Gospel

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Grace and Law Don't Mix

Some legalists find a ready loophole to justify their mixed gospel of works and grace in their interpretation of various Scriptures. They threaten New converts with being cut off when they continue not in God's goodness, as in Romans 11:22. But what they mean by that is this: you'd better measure up to THEIR interpretation of what constitutes goodness. You can be more assured of staying saved IF you go out witnessing with our team each and every Saturday. IF you "win" at least one person to Christ per year (or other specified time period). IF you fast at least two days per month (or more frequently if you can). IF you maintain a certain appearance that meets our standards of holiness. IF you tithe all your money great and small into our collection plate, because you should support the place you're being fed first. IF you do this and IF you do that it will be proof positive that you really love Jesus and are staying on the trail that leads to heaven.

The apostle James was very practical in his definition of holiness. James 1:27 says: Pure religion and undefiled before God and the father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world. A simple, no-nonsense definition of how to properly live the Christian life. It takes the grace of God to be in the world and still remain untainted by it, but true holiness doesn't just say "don't do this", it puts feet to its love. It goes out and helps those who are suffering or in need.

But even good works can impart a false sense of superiority or security. Good deeds can be done to “be seen of men” (Matt.6:1,5). Even acts of charity can be performed out of fear, rather than springing up from the Life of Christ within. Good deeds done in the energy of the flesh nature are a slippery slope. Religious acts done to impress God can be superficial at worst, and be a source of self-sufficiency and pride even when they are performed well. Some people think they have won large numbers to Christ within a short period, and find it hard not to brag about it. But how many new "converts" say an insincere prayer just to placate a friend or relative, then six months down the road they return to the hog pen of sin and show no further interest in the things of God! What needs to be brought to people's attention is something out of fashion these days: a revelation of the awfulness of sin in the sight of God and the need for repentance. Some think that all Jesus ever focused on is love and making people feel more positive about themselves. But in Luke 13:3 He says: "Except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish."

As for fasting, it's strictly between an individual and God. No apostle ever commands the early Church to do it, yet you are free to refrain from eating if you feel a need for uninterrupted, intense prayer. A good comparison would be a soldier in the middle of a battle. If the battle heats up he doesn't usually stop and start dinner, but concentrates only on the warfare at hand. If a New Covenant believer refrains from eating for a time it should not be seen as keeping a compulsory religious ritual, otherwise that's straying back into the area of law. Regulations which have to do with "touch not, taste not, handle not" are not for the New Covenant believer (Col.2:20-23). The Kingdom of God is not meat and drink, but righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Ghost (Rom.14:17). Nowhere in the New Testament does Christ or any of the apostles ever rebuke born-again believers for failure to fast, not even in Revelation chapters 2 and 3, when Jesus rebukes several churches for things they've neglected to do. Among the seven churches of Revelation are some spiritually sick ones, including the Laodicean Church, which is often compared to the pleasure-loving, materialistic churches of today. Jesus rebukes the Laodiceans for being lukewarm toward Him, and for boasting about their riches and self-sufficiency. If ever a sorry bunch ought to be exhorted to call their wayward church to a fast this one should be it. Jesus warns them to be zealous and repent but He does not order them to fast to outwardly demonstrate their repentance, as so often happened in the Old Testament. Christ is far more interested in what is going on inside of the Laodiceans’ hearts than whether or not they skip a few meals to prove they are good religious people.

Then there's the do's and don'ts of everyday life. I was in a church where liberty in Christ was preached, but there were unspoken standards to observe, which were just short of being considered laws. Mixed bathing was improper. Jewelry was frowned on, though some of the sisters wore a wisp of makeup. Television was darkly frowned on by the pastor, and back then, you didn't even have the excuse of hooking it up to a VCR! Christmas was a no-no. The pastor's wife always kept her skirts the "proper length", not too colorful and just below the knee. If one of the young girls wore her skirts above the knee the pastor's wife hinted they should wear their skirts longer (very sensible advice). After I met my husband he said he liked me in ankle-length skirts, which suit my artistic temperament to a tee. But the pastor’s wife thought I overdid it and once again pointed to the just-below-the-knee standard. A couple of other women in the church liked the longer skirts, too, and one girl even made the pastor's wife gasp because she wore pants!

The pastor’s wife did wear her hair long (and up) for awhile, but later she “took her liberty” and wore it shorter than a lot of men do. So did her daughter. We visited many churches together as a group. One church insisted that women wear head scarves during services. In another church about half of the women wore them, the others didn’t. At our church, it made the pastor feel uncomfortable to see them because they were legalistic. But all the churches we were affiliated with frowned on alcohol of any type, though, in John Chapter 2, Jesus’ very first miracle was to turn water into wine at a wedding feast.

Some of the churches were against mixed bathing (ours was) The head scarf church saw nothing wrong with the sisters wearing swim suits in front of the brothers. It makes me wonder why some activities are virtual sins in similar churches and perfectly all right in others. Why do some churches avoid other people’s legalisms like the plague only to make up their own legalisms? Talk about a pick-and-mix bag!

To this day I wonder if the pastor of my first church ever read all the scriptures I've studied on tithing. He was the one with the formal religious education and must have come across those never-mentioned Scriptures (no other preacher ever mentioned them either). He cited literally hundreds of Scriptures from the pulpit, from both Testaments, and I would sit in the pew taking copious notes as if my spiritual life depended on it. But he definitely didn't read this Scripture which instructs a worshipper what to do with money from the sale of tithed farm produce:

Deuteronomy 14:26: And thou shalt bestow that money for whatsoever thy soul lusteth after, for oxen, or for sheep, or for wine, or for strong drink, or for whatsoever thy soul desireth: and thou shalt eat there before the Lord thy God, and thou shalt rejoice, thou and thy household.

