Anti-Nomian. It's a term that refers to people who believe that because of God's grace,

Christians are no longer obligated to follow His law.

Today, there is fairly frequently anti-Nomianism that has an exogetical face.

By which I mean many New Testament scholars today argue that whereas the ten commandments

were important under the Old Covenant, they are no longer significant under the New Covenant.

Is that true? Are we free from following God's law? This week on renewing your mind,

Dr. Sinclair Ferguson is walking us through an 18th century church controversy.

It was called the Merrill controversy and it caused quite a stir.

But by wrestling through these issues, the church gained a much clearer understanding of how you and I are saved.

Well, we've come now to the seventh in our series of studies where around about the halfway point,

we began to remember thinking about this ancient controversy that began in an obscure Scottish village

and rumbled on through meetings of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland,

ended up with a book that almost nobody had ever heard of, the Marrow of Modern Divinity being banned,

ministers being told they shouldn't recommend it to members of their congregation.

And some of the gospel ministers in Scotland believing that the teaching that they found there

had helped them not only to preach the gospel to offer Christ freely,

but especially helped them to wrestle through issues like legalism and anti-Nomianism.

And we were thinking in the last studies about the characteristics of legalism

and one of the things we noticed is it actually began, you remember, in the Garden of Eden.

And we've been saying that by nature, everyone now born, the children of Adam,

comes into this world as a legalist, but may respond to that legalism in two quite different ways,

may respond by more legalism, by working harder to earn the favour of God,

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