Why the Law Matters: Sin, Grace, and Righteousness

Lachlan Reed

[curious] welcome to the bible study. Simon, Galatians 3:19 doesn’t first hit us like a slogan. It hits like a question: “Wherefore then the law?” Or, plain as day, “Why then the law?” And A. T. Jones says that question can come from two very different places. One is honest hunger. The other is basically a folded-arms objection.

Simon Carver

[warmly] And that difference matters straight away, because the exact same sentence can sound completely different depending on who’s asking it. “Why then the law?” can mean, “Please help me understand God better.” Or it can mean, “Aha, gotcha. Your whole gospel falls apart.” Same words, very different heart.

Lachlan Reed

Exactly. And Jones ties that objection to a really specific phrase from Acts 15:5: “the Pharisees which believed.” That one stings a bit. He doesn’t just say “Pharisees.” He says “the Pharisees which believed” because these weren’t outsiders chucking rocks from the fence. They had accepted Jesus as Messiah... but they’d dragged their old works-system in through the front door with Him. Bit like bolting a brand-new engine into a rusted frame and wondering why the thing still rattles. [chuckles]

Simon Carver

[reflective] That phrase from Acts 15:5 — “believed” — is the part I can’t shake. Because it means the danger is not only unbelief. It’s partial belief. It’s adding Jesus to an old self-saving project. You still want some receipt in your pocket that says, “Yes, grace helped, but I paid a decent chunk myself.”

Lachlan Reed

[reflective] Yeah, and Jones’s point is almost cheeky here. He says the objection gives the questioner away. If someone hears Paul say, “The law cannot justify,” and immediately fires back, “Then what good is it?” that tells you they only know one job for the law: justification. So if it can’t save them, they reckon it’s useless as a busted sprocket.

Simon Carver

Wait — let me say that back and see if I’ve got it. The objection is not actually exposing a weakness in Paul. It’s exposing a weakness in the objector. Because they’ve reduced the law to one function only: make me righteous. So when Paul says, in effect, “It cannot do that,” they conclude, “Then throw it out.”

Lachlan Reed

[responds quickly] Spot on. The question reveals the heart. Jones even says this objection wasn’t coming from the Gentiles — not from what he calls the plain, simple sinners. Not from people who knew full well they couldn’t tidy themselves up for God. It came from the religiously confident, the professionally righteous, the folks with polished sandals and polished theology.

Simon Carver

[softly] Because grace is hardest on pride. An honest sinner hears “you can’t justify yourself” and says, “Well... yes. I know.” But the religious achiever hears the same sentence and feels the floorboards move. If I can’t present my record, if I can’t bring my gold stars, then what exactly have I been building my identity on?

Lachlan Reed

That’s the surprise in this lesson, hey. The people furthest from grace are not always the messy ones. Sometimes they’re the neat ones. And Jones says in his own day ministers would quote Romans 3:20 — “By the deeds of the law shall no flesh be justified” — and use that true verse to reach a dead-wrong conclusion: “So the law has no use.” But that’s like saying a mirror can’t wash your face, therefore mirrors are pointless. Nah, mate. You’ve just asked the mirror to do a sink’s job.

Simon Carver

[laughs softly] The mirror and the sink — that’ll stick. And there’s a human thing here too. We don’t just misuse the law; we often prefer a tool we can control. If the law saves me, then in some strange way I stay in charge. If grace saves me, I have to receive. I have to admit need. That’s much more vulnerable.

Lachlan Reed

[calm] Yep. So before we even answer Galatians 3:19, Jones wants us to hear the question in stereo. One voice says, “If the law can’t justify, bin it.” The other says, “If it can’t justify, then what IS its purpose?” And those are miles apart. One is self-defence. The other is repentance with its ears open.