This one verse throws a monkey wrench into the notion that it's wrong for the worshipper to eat the tithe! According to Scripture, that's all you COULD do with the true Biblical tithe. Not only did the worshipper himself eat some of the tithe, but it was also for the feeding of the Levite, the widow, the stranger and the fatherless (Deut.12:17-18;14:29). Most surprising of all is that Deuteronomy 14:26 actually encourages the worshipper to buy wine or strong drink with the tithe money! Alcohol consumption of any kind was held to be a sin in our church. To this day I wonder how our pastor, who went to Bible school and taught us out of every book in the Bible, could have skipped over those passages which don't support the modern tithing doctrine!

I don't mean to diverge from the main topic, but I get the feeling the pastor was very reluctant to differ in doctrine from the mother church in Texas. Once the pastor read this passage to us: II Thessalonians 2:1-12. Only he skipped right over verse 7 which says: "For the mystery of iniquity doth already work, only he that now letteth (restrains) will let (restrain) until he be taken out of the way. This verse occurs in the context of the future appearing of the Antichrist, explaining that Someone is acting as a Restrainer holding him back until He is taken out of the way. When the Holy Spirit in His office as Restrainer of the Antichrist is taken out with the Church at the Rapture, then the Antichrist will be free to make his appearance on the world stage.

II Thessalonians 2:7 lends support to the doctrine of the appearing of Christ for His saints at the Rapture (I Cor.15:51-53; Thes.4:13-18). God has not appointed the Church to suffer the wrath of the Tribulation Period (I Thes.5:9). The mother church in Texas did not believe the whole Church would experience a pre-tribulation Rapture. They believed that only the most spiritual saints (the firstfruits) would escape the Tribulation altogether. That speaks of earning the Rapture through works, rather than being delivered from the outpouring of God's wrath upon a sinful earth through the merits of Christ alone. Christians must take care how they build upon the foundation God began in their lives, but earning the Rapture through personal piety is inconsistent with the clear teaching of Scripture that our salvation comes only by grace through faith in Christ's finished work on Calvary (Eph.2:8-10). Good works come out of our relationship with Christ, they don't cause the relationship or earn that relationship.

Having begun our walk with Christ in the Spirit, are we then to perfect ourselves through fleshly self-effort (Galatians 3:3)? The pastor taught us that we should become strong in the faith so we would be able to stand when the Antichrist was revealed. We were to remain sober and vigilant and on the lookout for signs of Antichrist's coming as the condition of the earth deteriorated. But Scripture does not teach us to look for the emergence of Antichrist. Nowhere does the Bible give believers instructions on how to survive the Tribulation Period (e.g. storing extra food and clean water, or how to stay alive and reasonably well during the outpouring of the plagues of Revelation). Instead, the Bible teaches us to look for the Blessed Appearing of Christ for His saints (Titus 2:13).

Many believe that only the "holiest" believers will be raptured to heaven, but how small some people's idea is of how good holiness has to be to satisfy God's demands! As the heavens are higher than the earth, so much higher are God's thoughts than the thoughts of puny, petty human beings (Isa.55:8-9)! How inadequate each and every one of us are to measure up apart from abiding in Christ, our Living Vine. The branches of a grape vine don't struggle to bring forth grapes. They will produce grapes if they remain in the vine drawing life from it sap (John 15:4-5).

Some secular places of work offer insurance policies for their employees where the boss contributes some and the employee contributes the rest of the cost of the policy. That's just what a lot of Christians try to do today. They try to “match funds” with Jesus, Who alone paid the entire penalty for our sins. Legalists say: "God wants you to do YOUR part. It's not an easy ride to heaven. Christ died for you, but unless you live for Him the best way you know how, you won't make it to Glory.

One popular “Scripture” is: God helps those who help themselves. But that commonly quoted “Scripture” isn’t even in the Bible! People's best efforts at imitating Jesus just won't cut it. Jesus paid the entire price for our redemption. He shouted "It is finished!" as He gave up His last breath for you and for me on the Cross of Calvary (John 19:30). Jesus didn't say He only made the down payment and we had to make up the rest. In fact, whenever we try to impress God by keeping religious laws of any kind we have fallen from dependency on the Grace of God in Christ (Gal.5:4). Keeping a long list of do's and don'ts in order to impress God deals a death blow to true saving faith in God's one acceptable Sacrifice for sin, Christ Jesus.

In Luke 18:9-14 two men approach God in prayer. One of them is very sure God sees him as a perfect, upright, moral man who has done no wrong. Just imagine what he might say if he spoke like your everyday modern man in the street: "I thank thee, God," he starts off piously. "First off, I thank You that I'm not so bad as this wretched slob standing next to me. I fast not one, but TWO days a week, and I ALWAYS pay my tithe on time. I even surpass what the written Law actually commands us to tithe on. I tithe on my Wall Street profits. I tithe on my tulips. I even tithe on my CD collection. Just look at this sorry tax collector here who had the gall to appear in this holy place. He ought to hide his head in shame! What does HE have to offer you that I don't?" And the proud Pharisee sticks his tongue out at the poor sinner standing downwind from him.

All the sinner can do is cast himself upon the mercy of the Lord. "God, be merciful to me a sinner!" he cries. And guess who God counts as righteous in his sight? The Pharisee who goes around looking miserable and hungry twice a week for the admiration of men, or the man who has nothing to offer God except the sacrifice of a broken heart and a repentant spirit (Psalms 51:17)? It was the one who cried out to God with empty hands to receive who was granted mercy and justified rather than the one rich in his own so-called good works.

We must depend on Christ to be our all-sufficiency (I Cor.15:10; II Cor.3:5). God's shoes are way too big for any of us to fill!

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