The Biggest Lie about Grace .... Law

are you rejoicing always? praying without ceasing? Never quenching the Spirit? abstaining from every appearance of evil?

I have explicitly said, several times (including the post you are responding to), that I am not. But, scripture is equally explicit in it’s statement that you and I, as Christians, can and should. There is no reason or excuse not to for any believer.

that my personal sanctification process best progresses when I live with the frequent reminders that Christ lived out perfection, absolute perfection, on my behalf; He fulfilled to the fullest and deepest meaning every single command God gave us. And now, by His gracious working in my heart, I will gaze upon Him, asking Him to show me Himself, how He did it. And ask, by His Spirit working in me, what does He want to do to express Himself through me now. I do this by abiding in Him and in His peace and power. I do this perhaps in tears at my failures, but with the comfort that I am accepted in His perfection. That no matter how sinful or sinless I may appear to myself or others, I can trust God with this process to it’s fullest extent in my life. I will not rigidly hold to my own ideas of what sanctification/Christ expression in my life should look like.

And I know that He does it inside me in such a way, that when I am before Him one day, Satan cannot accuse me that I didn’t do it. Somehow, legally, God is letting it be to my account. But then I will turn around and give all the rewards to Christ, because He did it.

that is one thing I’m trying to say.

[Chip Van Emmerik]

[Anne Sokol] If a person is really growing, they come to a point where they realized that God’s standards for the Christian are not reachable (I will explain this in a minute).

Anne,

I think you have a problem from the get-go here. It would be correct to say it is impossible to reach God’s standards on our own. However, that is not the case for the Christian. 1 Corinthians 10:13 is explicit, there is never a reason why a Christian cannot (is unable to) overcome any temptation in any given situation. The reality is that we never fully arrive at obedience in this life, but the it is just as real that God says their is no reason we cannot (are unable). We just don’t; which is a far different animal.

you have to think about this. just because God gives us commands doens’t mean he enables us to keep them. David himself, who expressed the heart God wants us to have toward His Word (to meditate d/n, to love it, delight in it, et.) even he, the man used by God to pen those words, couldn’t fulfill it perfectly.

Why did Jesus say “Lazarus, come forth!” to a dead person? The purpose of the command was not to make L expend effort in raising himself from the dead.

See, it’s what I was trying to say. Just because God gives commands and expects them, it doens’t have to follow that He will enable us to do them. There can be and are other purposes for the commands written. They show us what pleases God and what we ought to do, but they dont’ give us the power to do them.

About “trying” and “efforts,” once a person understand grace-sanctification (i dont’ konw how else to call it), then the best thing is just to pause and ask God, where is Your Spirit blowing in my life? …. if there are over 1000 commands required of us, we sure could get busy, and to a limited extent, we could do somehting. But it would be like screwing a screw into a board with a hand-held screwdriver. But going along in the Spirit’s power, where He is moving in one’s life is like screwing with a power drill. it’s like it’s not even work. Maybe it does feel like work, but you sense the Spirit’s power doing the work.

[Don Johnson]

….. But it is a fact that rules can be helpful to the growing Christian. That doesn’t mean he is sanctified by rule keeping, but rules nevertheless aid his sanctification.

Don,

There have been several good responses to the the debate. Mike Harding’s epistles have been helpful. The nature of blogs, and in this case Mark’s and Matt’s, do not lend themselves to clarity and do lend themselves to filling in between the lines. I think it would’ve been helpful from the start to better clarify whether the rules and regulations were human standards or biblical commands. I do not think it is helpful to employ rules and regulations language to biblical commands especially in light of Colossians 2:20-23

“Since you died with Christ to the elemental spiritual forces of this world, why, as though you still belonged to the world, do you submit to its rules: 21 “Do not handle! Do not taste! Do not touch!”? 22 These rules, which have to do with things that are all destined to perish with use, are based on merely human commands and teachings. 23 Such regulations indeed have an appearance of wisdom, with their self-imposed worship, their false humility and their harsh treatment of the body, but they lack any value in restraining sensual indulgence.”

If we drop the rules and regulations language it avoids the confusion that rules and regulations further sanctification even if one believes obeying biblical commands does. You say that one is not sanctified by rule keeping but that rules aid sanctification. That might be depending on how one defines “aid.” I had argued that rule keeping does not further sanctification since the One who sanctifies us is God (I Thess. 5:23) and that Christ’s perfect obedience makes possible even our imperfect obedience in which we should be making progress not through more effort or more rule keeping but as the fruit of God’s sanctifying work.

