God gave the LAW to Israel through Moses (Exodus 9:3 and following). He did not give the LAW to the Gentiles because He had given the Gentile world over to a debased mind (Romans 2:14, 1:28). The Gentile was without Christ, an alien from the commonwealth of Israel, a stranger to the covenants of promise, hopeless and Godless in the world (Ephesians 2:11-12). The Gentile was a dead man on furlough from Hades; what did he need with a law? Israelites were children of the Covenant. They lived for centuries without the LAW, but believers among them had access to God, howbeit indirect access. Then the LAW was added, added to Promise. It did not replace promise, it did not do away with promise, it did not even diminish promise, but it was added to promise (Galatians 3:19). The Law is the measure of responsibility of the natural man...what an infinitely holy God has a perfect right to require of His creature (we use the word "right" advisedly, God having no "rights" because of not needing any). Rights are for creatures, and they are divinely ordained. God is Himself the standard of right, the source of rightness, the very fountainhead of rectitude. He need not be, and cannot be, limited by "rights." The LAW is the perfect standard for man. If he could keep it, when he had kept it he would only have done what he was supposed to do--nothing extra (Luke 17:10). A man who kept the LAW perfectly would have no positive righteousness, just freedom from condemnation. He would not deserve any credit, doing what he was supposed to do, nor would he deserve any blame.

LAW cannot give life, and Law-keeping cannot produce righteousness (Galatians 3:21). Paul asks, "You who desire to be under the LAW, don’t you hear what the LAW is saying?" (Galatians 4:21). They didn’t, and it is no different today. Professing Christians who "desire to be under law" in their approach to God have not heard the LAW speak. Its message is not life, but death (2 Corinthians 3:7)! A holy law cannot accept less-than-holy conduct. A perfect law demands perfection of its subjects. A just law cannot excuse even one infraction. A good law must condemn bad actions. A glorious law cannot countenance rebellion against its Giver. The LAW speaks and it speaks death to responsible man. If we come before God on LAW ground all we can expect is "judgment and fiery indignation." God’s LAW does not mark on a curve; it demands absolute perfection. It must punish all imperfection; that is its ministry (Hebrews 2:2).

When you and I were saved, God delivered us forever from the curse of the LAW (Galatians 3:13). He removed us from Sinai with its curse, its message of doom, its smoke, fire, lightning, earthquake, and its warning, "Whoever touches the mountain shall surely be put to death (Exodus 19:12)." He removed us to Calvary with its promise of blessing, its glorious invitation, "Come unto Me," and its gift of life eternal. No matter how loudly or how long we insist on it, God will never again meet us at Sinai. We may place ourselves on LAW ground but God will not acknowledge it, and will not meet us there (Hebrews 10:26). When we died to the LAW, (literally "were slain" (Romans 7:4) to the LAW), the Adam-life ceased. Now God deals with us as new creatures in Christ and not as part of the old creation under condemnation and awaiting judgment (2 Corinthians 5:17). Were we to go back from Grace to LAW we would become adulteresses, bigamists; that cannot be. We are married to him who is risen from the dead that we might bear fruit to God (Romans 7:3-4).

Flee from Sinai; flee to Calvary and beyond Calvary, through the Tomb and all the way up to the Throne where our Representative sits, accepted of God, and we in Him. As God, He sits there by "right" of His eternal deity. As man, He sits there for us having won the Throne by an obedience that went well beyond the demands of the LAW; obedience to death, even the death of the Cross (Philippians 2:5-11).

We Grace Believers are not laboring under LAW with its condemnation; we are infinitely beyond that. Through LAW, we died to law that we might live to God (Galatians 2:19). That is why our orders are, "Present yourselves to God as alive from the dead" (Romans 6:13). There is a NEW CREATION for all those in Christ. We are all done with fallen Adam in his ruin...all done with sin and judgment, Hell and death. To grasp this is to be free...free to serve God because we want to and not because we have to; free from the earthly scene of a mountain belching JUDGMENT; freed to a heavenly scene, to Heaven itself, to the right hand of the Father, to full and eternal acceptance because all of our wrong was righted by the God-man on the Cross (Romans 3:23-24).