The Misery of Those Under the Broken Covenant
T. Boston, D. D. Galatians 3:10 For as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse: for it is written… I. WHAT THE CURSE IS WHICH MEN ARE UNDER. 1. God's curse. 2. The curse of the law. (1) the revenging wrath of God is in it. (2) A binding over of the sinner unto punishment for the satisfaction of offended justice. (3) A separating of the sinner unto destruction. II. WHAT IT IS TO BE UNDER THE CURSE. 1. Under the wrath of God. 2. Bound over to revenging justice. 3. A mark for the arrows of vengeance. III. CONFIRMATION OF THE TRUTH OF THIS DOCTRINE. 1. This is evident from plain Scripture testimony. The text is express. 2. It is evident from the consideration of the justice of God, as the Sovereign of the world.Two things will make this clear. 1. The breaking of that covenant, whereof all under it are guilty, deserves the curse. They broke it in Adam, and they are breaking it every day; and so they deserve the curse. Now, sin's deserving of the curse does not arise from the threatening of eternal wrath annexed for a sanction to the commands in the law, as our new divinity would have it; that is framed for bringing believers under the curse of the law too. But it arises from sin's contrariety to the command of the holy law; for it is manifest, that sin does not therefore deserve a curse, because a curse is threatened against it; but because it deserves a curse, therefore a curse is threatened. Now look at sin in the glass of the holy commandment, and you will see it deserves the curse. For the commandment is — (1) An image of the sovereign spotless holiness of God — "The law is holy" (Romans 7:12). When God would let out the beams of His own holiness to man, He gave him the law of the ten commandments, as a transcript of it, and wrote them in his heart; and afterwards, the writing being much defaced, He wrote them to him in His Word. So the commandment is holy without spot, as God is. So that the creature rising up against the commandment, riseth up against God. (2) It is an image of His righteousness and equity, whereby He does justly to all: "The commandment is just" (Romans 7:12). The commandment is all right in every part, and of perpetual equity" I esteem all Thy precepts concerning all things to be right" (Psalm 119:128). Look to it as it prescribes our duty to God, to our neighbour, and to ourselves (Titus 2:12). It is of spotless and perfect righteousness, as that God is whose righteous nature and will it represents. (3) An image of His goodness The commandment is good (Romans 7:12). It is all lovely, lovely in every part; lovely in itself, and in the eyes of all who are capable to discern truly what is good, and what evil — "O how I love Thy law!" (Psalm 119:97). Conformity to it is the perfection of the creature, and its true happiness, as rendering the creature like unto God (1 John 3:2). Thus the breaking of the covenant, by doing contrary to the holy commandment, is the transgressing of the holy, just, and good will of our sovereign Lord; a defacing of and doing violence to His image, who is the chief good and infinite good. Therefore sin is the chief or greatest evil, and consequently deserves the curse. 2. Since it deserves the curse, the justice of God, which gives everything its due, ensures the curse upon it (Genesis 18:25; 2 Thessalonians 1:6). If sin did not lay the sinner under the curse, how would the rectoral justice of God appear? He will rain a terrible storm on the wicked, not because He delights in the death of the sinner, but because He loves righteousness (Psalm 11:6, 7), and His righteousness requires it. 3. It appears from the threatening of the covenant — "In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die" (Genesis 2:17). And the truth of God requires that it take effect, and be not like words spoken to the wind. 4. If man had once run the course of His obedience, being come to the last point of it, he behoved to have been justified and adjudged to eternal life, according to the tenor of the covenant — "The man which doth those things shall live by them" (Romans 10:5); the sentence of the law would immediately have passed in his favour, according to the promise. And therefore man, having once broken the covenant, falls under the curse, and is adjudged to eternal death; for the curse bears the same relation to the threatening that law-justification bears to the promise. 5. Christ's being made a curse for sinners is a clear evidence of sinners being naturally under the curse. (T. Boston, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: For as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse: for it is written, Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them. WEB: For as many as are of the works of the law are under a curse. For it is written, "Cursed is everyone who doesn't continue in all things that are written in the book of the law, to do them."