The Christian's Rule of Duty

It's certainly a mystery.

As mere men (uh, and women too), we were incapable of keeping and obeying God's law for numerous reasons. One being that we couldn't really understand it as God intended. Even when we tried to interpret in a literal sense.

Now as Christians, we still cannot obey God's law in it's entirety because we suffer from indewelling sin and corruption.

As a result of our substitutionary atonement, we aren't under the law. For the law is intended to convict and to kill all those who oppose it.

However, as a result of our union in Christ, we are called to keep this portion of scripture, as with others, upon our hearts and minds that we might not sin against God.

We do this, not out of a need for salvation, but out of love and duty for our creator. Also, our consistency here, and our outward love towards one another manifests that we do indeed believe in Christ and place our confidence upon him.

What drastically separates us from those who would oppose such a view is that we must be content to police ourselves. They, on the other hand, do not police themselves. Instead, they wish to legislate their own notion of standards and self-righteousness upon the rest of society. Ironic when you think about it.

I think that the secret to avoiding legalism is in that little phrase "and he delights therein." Yes, obedience is the Christian's duty. However, it becomes legalism when the only reason we do it is because it is our duty. I am reminded of Piper's illustration of bringing his wife flowers. She tells him, "You shouldn't have." He then responds, "Don't worry about it, it's my duty!" It is true that husbands have a duty to love their wives, but how would any wife feel if her husband only loved her because "he had to." We escape the circle of legalism when we do our duty because nothing makes us happier than doing it.

Exactly. It boils down to heart motive.

I get alot more e-mails then I do people willing to comment here. Sometimes my posts are responses to several e-mails that I have gotten that have the same question or idea or even heretical thought, etc. I do understand that there are those that prefer not to post publicly. But I cannot answer every e-mail that comes my way. This would become a full-time job if I did that... and I already have the best full-time job around! :-)
I do appreciate the people that post publicly and e-mail privately. They cause me to dig deeper into the Word of Truth.

I have been asked how I find the time to write and run a blog and respond, etc. with 6 kids as I homeschool them. I seriously have "more hours in my day" for these top 2 reasons... I do not watch much TV and I do not do for my children what they are capable of doing for themselves.

It is a joy for me to have people leave comments here who are not afraid to "speak" the truth in love, to expound more clearly on what was written in the post, to correct error, to challenge my thinking. So, thank you!!! And of course... to God be ALL the glory!!!

Lisa

Lisa,

I would suggest that not all forms of legalism are the result of impure heart motives. There is a form of legalism that I see occur in many new believers. They become enraptured with God's law and seek to obey it faithfully. In the process of that they recognize their weakness in an area and put up hedges that go beyond Scripture. For instance someone who has a problem with television might remove it from their house in order to avoid temptation. The problem comes when they then elevate this hedge to the level of God's law for themselves or others. Rather than being seen as an application of the law it becomes part of it. This is not always a problem of the heart but often a case of misinformed zeal. They go from saying "It really helped me with such and such to get rid of my television" to "You OUGHT to get rid of your television." In the life of a new believer this will go away as they come to better understand the role of God's law. Sadly, many churches encourage this behavior from the pulpit rather than refocusing the zeal into more biblical channels.

Bob

Thank you Bob. Excellent insight that is much appreciated. I am sure the 10 or so people that have e-mailed me about this will appreciate your contribution to this as well.

Zeal boils down to motive in the end. Their heart motive in that zeal is likely genuine, though in essence legalistic, as portrayed in your illustration. I especially like your statement regarding refocusing that zeal into more Biblical channels.
This makes me think of the SBC and their alcohol ban. Though I can understand it... But, like I recently posted from Luther titled A Disease Not Properly Diagnosed where Luther says, "We must not…reject [or] condemn anything because it is abused... wine and women bring many a man to misery and make a fool of him (Ecclus. 19:2; 31:30); so we kill all the women and pour out all the wine... indeed, if we want to drive away our worst enemy, the one who does us the most harm, we shall have to kill ourselves, for we have no greater enemy than our own heart, as the prophet, Jer. 17, says, “The heart of man is crooked,” ... And so on - what would we not do?”

Well, what should we NOT do? is clear in the Word. May we not add or take away from it to fit our finite picture of what obedience entails. One of those things that is illucid: women preaching is not ordained by God. I like what Capoccia wrote to me awhile back.

This reminds me of Romans 10