Wesley Corpus

6. But to return. The law of God (speaking after the manner of men) is a copy of the eternal mind, a transcript of the divine nature: Yea, it is the fairest offspring of the everlasting Father, the brightest efflux of his essential wisdom, the visible beauty of the Most High. It is the delight and wonder of cherubim and seraphim, and all the company of heaven, and the glory and joy of every wise believer, every well-instructed child of God upon earth. III. 1. Such is the nature of the ever-blessed law of God. I am, in the Third place, to show the properties of it: -- Not all; for that would exceed the wisdom of an angel; but those only which are mentioned in the text. These are three: it is holy, just, and good. And, First, the law is holy. 2. In this expression the Apostle does not appear to speak of its effects, but rather of its nature: As St. James, speaking of the same thing under another name, says, "The wisdom from above" (which is no other than this law, written in our heart) "is first pure" (Jas. 3.17;) agnh, -- chaste, spotless; eternally and essentially holy. And, consequently, when it is transcribed into the life, as well as the soul, it is (as the same Apostle terms it, Jas. 1:27) qrhskeia kaqara kai amiantos, -- pure religion and undefiled; or, the pure, clean, unpolluted worship of God. 3. It is, indeed, in the highest degree, pure, chaste, clean, holy. Otherwise it could not be the immediate offspring, and much less the express resemblance, of God, who is essential holiness. It is pure from all sin, clean and unspotted from any touch of evil. It is a chaste virgin, incapable of any defilement, of any mixture with that which is unclean or unholy. It has no fellowship with sin of any kind: For "what communion hath light with darkness" As sin is, in its very nature, enmity to God, so his law is enmity to sin.