Grace and Law XI: Rejecting the Lies of Antinomianism

Welcome to the Whole Council Podcast. I'm Jon Snyder and with me again is Steve Crampton and we're looking at the theme of the law and the gospel and how we understand the interplay between those in the new covenant and the Christian life.

And we've been using a book by Ernie Reisinger and it's it's a good book very simple really. He writes for the the common man and so it's it's a good book for us to use just to kind of guide some of our thoughts but it has been a while since we have had our podcast on the law so if you've been following the podcast we had a couple of gaps there where we ran some of the things so Steve it would probably help if just give us a running you know.

Head start to get back up to where we're at sure. Yeah we're looking at the law and the gospel as the title suggests but we took the law from the very first chapters of Genesis looked at what was the law where was the moral law back before Mount Sinai how it manifested itself and was clear that even the patriarchs were abiding by and bound under the law.

We looked at the Ten Commandments at Sinai. We've brought it up through looking at several of those commandments the interplay with the gospel and we have begun now looking at the difficulties in the law.

And we spent a good deal of time talking about even the different uses of the term law and throughout Scripture it is used in such a wide variety of ways. You've got the law of Moses you got the law of Christ you've got the Mosaic law you've got the ceremonial law you've got the judicial code and all of these terms that are law in a broad sense.

And that's where we came down is. We're using the definition that Reisinger gives us which basically very broadly is any doctrine instruction ordinance statute etc that teaches or directs or commands men with respect to a duty we owe to God.

So that's where we are with law. And John where are we gonna take it now. So we're looking at chapter.

7 in his book and it deals with the difficulties of the law and this is difficulties part 2. Part 1 was what you just mentioned where they're where the different uses of the law require that we kind of carefully read the text and understand what it's talking about.

It's not you know rocket science it's you don't have to know Hebrew and Greek. It's just a matter of kind of reading carefully. And we're going to look at law and liberty and the issue of antinomianism today and again next week in our podcast.

Before we jump to that I want to say that we talk a lot about how important it is that we get a right view of these things because even with genuine believers there there is a constant you know we do have an enemy that lies to us and that manipulates the truths of Scripture.

And we do love the truths of Scripture you know we love the things that are attached to obeying God because we're Christians. So when someone comes and says to us well the law is the expression of obedience to God and we agree.

But if we're not careful perhaps we could apply that in a way that would lead to legalism. And then another man comes and says Christ is all and in all for the believer and we love Christ and we love the gospel and and the free the way that he is freely given a cleansing for our soul and a positive righteousness applied to our account because we love those things.

And someone comes along and says you know it's grace that we need to be talking about not law. We're tempted perhaps maybe to swing like a pendulum the other way and and with other topics throughout Christian history we find that that pendulum is a good illustration.

It's often easy to think that the safest place when you see an error so let's say legalism. The safest place for a Christian when he sees the error of legalism is to go as far from legalism as you can get.

Well then you end up in an opposite error. And so you know what we want to do is instead of swinging here legalism and then going into antinomianism. And you know this takes a number of years in our life to kind of realize I shouldn't have gone so far.

I think I over I overstressed that and so then we tried to react against that. And you know culturally the church is doing this. So we want to follow the scripture through the midst of all the overreactions.

Sometimes I think that you know views that we had of the law before we are believers it tends to kind of be a hangover afterwards we had these old views so I used to think of the law as something that perhaps God was requiring me to do to kind of help him out.

So like you know mutual been a mutually beneficial interaction here. So God obviously is offering me much more than I can offer him but but still I have to help something. Yeah so you know I'm coming to you and I'm going to offer you this forgiveness but I have a long list of duties I want you to do because you're gonna help me spread my kingdom.

And so you know if you have that view you misunderstand grace. You think so actually this is not an unmerited free gift where all the reasons are drawn from within God's own you know amazing character that he chose to love us rather he looks at us and says this person looks like they would be useful and so if you follow my rules you will be more useful.

