1063. Confidence Becomes Volatile When It's Based on Behavior

Most have been subjected to religious behavioral requirements. It may be a standard you set for yourself, or it may have come from church friends or other sources. Maybe even by misunderstandings within Bible verses. If you convince yourself you're doing a 'pretty good' job of keeping up by performing enough to think of yourself as a successful doer, your 'spiritual' and emotional confidence rises. Wander from it and you might start to wonder where you stand with God—and what you need to do to get back on track.

The good news of the gospel of grace is that we can be confident and at peace ... but it's not based on our obedience or trying to be good enough with what we do. It is fully rooted in Jesus, His obedience, His blood, and a redemptive work He completed once, for all. Anything else will have the legal eagles swooping for an opportunity to bring the fish back to their nest.




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990. Faith Counted as Righteousness: God Justifies the One Who Does Not Work - But Believes

When it comes to righteousness as a gift from God, the "faith without works" crowd struggles to explain their inconsistent approach. Some will appear to speak words about God's grace while later their lips leak legalism because the mindsets they have been clinging to are based upon false assumptions that have been hammered into them by the church Doctrine Department. If one who believes in Christ doesn't have works, does this mean their faith is phony and not genuine? The Apostle Paul didn't seem to think so.

In addition, they can never tell you specifically what precise works are required and how much. But James could ... because he was speaking about a specific blueprint—the works of the Mosaic law. It was the very thing Paul declared had been wiped out and deemed to be obsolete under a new and better covenant. Bearing the fruit of the Spirit is a good thing, but don't be deceived into thinking you are the one producing it. So which is it? It is important to come to the knowledge of the truth as to whether salvation is truly by grace through faith in what God has done through Christ ... or if it is only for the person who has faith and then has works to show for it.



   
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989. Why Do People Gravitate Towards Religious Rules and Law?

Paul wrote to the Galatians with the motivation to help turn them back to grace and the ministry of the Spirit that he had introduced to them. They had come freely to Christ by faith alone and received the Spirit apart from works ... but they would later be solicited by believing Jews who warned them they also needed certain applications from the law of Moses—starting with circumcision.

It got us thinking about a question that may be difficult to answer: What if they had never been approached by the Judaizers who were baiting them into adding law/works to faith? Would they have continued on the path of grace by faith alone as Paul had ministered to them? Or would they have drifted towards feeling the need to establish or maintain their own righteousness without any outside persuasion? In other words, as humans, are elements of legalism and fleshed-based works unavoidable in this world?

As God's creation, we are faced with many choices. Ask yourself, do you believe confidently in what God did through the gift of His Son, Jesus Christ, to bring you life and a righteous perfection ... or do you feel it was deficient and uncertain enough for you to work at adding something to it? It may even be something related to church ceremonial practices. Will we listen to the witness from within or the wide array of audible voices from outside?



   
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916. Is the Mosaic Law Still a "Tutor" for People Today?

Since the death and resurrection of Jesus, both Jews and Gentiles are justified by grace, apart from works. How can we keep from getting tangled between a mixture of law and grace ... or faith and works? Once we begin to understand that non-Jewish people (Gentiles) were never given the law that Moses handed to Israel, this will be a step in the right direction. That's right, the law was never for us to use. The Church has been thrown into a lurch by trying to balance law and grace and attempting to place believers in Christ under a combination of two different covenants—albeit a very revised version of it in our modern culture.

In the book of Galatians, Paul addresses this confusion to some believing Gentiles who had been persuaded by Judaizers they needed Jesus plus certain aspects of the Mosaic law. When Paul called the law a tutor, a better interpretation in our English language is "guardian" ... as some translations will show. Let's take a closer look at what Paul said in Galatians 3 and 4 from his Jewish perspective and how it translates to Gentiles and Jews ... then and now. We'll want to consider not only the historical background, and not just the context of the passage, but the context of the gospel itself so we can get a better view of the bigger picture.



   
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899. False Assumptions: "Fallen From Grace"

When someone is accused of falling from grace in today's "religiondom" (introducing a new word on the podcast!), it is usually used in the context of a person who has been caught in some sort of "major" sin or was discovered to have broken a significant commandment from the Mosaic law. Perhaps it involved a habitually failed attempt at commandment-keeping—and caught the attention of the rumor mill—also known as the judge and jury.

The phrase "fallen from grace" appears in one passage (Galatians 5:4). Even within this very Bible verse, it tells us what caused the Galatians to have fallen from grace, and it's pretty much the precise opposite of what church attendees have been told. But as we often do, we will expand the boundaries of the context to help get a clearer understanding in order to avoid the pitfall of yet another false assumption which slipped through the religious church filter.



   
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784. Paul and James: The Abraham Chronicles

How is it possible that both Paul and James quote the same passage from Genesis 15 – referring to Abraham – and come to different conclusions on how Abraham was declared justified? It might be for the same reason we often see today … in an effort to prove an assumed mindset, one of them attempts to apply the “verse” out of context. We break it down on this week’s program.

And what about those “Judaizers” who came from James to bewitch Gentile believers in Christ with requirements from the law and Jewish ceremonial customs? It caused even Peter to play the hypocrite as he feared the peer pressure, which led to “not being straightforward about the truth of the gospel.” Ultimately, Paul’s message was that justification was purely by grace through faith, apart from works. But this would be a battle he would fight even with those who were considered of high reputation and pillars of the church.

   
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782. Paul Opposed Peter to His Face

In Galatians Chapter 2 we find the story as told by Paul about how he opposed Peter to his face … and in front of other people of whom he considered to be hypocrites. You see, Peter would live like the Gentiles (apart from the law) and he would hang-out with them, which God had revealed was perfectly fine. But when certain men from James showed up, Peter would separate himself from the Gentiles for fear of these people and their lawful doctrine which opposed the truth of the gospel. It’s as if Paul was telling Peter he should know better than to try to blend in with the Jewish hypocrites, including false brethren who were deceiving Gentiles into believing they needed portions of the law to be mixed with faith in Jesus.

 We can begin to clearly see Paul’s writings reflect an opposition to the teachings brought forth from some of those that were associated with the church in Jerusalem, where James was considered a leader. The letter written to the Galatians is centered around the freedom both Jew and Gentile have in the New Covenant, and it was a different gospel than what was coming from the Jerusalem church.

   
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