In the book of Romans Paul does not disqualify the law. In fact he says the complete opposite: “Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law.” ~ Romans 3:21

Paul never disqualifies the law in any of his epistles, but skillfully explains the purpose of the law. According to Paul, the law was weak through the flesh. The written code with it’s commands, decrees, and statues, as was given to Israel, was weak because it could not put a stop to sin, it could only regulate it.

Only by the power of Christ can sin be permenately dealt with, and only by the power of Christ can we live victorious over sin. Those who are changed by the power of Christ are not under the written code of law as the Israelites were, because their law was given to regulate sin, not deliver them from it.

Does this mean that we are without any law now that we are in Christ? Absolutely not!

Serving Christ doesn’t mean we are now lawless. That for which the written code was given is fulfilled in us by the power of Christ. The goal was never the command, but the purpose for which the command was given. The goal of “thou shalt not kill” was “love your neighbor.” The goal of thou shalt not covet or steal is “love your neighbor.”

When Christ came, he did not come to abolish God’s law, but to fulfill it, and those who follow Christ fullfil the law as well, for they do the will of God from the heart.

God’s law is fulfilled in those who live according to the power of Christ. This is why both Jesus and Paul tell us that love fulfills the law.

The virtues of godliness such as kindness, self control, patience, peace, etc., are the very things to which the Law gave witness. The law (the written code) had no strength to free us from sin and empower us with righteousness. Nor did we have this strenght in ourselves, for we had become servants to our own sins. Thus Paul says, “For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly.” ~ Romans 5:6

Now that Christ has come, we have the strength to please God from our hearts and the law does not condemn us, for we are justified in Christ!

God’s law has not been abolished, but the administration of it in written code has. God’s law is now made manifest through those who have the power of Christ ruling their lives. The goal of God’s law wasn’t to keep us from murdering our neighbor, it was to teach us to love them.

In Romans 2 Paul speaks of the work of the Law in the heart and speaks of the same when he tells the Thessalonians, “But as touching brotherly love ye need not that I write unto you: for ye yourselves are taught of God to love one another. ” ~ 1 Thessalonians 4:9

The Law of God is eternal, but the administration of his law has changed. No longer is it the ministation of death in written code. It is now inscribed on the hearts and minds of those who are redeemed by the blood of Jesus. ~ See Hebrews 10:16-22

Now it is administered as the commandment of love which only Christ can give, and properly know as “the law of Christ”!

Brethren, I write no new commandment unto you, but an old commandment which ye had from the beginning. The old commandment is the word which ye have heard from the beginning. Again, a new commandment I write unto you, which thing is true in him and in you: because the darkness is past, and the true light now shineth. ~ 1 John 2:7-8