Posted on 04/08/2014 9:31:13 AM PDT by Gamecock
One of the most amazing statements by the Apostle Paul is his indictment of the Galatian Christians for abandoning the Gospel. “I am amazed that you are so quickly deserting Him who called you by the grace of Christ, for a different gospel,” Paul declared. As he stated so emphatically, the Galatians had failed in the crucial test of discerning the authentic Gospel from its counterfeits.
His words could not be more clear: “But even if we, or an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel contrary to what we have preached to you, he is to be accursed! As we have said before, so I say again now, if any man is preaching to you a gospel contrary to what you have received, he is to be accursed!” [Gal. 1:6-7]
This warning from the Apostle Paul, expressed in the language of the Apostle’s shock and grief, is addressed not only to the church in Galatia, but to every congregation in every age. In our own day — and in our own churches — we desperately need to hear and to heed this warning. In our own time, we face false gospels no less subversive and seductive than those encountered and embraced by the Galatians.
In our own context, one of the most seductive false gospels is moralism. This false gospel can take many forms and can emerge from any number of political and cultural impulses. Nevertheless, the basic structure of moralism comes down to this — the belief that the Gospel can be reduced to improvements in behavior.
Sadly, this false gospel is particularly attractive to those who believe themselves to be evangelicals motivated by a biblical impulse. Far too many believers and their churches succumb to the logic of moralism and reduce the Gospel to a message of moral improvement. In other words, we communicate to lost persons the message that what God desires for them and demands of them is to get their lives straight.
In one sense, we are born to be moralists. Created in God’s image, we have been given the moral capacity of conscience. From our earliest days our conscience cries out to us the knowledge of our guilt, shortcomings, and misbehaviors. In other words, our conscience communicates our sinfulness.
Add to this the fact that the process of parenting and child rearing tends to inculcate moralism from our earliest years. Very quickly we learn that our parents are concerned with our behavior. Well behaved children are rewarded with parental approval, while misbehavior brings parental sanction. This message is reinforced by other authorities in young lives and pervades the culture at large.
Writing about his own childhood in rural Georgia, the novelist Ferrol Sams described the deeply-ingrained tradition of being “raised right.” As he explained, the child who is “raised right” pleases his parents and other adults by adhering to moral conventions and social etiquette. A young person who is “raised right” emerges as an adult who obeys the laws, respects his neighbors, gives at least lip service to religious expectations, and stays away from scandal. The point is clear — this is what parents expect, the culture affirms, and many churches celebrate. But our communities are filled with people who have been “raised right” but are headed for hell.
The seduction of moralism is the essence of its power. We are so easily seduced into believing that we actually can gain all the approval we need by our behavior. Of course, in order to participate in this seduction, we must negotiate a moral code that defines acceptable behavior with innumerable loopholes. Most moralists would not claim to be without sin, but merely beyond scandal. That is considered sufficient.
Moralists can be categorized as both liberal and conservative. In each case, a specific set of moral concerns frames the moral expectation. As a generalization, it is often true that liberals focus on a set of moral expectations related to social ethics while conservatives tend to focus on personal ethics. The essence of moralism is apparent in both — the belief that we can achieve righteousness by means of proper behavior.
The theological temptation of moralism is one many Christians and churches find it difficult to resist. The danger is that the church will communicate by both direct and indirect means that what God expects of fallen humanity is moral improvement. In so doing, the church subverts the Gospel and communicates a false gospel to a fallen world.
Christ’s Church has no option but to teach the Word of God, and the Bible faithfully reveals the law of God and a comprehensive moral code. Christians understand that God has revealed Himself throughout creation in such a way that He has gifted all humanity with the restraining power of the law. Furthermore, He has spoken to us in His word with the gift of specific commands and comprehensive moral instruction. The faithful Church of the Lord Jesus Christ must contend for the righteousness of these commands and the grace given to us in the knowledge of what is good and what is evil. We also have a responsibility to bear witness of this knowledge of good and evil to our neighbors. The restraining power of the law is essential to human community and to civilization.
Just as parents rightly teach their children to obey moral instruction, the church also bears responsibility to teach its own the moral commands of God and to bear witness to the larger society of what God has declared to be right and good for His human creatures.
But these impulses, right and necessary as they are, are not the Gospel. Indeed, one of the most insidious false gospels is a moralism that promises the favor of God and the satisfaction of God’s righteousness to sinners if they will only behave and commit themselves to moral improvement.
The moralist impulse in the church reduces the Bible to a codebook for human behavior and substitutes moral instruction for the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Far too many evangelical pulpits are given over to moralistic messages rather than the preaching of the Gospel.
The corrective to moralism comes directly from the Apostle Paul when he insists that “a man is not justified by the works of the Law but through faith in Christ Jesus.” Salvation comes to those who are “justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the Law; since by the works of the Law no flesh will be justified.” [Gal. 2:16]
We sin against Christ and we misrepresent the Gospel when we suggest to sinners that what God demands of them is moral improvement in accordance with the Law. Moralism makes sense to sinners, for it is but an expansion of what we have been taught from our earliest days. But moralism is not the Gospel, and it will not save. The only gospel that saves is the Gospel of Christ. As Paul reminded the Galatians, “But when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the Law, so that He might redeem those who were under the Law, that we might receive the adoption as sons.” [Gal. 4:4-5]
We are justified by faith alone, saved by grace alone, and redeemed from our sin by Christ alone. Moralism produces sinners who are (potentially) better behaved. The Gospel of Christ transforms sinners into the adopted sons and daughters of God.
