Trinity Grace,

Several weeks ago, when preaching from Mark 7:1-13, I said the following statement:

When I look into the future, when I anticipate a future in which I am not present, the most significant problem for this church I see lurking in the shadows is not the culture. It is not socialism or critical race theory. It is not politics. It is not worldliness. The most significant problem I see lurking in the shadows is legalism.

After the message, my lovely wife said: Honey, is legalism really the most significant problem you see facing our church?

I said: Yes.

But her question made me pause & has pushed me to clarify why I think legalism is often the main problem frustrating the people of God.

LEGALISM DEFINED

Legalism, as defined by C.J. Mahaney, is “attempting to gain acceptance before God through obedience to God.”

It’s the lie insinuating that God loves me more and blesses me more when I do things for him. It shrinks the sovereign God to a slot machine, where we throw in coins to satisfy him. It reduces the generous God, as Sinclair Ferguson has said, to “He-whose-favor-has-to-be-earned.”

And it’s completely untrue.

God does not love you less because of what you fail to do for him. And God does not bless you more or less because of what you do for him.

Many of the apostle Paul’s letters focus on the wrong-headedness of legalism, especially Romans and Galatians. Acceptance before God is only through faith in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. As Galatians 2:16 says, “For we know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ.”

LEGALISM DIVERSIFIED

But, legalism is not that simple.

Like a wealthy man may invest his money in a wide range of businesses, due to our sinfulness, legalism is diversified into all sorts of tendencies and temptations. It is not just doing good things to try to get God to accept us. It is a web, as Sinclair Ferguson describes, “woven intricately and invisibly to trap the unwary.” And this web is “always much stronger than we imagine” (The Whole Christ, 75).

In the message on Mark 7:1-13, I noted that legalism is present when we add our manmade rules to what God has said in his Word (e.g., often by prohibiting something Scripture does not). I also noted that legalism is present when we use one part of Scripture to excuse ourselves from obeying another part of Scripture, which we referred to as “loophole-ism.”

But even that doesn’t sum it up.

ONE OF THE (MOST) COMMON WAYS LEGALISM DIVERSIFIES

In perhaps its most pervasive form, legalism is when we assess ourselves and approve ourselves according to measures God does not use.

Last week, our family went to the beach. We saw lots of people as we swam in the ocean, ate in restaurants, and visited nearby landmarks (homeschool field trips!).

Every person we saw was unique and different. Some tall, others short. Some with heads full of hair, others bald. Some dark, others light. Some asparagus-shaped, others pear-shaped. Some clearly well-off, others living more simply.

The world is filled with wonderfully diverse people. People of different shapes, sizes, backgrounds, upbringings, talents, careers, and so on. This diversity is part of what makes this world so beautiful and interesting.

These differences are just that, differences. They are meant to be seen as a spectrum of differences. Much like the full spectrum of colors, all the differences in our looks, likes, & lives are meant to display the creativity and beauty of God in a way that sameness could not.

But, as I learned from David Powlison, far too often these horizontal differences are turned into vertical ladders by which we measure and compare ourselves with others.

A COMMUNITY GROUP GATHERING I’LL NEVER FORGET

Years ago, I attended a Community Group gathering I’ll never forget.

Before beginning a time of prayer, a woman in the group confessed that she felt that she was not a good helpmate to her husband like the other women she knew because she was overweight.

My Community Group Leader responded immediately, “That is a lie from the pit of hell!”

Somewhere along the way, she had begun to notice differences in the way she looked in comparison to other women. She began to measure herself and began living under the oppressive burden of trying to measure up. When she couldn’t, she assumed she was failing to obey God and Scripture.

But that measure—that a woman should be a certain shape—is not found anywhere for godly womanhood in Scripture!

Do you see how this measure became legalism? Do you see how she began to assess herself and approve herself according to a measure God does not use?

That is perhaps the most common form of legalism.

We may see someone who is more fit-and-trim than we are. We measure ourselves by them. We climb on the treadmill and count carbs, trying to climb the ladder to reach them. When we succeed, we rejoice. When we fail, we despair.

We may see someone who is more outwardly successful than we are. We have trouble thanking God for the blessing they are receiving. We prop up our successes alongside theirs. We redouble our efforts. We climb the ladder and chase success that could be measured, managed, and maintained up against theirs.

We see someone who is more talented in one area than we are. We have trouble rejoicing with the talent God has given them. So, we don’t. We chase after trying to find a way to measure up. Or, we give in to self-pity.

It really could be anything we see in others.

Someone who is a better parent or better runner or has better hair or takes better vacations or has a better house or prays “better” prayers.

Each time our tendency towards legalism becomes evident. We assess ourselves and approve ourselves according to measures God does not use. We take the diversity God has woven into the world and use it to measure ourselves before God and others.

legalism defeated

In 1 Corinthians 4, Paul communicates the astounding freedom from legalism that only the gospel can bring. When discussing the final judgment, he says:

But with me it is a very small thing that I should be judged by you or by any other human court. In fact, I do not even judge myself. . . . It is the Lord who judges me. 1 Corinthians 4:3-4

Paul does not measure himself by others. Nor does he measure himself by himself. The only measure that matters is how he measures up before the Lord. And the Lord has accepted him freely and fully in Jesus.

So, he is completely free. And so too are you.

God accepts you freely and fully in Jesus.

As Paul warns the Galatians, “For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery!” (Gal. 5:1).

CONCLUSION

But, don’t get me wrong.

I am concerned about the culture. I am concerned about critical race theory, something I hope to cover in a future letter. I am concerned about worldliness. But, yes, I am more concerned about heart’s tendency towards legalism.

May God help us to live in the freedom of the gospel,

Walt