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This may be the most difficult blog I have posted to date. The reasons for that are that it addresses very directly the divisions and uglier sides of the Christian faith in modern day context. I also fear that a majority of my fellow believers, brothers and sisters in the Lord, will not agree with me. Yet, I feel compelled to publish this as an appeal to true faith and spirituality without continuing in the guilt manipulation of “Legalism” taught by so many denominations and pastors.

I grew up in Christian faith, but from a very legalistic fundamentalist tradition. What I mean by that is my family interpreted Biblical tradition where we were quite focused on the “laws” and “commandments” of God in both the Old and New Testaments. We were taught to continue observing Old Testament dietary laws and we worshipped on Saturdays just like the Jews and Adventists. We also fundamentally believed in all the New Testament gifts and fruits of the Holy Spirit to be applicable now and forever until the return of Jesus Christ to this earth…in other words, Pentecostalism.

I don’t regret being brought up with such a myriad of Christian traditions or teachings because it helps me understand the wide range of church denominationalism that makes up the world of Christendom today. While I know most of these traditions or “doctrines” are not core to the Gospel of salvation and belief in Christ, most people would agree that to “walk in faith” can be exercised in a variety of ways. We can admire those who have the discipline of self-denial and the desire to be obedient to all the laws in order to demonstrate their faith and love of the savior. On the other hand, I think we have to accept the New Testament truth that believers are no longer under the law but under grace and mercy that God provided through the substitutional death of Jesus on the cross to pay the penalty of sin and curse all of us live under. He died once for ALL who would simply believe and place their faith in His mercy and grace with a repentant heart. It is very clear we are not saved by WORKS or “being good enough”.

American Protestant legalism grew out of the “holiness movement” and the “latter day rain” new Pentecostalism, both of which exploded from the late 1800s through the 1950s and beyond to create a new sector of Christians we call “Evangelicals”. Out of these European and American based movements grew myriads of denominations and growing divisions throughout Christendom based on various interpretations of Biblical writings from a “western civilization” perspective. Suddenly, thousands of denominations and churches were formed over doctrinal differences along the lines of temperance, interpreting the “filling” versus the “baptism” of the Holy Spirit, and cross accusations of idolatries including crucifixes, images of Mary the mother of Jesus, who is a saint, what is a sin, how “believers” are to dress…in general a lot of emphasis on the outward appearance and regarding “mingling” with the secular world.

I was a serious child who was encouraged and enjoyed studying the Bible at a young age. I also read the Quran, Torah, and the Book of Mormon by the time I was 13. My pastoral Christian grandfather had his hands full listening and answering all my questions on so many theological issues. It seemed to me 80-90% of what was written in those books were basically the same content. They pushed the moral laws, Ten Commandments, and the histories of battle between the secular and spiritual…God against the world. It was exciting to contemplate “righteousness” yet very discouraging to implement in a world that wasn’t spiritual and in churches that were worldly. Where is the centerline of absolute truth? Obviously all these statements and doctrines cannot be true. Which ones are true? Which ones are false? Are some laws just for certain people at certain times in history? Most of us transfer responsibility for those decisions to theologians of choice or various pastors and priests who believe themselves to be the oracles of God to their followers. Many of these encourage their followers NOT read the Bible for themselves or only under the direction of the pastor or priest. To read the Bible without macro or spiritual understanding could be a worthless pursuit. Then again, not all who claim spirituality are truly spiritual. There are so many paradoxes.

As I have written in a recent book called “Help My Unbelief”, as I began to experience a wide chasm between the religious world and the secular one, I decided to focus on secularism for over 35 years and attempted to blot out the din of religion. I went back to “ground zero” on what I believed and, like the popular process of these times they call “deconstructing my faith”, I deconstructed. I threw out religious piety from my life. I threw out legalism which made it much easier to be the rebel I naturally am.

