The Love of Law
by R.C. Sproul Jr.

I wonder how many of you read Credenda/Agenda. (I wonder more how many of you read Every Thought Captive.) We reviewed this magazine several issues ago and I confessed what should be painfully obvious to you. Credenda is what Every Thought Captive aspires to be. We have an education column, they have an education column. We have a column on family, they have three columns on family. They have a column on understanding the Scripture, and now we do as well. In my notes for this issue this column is listed as Exegetica, the name of their column. I changed it to protect our friends at Credenda. Though we want to reflect their virtues, we don't want them painted with our faults. So there, I confess again. They are biting in their humor, we are far nicer.

And as I considered what passage to look at that would connect with our theme of pleasure, I had a hard time. First I thought of Peter's vision in Acts. See, see, God says enjoy your food. I thought of Paul's injunction to the Colossians, to not let anyone pick at them for their legitimate pleasures. I thought of something racy from Song of Solomon, but Laurence has that pleasure covered in Family Circle. Finally I turned to the longest chapter in the Bible.

David writes this: "Oh how I love Thy law! It is my rneditation all the day. Thy commandments make me wiser than enemies, for they are ever mine. I have more insight than all my teachers, For Thy testimonies are my meditation. I understand more than the aged, Because I have observed Thy precepts. I have restrained my feet from every evil way, That I may keep Thy word. I have not turned aside from Thine ordinances, For Thou Thyself has taught me. How sweet are Thy words to my taste! Yes sweeter than honey to my mouth! From Thy precepts I get understanding; Therefore I hate every false way" (Psalm 119: 97-104).

Dirty legalist. In our battles over the law of God we often see two armies arrayed against each other. On the one side are the anti-nomians, those who hate the law of God and will not have it rule over them. On the other side are those who believe the law still binds us. We legalists fight tooth and nail, (or eye and tooth) to defend this principle. But David here is not saying, "Oh Lord how binding is your law. I will meditate on its binding nature day and night. Like spinach Thy law doth make me gag as it goeth down, but it doth make my biceps bulge like unto Popeye. How useful is Thy law for the unpleasant work of my sanctification." No, David writes a love song to the law.

David's love for the law can be divided into two parts. To be sure he spends a great deal of time expressing the practical benefits of the law. It is a nice thing to be able to be wiser than one's enemies. It is a wonder to have more insight than one's teachers, to be able to teach the elders. And because His law is designed for our benefit, things just work out better. When we study the law of God we learn, for instance, not to sleep around. Sleeping around can cause disharmony in the home, poverty, and death. Knowing the law can help one avoid those unpleasant things. It restrains us from every evil way. That would be enough to prompt a nice Spirit inspired ode to the law.

But David's poem goes beyond a rehearsal of practical benefit. It breaks into a sticky sweet doxology for the law. It tastes sweet, sweeter than honey. Slather a bunch of that "Thou shalt not..." on my biscuit Lord. See I know His law is a bitter pill for me because here in His poetry my response to it is guilt. Why don't I love the law like this? Because it makes me feel like I feel right now. This is not a fun thing. And my guilt is compounded if I try to reduce Psalm 119 to a defense of the binding nature of Law. I'm not just supposed to obey it, I'm supposed to love it. And if I say all I need to do is obey it, I am neither loving it nor obeying it.

We're supposed to delight in the law of God, to find pleasure in it. And that pleasure is not restricted to the fun we sometimes have with it using it as a club against others. David doesn't say, "Oh how I love Thy law, for I find such sadistic pleasure in making others feel guilty. Thy commandments doth work so nicely as a weapon. " We're supposed to delight in it as we contemplate it in the quiet of our own minds.

David, I believe, is able to do this not just because he is more sanctified than me, but because he is able to see the reflection of God in the Law. That, more than its practical benefits, is what makes the law sweet, beautiful, able to give great pleasure. Which perhaps makes things worse. One cannot say, "I love you Lord, but Thy law is a stench in my nostrils." If the law is not sweet to us, then the Lawgiver is not sweet to us. If the law is not sweet to us, then we are still under its curse. We have no claim on the grace we claim to love.

My guess is that David is better able to see the beauty of the character of God in the law because he has studied the law with such depth. The solution then, if the law tastes like medicine to us, is to take our medicine. With each swallow the bitter will fade and the sweet will grow. As we do our work diligently we will increasingly come to do our work joyfully.