Rather than speak of a “works principle,” we ought to speak of a death principle. Paul is clear that that Old Testament was a ministry of death and that the letter kills. It was when the commandment was given that sin sprang to live and “I died” (Rom. 7:9).
The law kills stuff. That was part of its original purpose in Eden too. Tree of life. Tree of death. To fulfill the law, Jesus could not have stopped with a perfect life. He needed to be obedient unto death, even death on a cross.
I liked this post.
Yeah, but contextually doesn’t the New Testament also include a ministry of death that kills (2 Corinthians 2:15-16)? Doesn’t the Gospel kill when people reject it?
Doesn’t the Gospel kill when people accept it (Col 3:3)?
The gospel does kill, dying with Christ, but it also raises to new life. That is something that the law could not do because it was flesh, not Spirit.
In response to Michael, the gospel doesn’t kill something that’s already dead like that, it kills death.
So in the process of killing death in our bodies and souls we find that we are renewed, that the singular death blow of the Gospel to death makes the dead come alive. But the gospel itself doesn’t kill the dead man in the sense of condemnation – that is already the case under the law.
My point was was that Paul’s ministry (no less than Moses’ ministry), was also a ministry of death when people respond in unbelief. But like Moses, it’s a ministry of life to those who believe After all, the ministry of Moses was also the ministry of the Gospel (Hebrews 4:2). The whole “ministry of death/condemnation is connected to the unbelieving response of the people. Moses was not a ministry of death to Joshua or Caleb, but to those who perished in the wilderness. Similarily, Paul’s ministry was the aroma of death to those were perishing (2 Corinthians 2:15-16)