Steve

[Anne Sokol] you have to think about this. just because God gives us commands doens’t mean he enables us to keep them.

What? It means exactly that.

is that what it meant in the O.T.?

[Anne Sokol]

are you rejoicing always? praying without ceasing? Never quenching the Spirit? abstaining from every appearance of evil?

The point is not that we don’t need Christ in the process or that we can somehow be perfect in our obedience in our own strength.

The point is that we can’t divorce commands/human response from sanctification.

[Steve Davis]

If we drop the rules and regulations language it avoids the confusion that rules and regulations further sanctification even if one believes obeying biblical commands does. You say that one is not sanctified by rule keeping but that rules aid sanctification. That might be depending on how one defines “aid.” I had argued that rule keeping does not further sanctification since the One who sanctifies us is God (I Thess. 5:23) and that Christ’s perfect obedience makes possible even our imperfect obedience in which we should be making progress not through more effort or more rule keeping but as the fruit of God’s sanctifying work.

We are in agreement on what you are saying here. Where we disagree is over the part individuals play in this process.

The argument against “rule keeping” seems to be an effort to follow a new rule, “rest in Christ” or “meditate in Christ”. It is every bit as much rule-keeping as any other method.

The result, in my opinion, is a distortion of sanctification. It sounds very much like Keswick theology, but with a slightly different focus. We need the entirety of New Testament sanctification teaching, not just part of it.

[Anne Sokol]

is that what it meant in the O.T.?

You still have not dealt with 1 Corinthians 10:13. If I am misstating the meaning of the verse, explain what you think it means. If I am correctly interpreting the verse, explain how it fits with your statements that I have called into question.

Anne Sokol wrote:
you have to think about this. just because God gives us commands doens’t mean he enables us to keep them.

I have to disagree with your statement. Actually we are told in 2 Peter 1:3-11 that He has given us everything we need for godliness, now get to work! Because we are have been changed, we are to work at cultivating Godly qualities that are already ours and are increasing so we are neither useless or unfruitful in in our faith - true knowledge of God and our Lord Jesus Christ. The Bible teaches in many places that God gives us the resources to do what he asks of us, Jeremiah is a good OT example. What he doesn’t do is take away our sin nature so we always do what he asks of us.

[Don Johnson]

We are in agreement on what you are saying here. Where we disagree is over the part individuals play in this process.

The argument against “rule keeping” seems to be an effort to follow a new rule, “rest in Christ” or “meditate in Christ”. It is every bit as much rule-keeping as any other method.

The result, in my opinion, is a distortion of sanctification. It sounds very much like Keswick theology, but with a slightly different focus. We need the entirety of New Testament sanctification teaching, not just part of it.

This might be rare but I do think we are in agreement for the most part and probably not too far apart over the part of the individual. I wouldn’t argue against rule-keeping in general in its importance for order and we are not passive in our obedience. I do find the rule-keeping language clumsy if used in reference to scriptural commands. Mike Harding had mentioned how Swindoll’s view sounded like self-rule. On the flip side rule-keeping to further sanctification can sound like auto-sanctification although I don’t think it’s intended to be understood in that way. It’s possible to go over the cliff either way. Truly resting in Christ or meditating on Christ will transform our lives since Jesus said if we love him we will keep his commandments and he questions how someone can call him Lord and not do what he says.

We would probably agree that through union with Christ and indwelt by the Holy Spirit, the perfect obedience of Christ is reckoned as our own so that we stand before God both justified and sanctified by grace alone. We are progressively sanctified through the Word which is truth, empowered by the Spirit and “beholding the glory of the Lord, [we] are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another.” Our obedience is made possible by Christ’s obedience. Our active obedience, while important, is impossible apart from the Word and the Spirit which further the work of sanctification in our lives and remains always imperfect.

Let’s stop taking about rules furthering sanctification and articulate more clearly 1) the impossibility of obedience apart from Christ’s obedience and the work of the Spirit, 2)the importance of obedience out of love for the Savior, 3) the humility to accept that my effort does not produce godliness although it reflects my response to grace, 4) the exercise of care in trying to determine how far along others are in their sanctification measured by our fallible evaluation of our own, 5) and the acceptance that practical life-style choices others make that differ from ours are not necessarily disobedience to God’s commands but that we may have different lists of rules for ourselves based on our present incomplete understanding, our personal preferences, and the influences apart from Scripture which have shaped us.