During my decades of apostasy, I still had “spiritual” experiences. I always had a kernel of faith that I believe comes from God the creator…not just my imagination. God had called me early in life, and He wasn’t going to let me go forever on my own merry way. I continued to have a conscience regarding dishonesty, sexuality, and loving/caring for the needy and disadvantaged. My personal circles were full of people struggling to live successfully, overcome adversity, addictions and other carnal controls that come from our sin natures. The more I pursued and embraced Secular Humanism, the more I found the concept of “justice” questionable. How can a majority of people who put self at the center of their existence understand or espouse any law or rules that would control individual behaviors? A true secularist cannot admit belief in absolute right and wrong. A true secularist would not submit to judicial processes of legal or illegal behaviors. If there is no “godly” standard of behavior, what is right and wrong based on? Would it be based on the majority thinking of people? Would it be based on EDICTS from governments or kings? It would appear to be a combination of majority coercion and edicts from kings or government.

I think we can clearly state that “justice” in the world is now a human construct based on religious beliefs. Western civilization’s legal system is based on Judeo-Christian law while many eastern civilizations are based on Islamic and some other religious systems of faith. Leaders throughout the history of the world have established “religion” and/or political parties in order to gain support for their efforts to control and lead the masses to behavioral submission. Due to man’s urging God has given up trying to direct the masses individually or spiritually, and instead has given us religions and governments to “keep us in line”. Even when done in the name of “god”, our world’s current judicial systems are obviously corrupt and full of inequality. The powerful and rich do not suffer the same consequences of breaking the “law” as the common people. If you can’t see this, I don’t know what planet you are on.

Then there is Biblical scripture, itself a paradox related to the law and morality. Fundamentally, I agree with Martin Luther’s quote that “the law discovers the disease. The Gospel gives the remedy”. In the Bible we have two different “covenants” between God and man. Until Moses delivered the 10 commandments to the Jewish people of that time, there were no written or verbal standards of behavior outside of “natural laws” of conscience and family traditions or presuppositions. Romans 1 is clear that from the beginning GOD wrote the law on the human heart. When Adam and Eve ate of the forbidden fruit, they knew to hide from God in shame when He sought them out. When Cain killed Abel, he knew he had done wrong and paid a big price for it. Yet, there were no written laws or decrees for around 2500 years between Adam and Eve to Moses’ tablets of the 10 commandments in Exodus 20. What authority was there to determine right and wrong during those first millenniums? I would argue it was spirit and conscience that comes from man’s spiritual side tied to authority of family rule and order.  It was individual men and their families that “walked upright before the Lord”. It was not because they read something and obeyed it. As the science of history reveals, mankind has gone from families, to clans, to towns, to states, to countries as the social construct of “law and order” which have proceeded to control the world and its interactions through statism and globalism.  While these constructs often refer to holy books as their sources of authority, most all are corrupt and “evil in the sight of the Lord”. Unfortunately, we see this most vividly in the culture of the USA where leaders give lip service to Judeo-Christian ethics and foundation of scripture, yet do not live by or enforce the essence of those scriptures.

In modern Christianity, we now see these constructs being played out in our new world order. Kingdoms and fiefdoms ruled civilization until the advent of Western Civilization which brought “enlightenment” and the printing press. As man’s means of communication increased through languages and writings, the secular mindset began shaping everything from our religions to our governing bodies. Governments and religions became interdependent to maintain their “controls of the masses”. As this unholy duality of religion and government took power over the masses, there was no longer any purity of laws and justice. Secularists would claim adherence to religion while religion became subservient to secularists. The dichotomy between spirit and “the world” has become shrouded in our new constructs of “church and state”. Up until now church and state have worked together for the most part to maintain “law and order” in our global civilization according to traditions of men. It seems obvious to us now that statism and global governance are quickly disassociating from religion apart from that of Secular Humanism. Man is now at the center of defining what is “right and wrong” as people follow one politician, religious leader, or another as their source of truth and righteousness.

