“Do we then nullify the law through faith? Absolutely not! Instead we uphold the law” (Romans 3:31 NET).
After reading through portions of Romans chapter two, some of the initial recipients of this epistle might have wondered if the Old Testament law was still relevant. Nevertheless, the Apostle Paul’s contention that “…we uphold the law” should not have come as a surprise. We can validate this idea with a few quick observations.
First, Paul alluded to this conclusion earlier in this chapter in saying, “But now the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets, even the righteousness of God, through faith in Jesus Christ, to all and on all who believe…” (Romans 3:21-22).
A person with a good working knowledge of the Mosaic Law could also point to Abraham’s example in Genesis 15:6: “…he believed in the Lord, and He accounted it to him for righteousness.” Paul will have much more to say about that aspect of Abraham’s life in the following chapter.
Furthermore, God is an impartial judge who refuses to invalidate or disregard the law for the benefit of those who have disobeyed it. Instead, He upholds the law by personally fulfilling its demands in the Person of His Son. That brings us to a specific aspect of the law’s purpose…
“Therefore the law was our tutor to bring us to Christ, that we might be justified by faith” (Galatians 3:24).
So, faith upholds the law by fulfilling one of its primary objectives. The law fulfills that objective whenever we acknowledge our inability to uphold its commandments and subsequently place our faith in Christ. One commentator has drawn a connection between this concept and Jesus’ own evaluation of His relationship to the law…
“His concluding thought is that justification by faith does not make void the Law of God. The Law of faith by which God justifies Jew and Gentile, establishes the Law of God. His concluding statements about the Law are an echo of the words of his Lord, Who told us on that mountaintop in Galilee that He had not come to destroy the Law or the Prophets, but to fulfill the essence of what the Law and the Prophets teach us (Matthew 5:17).” (1)
In this manner, “Justification by faith alone honors the law, because prior to Jesus Christ no one ever honored the law by perfectly keeping it. Since the Lord Jesus did, faith in the finished work of Christ on Calvary brings the ultimate respect to the law.” (2)
(1) Dick Woodward, Mini Bible College Booklet Twenty-Nine The Book Of Romans Verse By Verse (part one). Pg.30. https://mbc.icm.org/
(2) Edward E. Hindson and Woodrow Michael Kroll, eds., KJV Bible Commentary (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1994), 2223.