It is with great humility, thoughtful prayer, and diligent study that I've compiled this post as a response to a comment left on my blog. I did not want to reply to this comment with a harsh attitude. So I spent much time thinking of this reply. The comment is from a post I did called “Don't have people ask Jesus into their heart”
here is the comment from that post
“I believe this to be an incredibly arrogant display of legalism. To imply that on becoming a Christian our sin nature is completely done away with is ridiculous. Yes we live in Christ...exactly. We are not some person set on Jesus Auto-pilot. I'd like to see this article set to more biblical text. How would Romans 7:14-25 compare and contrast with this article? The first converts in Acts? How does this article interact with the book of Hebrews.“
Let me addressed a couple things that are pointed out in this comment. You can make the insertion that this is a display of legalism. But it's a display of what the Bible teaches. Further down in this article I will give ample scripture to back up my thoughts. If you walked out the front door of your house right now, and were hit by a car. You would instantly pass to heaven or hell. At that point, it doesn't matter if its legalism. What matters is, "is what the bible teaches true". You’re dead! and if you’re dead the question is did I repent of my sin (turn from sin) and believe in Christ. When you realize that we are dealing with eternity, we are dealing with people's souls that will be either tormented for eternity in hell or glorify God the Father and Jesus in heaven I don't consider it anything but the gospel. I ask everyone who reads this article to put aside things someone has told you, the thoughts that you've had about Christianity, conclusions you have, and listen to the Scripture
Matthew 7:13-23
13 "Enter by the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many.
14 For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few.
A Tree and Its Fruit
15 "Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves.
16 You will recognize them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thorn bushes, or figs from thistles?
17 So, every healthy tree bears good fruit, but the diseased tree bears bad fruit.
18 A healthy tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a diseased tree bear good fruit.
19 Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.
20 Thus you will recognize them by their fruits. I Never Knew You
21 "Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.
22 On that day many will say to me, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?'
23 And then will I declare to them, 'I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.
In Matthew 7 you will clearly see that your profession in Jesus Christ means absolutely nothing. The person in verse 21 is someone who emphatically declares Jesus as Lord of their life and what does Christ's say to them. Depart from me you workers of lawlessness. Or iniquity. what is lawlessness? I want to point out that it says workers of lawlessness. When you see the word work or practice it is speaking of something, you continually do if I practice my baseball swing. That means I repeat the act of what I'm trying to accomplish. If I’m practicing on my swing, I keep swinging the bat. So if I practice lawlessness, than I would be someone who consistently breaks God's law. What is God's law? We could look at the standard that God has set for us, in the 10 Commandments. Now I am not saying that our works save us, but faith without works is dead (James 2:17).
The next thing I want to address in the comment is the sentence that says, “To imply that on becoming a Christian our sin nature is completely done away with is ridiculous.” Are we not new creatures in Christ; are we not dead to sin?
Hebrews 10:26-31
26 For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins,
27 but a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries.
28 Anyone who has set aside the Law of Moses dies without mercy on the evidence of two or three witnesses.
29 How much worse punishment, do you think, will be deserved by the one who has spurned the Son of God, and has profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has outraged the Spirit of grace?
30 For we know him who said, "Vengeance is mine; I will repay." And again, "The Lord will judge his people."
31 It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.
Does your conscience convict you? Or does your conscience speak clearly? In Paul's epistles he talks about the conscience. About having a clear conscience. About having nothing convicting him in his conscience. When he was being accused of this by people and he said my conscience is clear. Is your conscience clear? If you always lie, always steel, or always lust for women (or men), or when you blaspheme Gods name by flippantly using His Holy name. You are breaking Gods law.
In reference to Romans 7:14-25, Do we not all sin as Christians? Yes. The New Testament talks about the fact that as believers we still sin. If we say we do not sin. We make God a liar. There is a difference between stumbling and diving into sin. Never giving up your sin, longing for sin and enjoying the sin. Paul is simply talking about the fact that he doesn't want to sin, but it still happens the things you don't want to do, You are doing and you get frustrated and upset and disappointed that you've let God down. But your life is not marked by that sin. You are not defined by that sin; Paul's life was clearly not marked out by sin.
