Grace and Law

Announcer:

This is Today With Derek Prince. The internationally recognized Bible teacher and author presents to you Keys to Successful Living.

Yesterday in his new topic ‘Faith and Works,’ Derek Prince began by sharing that righteousness is only received by faith in the facts of the gospel message. Join him now as he continues this teaching today and shares about the effects of law and grace in our lives. Tune at the end of the broadcast today for our address and this week’s special offer.

Derek Prince:

Now, let’s come to a little bit of definition and here is where we really need clear thinking. In fact, you really need clear thinking all the time! How many of you would agree with that? Well now, we need to discuss briefly the nature of grace. Grace is a beautiful word but it’s often been abused. I was preaching once in a certain church and I said, ‘As a matter of fact, the churches that call themselves ‘Grace’ churches often know the least about grace.’ And then I woke up to the fact that I was preaching in one of those churches! Nevertheless, it remains true. A lot of people who use the word grace don’t have any idea of what it really means. The root meaning of grace is comeliness, it’s beauty. And then it’s a beauty that God imparts to us because we believe in Him. He makes us beautiful with His grace.

“And then Paul says—here’s the crux—in Romans 11:6:
If by grace, then it is no longer by works. Otherwise, grace is no longer grace.”

In other words, in my language, you cannot earn grace. Anything you can earn is not grace. This is

somewhat humbling for many of us. We’ve got to depend on His grace, we cannot earn it. Nothing we can do can ever obtain for us the grace of God. But by grace we have been saved through faith. And just when you’re getting excited about the fact that you have faith, remember Paul goes on to say:

“. . . and that not of us, it is the gift of God.”

You have nothing whatever to boast of if you’ve been saved by faith. God has done this to protect you from the greatest sin of all, which is pride.

Now I want to consider the relationship between faith and works, what we believe and what we do. And as far as I know, all I’m going to say will be taken directly from the New Testament and yet for many of you it will be startling and even shocking. I’ve discovered this merely to preach the simple New Testament message of salvation by grace is startling to most professing Christians.

I remember once saying in a congregation about this size, ‘Of course, Christianity is not a set of rules.’ And then I looked at those people and they were shocked. I think they would have been less shocked if I’d said, ‘God is dead.’ Their concept of Christianity was a set of rules. Maybe you have the same concept. I want to tell you Christianity is not a set of rules; you can’t achieve it by rules.

Let’s look at what Paul says in Romans chapter 3:20. The theme of Romans, incidentally, is righteousness. This is the central issue of Romans, is how can we become righteous before God? Many, many centuries before Job had cried out in his agony in Job chapter 9:2:

“How can a man be righteous before God?”

His religious friends all ridiculed the idea that anybody could ever be righteous before God. But God heard that cry and many, many years later through the epistle to the Romans He answered the question ‘How can a man be righteous before God?’ And it is not by keeping a set of rules. In Romans 3:20 Paul says:

Therefore by the deeds of the law, no flesh [that’s no human being] will be justified in his sight for

“/3 by the law is the knowledge of sin.”

Now I’ve read this translation which is the New King James. The NIV essentially says the same. Both of them put in two words which are not there. I’ve learned Greek since I was ten years old, I am confident in what I’m saying. They put in the phrase ‘the law’ twice. The law. Paul doesn’t say that. He says:

“Therefore by the deeds of law no flesh will be saved, for by law is the knowledge of sin.”

You say, ‘Well, what was the purpose of the law?’ The purpose of the law was God’s diagnostic to expose your problem, to expose that you have a problem which is sin. The law can diagnose your problem but it cannot solve it. It can only be solved by grace. So you need the law to get you to the point where you see you need grace, that’s it’s purpose.

“James says in chapter 2, verses 10–11 of his epistle,
For whoever shall keep the whole law [now he’s talking about the law of Moses] and yet stumble in one point, he is guilty of all. For he who said do not commit adultery also said do not murder. Now, if you do not commit adultery but you do murder, you have become a transgressor of the law.”

You see what James is saying? You either keep the whole law or you don’t keep the law. To keep ninety-nine percent of the law is not to keep the law. The law is one whole system. Incidentally, none of us can anywhere near keep it ninety-nine percent. The Orthodox Jews say there are six hundred and thirteen commandments that you need to observe. And privately they’ll admit to you that they don’t observe many more than about thirty-two. No one today alive on the earth keeps the entire law of Moses. No one ever has done except one person. You know His name, Jesus, that’s right. He’d say to these people of His day, ‘Which of you convicts me of sin?’ They couldn’t answer Him. He’s the only one who kept the law perfectly. You and I cannot do it.