And then you know you look at the gospel and there's just no for that and so you think well then there's no room for the law now that I'm a Christian because God you know God doesn't need me to do that.

And I had a wrong view of law or or that was my view of law so it doesn't translate into the New Testament life. I also think of you know punishment you know you can kind of think of the the law is God kind of cruelly laying on humanity rules that are right just holy and pure but it's kind of like it's it's there's no purpose to them you know it's just I just have to do it because God makes me do it and it reminded me of a Greek myth and so I had Teddy look this up so I'll give you a Greek myth today.

Sisyphus all right Sisyphus and Steve was around when Sisyphus was around so all right Sisyphus was the king of Corinth. It wasn't called Corinth when he was king and according to the Greek myth Zeus was angry with Sisyphus because he cheated death twice.

So he's supposed to die. He doesn't die. He kind of sneaks past you know the rules gets it gets you know cuts the corners cheats death and Zeus punishes him by making him roll this enormous boulder up a hill and every time he gets close to the top of the hill it just rolls down and he has to do that for eternity.

So the reason I mentioned that Greek myth is because it's it's kind of how I viewed the law except you know I thought well the law is good. It's right it's pure. But really my view was that it was like rolling a boulder up a hill that would never get there and God was just going to make us do that forever.

Now if that is your view and then you come to the gospel and you see the cross in its correct light then there's there's no room for that added that that kind of a view of a law. And you think well there's so there's no room for law in the Christian life.

But then I was thinking this morning so what is the law. The law is this perfectly laid path by God that is a it shows the life that is the happiest fullest life. It is the furthest from self-destructive behavior.

It is the life that walks in harmony with our Creator. It is the life that Christ lived in front of us. You know he blazed a trail. There's his footsteps in you know his footprints right there. And when the cross comes that doesn't make that path useless.

When I think of that path in the right way and then I see it in light of the gospel. I think well the path belongs here because now the gospel has made it so that we forgiven for our rebellion can come to our King and say having forgiven me of all may I walk this path.

Yes you know and will you grant me moment by moment all I need to walk this path with you. I mean we want to walk the path and we want to know could I could I come back to the path that I mocked and rejected.

And the answer is yes. And so in that light I think it's just so clear that the moral law lays a path of obedience that is in perfect harmony with the work of Christ in our rescue. Well he says in this chapter that the object of the chapter is to fold number one to uphold the law so that it does not threaten Christian liberty.

And second to establish grace so that the law is not made void and the believers are not exempted from their duty. So how to view the law how to how to hold it before our eyes in a way that does not go against Christian liberty that's taught in the New Testament.

And how to see grace and Christian liberty in a way that does not go against what.

The New Testament says about the law so that leads us John to rising errs point. Well if Christ has liberated us granted us freedom freedom from what right is it. Freedom from as you laid out there from the law in its entirety.

No obviously based on what you just said. So riser gives us three broad topics three areas in which Christ has brought us liberty. First we are freed from the law and this I think really is critical as a system of salvation.

It is not as I think you've used the illustration in the past the ladder by which we climb up to God and earn salvation. I mean that is obviously critical to our whole understanding of what it means to be free in Christ and to be given by grace that life in Christ.

We're to be not perfect law keepers but really we're walking by faith and by being forgiven in Christ. That's the path to salvation. So Christ has freed us from what some would call the covenant of works.

We've I think touched on that in the past too. Secondly again also I think critically Christ has freed us from sins dominion and scripture is very clear that we really are slaves Romans 6 in particular to sin Christ has broken that power of sin over us and so we are supernaturally regenerated.

We are united with Christ and and it's in that context as you talked about a moment ago John how we now want to walk that path of righteousness the the path that the moral law lays out for us. We have a new love for God and his law.

And as Paul puts it in Romans 7 we now serve in the newness of the Spirit not in the oldness of the letter. I think that's a beautiful way of drawing that distinction. But I would underscore as you said in that intro we are serving in that newness of the Spirit.

