Who really understands the purpose of the Law? During the course of my long Christian life I have seen various extremes. 1) One type teaches that all or most Old Testament laws remain in effect and make them binding upon themselves and those they fellowship with. These might wear tassels on garments, grow long beards or hair, religiously observe all the the Old Testament feasts, obey the dietary laws, try to keep the Sabbath holy by refusing to do any secular work on Saturday or Sunday (or whatever other day their understanding of the Law says is the Sabbath), etc. 2) Another extreme teaches obedience to a certain few of the ten commandments and then proceeds to add their own set of commandments that might include rules like “do not smoke,” “do not drink alcohol,” “drive only black cars or trucks,” “don’t use electricity,” etc. 3) At the other end we have those who claim to be led by the Spirit and under no law. These often raise their kids in public schools where they learn to be whores and homosexuals, they usually feel free to watch any perversion on television or at the movies, they might laugh hysterically (by the Spirit, of course) at their church meetings, they consider (false) prophecies coming from the mouths of their prophets to be the Word of God, etc. Rather than “obeying the truth,” these folk are usually quite lawless; and 4) Finally, at the bottom (or top, depending upon your perspective), we have those who claim to be led neither by the Law nor by the Spirit. They are simply lawless.
Do any Christians in groups like those mentioned above actually walk in truth? What will God say to them in the day of judgment? To answer these questions we need to understand the purpose of the Law. Paul teaches this succinctly in Romans 7:7 where he says, “What then shall we say? That the law is sin? By no means! Yet if it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin. I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, `You shall not covet.'” Paul even goes so far as to say, “the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good,” and “we know that the law is spiritual.” Romans 7:12,14 (ESV)
The purpose of the law, Paul says, is to teach men the knowledge of good and evil so that we will know what it means “to sin,” that is, what it means to miss or fall short of God’s mark of perfection. God gave us his Law in order to teach us his ways so that we could grow into his image, so that we could become like him. This is the grand and glorious purpose of the Law!
But there’s a catch. The Law contains blessings and curses, blessings if we obey it and curses if we don’t. If we fail in just one aspect of the Law, we fail, we become cursed. This shows us one more purpose of the Law, to prove to us that we can’t perfectly obey it in our own strength and that we need someone or something to deliver us from its curse. So the purpose of the Law is twofold: 1) to teach men the knowledge of good and evil and 2) to show man his need for a deliverer, a Savior.