Below I've added several more Bible verses that reiterate the stance the bible takes on the issue of sin and the reason understanding sin is so important. It goes right back to Matthew 7, there are people in this world that believe they themselves are saved, they have prayed a prayer but have never turned their life over to Christ. They've never repented and believed and on the judgment day when Christ will say to them. Depart from me. I never knew you. You workers of lawlessness. That's why I come across boldly, because we cannot modify the Gospel. We can't make it more palatable. We can't take the offense out of it. We are all sinners. We all need a Savior. We all need a substitution and we have that in Jesus Christ. If you say I'm a Christian, But you bear bad fruit than on that day I hope you don't find your self as one of the many who lived on the broad road, who thought they were on the narrow road passing through the narrow gate. But hear Christ say depart from me!
Judge not let you be judged
1 John 2: 3-4
3 And by this we know that we have come to know him, if we keep his commandments.
4 Whoever says "I know him" but does not keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him,
1 John 2: 29
29 If you know that he is righteous, you may be sure that everyone who practices righteousness has been born of him.
1 John 3:4-10
4 Everyone who makes a practice of sinning also practices lawlessness; sin is lawlessness.
5 You know that he appeared to take away sins, and in him there is no sin.
6 No one who abides in him keeps on sinning; no one who keeps on sinning has either seen him or known him.
7 Little children, let no one deceive you. Whoever practices righteousness is righteous, as he is righteous.
8 Whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil.
9 No one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God’s seed abides in him, and he cannot keep on sinning because he has been born of God.
10 By this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the devil: whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother.
Romans 1:28-32
28 And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done.
29 They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips,
30 slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, 31 foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless.
32 Though they know God’s decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them.
Romans 2:2-6
2 We know that the judgment of God rightly falls on those who practice such things.
3 Do you suppose, O man—you who judge those who practice such things and yet do them yourself—that you will escape the judgment of God?
4 Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?
5 But because of your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God’s righteous judgment will be revealed.
6 He will render to each one according to his works:
Romans 2:12-16
12 For all who have sinned without the law will also perish without the law, and all who have sinned under the law will be judged by the law.
13 For it is not the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but the doers of the law who will be justified.
14 For when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law.
15 They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them
16 on that day when, according to my gospel, God judges the secrets of men by Christ Jesus.
Romans 6:11-14
11 So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.
12 Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, to make you obey its passions.
13 Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and your members to God as instruments for righteousness.
14 For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace.
Romans 8:4-7
4 in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.
5 For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit.
6 For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace.
7 For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law; indeed, it cannot.
1 Corinthians 3:1-3
1 But I, brothers, could not address you as spiritual people, but as people of the flesh, as infants in Christ.
2 I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for it. And even now you are not yet ready, 3 for you are still of the flesh. For while there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not of the flesh and behaving only in a human way?
2 Corinthians 13:5-6
5Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless indeed you fail to meet the test!
6 I hope you will find out that we have not failed the test.
Hebrews 10:26-31
26 For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins,
27 but a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries.
28 Anyone who has set aside the law of Moses dies without mercy on the evidence of two or three witnesses.
29 How much worse punishment, do you think, will be deserved by the one who has spurned the Son of God, and has profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has outraged the Spirit of grace?
30 For we know him who said, "Vengeance is mine; I will repay." And again, "The Lord will judge his people." 31 It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.
James 1:21-25
21 Therefore put away all filthiness and rampant wickedness and receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls.
22 But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.
23 For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror.
24 For he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was like.
25 But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing.
James 2:17
17 So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.
James 4:7-10
7 Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
8 Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.
9 Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom.
10 Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you.
1 Peter 2:11-12
11 Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul.
12 Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation.
All referenced Scripture is from the ESV Bible
Repent and believe in the gospel!
"Most people lack true repentance. They lack the true contrition, the true brokenness. They are void of urgent desperation. They don't have a true relationship to Jesus Christ. They just "hang around" Jesus... And they do not know what it means to bow to that which is eternal. To be concerned about that. They want a gospel that doesn't ask for repentance. They want a gospel that has no threats. They want a gospel that allows them to have some superficial attachment to Jesus, but not a bowing to His absolute sovereignty at any cost. They want a gospel that fixes them in this world to make them more comfortable. That's not it. And that's not what Jesus offers."
—John MacArthur
ARE YOU SAVED
—John MacArthur
Saturday, August 30, 2008
"Arrogant Legalism" or the offense of the Gospel?
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10:10 PM
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