We are walking that path in the third area that rising or highlights here and we were talking before the show. It doesn't seem to rank really with the first two but we'll include it here and just mention it anyway he says that we have been freed from superstitions and there what he uses is the example of those and this is one of the the heresies of old that saw the entire material world as inherently evil intrinsically so and so as spiritual reborn believers we are to basically run from and have as little to do with the physical world and physical pleasures as we can.

And of course that's just not what Scripture teaches. We are men created with feet of clay in bodies. And God has given us this created order as a beautiful gift to be enjoyed in proper relation as some commentators would put it with God not apart from God.

I think that's that's a critical distinction. So there's where rising or is talking about the superstitions but that's the big.

Three he also points out that when the Apostles give moral direction to the churches and so we have in the church is quite a mixture you have the Jews who've been converted and embraced Christ and they're wondering what to do with the the entire old system the Old Covenant as it becomes a thing of you know what Paul says to the Corinthians.

Really a thing of no glory in contrast or comparison with the New Covenant. So how what what is laid aside. And what's brought into the New Covenant. I mean good legitimate questions. Yeah. And as they're wrestling with those then you also have Gentiles who are wondering how Jewish do I need to become to follow the Jewish Messiah you know Jewish at all if I'm not required to be Jewish which Paul is so very clear about I'm not required to be circumcised or to offer these animals sacrifices.

What about the moral law. What part does that play. Obviously we find in the New Testament a stress on following Christ and that the law is summed up in the word love. And so perhaps have said well that means that that leads you to think that the Apostles downplay the law.

Maybe they even dismantle the law as a guide for Christian living. But I think that Reisinger is does a good job. He just mentions a couple of passages and we'll give you two Galatians 5 and then later in Romans where the Apostle is going to talk about liberty and love.

And he uses specific statements from the Old Testament moral law as the guide for what these look like. So in Galatians 5 verse 13 we read for you brethren have been called to liberty now. That's a wonderful statement.

Christian you're called to a life of freedom only. He goes on do not use liberty as an opportunity for the flesh but through love serve one another. Now that could be taken as kind of somewhat vague he keeps going for all the laws fulfilled in one word even in this you shall love your neighbor as yourself.

But if you bite and devour one another beware lest you be consumed by one another. And this is what Reisinger says. If the liberty possessed by the Galatians consisted in freedom from the obligation to obey the moral law it would be strange that these very precepts should be urged as an authority against their using liberty as an occasion to the flesh.

So in other words Paul says you're free but don't use the freedom in the wrong way. Well what do you mean Paul. Can you give us some guidance. Yes it's clear. It's the moral law love your neighbor as the moral law directs you.

So you are now free. Free from what. Free from the penalty of the law but not the precepts of the law. So from the penalty but not the path. He then mentions Romans 13. And I'm gonna read a larger section.

This is verse 8 through 14. And you remember that the first 11 chapters of Romans it's it's just this great sweeping theology lesson from the the desperate need of humanity to the provision in Christ to the to the means of embracing that provision faith which unites us to the Savior.

And then the results in Romans 6 7 8 where you know union with Christ not only produces justification but a justification that frees us to be sanctified to live for him 9 10 and 11. Explaining if this is such a great salvation why why do so many of the reject it.

And we we look at what Paul says there chapter 12 the great application. You know. Therefore and this picture of presenting myself as a living daily moment-by-moment sacrifice to God out of love. But what does that sacrifice look like.

Well it's guided by the moral law. In chapter 13 he says this. Oh no one anything except to love one another. For he who loves another has fulfilled the law for the commandments. Now he's taking us back to the specific commands.

You shall not commit adultery. You shall not murder. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness. You shall not covet. And if there is any other commandment are all summed up in this saying.

Namely you shall love your neighbor as yourself. Love does no harm to a neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law. And do this knowing the time that now it is high time to awake out of sleep.

For now is our salvation nearer than when we first believed. So he's speaking to believers the night is far spent the day is at hand. Therefore let us cast off the works of darkness and let us put on the armor of light.

