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Every time I teach a course on the Pentateuch, the topic of God’s law comes up. I typically ask, “When you hear the phrase ‘God’s law,’ does it leave you with a positive feeling, a negative feeling, or a mixed feeling?” The majority of students fall into the second category (negative feeling), with the next largest group in the third (a mix of negative and positive feelings). When asked to explain the negative feelings, two responses rise to the top:
“In places like Galatians, Paul associates the law with being cursed. It seems we’re to look at the law negatively.”
“The very notion of law feels restrictive, binding, like something that takes away flourishing because it takes away our freedom.”
In light of these common thoughts, it is important to consider possible problems with the assumptions underneath them and to see how other biblical passages encourage us towards a much more positive perspective on God’s law.
Exploring Our Assumptions About the Law
As my students and I process their negative feelings about the law, we identify different assumptions underneath them. For example, in Galatians, does Paul associate the law with being cursed? In a sense, but note exactly what Paul says leads to cursing: “All who rely on the works of the law are under a curse, for it is written, ‘Cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the Book of the Law’” (3:10; emphasis added).
In the context of this chapter, Paul is in effect saying, “If you rely on the law for salvation, you’re cursed because the law can’t save you.” From the perspective of being saved, the law can only condemn. (It’s why Paul elsewhere refers to the law as a “ministry of death” and “ministry of condemnation,” 2 Cor. 3:7, 9.) But salvation has never been the law’s purpose. As the Old Testament demonstrates, salvation has always been by faith in God’s promises, a point Paul makes in the immediate context of Galatians 3 and that he spends an entire chapter emphasizing elsewhere (Rom. 4).
What about the common feeling that the law is restrictive and takes away flourishing because it takes away freedom? We talk about how this feeling assumes that flourishing is found in being free and that such freedom means having no restrictions. But as we think further, it becomes apparent that all sorts of restrictions are necessary for flourishing. To flourish physically means restricting the number of hours you stay awake in a day and the type of nourishment you put in your body. To flourish as a professional musician means restricting how you use your time to ensure you can practice enough.
The right restrictions lead to the most flourishing. If a fish wants to flourish, it won’t happen by leaving the “restriction” of the ocean to explore the shore. It’ll only happen by staying within the ocean’s boundaries, because only there can the fish live to the fullest.
How Old Testament Believers Viewed the Law
This connection between the right restrictions and flourishing leads to another approach my students and I take as we process our thoughts about God’s law: We look at how Old Testament believers viewed the law to see what we can learn from their perspective.
We assume that flourishing is found in being free and that such freedom means having no restrictions. But all sorts of restrictions are necessary for flourishing.
The first place we look is Psalm 119, which is the longest psalm in the Bible and which focuses entirely on God’s law. The psalmist couldn’t be more thankful for it, more excited about it. He describes God’s law as something he thanks God for (v. 7), delights in (v. 16), longs for (v. 20), clings to (v. 31), loves (v. 47), sings about (v. 54), meditates on (v. 78), and rejoices over (v. 162).
I wonder how our view of God’s law compares. Bear in mind that the Lord provides the psalms as prayers that model how to respond to God and his commands. Psalm 119 is a prayer for us as much as for Israel. Which leads to the question we began with: Does our theology of the law have room for Psalm 119?
The Law: A Window into the Lord’s Good Values
The psalmist can have such a positive perspective of the law because he understands two realities. First, the Lord’s laws reflect the Lord’s values. That’s how laws work. Why do we have laws today against murder? We value life. Why do we have laws against stealing? We value the right to private property.
This brings us to the second reality the psalmist understood: The Lord’s values are good. “You are good and do good; teach me your statutes” (119:68). In other words, “Your laws, which reflect your values, are a window into your goodness. And because that’s true, bury them deep into my heart, because following these laws must ultimately be for my good and flourishing!” The book of Psalms begins by making this very point:
Blessed is the one . . . whose delight is in the law of the LORD,
and who meditates on his law day and night.
That person is like a tree planted by streams of water,
which yields its fruit in season
and whose leaf does not wither—
whatever they do prospers. (1:1–3, NIV)
Fruitful. Flourishing. That’s where God’s good laws lead. Why? Because true freedom isn’t the absence of restrictions but the ability to run in the paths you were made for. God’s laws mark out those paths—and he gives them to us in his goodness so we might flourish.
Yes, we’re under a new covenant, not the old, so we aren’t bound by Old Testament laws the way that an Israelite was. But because these laws are still a window into the Lord’s values, the believer today will want to study them, understand them, and seek to embody the values they contain, knowing that to imitate the Lord’s values is to walk in a field of flourishing.
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Originally sourced via trusted media partner. https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/theology-law-psalm-119/
