I heard a man preaching the other day. He was pounding out words slow of speech and heavy of tongue against the world and the church. He called the church a world conforming church with sleeping dogs for rulers. He hurled threats at them for not speaking out against sin and rebellion. He spoke against adultery, fornication, homosexuality and drinking. He indicted the church for not preaching what he was preaching. And while he put forth his tirade he gave a disclaimer. I’m not preaching legalism; this is the truth!
Well he was preaching truth but he also was preaching legalism. How glorious legal preaching can be to the religious. They call it good old fashion preaching. The problem is that it damns the hearer and the preacher. It’s a snare, gin and a trap to everyone that submits to it. For those who look to it for their cleansing, it will deceive delude and damn you, because of its glory. It’s the glory of the flesh. It’s what makes you appear different, better than the rest of us sinners. It will, if you are serious, deliver you from the practice of certain sins but not the nature of sin itself. It is a righteousness that is so glorious that the children of Israel could not steadfastly look upon the face of Moses for the glory of it. See 2 Corinthians 3:13.
It’s so glorious it will make you want to say we will do it. Like Israel in the wilderness spake, and everyone of their carcasses fell in the wilderness who said we will do it.
I heard of a church recently that watched films all week long on hell. And afterwards had one of the members, maybe a deacon or an elder dress up like the devil in a red suit with a pitch fork ( that’s doing the work of an evangelist isn’t it ? ) and scared the kids in the church. At the end of the week, come Sunday, they had 250 altar calls and confessions of faith and people accepting Jesus.
I heard one who had heard the message of the gospel of GOD's Grace in Christ, freedom from sin, and the imputation of GOD's everlasting unchanging immutable righteousness say they wish they were under the law again so that they would do right. Is that how it works? Do you need to be brought back into bondage, fear and doubt of your election and calling. Do you need someone to constantly tell you to do right or else?
If you do you’re a child and have need of the milk of the law until Christ be formed in you. For this is the word of the Gospel "And they shall not teach every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for all shall know me, from the least to the greatest. For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more. In that he saith, A new covenant, he hath made the first old. Now that which decayeth and groweth old is ready to vanish away." Hebrews 8:11-13.
The apostle was astonished more than once at the saints giving themselves to the glory of Moses and his ministers. His only confidence when he laid his head on the chopping block was that Christ's sheep will hear his voice and they will follow him, ............ follow Christ.
Jesse Gistand, Pastor
Grace Bible Church
San Leandro, CA 94572
510-799-7934