The Highway Forums General Discussion Theology Discussion Forum ...The people miscalled Antinomians ?

Oh how I wish you hadn't made such sweeping statements Pilgrim, because by going on to complete confuse justification with sanctification in your exegesis of the verse below you really contradict yourself here.

A few comments on your points above. The context is that amongst those to whom Paul writes were those who had turned aside from the simplicity of Christ's commandments in the Gospel of faith and love, “unto vain jangling: Desiring to be teachers of the law; understanding neither what they say, nor whereof they affirm.”.

These were believers (or professing believers) who sought to teach the law to their fellow believers. They felt that it was important that believers used the law as a rule of life. So they desired to teach it, “understanding neither what they say, nor whereof they affirm”. But as Paul says in verse 9 “the law is not made for a righteous man”, so why insist that he is bound to it? These people were guilty of not using the law lawfully. The law is made for sinners – to them it is addressed. But believers have paid the law’s debt in Christ’s death for them – the law has no more to say to them, having been completely fulfilled in Christ. Thus to return to it is to use it unlawfully.

Of course this passage deals with ‘justified’ Christians. The only men who are righteous are those who are justified by faith in Christ. And that passage says that “law is not made for a righteous man, but for the lawless and disobedient”, or in other words, “law is not made for a justified man, but for the lawless and disobedient”.

A righteous man IS a justified man. A justified man IS a righteous man. And the law is not made for a righteous man.

That is SO obvious it hardly needs stating. Yet it seems you are SO obstinate that I do need to state it. It grieves me that that is so. Oh may ears be opened to the truth of God's word, by His grace!

The lawful use of the law is to preach it to sinners to convict of sin. It is a schoolmaster unto Christ. But when faith is come we are no longer under the schoolmaster. The law is made for sinners, not the righteous.

These comments are pretty good, and just go to prove what I am saying. It is the sick which need a physician. The law was made for the ‘sick’ to prove them to be sinners, and is thus a schoolmaster unto Christ (Gal 3:24). But after that faith is come we are no longer under a schoolmaster (Gal 3:25). Once made whole by Christ, we are righteous in Him. We have no need to be under that law which was ‘not made for a righteous man’.

Yet these men taught it, probably because they had never been completely slain by the law – it had never finished its work upon them, they were never truly delivered from it, so continued to teach it as binding upon believers and unbelievers alike, whereas Paul firmly responds by showing that it is made for unbelievers not believers. For sinners, not the righteous.

The passage’s comments regarding “the lawless and disobedient” for whom the law is made certainly deals with sinners who need to be convicted under the law, repent and believe on Christ unto justification. But that is CONTRASTED with those for whom the law is NOT made – righteous men, justified men.

Thus the passage certainly deals with justified men, in contrast to those who are NOT justified. The law is not made for a righteous, a justified, man. So who are these people who are “desiring to be teachers of the law, understanding neither what they say, nor whereof they affirm”?

Why, they are those who would teach justified believers who are righteous in Christ, that the law is ‘laid’ upon them for their sanctification! That though justified by faith alone, now they must use the law as rule of life. BUT, says Paul, the law is NOT laid upon a righteous man, a justified man, but upon the lawless and disobedient.

And to say otherwise about the law is to use it unlawfully, having swerved aside from faith unto vain jangling.