The bondage of legalism

Often time in our churches we hear the call “let’s pray for unity”, but have you ever asked yourself what exactly does that mean? I am afraid a lot of people confuse unity with sameness. If you look around there is hardly anything that is identical in God’s creation, so trying to make everybody look the same, function the same, or trying to achieve complete uniformity is a losing battle. It flies in the face of our very nature because God created us as unique individuals very different from each other. Back to my question, what does unity really mean? It means unity of purpose. A band has many different instruments, of different shapes with different tones, but they all taken together produce a magnificent melody because they are all in step playing off of the same sheet.

Diversity of opinion is something to be embraced - it creates a healthy organization while sameness and uniformity is a sure sign of sickness. For a thousand years nobody was allowed to think differently from the dogma imposed by catholic church, without risking to be burned at the stake.

The wholeness of the church is compared in the Bible with the human body where all the different organs perform different functions working together in almost perfect harmony for a common goal. A simple hand movement to pick up a glass of water seems easy and natural to most of us, but it requires a lot of eye-hand coordination with the brain calculating complex algorithms in the background in a fraction of a second like a supercomputer. Notice that the concept of who is better doesn’t even exist. The eye cannot say to the hand “I am better” because that would be silly – they are just different. Why in the church, as the spiritual body, often times, there is a lack of harmony and the music is not pleasant? Because at some point people replaced the original sheet with their own and they started playing their own little tune, following their own bit, ignoring the conductor. The unity of purpose is gone.

Christianity at its core is very simple – we are all sinners saved by the grace of God because it is impossible for us to redeem ourselves no matter what we do. In spite of this fundamental truth, there are some that seem to say “Look at my merits! I must be really high on God’s list based on what I do”. God declares that your best works are like a dirty rag before him? When you develop that kind of mindset and start behaving as somehow you are spiritually superior to your brother, you are full of pride and in need to be regenerated by the Holy Spirit. In the Temple the Pharisee claimed to be so much better than the tax collector next to him, but that imaginary scale existed only in his mind. This is where Christianity ends and a heresy called legalism starts - when people think they are entitled to something based on merit, when they stop having a personal relationship with God, but rather a checklist with exterior symbols that will give them bragging rights: a lot of kids - checked, no necktie - checked, no TV - checked, church attendance – checked, church board member - checked. These are all positive things and there is absolutely nothing wrong with you being very strict with yourself, but when you make a pedestal out of them and start looking down on others that’s what makes you a card-carrying legalist.

The bondage of legalism is very subtle and insidious, it is like a cancer in a body that appears healthy on the outside. They all look humble and deeply religious and they all say the right things, but their biggest sin is that they play God. Satan managed to make them proud of their humility – what a dichotomy! It reminds me of a lady that came to our church and told some young girls that they will go straight to hell because their scarves were not wide enough - now that’s legalism at its best. When I was growing up wearing a wrist watch was considered a sin, later it was the necktie, the short sleeves, and the list goes on and on. As unanointed gatekeepers of God’s salvation they are big on rules, traditions and rigid enforcement a la Vicovu de Sus - our Mecca of legalism. They always carry their little list ready to pin you down on some marginal thing. The obsession with form makes them miss the substance and the true meaning of what the Gospel is all about – loving each other. The Pharisees were accusing Jesus that he was eating without washing his hands or that he healed somebody during the Sabbath day.

C. S. Lewes in his book Mere Christianity dedicated a whole chapter to this issue called “The great sin”. According to him “it was of those people Christ was thinking when he said that some would preach about Him and cast out devils in His name, only to be told at the end of the world that he had never known them”. How sad! I hope and pray that you will wake up and make a U-turn today.

Nick Rosioru

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