Let's begin by paying a quick visit to the National Gallery in Edinburgh. As soon as we enter, we climb to the first floor. If you are a frequent visitor, at the head of the stair you are more likely to turn right rather than left, as that is where all the Raphaels are to be found. But on this occasion please turn left with me. What faces you is the only significant painting to survive the Scottish Reformation, Hugo van der Goes' Trinity Altarpiece that probably owes its survival to the fact that King James III and his wife are among the figures. However, do not tarry long here, as I want instead to draw your attention to a small picture on the right from the following century by the German artist, Hans Holbein the Younger. Entitled An Allegory of the Old and New Testaments it is a most unusual composition, for the patron clearly did not trust the power of images alone to convey the truth. So, scattered across its surface are Latin tags or titles to help you get the correct meaning. At the painting's centre under a large tree is a naked human being labelled Homo (Humanity), with Isaiah and John the Baptist (also labelled) on either side of him, both pointing to the right. On that right side we can see various positive images, including Christ rising from the tomb as Victoria Nostra (our victory), while on the left two naked figures, clearly Adam and Eve, have the word Peccatum (sin) placed above their heads with a tomb nearby inside which there is a skeleton labelled Mors (death). As if to leave the viewer in no further doubt, the large tree in the middle is itself divided sharply into two. While its left hand side withers, its right is in full and vibrant leaf. By now you may well be wondering what all this has to do with the text with which I began, but look at the top of the painting and you will at last find the explanation for why I have brought you here. There are two mountains at the back of the painting. On the one on the left Moses is receiving tablets from heaven bearing the tag Lex (law), while on the right Christ is receiving the cross from an angel, while above him is written the Latin word Gratia (grace).
The painting is in fact a careful exposition of the verse with which I began: 'The law was given by Moses but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.' But it is no ordinary exposition. It is an account of how Martin Luther understood the relationship between the Old and New Testaments. God had given the law to bring us to a conviction of our own unworthiness, our own sinfulness and guilt, for it was only once we had been brought to our knees in a sense of failure and inadequacy that he believed we could properly hear the story of salvation through Christ, not something that we in any sense merited or deserved, but pure mercy, unmerited grace. Thus whereas the law was imposed on Moses and the Jews, Christ had no need to take up the cross that the little cherub is offering in Holbein's painting. It was a free decision, a purely gratuitous act of love.
In terms of the positive side of what Christ is envisaged as doing there are of course many other examples that I might have taken from art, literature, or hymns. John Newton's hymn Amazing Grace is, I'm sure, familiar to you all. Personally, I prefer one of Charles Wesley's that continues to be excluded from most Anglican hymnbooks, presumably because of its over-jaunty tune:
And can it be ....
Died he for me? Who him to death pursued?
Amazing love! How can it be
............
Tis mystery all: th'Immortal dies!
...............
Tis mercy all, immense and free,
For O my God, it found out me!
..............
I woke, the dungeon flamed with light;
My chains fell off, my heart was free,
I rose, went forth, and followed thee.
So the right-hand side of the painting certainly captures an important truth. Nonetheless, it seems to me Luther was altogether too negative about law, and indeed makes it puzzling why God should ever have introduced law in the first place, if its role was to be purely negative. Of course, the danger is that one goes to the opposite extreme, which was certainly the case with some of Calvin's followers. Calvin had disagreed with Luther, and suggested that law could play an important part in ordinary Christian life, in what he called our sanctification. But from that his followers quickly resorted to church discipline that was often frightening in its intensity, as in the notorious repentance stool that used to exist throughout Scotland, where those guilty, particularly of sexual misdemeanours, were required to be exposed to public humiliation and disgrace.
But there is a value that lies somewhere in between, and so that I want to end by noting two ways to which law or rules can contribute to the Christian life.
The first is in saving us from something much worse. I'm sure that on occasion you will all have been confronted by non-believing friends who have raised objections to the harshness of Old Testament law. And sometimes that seems exactly right. But on other occasions the objections seem based on misunderstandings. Take the famous phrase, 'An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth' (Exod 21.24 & elsewhere). It sounds harsh, and so it is. But as law it was in fact intended to eliminate something much worse, blood feuds where the basic principle is escalation, retaliation under which one pays back one's enemy but with that little bit of extra pain thrown in for good measure. No, says this law, the return must be proportionate; otherwise, it can lay no claim to justice. Nor, be it noted, can we say that this is a principle for which the modern world has no longer any need. Recall numerous wars during the twentieth century, for example in the Balkans, and you will find plenty of cases where that basic principle was violated again and again.
Nor is this saving us from something much worse just a matter of negative restraint. Running throughout the Old Testament is legislation to guarantee that the community acts to secure the welfare of the poor, the remains of the harvest gleanings left for them, for example. Long before the Welfare State came into being, Christian societies were constantly being reminded of the requirement upon them to cater for the welfare of the poorest in their midst. Of course, they were more often than not defective in that care, but nowhere does Scripture let us off the hook. As a schoolboy collecting on the doorstep for charity, I would sometimes be met with a refusal to give in the form of the adage, 'God helps them who helps themselves.' But, take note, God may be mentioned here, but nowhere is that sentiment to be found in the Bible.
Secondly, however, law and rules are not necessarily the burden they are so often portrayed to be. Continuing reversions to my childhood, I remember well singing the hymn:
Yield not to temptation
For yielding is sin.
Each victory will help you
Some other to win.
And it is true. Structures do make duties easier. Going to church every week, for example, not only makes attendance easier it also makes it more enjoyable. The prayers and the music became more easily said and sung. To given once more a personal example, when I was appointed a canon of Durham Cathedral, I was looking forward to hearing lots of Victorian and modern anthems from the choir, but I dreaded the though of all that Tudor music which I thought I must now endure but had never much liked. Seventeen years later, and my attitudes were transformed, simply because my ears had grown more accustomed to the principles involved. And that is equally true of works of charity. If you are shy, it can be a tremendous effort to volunteer to place yourself, however indirectly, in the limelight. But gradually the burden lifts, and enjoyment begins. In other words, the practice of virtue can bring its own reward, in duty now transformed into delight. And that is a secret that the Bible also knows. Think how often the law is spoken of as something in which to delight, especially in the Psalms. Indeed, the very first psalm declares: 'Blessed is the man ... whose delight is in the law of the Lord... He shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper' (1.1-3).
So do take the opportunity to look at the Holbein painting the next time you are in Edinburgh, but do not believe everything the person who commissioned it wanted you to believe. Grace and truth certainly come pre-eminently through Christ, but law too has its own part to play, and not merely by way of burden but also bringing its own distinctive joy.
Sermon by: David Brown