The Church must never evade, accommodate, revise, or hide the law of God. Indeed, it is the Law that shows us our sin and makes clear our inadequacy and our total lack of righteousness. The Law cannot impart life but, as Paul insists, it “has become our tutor to lead us to Christ, so that we may be justified by faith.” [Gal. 3:24]
The deadly danger of moralism has been a constant temptation to the church and an ever-convenient substitute for the Gospel. Clearly, millions of our neighbors believe that moralism is our message. Nothing less than the boldest preaching of the Gospel will suffice to correct this impression and to lead sinners to salvation in Christ.
Hell will be highly populated with those who were “raised right.” The citizens of heaven will be those who, by the sheer grace and mercy of God, are there solely because of the imputed righteousness of Jesus Christ.
Moralism is not the gospel.
Never confuse your justification with your sanctification.
IOW, the Gospel brings you to Christ, the Gospel saves you. Then you become more and more Christ-like. Or Biblically moral.
We had a moralist serman from the pulpit of my Baptist church last week. I made me squirm because I was very uncomfortable with the logical conclutions his sermon supported.
He got a bigger than usual group coming to the alter to pray, though.
I like the people at my church, but they are serious tea totalers and seem to consider drinking to be an unpardonable sin. Meanwhile, I have a full bar at home and am in two bar bands. The first “bar band” I ever joined was an interesting lot. I was the lone non-mormon.
People will “commit” to some behavior they can support. Sad because that won’t save them.
Last week during adult sunday school we were studying Proverbs. After a while I just couldn’t resist. I told the class that Proverbs is not about salvation. Solomon was the equivalent of a Brian Tracy or Zig Ziegler of his day, except he was the original author of the message that the modern guys just repackage into modern language and examples.
And, of course, Solomon got it from God.
But it’s about living a better, happier and more fruitful life. Salvation is something else again. It’s a different message.
Yeah, the funny part is that a lot of them are tobacco growers and a LOT of them smoke. ;-)
Years ago, I heard a preacher say that Proverbs isn't about "right and wrong", it's about "smart and foolish". The message stuck, and that's how I've viewed it ever since. God doesn't just tell us how to be saved - He tells us how to not act like idiots.
Repentance is from unbelief, to belief! We must understand we are sinners, are doomed as a result, and only Jesus can save us. After that, sanctification kicks in, but we remain sinners until death, some worse than others.
Or so I learned in seminary.
Exactly. That’s my take on it as well.
Unbelief, e.g. blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, is the only unpardonable, as I bet you already know.
Drinking is not a sin, in fact, Jesus' first miracle was to make wine. He was accused as a wine-bibber in his own day by those with the same pharasaical attitude. Not much has changed.
I just love the whole "The wine was unfermented" and "My Jesus was not a bartender" arguments.
That said, drunkeness is a sin, and the best way to avoid it is to... tee-total. (actually is is T for Total (abstinence)). Sometimes I wish I was a T-Totaller
Sheesh. You sound like me. ;-)
BTW, in my first church (tea totalling), a fairly large AG congregation (two services with about 800 people in each) the pastor was reading a new testament scripture and as he completed a sentence with the word “wine” in it, he stopped and looked up at the congregation and said (and I paraphrase from memory”, “Folks, the greek word means fermented wine, not grape juice.” and then looks down and keeps reading. I thought it was pretty funny.
Reminds me of all the stuff I heard and believed in the 80’s while a new believer. The “eye of a needle” is some narrow passage in some un-named part of the earth was another one.
Yep, let God be true and every man a liar.
1 peter 1
24 For all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of grass. The grass withereth, and the flower thereof falleth away:
25 But the word of the Lord endureth for ever. And this is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you.
Cause Jesus turned water into grape juice and saved the best grape juice until last.
The Gospel of Christ transforms sinners into the adopted sons and daughters of God.
This is a common, but wrong statement. The human born in sin is not made a child of God by adoption. God only accepts as children those who are re-generated, born of the Spirit, a newly born Spiritual babe in the old carnal husk, whose task will be to overcome the old sinful nature through yielding that old self to God.
The adoption, that is the redemption of the body, is counted as being received as a consequence of new birth, but has not yet been received by any redeemed soul.
To say that one has become a child of God by adoption is quite wrong in concept, and a wrong explanation of how that relationship to The God has been established, and should not be preached as part of the Gospel.
Cause Jesus turned water into grape juice and saved the best grape juice until last.
Dang. I’m gettin’ a hankerin’ for some two buck Chuck.
How can you tell a Catholic from a Baptist?
A Catholic will wave back at you in the liquor store.
You don't have to make it personal about me.
Where I live, the Catholic counties are wet and the baptist ones are either dry or “moist”. I live on the edge of a Baptist county right next to the county made famous by Copperhead Road and the book “Cornbread Mafia”. I have several liquor stores nearby. Sadly, all the tax revenue goes to another county.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.