1 Timothy 1:8-10 But we know that the law is good, if a man use it lawfully;… It would appear from this text that there is a way in which the law may be used lawfully, or rightly, from which we infer that there is also a way in which it may be used unlawfully, or unrightly — it may be put to a right use or to a wrong one. And there is a real distinction between this right and this wrong use of the law, which, if steadily kept in view, would be perfect safeguard, both against the error of legality and the equally pernicious one of Antinomianism. First, then, we use the law unlawfully when we try to make out a legal right to the kingdom of heaven. There are two ways in which one may proceed who purposes to make out his right by his obedience to the law. If he have a sufficiently high conception of the standard, then he is paralyzed, and sidles into despair because of the discoveries that he is making of his exceeding distance and deficiency from that standard; and thus he is haunted at all times by a sense of his great insufficiency, and he never can attain to anything like solid peace. But there is another way — he may bring down the law to the standard of his own obedience, and may bring his conscience and conduct into terms of very comfortable equality with one another. But this is what the Bible calls a peace which is no peace. The ruin of the soul comes out in either way of the enterprise. 2. Having said this much on the wrong use of the law, I have only time in this discourse to instance one right use of it. When we compare our conduct with its commandments, we cannot fail, in our deficiency and in our distance, to be convinced of sin. (T. Chalmers, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: But we know that the law is good, if a man use it lawfully;WEB: But we know that the law is good, if a man uses it lawfully, |
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