Legalism?

So last night Brian, one of my roommates, read a quote about legalism. Something I thought I once was in deep with but had overcome. Then this morning, I was reading my Bible, and the thought popped into my head, "You need to define and figure out legalism." But it wasn't involved with where I was reading just random, so i dismissed it and kept reading. Then today during the illustrations class, we had to define abstract terms or churchy terms using illustrations and guess what. . . my group got legalism. No one could really think of it, Ed defined it and all of a sudden I had it. I thought it was ironic 3 times in a day and a half. Then during our "Discipline of Silience" time (aka alone time with God), I started writing down some analogies from this class and the one I wrote most about . . . legalism. I just got off the phone with a friend where the idea came up and I tried to explain it, but it was like I was wearing glasses and didn't need to. The ideas and thoughts are right in front of me, but I just can't see it. I need to write it down and out and do some research on it. (One thing I've found I need to do is journal or write, thats how I put thoughts together and how God speaks to me, and thats what Satan doesn't want me to do, so here I am writing.) I'm going to write about Legalism, and what I know about it and the research I've found. I'm not saying this is the Gospel truth.

Legalism Illustration:

Legalism is like a big coorperate office where you have to be at work at 9:oo.00 A.M. on the dot, no excuses. Very strict. You sit at your cubical, everything formal, gray. You sit there until Noon and leave for lunch. You must be back by 1:00.00 pm and not a second later. If you are late you get your head chewed off. You have your parking space where you and only you can park. You work must be completed and perfect, no typos or stray marks. You work by yourself because only you are in charge of your work. You wear a black or blue suit and tie every day. You must look professional. One small slip up of parking, tardiness, dress, work, or bathroom attendance and you're back in the mail room, starting from the bottom working your way up.

To me Legalism seems to be tied very close to the Law in the Old Testament that the Jews were so caught up in preserving. They didn't understand grace. Dang, I just realized thats what I've been reading in Romans. Like the first 3.5 or 4 chapters is proving how you can't do it by yourself and can't do it by the law. But Paul doesn't stop there, he shows us how no matter how much we try and follow the law, we can't make it, but he also goes on to prove how we can make it. How Christ made a way for us. Grace.  (Grace (as defined in the back of my bible) - God's free and unmerited favor for sinful humanity. or "getting what we don't deserve.") But back to the Law and it's Legalistic comparisons, one website noted the purpose of the law in Galatians 3:24 "So the law was put in charge to lead us to Christ that we might be justified by faith."

I feel like thats where a lot of churches get stuck in. We see ourselves as pitiful worthless sinners who will never amount to anything. But thats not what the Bible says. I heard once (haven't checked it out to prove it for myself yet) that not once in the new testaments are believers called sinners. Thats not who we are anymore. Paul says he was one of the worst sinners. Note that he was. But in 2 Corinth 5:17 it says we are a "new creation; the old has gone, the new has come." It doesn't say God took a sinner and slapped a fresh coat of paint on them. He made us something new.. . . . . . I think I'm getting off track. All serious and valid points, but I should get back to legalism. 

The way I understand it is Legalism is almost borderline religion. It's admitting all the facts, but letting your actions become religious. Legalism seems like its like "You have to read your bible 30 minutes a day, and pray 15 min, and talk to at-least 3 people a week about Jesus." Don't get me wrong I think those things are great, and I think it's very important to set goals and even vocalize them, but the key word in that sentence is the second one, HAVE. As soon as you force these things, its like its a religion. You have to do these so many things to get closer to God.  God's more into relationships. God wants you to come to Him and seek Him because you love Him. True, some days you don't feel like you love Him, or you don't want to seek him and you do you have to force yourself to do it. Like Paul says he has to "beat [his] body and make it [his] slave" 1corth9.27- He's talking about running the race, but I've had to chose to worship God or chose to serve him or chose to get up and go when my body didn't want to and my emotions didn't want to.  But I think we kind of sell Christianity at churches as legalism. "If you read your bible and you pray and blah blah blah." Grant it those things are important and the best things you can do, but you shouldn't do it because you think you HAVE to or God won't love you.  If you think, that check out Romans 5:8. 

Ooooh. Here's the quote from Brian's book called "UnChristian" by David Kinnaman and Gabe Lyons. "Embracing truth without holding grace in tension leads to harsh legalism, just as grace without truth devolves to compromise." 

^ I think sometimes as the Church, we fight so hard not to compromise that we make it legalistic. It's a hard balance to find, but we need to be aware that we're off balance.

Here's an excerpt from a website I found and liked.  

www.gotquestions.org/Bible-Christian-legalism.html

"The word legalism does not occur in the Bible. It is a term Evangelical Christians use to describe a doctrinal position emphasizing a system of rules and regulations, in achieving both salvation and spiritual growth. Legalists believe that strict literal adherence to those rules and regulations is demanded. Doctrinally, it is a position essentially opposed to grace. Those who hold a legalistic position may even fail to see the real purpose for the law, especially the purpose of the Old Testament Law of Moses, which is to be our "schoolmaster" or "tutor" to bring us to Christ.

