Home
Did The Cross nullified the Law?
Some Christians often use the death of Jesus on the cross as a decisive event that somehow nullifies the law of God. They point to Christ’s grace as something that negates the obligation to obey the Ten Commandments.
This errant belief can be countered in a number of different ways. For instance, if after Jesus died we don’t have to keep the law, does that mean we can now commit adultery, murder, and steal? No one really believes that! However, there’s another way of looking at the cross and the law: Far from nullifying the law, the cross is the one thing above all others that validates the Ten Commandments. How so?
When King Henry VIII wanted to divorce his first wife, he had a big problem. According to the laws of England, it was illegal to divorce, especially because he wanted to marry his mistress. So what did he do? He simply changed the law. Henry didn’t change his actions to meet the demands of the law; he changed the demands of the law to meet his actions.
That was a real kingdom; let’s look at an imaginary one. A king has a son, a hopeless reprobate who is caught stealing jewels from a rich neighbor. The law demands 10 years in jail for theft—no exceptions. What does the king do? Not wanting to put his own son away for 10 years, the king uses his royal powers to change the law. He gets rids of the statute that made stealing jewels a crime. How could his son be punished for breaking a law that doesn’t exist? He can’t. But what would happen to a kingdom with no law regarding stealing?
Imagine the same scenario, only with one difference: Suppose the law was so sacred that not even the king could change it—as in Daniel 6:8. The law demands punishment, but the king loves his son so much that he doesn’t want him to face punishment. So the king mercifully takes the punishment on himself. He substitutes himself for the son in order that the demands of the law are met and his son is spared.
This story is obviously analogous to the gospel, the self-substitution of God in our place. Because God’s law cannot be changed, Jesus paid for our violation of the law, so the demands of the law were filled while we, as violators of that law, are not punished.
If God could capriciously change His law, wouldn’t it have been easier for Him to pull a King Henry—and change the law to accommodate the transgressor? When you think about the cost of the cross—God bearing the sins and the suffering and the guilt of all humanity—wouldn’t it have been less costly to have just “lowered the bar,” to have modified the law so that deeds once deemed violations of the law no longer were? How much easier for God to have changed the definition of sin to meet humanity in its sin rather than to bear the penalty for that sin.
But more to the point, if God didn’t change the law before Christ died on the cross, why do it after? Why would the law have been abolished, or changed, after the penalty for its transgression had been paid. If anything, paying the penalty for the law reinforces its authority. How much easier for God to abolish or alter the law right at the start! It would have been like the king changing the law about theft after he had already paid the penalty for its violation. Why not change it beforehand and save himself the punishment? In the same way, Jesus’ death shows that if the law could have been changed, or abolished, it would have been before and not after the cross.
Thus nothing shows the continued validity of the law more than the death of Jesus, a death that occurred precisely because the law couldn’t be changed or abolished.
Some Christians often use the death of Jesus on the cross as a decisive event that somehow nullifies the law of God. They point to Christ’s grace as something that negates the obligation to obey the Ten Commandments.
This errant belief can be countered in a number of different ways. For instance, if after Jesus died we don’t have to keep the law, does that mean we can now commit adultery, murder, and steal? No one really believes that! However, there’s another way of looking at the cross and the law: Far from nullifying the law, the cross is the one thing above all others that validates the Ten Commandments. How so?
When King Henry VIII wanted to divorce his first wife, he had a big problem. According to the laws of England, it was illegal to divorce, especially because he wanted to marry his mistress. So what did he do? He simply changed the law. Henry didn’t change his actions to meet the demands of the law; he changed the demands of the law to meet his actions.
That was a real kingdom; let’s look at an imaginary one. A king has a son, a hopeless reprobate who is caught stealing jewels from a rich neighbor. The law demands 10 years in jail for theft—no exceptions. What does the king do? Not wanting to put his own son away for 10 years, the king uses his royal powers to change the law. He gets rids of the statute that made stealing jewels a crime. How could his son be punished for breaking a law that doesn’t exist? He can’t. But what would happen to a kingdom with no law regarding stealing?
Imagine the same scenario, only with one difference: Suppose the law was so sacred that not even the king could change it—as in Daniel 6:8. The law demands punishment, but the king loves his son so much that he doesn’t want him to face punishment. So the king mercifully takes the punishment on himself. He substitutes himself for the son in order that the demands of the law are met and his son is spared.
This story is obviously analogous to the gospel, the self-substitution of God in our place. Because God’s law cannot be changed, Jesus paid for our violation of the law, so the demands of the law were filled while we, as violators of that law, are not punished.
If God could capriciously change His law, wouldn’t it have been easier for Him to pull a King Henry—and change the law to accommodate the transgressor? When you think about the cost of the cross—God bearing the sins and the suffering and the guilt of all humanity—wouldn’t it have been less costly to have just “lowered the bar,” to have modified the law so that deeds once deemed violations of the law no longer were? How much easier for God to have changed the definition of sin to meet humanity in its sin rather than to bear the penalty for that sin.
But more to the point, if God didn’t change the law before Christ died on the cross, why do it after? Why would the law have been abolished, or changed, after the penalty for its transgression had been paid. If anything, paying the penalty for the law reinforces its authority. How much easier for God to abolish or alter the law right at the start! It would have been like the king changing the law about theft after he had already paid the penalty for its violation. Why not change it beforehand and save himself the punishment? In the same way, Jesus’ death shows that if the law could have been changed, or abolished, it would have been before and not after the cross.
Thus nothing shows the continued validity of the law more than the death of Jesus, a death that occurred precisely because the law couldn’t be changed or abolished.