Simon Carver

[matter-of-fact] So then Jones turns and treats the question seriously. Not as a sneer, but as a sober inquiry. And his first answer comes from Romans 3:20: “By the law is the knowledge of sin.” Then Romans 7:13 adds that sin, “by the commandment,” might become “exceeding sinful.” That’s strong language. Not just bad. Exceeding sinful. The law gives sin edges. It names it. It refuses to let us keep it vague.

Lachlan Reed

[curious] And that “knowledge of sin” bit from Romans 3:20 is crucial, because the law isn’t making sin appear out of nowhere. It’s showing what was already there. Like flicking on the shed light and seeing just how much dust has been building up on the bench. The light didn’t create the mess. It just ruined your little fantasy that the place was spotless. [chuckles]

Simon Carver

[calm] Yes — and Jones is careful here. The law reveals sin not so we’ll sit in guilt like that’s some kind of spiritual achievement. Its purpose is diagnostic. It shows the disease so we will cherish the cure. Romans 5:20–21 says, “The law entered, that the offense might abound. But where sin abounded, grace did much more abound.” Not a little more. MUCH more.

Lachlan Reed

That “much more” in Romans 5:20 is the bit I want to underline with a fat texta. Because if the law only leaves you staring at your failure, you’ve parked halfway. The law says, “Look properly at the wound.” Grace says, “Now look properly at the Healer.” The blacker the night, the brighter the dawn. Or in less poetic Aussie shed terms: you don’t get grumpy at the fuel gauge for telling you the tank’s empty. You go fill the bike.

Simon Carver

[questioning tone] Let me push this a little. If sin becomes “exceeding sinful,” why doesn’t that crush a person? Why doesn’t deeper awareness just turn into despair?

Lachlan Reed

Because the gospel arrives in the same breath. That’s the thing. If I think my debt is ten bucks, I’ll give a polite thank-you when somebody pays it. If I discover it’s ten million and I could never pay it in a thousand lifetimes, then grace stops being a nice religious extra and becomes oxygen. The law makes the debt plain; Christ makes the payment glorious. So the law shatters lukewarm gratitude. It doesn’t create the Saviour, but fair dinkum, it makes you run to Him.

Simon Carver

[reflective] And then Jones gives the second job, which is almost more surprising. Romans 3:20 says no flesh is justified by the law. Then Romans 3:21–22 says, “But now the righteousness of God WITHOUT THE LAW is manifested, being witnessed BY THE LAW and the prophets; even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe.” That is such a beautiful turn. The righteousness comes without the law, but the law recognizes it.

Lachlan Reed

[excited] There it is! Without the law... witnessed by the law. The law is not the source, but it is the witness. It’s like a building inspector — you used that image once, I think — who didn’t build the house but can say, “Yep, this matches the standard.” Christ, through faith, brings the righteousness. The law looks at that righteousness and says, “That’s the real article.”

Simon Carver

[warmly] And what changes is not the law, but the person. That’s the quiet miracle. The same law that once condemned now bears witness in favor of the one who has received the righteousness of God by faith. So before conversion, the law says, “This is sin.” After conversion, it says, “This is righteousness.” Not because the law became softer, but because grace made the sinner new.

Lachlan Reed

[warmly] That means the law is never obsolete. It just doesn’t stay in the same role. Before faith, diagnoser. After faith, witness. But never saviour. Never the engine. Never the source of life. And if we mix that up, we’ll drift into one of the two old ditches Jones is warning about: legalism — the law saves me — or antinomianism — the law doesn’t matter. One worships the standard. The other tosses the standard in the bin.

Simon Carver

So Galatians 3:19 keeps asking every generation the same searching question. Why then the law? Not to justify. Romans 3:20 has already closed that door. But to reveal sin, so grace becomes astonishing. And to witness righteousness, so the life of faith is not vague mist but something real, recognizable, true to the character of God.

Lachlan Reed

[softly] Which leaves us with a pretty searching thought, doesn’t it? When I ask, “What use is the law?” am I trying to understand God’s way of salvation... or am I still looking for some way to keep a little credit for myself? [short pause] That’s a question worth sitting with. Catch you next time.