The law required perfect obedience and pronounced a death sentence
on any who broke it. Paul tells us that "the wages of sin is death..." (Romans 6:23).
Consider, for a moment the penalty that each of us brought on ourselves
by sin. It isn't purgatory or hell, or some other place or state of
being or consciousness (request or download our free booklet Heaven
and Hell: What Does the Bible Really Teach?). It is death -eternal
oblivion, a nothingness, a total blotting out of existence from which
we could never escape were it not for God's promise of the resurrection.
Paul continues in Romans 6:23, "...But the gift of God is eternal
life in Christ Jesus our Lord." Since we all sin, the law can only demand
our death. It has no provision for giving us eternal life. So how could
anyone hope for life beyond the grave?
Jesus also fulfilled the law in the sense that He met the law's requirement
by paying the penalty each of us incurred for disobedience, which is
death. Jesus, who never sinned, never brought on Himself the death penalty
that was required by the law. But as Creator of humankind and our perfect
sacrifice for sin, He was able to satisfy the law's demands that required
our death. Thus He "put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself" (Hebrews 9:26). Having "washed us from our sins in His own blood" (Revelation 1:5), Jesus makes it possible for us to receive God's gift of eternal
life.
