Legalism and Liberty Pt2

I’m looking at the clock because
it’s obviously malfunctioned. It is racing ahead quicker than I planned. If the Lord’s people would please
take their Bibles, turn back to Colossians chapter 2. And
here in the greater portion of this chapter, we’ve seen now
for many weeks, Paul is providing these examination standards for
those who profess to be Christians. They say they believe in Christ,
and now, after some time, there’s an opportunity to evaluate their
profession of faith. A professing believer is the
fruit of the gospel. That’s good news, but the fruit
needs to be inspected so that it might be verified as genuine.
And not only pastors do this, but other believers will examine
us and should. And even we ourselves are called
to engage in this examination process. And so these standards
must be applied. No one benefits by ignoring godly
standards. The church, fellow believers,
and especially we ourselves need to evaluate if we claim to be
saved. As we’ve seen, Paul has presented
several of these examination points already. The discernment
that is to be exercised in verses 4 and 5. The steadfastness that
is to be maintained in verses 6 and 7. The caution that is
to be exercised in verses 8 through 12. The regeneration that is
simply to be enjoyed, verses 13 and 14. And those four we’ve
already considered, you know well. But here in verses 15 through
23, Paul has introduced his final examination point in this series,
the liberty to be guarded. Paul here says that the Christian
ought to be one who guards his or her liberty in Christ. Well, what Paul, of course, is
dealing with here in this final examination point is the destructive
error of legalism. Legalism, as we were reminded
last week, is the adherence to rules or laws or practices that
are outside of Scripture in order to gain or enhance our spiritual
standing. And it can be very easily imbibed. Legalism can be taken in by an
individual very easily. And then it can rapidly spread
through an entire church very, very thoroughly. The legalistic
mindset in any day and age is plentiful. Not only does every
religion of the world have its set of customs and rituals that
must be performed in order for the individual to appease his
or her God, and be right with that God spiritually. Only Christianity
is a religion that teaches that we are never justified by the
works of the law, but only by faith in Jesus Christ. All other
religions promote a system of works-based righteousness. Unfortunately, legalism was no
stranger to Christ’s church. It never has been. And that is
not by God’s will and design, but through the natural tendency
of people. We lean towards legalism. There’s an almost innate proclivity
in people to want to do something to earn or to enhance their spiritual
standing, their free salvation that they’ve come to enjoy. But
legalism, for one’s spiritual life, is as poison to the body. Because once a religious ritual
or a religious observation becomes mandatory for salvation, it begins
a steady process of eroding away the person’s confidence in faith. A sinner comes completely empty-handed
to God for salvation. He or she is saved simply by
their faith in Jesus Christ alone and his death on the cross for
their sin. But that great tenet of the gospel,
justification by faith, simple, foundational, wonderful, justification
by faith is slowly drained of its glory and significance by
a legalistic mindset. Those who are infected with legalism,
what must I do to gain eternal life? They have fallen for another
gospel, as Paul warned the Galatians. If we begin to transfer our faith
to anything other than Jesus Christ for salvation, it is a
sure indicator that our confidence in the gospel is running dry. And it’s very clear now that
at this point in Paul’s letter to this little church in Colossae
that some form or forms, plural, of legalism were present there
in that area. The troublemakers in their midst
may well have included Judaizers, Jewish people who tried to press
this adherence to Jewish law, circumcision and the like, They
were pressing these things upon new believers, but if the troublemakers
included Judaizers, it was not limited to them. The errors mentioned
here, even in this short list, make it clear that there were
many and widely varied kinds of legalists milling about in
Colossae, all pressing for their insidious perspectives to be
applied to people’s lives. They were pressing any who would
listen that something yet needed to be added to their faith, that
there was this thing or things, plural, that they must do to keep hold of God’s favor. And for Paul, such news set off
all kinds of internal alarms, and this is why he’s addressing
these believers so stridently here. For Paul, legalism, in
any of its forms or particulars, is an assault on the gospel itself. Sinners are justified by faith
alone in Christ for salvation. Trust in anything else Any measure
of personal righteousness destroys that simple faith of the gospel. No matter how noble, no matter
how reasonable some practice sounds to people, adherence to
such for salvation undermines the faith of the gospel. And
so when the apostle heard of such error flooding, really,
the region of Colossae, he knew that he must sound the alarm.