[Anne Sokol]

are you rejoicing always? praying without ceasing? Never quenching the Spirit? abstaining from every appearance of evil?

It doesn’t follow that if nobody keeps rules (or the commands of the NT either) perfectly, there is therefore no value to keeping rules at all or striving for more consistent obedience at all.

I’m not sure why you are looking at it in these all-or-nothing terms.

Similarly, you raise the question later as to whether God empowers us to obey what He commands. The NT certainly encourages us to believe He does. But even if we are not fully empowered to obey 100% of the time, it doesn’t follow that we are empowered not at all or 0% of the time.

Empowered to Obey

NKJV And God is able to make all grace abound toward you, that you, always having all sufficiency in all things, may have an abundance for every good work 2 Co 9:8

as His divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us by glory and virtue, 4 by which have been given to us exceedingly great and precious promises, that through these you may be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust. 2 Pe 1:3–4

and what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to the working of His mighty power 20 which He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly places, Eph 1:19–20

To this end I also labor, striving according to His working which works in me mightily. Col 1:29

No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it. 1 Co 10:13

I think part of the appeal of this new Reformed version of let-go-let-Godism is that if we make obedience into something mystical and complicated, we are more able to excuse our lack of it. So a model of sanctification that blankets the process in fog allows me to not feel responsible for continuing sin, stagnation, etc. I’m waiting for something to happen to me at which point I’ll be changed and live better … without having to work at it.

It’s a wonderfully appealing idea (and I can hardly blame anyone for being drawn to it). It just isn’t the teaching of the NT.

[Steve Davis]

5) and the acceptance that practical life-style choices others make that differ from ours are not necessarily disobedience to God’s commands but that we may have different lists of rules for ourselves based on our present incomplete understanding, our personal preferences, and the influences apart from Scripture which have shaped us.

Too much agreeing going on out deah!

On this last point we would probably come to a difference at some point. Joel spoke of “legitimate” rules that God-ordained institutions create. (Going from memory - I know he used the word ‘legitimate’, but don’t remember exact wording of the rest of it.) Would you agree that there is such a thing as legitimate ‘rules’ or ‘standards’ or what-have-you that a church, for example, might set up? If yes, could it be that those standards are applied to practical life-style choices and adherence/non-adherence could say something about spirituality?

You might agree in theory with what I am suggesting here, but I think we might disagree in application.

[Bill] I know that we have been taught for many years that “works don’t save us.” And I do believe that. But any attempts to bifurcate faith and works leads to the exact problem we are having in this discussion. I have many friends who think that the phrase, “we are saved by faith alone” is in the Bible. When in fact it can be found no where.

Second part of that statement first. Though the phrase is not exactly “we are saved by faith alone” the meaning is exactly that….

Ro 4:5 But to him who does not work but believes on Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is accounted for righteousness,

Tt 3:5 not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit,

Ga 2:16 knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law but by faith in Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Christ Jesus, that we might be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the law; for by the works of the law no flesh shall be justified.

There’s more where that came from.

But any attempts to bifurcate faith and works leads to the exact problem we are having in this discussion.

I haven’t seen you explain yet how these verses do not teach a bifurcation of faith and works. Did I miss that? What do these verses (and the ones I quoted earlier) mean if not that we are justified by faith alone and without the presence of works?

The reason this bifurcation is not really all that relevant to the sanctification issue is because there is a huge before-and-after difference at conversion. And what is true of us before is not likely to be true after.

• Before: dead in trespasses and sins
• After: a new creation, created in Christ for good works (Eph. 2:10)
• Before: no relationship to the Spirit
• After: indwelled by the Spirit
• Before: not capable of doing good in the ultimate sense (Rom. 3)
• After: called to walk worthy of our calling (Eph. 4:1)

Say… is anyone noticing the quantity of Scripture involved in the various sides of this discussion? (Of course, the Devil can quote Scripture too, but it’s interesting how the pattern on the rules-don’t-help/obedience-is-impossible side don’t interact with Scripture much in their points.)