Four years ago I gave in to the spiritual battle for my life that lasted around five years. After gaining my “Phd” in Secular Humanism over decades, I started having what some would call “flashbacks” of my spiritual faith experiences growing up. I would have scriptures I hadn’t read in decades invade my thoughts in the middle of very sinful behaviors. Spiritual songs from my previous life started haranguing me almost every day. Secularists would probably say I was having “psychotic episodes”. If that is a pseudonym for spiritual battles, that is probably correct. Without repeating the full story included in my book, lets just summarize to say that I felt a definite call back to faith in Jesus Christ and after a long battle with self, I relented and requested the Holy Spirit to once again restore my life and its calling. From that day on, everything major has changed in my life…except the continual battle between flesh and spirit, good and evil that I think all of us live with every day. While knowing “the law” had kept me in check with an intact conscience, it took the Holy Spirit to bring me to a point of spiritual renewal where I submitted my ways to His. Yes, it IS a mystical experience…that frees us from the limits of physical selves. Scriptures did not set me free…rather they convicted me. It took a spiritual encounter to know I could change and overcome my carnal nature at least most of the time versus being “dead in my trespasses”.

Interestingly, while I think I have personally grown and changed a lot through all of this, I really don’t see much difference in the organized church and religion. Religious legalistic people are still content to count on their good works and thinking THEIR choices and being “righteous” is what makes them right with God. Meanwhile I continue to see more than ever that ONLY God’s grace, mercy, and faith HE provides will ever get any person into the New Kingdom that is coming for eternity. Church people continue to count on their traditions versus true spirituality to make them “right with God”. The charlatans and money changers are still running many large denominations and mega-churches. “Christianity” is still BIG BUSINESS for many of the masses who call themselves Christian.

Meanwhile, I continue to count on the scriptural truths and pursue the fruits of the spirit to sense my and others levels of spirituality. Very basically, spirit is life and the law is death. The Bible doesn’t say “where the laws of God are there is life”. It says “Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty” (2 Corinthians 3:17). The law brings death, the spirit brings life. So when religious people focus on the laws, rules, and “order”…it creates a dormant, dead church.  The spirit of legalism puts believers under bondage and works to justify their beliefs. When truly Spirit filled believers focus on the spiritual through humility, prayer, and reliance ONLY on God’s Holy Spirit to renew their spirits, it creates a live, progressive church where believers want to be and can be real with each other.

“Such is the confidence that we have through Christ toward God. Not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God, who has made us sufficient to be ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit. For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.” (2 Corinthians 3:4-7)

I continue to be disheartened by legalistic preachers and teachers who emphasize exercises of reading scriptures in a habitual, legalistic manner while not connecting spiritually nor contextually with what was written. We are dead in our sins because of the law! We are freed from sin and the ravages of the law by the Holy Spirit who sets us free from the bondage of the law only through the shed blood of Jesus and power of the Gospel (Good News). We no longer obey “the law” out of fear of hellfire and brimstone. We obey the revealed word because we have been called and transformed by the Holy Spirit. Our spirits have been regenerated when faith is imparted to us by the Holy Spirit. It is not something man conjures up to save himself. Jesus is the “author and finisher of our faith”. Faith is not something “we decide to do”. Sure, we have to submit via our “free will” when prompted to believe, but Gods hand doesn’t move because WE decided something. Our lives get moved and consumed because God decided you would be His. Our power doesn’t come from believing God can save us. It comes from connecting/plugging/knowing the power of the Holy Spirit when offered to us. Let’s stop going around trying to discern who will and who won’t be in the new kingdom based on self proclaimed “righteousness”. Let us simply make sure we are plugged into that spirit as it passes by. Believing isn’t just thinking there is electricity in the wall socket. It is KNOWING there is electricity there because we are plugged into it. There is a great difference between potential and ACTUAL. You can believe that God can change or heal you…but if you never submit and plug into the Holy Spirit as it passes by, you will miss the whole purpose and true knowledge of that power.