I discovered when I was in the British Army and I got saved and I began to talk to people about being saved, they all began to think in terms of religion, not of salvation. I would find, generally speaking, each one of them would trot out a little list of rules that he kept. That was his righteousness. It was especially tailored to their own situation. If there was something wrong they were doing they didn’t include that rule in their list. I saw this is how the human mind thinks. I’m righteous by keeping a set of rules. No, you’re not. You could be if you kept the whole rule but you don’t, no one does. So you cannot say, ‘I keep so much of the law and that’s all that’s needed,’ because the law is one single system. You either keep it or you don’t keep it. If you could keep it all, God would consider you righteous. But, you can’t. So, you’re shut up to the alternative which is—grace, something you cannot earn.

“I’ve already pointed out, and I return to this point, in Romans 3:20:
Therefore by the deeds of law no flesh will be justified in his sight.”

Don’t ever try to achieve righteousness with God by keeping a set of rules. That’s what it means, because you will fail. If your rules are right, you can’t keep them. If your rules are wrong, you’re not made righteous by keeping wrong rules. Do you understand?

Now, let’s go on from there. The next thing I want to say, and this is where people begin to get shocked, is law and grace are mutually exclusive. You cannot benefit from both, it has to be one or the other. If you go on in Romans chapter 6 to verse 14, it says:

“For sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law but under grace.”

So those are two mutually exclusive alternatives. You can be under law or you can be under grace but you cannot be under both at the same time. And if you’re under law you’re not under grace, and if you’re not under grace you are not under law.

The implications of what Paul says are very far reaching. He says sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law but under grace. The implication is if you are under law, sin would have dominion over you. The only way to escape from the dominion of sin is to stop trying to keep a law and avail yourself of God’s grace. I told you this would be shocking. I can see some of you are already a little bit shocked. Now in Romans 8:14 Paul says:

“For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God.”

Who are the real children of God? Those who are led regularly by the Holy Spirit. That’s the alternative to keeping a set of rules. You can keep the set of rules or you can be led by the Holy Spirit, but you can’t do both.

There’s a little illustration that I use which comes to my mind. I think I’ll use it just to make this vivid. There’s this young man, he’s just graduated from a Bible school. He’s got a degree in theology, he’s strong and healthy, and he’s got to make his way from a certain point to a certain destination. God says to him, ‘Now, you’ve got two alternatives. You can either use the map or you can avail yourself of a personal guide.’ This young man says, ‘I’m pretty smart, I’ve got a degree in theology. I know how to read maps. I’ll take the map, I don’t need the guide.’ When he starts off, the sun is shining, the birds are singing, but about three days later it’s dark. It’s the middle of the night, he’s in a forest, he’s on the verge of a cliff and he doesn’t know whether he’s facing north, south, east or west. A gentle voice says to him, ‘Can I help you?’ Do you know who that is? The Holy Spirit, the personal guide. So he says, ‘Holy Spirit, I really need you!’ The Holy Spirit gets him out of his position and they start off on the road again.

Then after a little while he says to himself, ‘You know, I think I was a bit silly. I could have handled that without any help. I really didn’t need to panic.’ He looks around and his guide is no longer there. He’s on his own. ‘I can make it.’

Another three days later he’s in the middle of a bog. Every step he takes he sinks deeper and he can’t get out. The gentle voice says to him, ‘Perhaps you need me now.’ ‘Oh, Holy Spirit, please help me! Only you can get me out of this.’ And so he goes on with the Holy Spirit walking on the way that leads to his destination. Then he says to the Holy Spirit, to his guide, ‘You know, I’ve got a very excellent map. Maybe I could share the map with you.’ The guide says, ‘Thank you but I don’t need the map, I know the way. Besides, I was the one who made the map.’

Announcer:

Listen again tomorrow as Derek Prince continues his theme ‘Faith and Works,’ by showing us the problem many Christians experience, that of trying to live halfway between law and grace. This week’s message is available on audiocassette No. RC4163, and also on video. Our special offer this week is Derek’s book Faith to Live By, which explains what faith is, how we can live in faith and how it can grow stronger. To receive your copy of ‘Faith and Works’ write today and include a contribution of $5.00 or more for audiocassette RC4163 or $14.95 for the video teaching. Include a gift of $5.00 or more for the book Faith to Live By.

Derek Prince also welcomes your letters and prayer requests. Our mailing address is Derek Prince Ministries, Box 19501, Charlotte, North Carolina 28219. That’s Derek Prince Ministries, Box 19501, Charlotte, North Carolina 28219. In Canada write to Derek Prince Ministries, Box 8354, Halifax, Nova Scotia, B3K 5M1. The Canadian address again is Box 8354, Halifax, Nova Scotia, B3K 5M1, and please give us the call letters of this station when you write.

This radio ministry is supported by your prayers and financial contributions. Contributions in excess of the value of the material are tax deductible and we relay on them to keep this ministry on the air.