Concerning one's dispotion, legalism is opposed to being gracious, and even so believers can be legalistic. We are instructed, rather, to be gracious to one another: "Accept him whose faith is weak, without passing judgement on disputable matters" (Romans 14:1). Sadly, there are those who feel so strongly about their eschatological (concerning the events at the end of time) position  that they will run you out of their fellowship before allowing you to express another position. That, too, is legalism. Many legalistic believers today make the error of demanding unqualified adherence to their own biblical interpretations and even to their own traditions. For example, there are those who feel that to be spiritual one must simply avoid tobacco, alcoholic beverages, dancing, and movies, etc. the truth is that avoiding these things is no guarantee of spirituality."

I'm not going to say there is no good use for legalism, because maybe there is. . . I just don't know what it is. Right now, it seems like its a tool that the Devil uses to slow us down or stop us or get us distracted on the wrong thing. I'm not a big "the-Devil-made-me-do-it" type of guy, but over the past few weeks I have experienced some serious spiritual warfare. It may seem kind of old school or traditional to you or to whoever, but think about it. Satan doesn't want you to fall in love with Jesus, because then it'll be written all over your face and you can't help but talk about it, so more people will fall in love with Him. So wouldn't Satan, if he could, do something to prevent you from falling in love with Jesus or telling someone else about Him? Plus, there's numerous verses that talk about spiritual warfare. 

Something I've been learning a lot about, especially since I've got here is all the lies Satan tells us. Some of them he's told us so many times that we've just accepted them as the truth and would have no reason to question. Some of them he's tied into spiritual things so it seems like it's part of the chemical composition that we've ingested and makes up part of our thought process and who we are. But if we stop and examine everything closely enough we can see it's really more of a yellow leech thats tried to attach to a piece of truth and blend itself in so that we believe it's just part of it. Legalism for example, seems like one of those times Satan takes scripture and bends them or morphs it or take the perspective off of what it was meant to be to distract us. Weather or not it's intentionally taught, it is being taught in many churches. Sometimes, its just one of those traditions or acts that we do without thinking, but if we stop to think. . . hmm, why do we do that? or is that really in the Bible? then we see the truth without lies attached. 

One other thought/lie/lesson I've been learning is about sin, and the guilt of sin. I think a lot of times as Christians we drag around guilt when we don't need to. After we sin, the Holy Spirit convicts us of what we did and we do feel guilty, (it's like God puts this thick wet cotton blanket on our hearts that just dampens our lives and makes our hearts heavy) But when we confess our sins, he is faithful to forgive us. (1 John 1:9) But when he forgives us there is no guilt left, (in Romans 8:1 "there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus"). He takes the blanket away. But I think a lot of times, Satan uses that. He takes the wet blanket God puts on us, and attaches additional guilt and chains them over our heart. So after our wet blankets are removed because we've asked for forgiveness and turned away (repented) then we're left with chains on our heart from Satan. He tried to sneak them on afterwards. These chains are things like "you're never good enough" "you can't do that" or one I just realized is "you just screwed up, you need some time away to get yourself together before you go before the Holy God." Thats one I've gotten a lot lately and didn't really realize it or pick it out until this weekend when someone else mentioned it.  After I sinned, I felt so bad about it, I felt like I needed some time to prove I was sorry or to give me some recovery time before I went to God to apologize. It seemed like I was kind of cheapening grace if i just ran to Him. But if you think about it, thats like someone being in a car wreck and have their arm broken and face all cut up and bleeding and saying "just give me a few minutes to get cleaned up and straightened up before I go see the paramedic." It's stupid. God wants us to run to Him, as soon as we've messed up.  Like a parent, as soon as you break the cookie jar, you should go tell them what you did, instead of waiting. It seems like Satan brings that out so we put that distance in between us and God because we're "not worthy." (Side note: we weren't worthy before. But now we're covered in Christ's blood, which makes us worthy to be in God's presence.) It's like the best place to have a car wreck is in the hospital parking lot because your already there, you just have to go to the place of healing. Once we're saved, we are in the parking lot, and when we screw up all we have to do is go to the place of healing.

I'm sorry. I don't mean for this to sound preachery or like I'm standing on a soapbox. I'm just referencing these things because I've been finding that not everything thats taught in church is in the Bible.  So I can prove it to myself and to someone else, I have the scriptural proof of where it's at that proves it. I've added it on here so you can find the proof too. 

Ok I thought I was done but I clicked on one more site and it brings up this whole other side of it. Here's a one liner 

"Legalism is the damning lie that says God's pleasure and joy in me is dependent upon my obedience." 

"Legalism is the lie that God will find more pleasure in me because my obedience is greater than others or that God looks at me with disgust because I am not growing in grace as quickly as my friends. It is the failure to remember that God's pleasure in us comes outside of us (in Christ). Legalism causes the heart to forget that God sings over us because of the work He has done, not because of what we have done.  --  Believers equally bring pleasure to God because the pleasure He receives in us is the purchased pleasure of the substitution of Jesus Christ. Any imagined superiority to other Christians (not rules or lack of rules) is the sure sign of the legalist."

I was just thinking, I guess seeing your spiritual journey as a ladder is kind of legalistic. Like, I was here, now I'm here. Because with or without meaning to, you just compared yourself to yourself before and are opening up yourself to comparing yourself to others relationships. Then you start to think I'm doing more than Him, so Jesus is happier with me. There is no ladder, there is no next ring you have to stretch to reach for. It's a relationship not a corporate ladder of stuff to reach for.  There is no set of levels or pleasedness (yep just made up that word) with a friend, you just want to know more about them, you want to share more of your heart and see more of theirs, you want to spend more time with them for love. and I'll end with Love, because after all the greatest is Love.