You do not know the power of Gods word by simply reading it. You must connect or plug into it with faith you seek from God if you are to know the power of it. That faith doesn’t come from you but is provided by God as HIS choice to reveal it. You have no pride in “having faith”, because you don’t have any of your own. YOU don’t have faith outside of His providing it…and recognize that He doesn’t provide it to all equally. There is no truth in YOUR faith. There is power is HIS faith imparted to you. This is where the core of hypocrisy lies that man can conjure up faith or be the “decider in chief”. Your faith doesn’t save you. HIS faith in you and imparted to you is what saves you. All the righteous living in this world cannot save you from the hell that is coming.

Don’t be the believer who knows there is power there but never connects or submits to it by plugging in. Regeneration only comes from acting upon the promises given you by the word…not just knowing they are there. So many are unwilling to obey and submit to what they are reading in the Bible. They know what is there, but they have not ACTED on it. They know the commandments, but they do not obey them. They know there is potential love and power in fellowship in the Spirit, but they do not HAVE it until they submit and act upon that power when it is imparted to them.

Where is that GODLY faith today that helps people rise and be healed…physically, emotionally, and spiritually? It certainly is not in the life of the self-righteous or pious religious person who “thanks God he is not like those sinners in front of his path”. Godly and true faith has no doubt when praying for miracles. Godly and true faith does not allow “pride of life” and judging of others to take root in their minds with spirits of judgement and condemnation. “There is now no condemnation for those who are IN Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1). This is not about those who simply believe Jesus exists. Even the devil knows and believes that…but he will not be included in the New Kingdom. It is sinners, not self-righteous people, who are freed from sin and alive in Christ…BECAUSE of Christ and no other person or “self-deciding”. This sinful “pride of life” is the main sin most of us humans suffer from. “There are none righteous, no not ONE”. Yet most churches and religions consider obeying the laws and customs of the “church” as proving their faith and salvation. Prayer, getting baptized, and reading the Bible is not enough to enlighten or save you. As Jesus told Nicodemus, “You must be born again”. And those of you who get mad and say they cannot believe in a god who would be picky and not treat every human “equally” have bought into the lie of equality. God has never been an “equal opportunity employer”. He doesn’t call or reward everyone equally. Never did and never will.

“…yet we know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, so we also have believed in Christ Jesus, in order to be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law, because by works of the law no one will be justified. But if, in our endeavor to be justified in Christ, we too were found to be sinners, is Christ then a servant of sin? Certainly not! For if I rebuild what I tore down, I prove myself to be a transgressor. For through the law I died to the law, so that I might live to God. I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness were through the law, then Christ died for no purpose. (Galatians 2:16-21)”

Case closed…you are justified only by faith, not works. The works we do are our worship of God, not out of bondage and guilt controlling our lives. If you are full of the spirit, you will fulfill the true laws whether you know all of them or not. When we fall short, we are continually covered by the grace and mercy faith from God has provided. Rejoice in finding love, joy and forgiveness…not guilt driven works and bondage to the laws. We are NOT to walk around carrying the heavy burden of our ongoing flesh with its sinful desires. Instead we are to walk uprightly from a sense of FREEDOM and belonging. We are no longer condemned because of our temporal bodies we continue to struggle in. God looks at us through the shed blood of Jesus Christ, His son and sees us as without blemish…even though WE know we still have blemishes. He calls us His “sons” as the reward for simple faith based on repentance and spiritual rebirth. Our battle, like Paul’s (Romans 7:15-20), is for the rest of our earthly lives…but if we live in the spirit, we will no longer live with guilt or remorse over our carnal natures. We will fight to overcome carnality, but we will not be bowed or judged for our carnality any longer. We are IMPERFECT sons and daughters of the living God. Start living and acting like it. You take the first step and the Holy Spirit does the rest to assure you that you are HIS!  It is HIS power that frees us from the penalty of our sins. I challenge you to plug in today by simply humbling yourself before the Almighty God. If we are busy making sure we are staying in the right spiritual position before God, we will have no time or energy to judge our brother’s life based on works and the law. God doesn’t need YOU to correct your brother. Love and lead your brother to Him and God will do the restoration of renewed life and obedience…through the Spirit.