This is definitely one instance where following all the rules can pay off, but let me ask you, have you, or do you know someone who has followed the plans completely, no cheating…ever!? Their entire life!? It’s good to have a plan until you stop following it!
Following a list of rules and regulations can make our journey easier at times, but when it comes to choosing a list of rules over following Christ it becomes “legalism”. What exactly is legalism?
The best definition I could find was, pursuing “good works” with the intention of earning God’s favor. John Piper explained it this way: “The essence of legalism is when faith is not the engine of obedience”. Essentially, when we work toward earning God’s favor, we are not choosing to walk in faith. Instead, our actions seem to convey that we believe it’s all about “faith plus works”. Jesus’ work wasn’t enough, and therefore we must work to somehow gain God’s approval.
I was taught this growing up until someone showed me Ephesians 2:8-9, “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast.” These two verses tell us that there is nothing we could ever do to earn God’s favor and therefore, there is also nothing we can do to loose it. That’s freeing!
“It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery!”- Galatians 5:1
Jesus came to set us free! We discovered in the Old Testament that the Israelites were forever breaking The Law and choosing to follow other gods and other ways, and God promised, “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you,” the Lord promised. “I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws” (Ezek. 36:26–27).
The first evidence of this new heart, or the Spirit’s presence in our life, is that we will have a deep love for God and desire to please Him, BUT will we obey Him and His commands completely?
No. In this life, even the holiest have not been perfect. No believer is completely pure, but we now possess the beginnings of purity. Each of us, once we accept Christ, we posses the beginning of, “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control…”(Gal 5:22-23). These "fruits of the Spirit" are evidences of who is now large and in charge in our life.
Each day of our Christian life we are offered fresh opportunities for the life that God has begun in you to grow stronger; along with the promise that when you stand in the presence of God, what He has begun in you will be complete (Phil. 1:6).
We have the freedom to know we’ll never be perfect this side of heaven, but we’ve been given the freedom to journey through this life with a Friend who will promises to stick closer than a brother and has the power to perfect what God began in you!