⚖ Law & Sanctification

Overview

WCF XIX–XXII handles the law (XIX), Christian liberty and liberty of conscience (XX), religious worship and the Sabbath day (XXI), and lawful oaths and vows (XXII). The Larger Catechism Q. 91–151 exposits the Decalogue in extraordinary detail — sixty questions on the law alone, treating each commandment positively (what it requires) and negatively (what it forbids). WCF XIX establishes the tripartite division of the law (moral, judicial, ceremonial) and the perpetual obligation of the moral law on all persons. WCF XXI codifies the regulative principle of worship and the change of the Sabbath from the seventh to the first day of the week, kept holy from the Creation to the Resurrection on the seventh day, and from the Resurrection to the end of the world on the first day.

Philosophical significance

The Westminster doctrine of the law is the most fully developed Protestant moral theology of the seventeenth century, and the Larger Catechism's exposition of the Decalogue is its most striking achievement. The law has three uses (Calvin's *triplex usus*) — civil, pedagogical, and normative for the regenerate — and the third use is made central to sanctification (WCF XIX.5–6). The Sabbath is treated as a creation ordinance (perpetually moral), with its day changed to the Lord's Day (XXI.7) — the strict-Sabbatarian position that became the spine of Reformed piety on both sides of the Atlantic.

Scriptural ground

WCF XIX is grounded in Romans 5:12–19, Galatians 3:10, James 2:10–11, Matthew 5:17–19, Romans 13:8–10, and Hebrews 9–10. The Sabbath chapter (XXI.7–8) is grounded in Genesis 2:2–3, Exodus 20:8–11, Isaiah 58:13, Revelation 1:10, Acts 20:7, 1 Corinthians 16:1–2, and Matthew 12:1–13.

Key controversies

• The third use of the law — Antinomians (Crisp, the Familists) had pressed sola fide so hard that the law's normative use for the regenerate was either denied or attenuated. WCF XIX.5–6 secures the third use: 'The moral law doth for ever bind all, as well justified persons as others, to the obedience thereof…although true believers be not under the law as a covenant of works, to be thereby justified or condemned, yet is it of great use to them, as well as to others.'
• The strict Sabbath — Continental Reformed theology generally allowed more lenience on the Lord's Day. Westminster codified the strict English-Puritan position: 'whole time' to be 'kept holy unto the Lord' (XXI.8), 'observing an holy rest all the day from their own works, words, and thoughts about their worldly employments and recreations,' apart from works of necessity and mercy. The Westminster Sabbath became the defining mark of English- and Scottish-Reformed piety.
• Good works and merit — WCF XVI carefully threads between Rome and the antinomians: good works are 'the fruits and evidences of a true and lively faith' (XVI.2), they 'cannot make satisfaction for the debt of our former sins' (XVI.5), they are 'accepted in him' though not 'in their own nature' (XVI.6), and 'works done by unregenerate men' though 'commanded by God' are sinful 'because they proceed not from an heart purified by faith' (XVI.7).