Amazing Grace: Conclusions, Part 3

Spirit. We started these lessons with a couple of lessons on the Holy Spirit. It seems a good place to end as well.

In Galatians, after Paul tells us that only faith expressing itself through love matters and that the law is summed up in the command “Love your neighbor,” he tell us to bear the “fruit of the Spirit.”

Amazingly, we often talk about fruit of the Spirit as though the Spirit had nothing to do with it! We read the Bible. We interpret the Bible. We apply the lesson to ourselves. We bear fruit. It’s just a little boastful, you know.

(Gal. 5:22-23, 25) But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. … Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.

This is the conclusion of Galatians — the climax of the all the esoteric theology that preceded it. It’s simple and practical.

God has given us his Spirit. If we’ll keep in step with the Spirit — cooperate, yield, submit — these gifts will be given to us. These are, after all, fruit (products, results) of the Spirit, not us.

And these fruit are particularly useful in living in community, in forgiveness, and in serving the world. They are useless if we live in isolation!

(Heb. 8:7-13) For if there had been nothing wrong with that first covenant, no place would have been sought for another. 8 But God found fault with the people and said:

“The time is coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah. 9 It will not be like the covenant I made with their forefathers when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt, because they did not remain faithful to my covenant, and I turned away from them, declares the Lord. 10 This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after that time, declares the Lord. I will put my laws in their minds and write them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people. 11 No longer will a man teach his neighbor, or a man his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest. 12 For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more.”

13 By calling this covenant “new,” he has made the first one obsolete; and what is obsolete and aging will soon disappear.

Here’s the truly amazing thing about this passage. God says that in the new covenant we will no longer be responsible for learning God’s laws. Rather, God himself will write them in our minds and on our hearts.

Now, the first few times I read this, I figured God meant that I’d read the Bible and he’d write his law on my heart by means of my reading. But it later occurred to me that this is impossible. After all, the Israelites did the same thing. How would that be any different from what Moses and David and Isaiah did? And yet we’re told that the new covenant will be different.

So I thought: when has God himself written his laws on my heart? And I thought: I’ve never been directly influenced by God (or his Spirit) to know how to worship according to the pattern or to organize the church according to the pattern. And since these are the most important things, Hebrews is talking nonsense!

But this passage is the core of the argument made over the last several chapters of Hebrews. It’s central to the author’s understanding of Christianity. And it made no sense at all.

Finally, I had to yield to this conclusion. If God really does write his laws on my heart, then the laws must be something else. Maybe — just maybe — it’s stuff like love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.

And then I remembered all the times the Bible says that the only law is “love your neighbor.” Maybe God means it?? Maybe the Golden Rule really “is the law and the prophets” (Matt. 7:12).

And if that’s so, if Jesus and Paul really mean what they say, then Hebrews 8 and Galatians 5 make sense. I’ve seen in others (and sometimes even in myself) the fruit of the Spirit. I’ve seen Christians do astonishing acts of love and generosity. I’ve seen people dramatically changed by the Spirit. Maybe this is what it’s really all about.

And if that’s so, then the life of the Christian — our calling, if you prefer — is all about being the church, a community that really loves each other and really loves the world where it finds itself.

This makes sense — and it changes everything.

Everything changes. Christians — those who’ve been saved and are in grace — are no longer under law. Rather, we are free.

(Gal. 5:1a) It is for freedom that Christ has set us free.

Now, if we see our Christianity as being all about obedience to a vaguely revealed pattern, found in silences and human interpretations, then we feel very unfree indeed. In fact, we are very much under law.

(Gal. 5:18) But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under law.

Therefore, as the Bible and our tradition contradict, our tradition is simply wrong. Here’s how it works.

Love is commanded. But if we love out of a command, it’s not really love, is it?

If the only reason my children “love” me is because I’ll whip them if they don’t, they’ll just act like they love me. It’ll be hypocrisy and nothing but.

If I only “love” my wife for fear that she’ll divorce me and take my computer, well, I don’t really love her at all — I just love me and my computer.

As a result, love is a command that can only be fulfilled outside and beyond the command. Which means, in a very real sense, there’s no command at all. I am not under law.

Rather, the command is simply a teacher to help learn to be the kind of people God wants us to be (Gal. 3:24-25 (The NIV mistranslates this)).

True freedom comes when our hearts are so re-shaped by the Spirit that it’s our new nature to love, and so we take delight in loving God and others. At this point, we’ve left the command behind and become free indeed.

Just so, true worship cannot be commanded. The command can teach us, but it can’t make us worship God from the heart. And, ultimately, God judges the heart.

(Heb. 4:12) For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.

Notice what Hebrews says about the the word. It judges the heart. It judges our thoughts and attitudes.

And yet we just want to insist that Christianity is all about obedience to arbitrary rules — and nothing could be further from the truth.

(Eph. 3:12) In him and through faith in him we may approach God with freedom and confidence.

Conclusion. We in the Churches of Christ have to change our understanding of everything. I know it sounds harsh, but when we are damning one another over elder re-affirmation and other such absurdities, we have to seriously question the mindset, the theology — even the heart — that leads to such wickedness (and I use the term advisedly).

We have overlooked, ignored, and even trampled some of the most meaningful, life-changing, world-altering, beautiful, and delightful doctrines taught by God — all in the name of “sound doctrine.” It’s a great tragedy.

But the Spirit of God is living and active and, despite our doctrinal mistakes, has often brought forth among us good works and acts of remarkable charity and grace. And this gives me great hope for us. But the Spirit will not struggle with us forever.

It’s time to repent. It’s time to let our decisions to be driven by Jesus’ mission — not fear — and by love — not tradition. Change is essential. We cannot be the people of God called into loving community if we insist on imposing “tests of fellowship” and “salvation issues” that are just not found in the Bible.

We invent these out of fear. With fear eliminated —

(1 John 4:18) There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.

we are free to worship in celebration of God’s grace and to, in turn, share God’s grace with others — all without concerns over losing our souls over silences and such.

And, ultimately, the only way to be free is to live in freedom. If we allow ourselves to be bound by tradition for the sake of tradition — rather than mission — then we will teach our children and our converts that tradition matters more than freedom. And this would be a very dangerous and unpleasant place to find ourselves.