Let us walk properly as in the day not in revelry and drunkenness. Not in licentiousness and lewdness not in strife and envying. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ. And make no provision for the flesh to fulfill its lusts.

May I.

Play the other side for a moment. Okay. You just said I mean Paul. Just put it all of that Old Testament law is summed up in the New Testament command you shall love your neighbor as yourself. So why do we have the Old Testament moral law in its Decalogue sort of form instead of just love your neighbor.

Yeah.

I think that's a great question because I think that coming to a passage and reading that quickly you do get the impression like oh so Paul's just saying Old Testament laws have all been laid aside we don't need them no more because in Christ we have grace to love and loves all we do.

And I think the answer to that could be that in saying that they're summarized they're summed up in the word love and in loving we are obeying them. Paul is not dismantling them. Paul is explaining the nature of them.

So like a Pharisee we could be tempted to keep the specific rules but there's no love. So I didn't I didn't do that to my neighbor. I could have but I didn't because I'm a good church-going Christian and I keep the rules but you care nothing for your neighbor.

So have you really obeyed the law. You know it's easy to maybe check off our list of the Ten Commandments and not love and think that God is impressed. And Paul has to turn and say to us you haven't understood the law at all.

As Paul.

Himself experienced when he came when his eyes were opened as it were. And the other thing about that for me John we've again talked in past podcasts there's kind of hidden is it were. At least it's kind of mentioned but not highlighted in those Old Testament passages teaching the law they say expressly that we are to love our neighbor.

And then it lays out how you do that. So it's not that the love wasn't there before. We just didn't get the whole picture right. Still in the types and shadows sort of thing it seems to me. Well yeah and you know and and.

These commands that he mentioned some of them are you know you love your neighbor and I mean that is a direct quote from the Old Testament. So yeah so the specific laws other than love your neighbor are laying it out in you know with a clarity.

Well this is how it would look in your life setting. It would look this way. So it guards us against kind of that vague good intentions. You know where you where you know. Sometimes people will say I'm often shocked where someone will say you know you I feel like you didn't even care about me or you didn't love me.

And I think but I really cared about that person. Then I realized. But did I do anything. You know was it just all what did it get stuck inside John you know feelings of genuine concern and compassion and care and a and appreciation.

And I never followed the specific steps that scripture gave. You know I thought that well I loved him you know. But did did we. You know he gives also some people throughout history who have been falsely labeled antinomians which reminds me of a statement by Martin Lloyd-Jones when Lloyd-Jones said that you know you are preaching the gospel correctly if you offend a group of people in the church and they call you an antinomian.

And he and he gave his evidence by pointing to particularly to the Apostle Paul. People called Paul an antinomian because he preached the gospel so fully. And Paul of course has to explain how he is not an antinomian.

But let me give you the few examples that Risinger gives first he gives Christ. You remember in Luke chapter 7 that the crowds look at the life of Jesus and it looks different than the austere life of John the Baptist.

So Jesus they say look a glutton and a wine bibber. So this guy's always eating with people and he sits down at the table and he drinks wine by them. He's a friend of tax collectors and sinners. So the Pharisees look at Jesus and say he's enjoying himself.

He's with these lost people and he's you know he's befriending them. So he can't be serious about holiness. And so he's an antinomian. So to speak he's a he's a man who disregards the law dishonors it so clearly they're blind to the true nature of the law what it called for and what Jesus was doing later we find the same attitude toward the Apostle Paul in Romans 3 verse 8 we read where Paul says this.

And why not say let us do evil that good may come as we are slanderously reported and as some affirm that we say so Paul's statements to the Jewish year seem to disregard the Old Covenant so completely and grace seems to be painted in such large pictures that they say well if you follow Paul you might as well send more so that you can get more grace.

And of course Paul argues how that not only is not what he's saying but in Romans 6 he gives a clear you know theological explanation how of how that is actually impossible. A Christian cannot live that kind of life.

