THE LAW POINTS US TO CHRIST

Jn.1:17 – For the law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.

Everything in the Old Testament pointed us to Christ. Everything from the seed of the woman in Genesis to the sun of righteousness in Malachi. Then there was the water from the rock in the wilderness journey and the countless lambs slaughtered as offerings for sin in the tabernacle. The law itself was called a tutor or a schoolmaster by the Apostle Paul, it was designed to point all of us to our need for a Savior. The law could never change our hearts and make them new, all it could do is reveal our sinfulness and our desperate need of a Savior. Grace and truth burst on the scene in this glorious person Jesus of Nazareth. It’s in Him that the grace of God does more than cover our sin, God’s grace cleanses our hearts and then makes them brand new. Here is how the Christ Centered Expository Commentary describes this verse.

“There is no other source of grace but in Christ, where we find an inexhaustible supply. The focus here is more than just that we receive grace from Christ; it’s that this grace is fuller or more complete than what God had provided before Christ…..God has always desired his people to respond to him in faith and, as a result of that faith, to live in obedience to his word. However, because of the Israelites’ lack of faith and their disobedience, God gave them the law as a means of protection. The law was able to show them the sinfulness of their actions, but the law was never intended to save the Jews. The purpose of the law was not to draw people to itself, for it had no grace to offer.….The grace of the law was that it pointed people to Jesus, but how much more grace was given when Jesus came! The grace of God was seen in the law everywhere the shadow of Jesus Christ fell, whether in the Passover or in the temple sacrifices. But when Jesus came, the shadows no longer mattered; the light of Jesus Christ revealed completely what the shadows had revealed in part.”

All through the Old Testament even the followers of the Lord felt their way along as a blind man would. We were all hopelessly lost unable to save ourselves. That’s the way it was until Jesus Christ was born. In Him, the light of salvation’s brand new day broke in on us. Grace and truth were put on display offered to all of us in the gospel message of Jesus. What is that message? It is the simplest yet most profound message of all, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life”.