The Bible says more than you've been told.

Week 21 | Issue #21 | Spiritual vs. Legalism Series (1 of 4)

But some men came down from Judea and were teaching the brothers, "Unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved." — Acts 15:1 (ESV)

That is it. That is the thing Paul spent his life fighting. Not "Christians should obey God." Nobody was arguing about that. The claim was that a Gentile had to become a Jew first. Get circumcised, take on the law of Moses, and then Christ could do you some good.

Paul's answer was not that obedience does not matter. His answer was that the law of Moses is finished and you cannot go back to a system God ended.

He tells the Galatians exactly what happens if they try: "If you accept circumcision, Christ will be of no advantage to you... every man who accepts circumcision is obligated to keep the whole law" (Galatians 5:2-3, ESV). Pick this law and you have to under it and not under another. Every feast, every sacrifice, every rule.

When Paul says a man is not justified by works, he almost never just says "works." He says works of the law. In Greek it is erga nomou. Works belonging to the law. And the law he means is the one Moses delivered, the one the men were trying to require.

He says it that way in Galatians 2:16. He says it again in Romans 3:28: "For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law." That phrase is not a category that includes everything a Christian does. It is the name of a specific system that specific men were pushing.

Here is where people stops reading. Everybody knows Ephesians 2:8-9. "For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast." Wonderful. Now read the next sentence.

For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them. — Ephesians 2:10 (ESV)

Created for good works. Two verses after "not a result of works." Paul did not notice a contradiction because there is not one. You are not saved by earning. You are saved for doing. Same breath. Notice the difference between by and for.

And then there is James, who says the thing nobody quotes. "So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead" (James 2:17, ESV). And seven verses later: "You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone" (James 2:24, ESV). This is the only place in the entire Bible where the phrase "faith alone" shows up. It has the word "not" in front of it.

No. They were answering different people. Paul was talking to men who wanted to join the law of Moses to the law of Christ. And Paul says no, you cannot earn your way in. James was talking to men who said they believed and did nothing about it. He said no, that kind of faith is not alive. One is arguing with people who think they can purchase salvation. The other is fighting people who think they can be saved without it changing anything. Both are right, and neither one is contradicting one another.

So what is legalism, if it is not "caring what God said"? It is a question about where you think your salvlation comes from. The legalist obeys because he is accepted. He is keeping a ledger, and he expects God to settle up. That is the man Paul is after, and Paul says it plainly: those people were "seeking to establish their own" righteousness (Romans 10:3, ESV).

The Christian obeys because he has been accepted. Nothing he does puts God in his debt. Jesus said it better than anybody, and it is a strange little parable. A servant works all day, comes in, and still serves his master's supper before his own. Then Jesus says this:

So you also, when you have done all that you were commanded, say, "We are unworthy servants; we have only done what was our duty." — Luke 17:10 (ESV)

Look at what that sentence does. The servant did everything he was told. Full obedience. And he walks away, duty done. The whole argument is, obedience is your duty. Those two things fit together fine. They have always fit together.

Summaries, not direct quotes.

John Gill on Galatians 2:16: Gill holds that "works of the law" covers the whole law, moral and ceremonial, as a means of justification, and insists that no obedience of any kind can justify a sinner before God.

Albert Barnes on Galatians 2:16: Barnes reads Paul as addressing the Jewish claim that keeping the Mosaic law secured acceptance with God, and argues that Paul's target is the ground of justification rather than the obligation to obey.

Matthew Henry on Ephesians 2:10: Henry takes verse 10 as Paul's own guard against misreading verse 9, saying that good works are excluded as the cause of salvation and required as its fruit.

All three land in the same place on the thing that matters. The works are shut out as payment and brought back in as fruit.

Acts 15:1 — "Unless you are circumcised... you cannot be saved" (ESV). The sentence that started the fight. Any definition of legalism that does not fit this verse is not Paul's definition.

Titus 3:5 — "Not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy" (ESV). Paul again, same letter where he tells Titus to teach people to be careful to do good works.

