Legalism

Introduction

Last May, discussion here at SI about Heritage Christian School in Findlay, OH and the senior who chose a public high school prom over his own graduation ceremony revealed a rift on the issue of legalism. The majority were certainly comfortable with the rule against students attending a high school prom. But some thought such rules were legalistic.

Editor’s Note: This article is reprinted by permission from Getting Somewhere.

Hi, I’m Brent. And I am a recovering legalist. I’m looking for a support group for people like me.

I grew up in a Christian home, had parents who loved me and loved God. I went to church every Sunday, learned all the stories, gave my offerings—even went off to a Christian college. And I loved God—and I still do. But I had a problem— legalism. I didn’t know it was a problem, at least not for a long time.

I was addicted to “the list.” The list was made up of all the things that you were supposed to do and not supposed to do if you wanted to keep God happy with you. Most of the things on the list were good things—some of them even came right out of the Bible. But some of them didn’t. They were passed along to me from several sources, but mostly from the traditions of the church. Since I am not much of a rebel by nature, I had no problem with keeping the list. The problem was what the list did to my Christianity. It became way too much about performance, and not enough about reality. And “spirituality” became more of an issue of conformity than obedience.

And the list led to “the line.” The line was somewhere on the list. When a person kept enough of the list to make it to the line, he could feel good about himself, and about his supposed relationship with God. By measuring up to the line, a person could feel like he was good with God. And he could also feel like he was better than others. Think of it as spiritual arrogance.