And so it’s here in verses 15 through 23 that he does so. Paul
issues this, his fifth and final examination point, the liberty
which must be guarded. Would you follow along with me?
Beginning in verse 15 of chapter two. When he had disarmed the rulers
and authorities, he made a public display of them, having triumphed
over them through him. Therefore, no one is to act as
your judge in regard to food or drink or in respect to a festival
or new moon or Sabbath day, things which are a mere shadow of what
is to come. But the substance belongs to
Christ. Let no one keep defrauding you
of your prize by delighting in self-abasement in the worship
of angels, taking his stand on visions he has seen, inflated
without cause by his fleshly mind, and not holding fast to
the head from whom the entire body, being supplied and held
together by the joints and ligaments, grows with a growth which is
from God. If you have died with Christ
to the elementary principles of the world, why, as if you
were living in the world, do you submit yourself to decrees
such as do not handle, do not taste, do not touch, which all
refer to things destined to perish with use in accordance with the
commandments and teachings of men? These are matters which
have, to be sure, the appearance of wisdom, in self-made religion,
self-abasement, severe treatment of the body, but are of no value
against fleshly indulgence. We began our consideration of
this section last week, looking there at verse 15, and we saw
that that is a very transitional verse, a linchpin, if you will,
a chain, We saw that it links verse 14 with verses 16 and following. And here Paul tells us that Christ
had vanquished all authority. It only seems abrupt to us that
Paul warns against submitting ourselves to judges in our spiritual
life. This statement is not unrelated
to what follows. When Paul says in verse 15 that
Christ has conquered all authority, he means all authority, earthly
and spiritual. And he has overwhelmingly conquered
these enemies. He says there in that one short
little verse, verse 15, that Christ, or God through Christ,
has disarmed spiritual rulers, triumphed over them, and even
made a public display of them. It’s a metaphor, as we saw last
week, derived from military battle where the enemy is not only defeated, but he’s captured and shamed
in the process, marched through the streets. And the connection
with verses 16 and 17 is that if Christ has vanquished all
spiritual authority, then we need not subject ourselves to
any authority other than Christ. What Paul begins to do in verses
16 and 17 is to apply the principles stated in verse 15. Now that
Christ is victorious, what does it look like day-to-day in the
Christian’s life? And what Paul moves to show is
that the Christian’s heart and life is a battleground. It is the battleground of liberty.
It is here that souls are either secured and strengthened in their
faith, or they are lost to the error
of legalism. Here in these two verses, Paul
presents an assertion of freedom. He details the threats to freedom,
and he lays the foundation of freedom. Three things to observe
in these few verses. Let’s go back, if we could, to
verse 16, where, first of all, we see the assertion of freedom. In this battleground of liberty,
the first thing that Paul says is, therefore, no one is to act
as your judge. So verse 15 we see is very much
related to verses 16 and 17. And the way that we know that
for certain here is by that little word that stands at the head
of these two verses. When I say little, I’m speaking
about the Greek. In the Greek, it’s small, just
two letters. But in both the ESV and the New American, they
translate it as therefore, good translation. Paul is drawing
a conclusion here in verses 16 and 17, a conclusion based on
what he says there in verse 15. He’s applying it. And there,
as we saw last week, Jesus Christ has conquered his spiritual foes,
the devil and his battalion of demons. The victory was decisive
and final and overwhelming. He tore away their power and
weaponry in that he triumphed over them. And ultimately, he
led them in a public march of shame. Paul’s connection here
in verse 16 is basically this. Since Christ has conquered all
spiritual authority, no one should function in that capacity over
us as judge. Why, if Christ has vanquished
all other authority, would a reasonable Christian submit themselves to
those with no spiritual authority? It is in this opening line that
Paul issues a command, literally, let no one act as your judge. The verb here is in the imperative. It is a command. Do not allow
anyone to function as a judge in spiritual matters of your
life. Do not allow anyone to pass judgment
on you and your spiritual practices. Judging is the means of pressure
that these false teachers were using to gain compliance for
their perspectives and their practices. They would just pressure
people, browbeat them, guilt trip them into compliance on
these particulars. And they were all extra biblical
particulars. We’ll come back to that in a
moment. They were judging those who were living differently than
they were. Let me tell you something about
this word. It’s neutral. Judging. Very neutral. We tend to think of judgmentalism
as being only negative, don’t we? Someone disapproving of something
about you or something that you’re doing. They’re being judgmental. But the nature of this word makes
it clear that this judging can go either way. The verb speaks
of assessing or evaluating someone or something. It could be negative
or positive. It could come in the form of
condemnation, true, but it also could come in the form of affirmation.
