The Law & The Gospel
16-19 Sep 2026

Can anyone really run a conference on the Law?

Paul says of the false teachers engaged in such activity,

'Certain persons, by swerving from these, have wandered away into vain discussion, desiring to be teachers of the law, without understanding either what they are saying or the things about which they make confident assertions (1 Timothy 1:6-7).'

Fair warning indeed. And it will be well taken.

The Gospel Growth Fellowship's 17th Thinking Theologically Conference will be on 'The Law and the Gospel' because

'the law is good, if one uses it lawfully' (1 Timothy 1:8),

and the fellowship is committed to the health of the Klang Valley churches

'in accordance with the gospel of the glory of the blessed God' (1 Timothy 1:11).

Today, more than 2000 years after Paul's warning and the Church having settled the issues of the Law and the Gospel many times including in the historic Protestant Reformation, we continue to struggle quietly and live dangerously. Many Christians upon reading the Old Testament for the first time wonder if we sin for not keeping the Sabbath etc, and many are further troubled by teaching that Christianity is 'incomplete' or 'better' if it practised some aspect of the Old Testament. For the most part though, most Christians view the Law as 'complex', 'peripheral' or as somewhat resolved with Biblical Theology but are not fully confident to deal with matters pertaining to the Law. Especially, Christianity in Malaysia struggles with an epidemic of Christians not caring. But our Lord taught at the Sermon on the Mount:

'Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.' (Matthew 5:17).

What is at stake is enormous - the Law as content and intent spans most of the written Bible. Critically it is our very reading and interpretation of the Scriptures that hangs in the balance with every flip of the Bible's pages. The Law is cited by both the teachers and writers of the Bible and preachers today. The Law is recited by millions of baptismal candidates and weekly on Sundays. The Law continues to influence and determine scores of denominations and church practices.

What is truly at stake of course is the goal and purpose of the entire Christian revelation - the ethics of love. For both our Lord Jesus and the teaching of the apostles stated plainly, that love is the fulfilling of the law. The entire law and the prophets in fact 'witness' to and are upheld by the Gospel (Romans 3) meaning that even our 'biblical theological' grasping of the Gospel is dependent on how we have accurately grasped the teaching of our Lord. Unless we fully comprehend the Law as Paul and the apostles did of the Lord's teaching, we are at permanent risk, a ticking theological bomb, dangerously at risk of losing the Gospel, of misunderstanding the salvation that was prepared for by the Law, and the holy living that is dependent on utilising the written Law.

Evangelicals need the apostles' theological thinking on the Gospel and the Law.

Without this clarity, Christianity remains at odds with itself, a splinter of Judaism that lurches between the licentious desires of anti-nomianism and the dark forces of legalism, a sad Frankensteinein paper mâché of jumbled ideas. As God's 'true Israel' such a pale shadow of the new man God created through his biblical revelation is not God-glorifying, a travesty of our Lord's death and resurrection.

And most importantly, Grace is in jeopardy. True Grace. The grace that reigns over Christians for their holy love which brings life to the world.

Come to Thinking Theologically Conference 2026 to face your fears, to face yourself, to be faced by the God who has given you of himself, his Son and His Spirit in His Word.