He gives another example one from history Charles Spurgeon in 1856 March 16th this is when he is about 24 years old and he's at the Park Street Chapel the only reason I mentioned that is this is fairly early in his ministry before he before that building no longer serves them and they move into the building they built to hold thousands the Metropolitan Chapel.

I am fond Spurgeon says of being called an antinomian for this reason that the term is generally applied to those who hold truth very firmly and will not let it go. But I should not be fond of being an antinomian.

We are not against the law of God. We believe it is no longer binding on us as the covenant of salvation. But we have nothing to say against the law of God. The law is holy. We are carnal and sold under sin.

He quotes Paul none shall charge us truthfully with being antinomians. We do quarrel with antinomians. But as for some poor souls who are so inconsistent as to say that the law is not binding and yet try to keep it with all their might we do not quarrel with them.

So he's saying there there are some baby Christians who get confused. They say you know they say antinomian things. But in their heart they're not antinomian they just are not.

Really clear on how to explain it which was true of some of the Puritans that.

We've looked at yeah yeah and we'll talk about that in our next episode was we talk about that kind of that theoretical antinomianism. So Spurgeon says he kind of he goes easy on these guys because they he says we think they might learn to distinguish between the law as a covenant of life and a direction after we have obtained life.

So he is hard on antinomians who live as antinomians but he said you know he's a little more patient with those who speak.

Like antinomians. But really their heart isn't so. Reisinger does actually give us an example John of one who actually was an antinomian. Indeed the dispute between Martin Luther and Johannes Agricola was the genesis of the term antinomian.

As best we understand in history it was Luther that applied that term to his colleague and at one time friend fellow teacher there at Wittenberg who took the extreme. I think we can actually safely say here position.

What Agricola did is he says that we are as believers completely free of the law. And here are some of the the premises that he would teach men are not to be prepared for the gospel of a or a conversion by the preaching of the law you don't need it at all.

Or repentance is not to be taught out of the Decalogue or any law of Moses but only from the violation of the Son of God in the gospel. Again you don't really even need the Old Testament. Another one and this just has that great rhetorical ring.

But it's I think very dangerous when thou art in the midst of sin only believe and thou art in the midst of salvation. Another the law is not worthy to be called the Word of God. Shocking. Really again a believer is above all law and all obedience.

We'll touch on that again in the next podcast. I think again good works profit nothing to salvation. Ill works tend not to damnation kind of half-truth in there right. Finally our faith and New Testament religion were unknown to Moses.

What I mean remarkable. Well Luther took him to task as I say termed that antinomian ism and came back and taught the proper uses of the law. We won't go into those now. And in the interest of time but roundly condemned a Greco's position there historically a sort of recanted of some of those beliefs.

Or at least he tried to say that Luther never quite accepted that and I guess we can leave it at that. We were.

Talking earlier that it is interesting that throughout you know the examples he gives in Scripture and then even with Spurgeon it is often the more conservative element in a religious gathering that would be offended at the you know just this the freedom.

And you know the dimensions of the of the of the hope the grace the completeness of justification that when that's preached in a way that is you know so clear they feel that maybe the preacher has become antinomian you know.

So like Lloyd-Jones said and we want to be careful that we with long exposure to church aren't slipping back into an abuse of the law. Using the law as a thing that we think makes us better superior you know people us and those people.

And you know and we begin to forget that the law is a is a wonderful gift from God but all our hope is in Christ you know. And it's a walk alongside him. One of the marks of a Pharisee is always whether ancient or modern is that you officially put your feet on the right path so to speak.

But you're always bitter because the people over there aren't doing it. You know you're not paying the high cost. I'm paying a cost. And yet you call yourself a Christian and you seem happy in the Lord.

And this is not fair. You know it's like the child that keeps the rules for the wrong reasons and constantly complains that everybody else is getting off the hook you know. And when that's our attitude we know that we have a have gotten a wrong approach to the law again.

Well next podcast we're gonna actually look at 20 different errors connected to the root of antinomianism. And some of these we'll go through them but we'll spend some time on some of them because some of them are more prevalent in our day.

So we hope you can join us for that.