James 2:24 — "A person is justified by works and not by faith alone" (ESV). The only "faith alone" in Scripture, and it is denied.

Romans 10:3 — "Seeking to establish their own" righteousness (ESV). The clearest short description of a legalist in the Bible, and it is about ownership, not effort.

Legalism is not a word for "obedience I feel forced to do." We are not creating a debt on God that says because I did this then you have to…. Rather, understand the purpose and the purpose is not "does he obey." It is I obey because I am saved.

A man can keep every command God gave and claim nothing because it was his duty, like the servant in Luke 17. That is a Christian. But a Christian is not a person who keeps a list hoping to give it to God one day and cash in.

The people who exert this claim read Galatians and took it too far. If we are not under law, then nobody can tell anybody anything. Any call to obey is bondage. Any standard is a man putting himself in Moses' chair. The instinct behind it is good. These folks have usually watched somebody get crushed under rules that were never God's, and they do not want to be part of it. Fair enough.

But look what the position does to the Bible. The New Testament is full of commands. Paul gives them by the dozen in every letter. Jesus gives them. John gives them. "Flee sexual immorality." "Let the thief no longer steal." "Do not get drunk with wine." Those are not suggestions and they are not Moses.

And it does something worse. It turns "legalism" into a tool for avoiding whatever is inconvenient. Once the word can mean any obligation, it means nothing at all, and the person calling people and rules “legalist or legalism” has quietly made theirself the final authority on what God commands.

This people who believe the opposite know the rules cold. They can tell you what is required, where the line is, and who is over it. And they love to tell you who has crossed the line. Somewhere along the way the “obediece” list became their idol. God's approval became a number of rules you checked off.

You can spot it by how a man talks about other people. The legalist is always comparing. Jesus gave us the portrait and it is uncomfortable to read: "God, I thank you that I am not like other men" (Luke 18:11, ESV). That man who uttered those words had the better record and he wanted God to know. But if you continue reading he goes home with nothing.

Here is the whole thing in one question, and it is not a question about how much you obey. Why do you obey? If you obey so that God will accept you, you are working a ledger, and Paul spent his whole ministry telling you to put it down. You will never get the number high enough, and if you could, you would have earned something, and nobody earns salvation.

If you obey because God has already accepted you, then you are doing what Ephesians 2:10 says you were made for, and your obedience is not payment. It is what sons do. Two men can do the exact same thing on the exact same morning. One is living by the rules set by his family. One is living because of the family he is in. Same actions. Opposite religions.

The lesson: Before you call something legalism, ask what it is being used to buy. Obedience that claims nothing is not legalism. It is just obedience. That is why tools like BibleWord.ai exist.

Transliteration: NOM-os

Strong's Number: G3551

Definition: Law. A rule or body of rules. Most often in the New Testament, the law God gave through Moses.

This word is not an insult in the Bible. Paul calls the law holy, righteous, and good. He says he delights in it. He says it was the thing that showed him he was a sinner in the first place. So when Paul argues against the law, he is never saying the law was bad. He is saying it was never the thing that could save anybody, and it is finished as a system.

Now here is the part worth knowing, because it clears up a lot of confusion. Paul uses nomos for more than one thing. Sometimes he means the law of Moses, the whole covenant arrangement. That is what he means in Galatians. Sometimes he means a principle that governs how something works, the way we say "the law of gravity." That is what he means in Romans 8:2, when he talks about "the law of the Spirit of life" setting a man free from "the law of sin and death."

And the New Testament is perfectly willing to talk about a law that belongs to Christ. Paul says he became "under the law of Christ" to win people (1 Corinthians 9:21, ESV). He tells the Galatians to bear each other's burdens, "and so fulfill the law of Christ" (Galatians 6:2, ESV).

Read that again if you grew up hearing that Christians are not under law. Paul says they are under one. Just not the old one.

That is the whole point of this series. There is no third option where a man belongs; to Christ and owes Him nothing. The question was never law or no law. The question was which law, and who is the one who created it for you.

Until next time,