Our judge might coerce us by negative criticism, but they
also could coerce us by manipulative approval. So to submit either
way to these negative or positive judgmental people is problematic. And we cannot yield ourselves.
We cannot submit ourselves and our spiritual practice to the
extra biblical fanatical opinions, self devised rules of others. No matter how passionately they
hold to them or promote them, because in doing so, we are sacrificing
our Christian freedom. The question to be asked is,
why are we doing a certain thing? Or why are we not doing it? Is it biblical? Is it prohibited
in scripture? Or is it promoted in scripture? That’s the question that we have
to ask. If we’re doing it only to meet approval or to avoid
disapproval, we’re doing it for all the wrong reasons. You know, for this, would you
take a moment? I want to have you turn. Would you turn to Romans
chapter 14? I just want you to interact with
a little passage there. And here in Romans 14, Paul is
discussing some of these same exact things, legalism and liberty. Romans 14, and look, if you would,
beginning in verse 1. Now, accept the one who is weak
in faith, but not for the purpose of passing judgment on his opinions. One person has faith that he
may eat all things, but he who is weak eats vegetables only. The one who eats is not to regard
with contempt the one who does not eat. And the one who does
not eat is not to judge the one who eats, for God has accepted
him. Who are you to judge the servant
of another? To his own master he stands or
falls, and he will stand, for the Lord is able to make him
stand. One person regards one day above
another, another regards every day alike. Each person must be
fully convinced in his own mind. He who observes the day observes
it for the Lord, and he who eats does so for the Lord, for he
gives thanks to God, for he eats not, for the Lord he does not
eat and gives thanks to God.” You see, we’re not to engage
in this kind of brow-beating manipulation of our fellow believers,
because they’re not doing Christianity the way that we believe they
should. There is going to be a variance, Paul says, in our
perspectives on matters, especially those that are less defined in
Scripture, the gray areas. We cannot hold our brother or
sister in Christ in contempt over these things. That doesn’t
mean that we don’t take up the Bible and seek to instruct a
newer believer on something that is explicitly laid out in Scripture,
But if it’s a matter of conscience, in some lesser matter, we are
to relent. The key is this, they are doing
what they are doing for the Lord. They’re doing it unto the Lord.
And whether the individual observes a special day, or he eats a particular
food, or any other gray area, He does what he does for the
Lord. There’s something else, if you
would, back to Colossians 2. There’s something else I should
call our attention to here. In the original of this sentence,
therefore no one is to act as your judge. In the original in
the Greek, Paul narrows his audience here a bit. He gives a command,
but he focuses that command on what the Greek says, some of
you. In doing so, he isn’t suggesting
that this caution is not for every believer. We probably all
will interact with these principles at some point in our life. But
in doing so, he just says that only some of these believers
were struggling with this spiritual bullying. That’s what it was.
Not everyone was, or rather, not everyone was allowing themselves
to be harassed by these fanatics. He’s targeting those who are
finding it difficult to stand up to these false teachers. Because
life shows us, doesn’t it, that some people have a more
tender conscience than others. and they can be more easily intimidated
to adopt some habit or practice. Some are less taught than others,
and they may be easily steered into error. Some are less confident
than others, and they may be nervously led into legalism. Some are more eager to please,
and therefore more susceptible to influence than others. Some
are less mature than others, and may not recognize manipulative
coercion when they experience it. And because of this, Paul
singles out the weaker believers among them and he admonishes
them. Do not allow anyone to act as your judge. But over what
kinds of things? We already mentioned gray areas.
