Query 2. The Believer and the Moral Law
QUERY 2.—Is the believer not bound now by the authority of the Creator, to personal obedience to the Moral Law, even though it is not required for justification?
Ans.— What is given us for the ground of this query, is the following clause of our Representation, namely:—
“Since believers are” not under the Moral Law, to be thereby justified or condemned, we cannot comprehend how it continues any longer as a Covenant of Works to them, or such a law as to have a commanding power over them, that covenant form of it being done away in Christ with respect to believers.”
This clause of the Representation being so much one, even in words, with our Confession, we could never have expected the Reverend Commission would have moved a query upon it; but since they have been pleased to think otherwise, we answer affirmatively: —
The believer, since he does not cease to be a creature by being made a new creature, is and must ever be bound to personal obedience to the law of the Ten Commandments, by the authority of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, his Creator. But this authority is, as to him, issued by and from the Lord Jesus Christ, from whose mouth he receives the law, being his Lord God Creator, as well as his Lord God Redeemer, and having all the fulness of the Godhead dwelling in him; the sinful creature neither can nor will ever apply himself to obedience acceptable to God, or comfortable to himself, without the Creator’s authority coming to him in that channel.
We are clear and fully of the same mind with our Confession, that the Moral Law of the Ten Commandments forever binds all, justified persons as well as others, to the obedience of it, not only in regard to the matter contained in it, but also in respect to the authority of God the Creator who gave it; and that in the gospel, Christ does not in any way dissolve, but greatly strengthens this obligation; for how can it lose any of its original authority by being conveyed to the believer in such a sweet and blessed channel as the hand of Christ, since he himself is both the supreme God and Creator, and since the authority, majesty, and sovereignty of the Father is in his Son, he being the same in substance, equal in power and glory? “Beware of Him,” says the Lord to Israel, concerning Christ the angel of the covenant, “and obey his voice; do not provoke him, for my name is in him.”Exo 23.21f That is, as we understand it, “My authority, sovereignty, and other adorable excellencies, indeed the whole fulness of the Godhead is in him; and in him only will I be served and obeyed.” And then it follows, “But if you shall indeed obey his voice, and do all that I speak...” The name of the Father is so in him — he is so much of the same nature with his Father — that his voice is the Father’s voice: “If you obey his voice, and do all that I speak.”
We desire to think and speak honourably of Him whose name is “Wonderful, Counsellor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, and the Prince of Peace.” And it can only exceedingly grate our ears, and grieve our spirits, to find such doctrines or positions vented in this Church, especially at a time when the Arian heresy is so prevalent in our neighbour nations, as to have an obvious tendency to darken and disparage his divine glory and authority — these doctrines are such that, if a believer should not receive the law of the Ten Commandments at the hand of God, as he is Creator apart from Christ, then the believer is not under its obligation, because it was delivered by God the Creator. And so he is loosed from all obedience to it, because it was enacted by the authority of the Lord Creator [i.e., the Father].
It is injurious to the infinite majesty of the Sovereign Lord Creator [i.e., the Father], and to the honour of his holy law, to restrict the believer to receive the Ten Commandments only at the hand of Christ. And what can be more injurious to the infinite majesty of the sovereign Lord Redeemer [i.e., Christ] — by whom all things were created that are in heaven and in earth, visible and invisible, whether they are thrones or dominions, principalities or powers Col 1.16 — than to speak as if the Creator’s authority [i.e., the Father’s authority] was not in him, or as if [conversely,] receiving the Creator’s law from Christ loosed men from obedience to it, because it was enacted by the authority of the Father? Woe to us if this doctrine is the truth, for we would be brought back to a consuming fire indeed. Apart from Christ, “He that made us will have no mercy upon us; nor will he that formed us show us any favour.”Isa 27.11 We humbly conceive that the Father does not reckon himself glorified, but contemned by Christians offering obedience to him as Creator apart from Christ. Nor does offering to deal with him in this way, or to teach others to do so, reveal a due regard for the mystery of Christ revealed in the gospel. For it is the will of the Father, the Sovereign Lord Creator, that all men should honour the Son, even as they honour himself; Joh 5.23 and that at or in the name of Jesus every knee should bow; and that every tongue should confess Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father,Phil 2.10 who having in these last days spoken to us by his Son, by whom also he made the worlds,Heb 1.2 and with an audible voice from heaven has said, “This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased: hear him.”Mat 17.5 If it were not that we would be thought tedious, Perkins, Durham, Owen, and others, might have been heard on this topic. But we proceed to —