I Once Was Alive
without the Law

How awful the state I was in,
When Satan's proud vassal I stood,
Bound fast in the fetters of sin,
Rejecting salvation by blood:

On self my dependence was laid,
I thought myself holy and free,
Till Sinai its terrors displayed,
And drove me, dear Jesus, to Thee.

Thus stripped by the precept at last,
A debtor insolvent I am;
My sins, both the present and past,
Were paid in the blood of the Lamb;

From hence this conclusion I draw,
With gospel assurance, that he
Whose heart was ne're broke by the law,
No sweets in the gospel can see.

John Kent

Romans 7:9 For I was alive without the law once: but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died.

Galatians 3:23-26 But before faith came, we were kept under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed. Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith. But after that faith is come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster. For ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus.

background and graphics by Mary Stephens
vintage graphic: unknown source
Published 2021, CA