scrupulous care.
A.A. Hodge
Evangelical Theology
Too many, Lord, abuse thy grace,
In this licentious day;
And while they boast they see thy face,
They turn their own away . . .
The liberty our hearts implore,
Is not to live in sin;
But still to wait at wisdom's door,
Till mercy calls us in.
John Newton
The Works of John Newton/Vol. 3