And if there is something explicitly written in Scripture, and by
the way, if you go to correct your brother or sister, it is
not your opinion that matters. If you can’t find it in Scripture,
stand down. What kinds of things are mentioned
as threats to freedom? In looking at the battleground
of liberty, Paul not only gives us the assertion of freedom there,
he gives us the threats to freedom there in that text. Look at verse
16. No one is to act as your judge
in regard to food or drink or in respect to a festival or new
moon or a Sabbath day. I’ll tell you right away that
this list is in no way exhaustive. Paul merely throws out a quick
list of the ways that the current false teachers, some of the ways
were taking away from the purity of the gospel by adding in some
element. You must do this or that. Paul
provides a general list of five things, five areas where someone
might begin to exert pressure in regard to food or drink, respect
to a festival, new moon, Sabbath day. We’ll look at each of those,
but there are countless other areas where such extremism may
develop. Paul cautioned young Timothy,
didn’t he, about those who could harm his flock with controversial
questions and disputes about words. 1 Timothy 6, 4. Wrangling
about words, 2 Timothy 2, 14. Foolish and ignorant speculations,
2 Timothy 2, 23. Myths. 2 Timothy 4.4. Foolish controversies,
genealogies, disputes about the law as he communicated to Titus,
Titus 3.9. And everywhere Paul went, it
seemed that the Judaizers dogged his steps over the subject of
circumcision. So the number of things that
could be used to pressure a fellow believer are plentiful. In our
day, We often face pressure, don’t we, regarding the particulars
of our worship. What do you mean that women don’t
preach in your church? What do you mean that you don’t
have drums? The celebration of the Lord’s
table is often a point of contention. Wine versus grape juice. Unleavened
bread versus a loaf of bread. Manners of prayer, attire, what
we wear, how we wear our hair, including our facial hair, what
Bible translation do we use, drinking of alcohol, soda, or
caffeine, observances of special days, and on and on and on it
goes. You probably have been pressured
about a number of those areas. The number of things about which
people will take issue is never ending. Let’s briefly consider
Paul’s list. What does he provide? First,
he says that no one should be your judge in regard to food.
Well, we know that dietary laws were strict, very strict for
the Jews. What animals were clean and permissible
to eat and what was forbidden. And it’s possible that some of
this was woven in to what these false teachers were promoting.
They were bringing in the Old Testament Jewish dietary laws. Possible. And such scrutiny would
go something like this. Oh, are you really going to eat
that? Or, as a believer, Do you really
think that you should be eating bacon? Or, I’m sure that you
would agree with me that eating vegetables only is the most godly
diet. Or, well, red meat will certainly
not be brought into this temple. The historic list of do’s and
don’ts regarding what we eat or should not eat is endless. But while it could be that these
false teachers were promoting elements of that, it’s likely
that this scrutiny went well beyond the Old Testament laws.
And then to add to that the whole matter of not eating at all. Fasting. When and why and where
and how to fast. And I’ll just tell you from my
Christian experience, I’ve noticed that people quickly become the
local experts on the subject of fasting as soon as they begin
to do it. And they want everyone else to
follow their model. That, I believe, is one of the
reasons that Jesus addressed this in Matthew 6. Whenever you
fast, do not put on a gloomy face, as the hypocrites do, for
they neglect their appearance, so that they will be noticed
by men when they are fasting. Truly, I say to you, they have
their reward in full, but you, when you fast, anoint your head,
wash your face, so that your fasting will not be noticed by
men, but by your father who is in secret, and your father who
sees what is done in secret will reward you. You see, even in
such a special practice as fasting, it can quickly give way to a
legalistic mindset. You must do it this way. You
must do it this often. That essentially is asceticism.
The asceticism is the denial of certain things, food, drink,
sleep, et cetera, in order to gain some spiritual benefit or
standing. I don’t know of any subject that
more quickly produces smugness than the practice of fasting.
And so this extreme asceticism that Paul is speaking about here,
abstaining from food, in large measure fasting would also apply
to drinking. When Paul says in effect, let
no one act as your judge with regard to drink, I think that
we might be tempted here to render this as an absolute liberation
here in the use of alcohol. I don’t think that would either
be wise or exegetically correct here. That’s not what Paul’s
talking about at all. He’s not talking about what is
consumed. but whether it’s consumed at
all. And this too would point to asceticism
as the culprit in Colossae, the prideful man-made practice of
limiting one’s fluid intake for the purpose of spiritual growth.
We know that one group in particular, the Essenes, were proud about
the fact that they drank only water This is not a rigid application
of Jewish law at all. The Old Testament had nothing
to say about the intake of fluids except for the dictates to priests
regarding alcohol, but those would not apply to every Colossian
believer. That can’t be what Paul’s discussing
here. There was likely some practice, some pseudo-religious rite, R-I-T-E,
that tied abstinence from food and drink, and it was done in
vogue in Colossae. And the adherents were pushing
this on others, on Christians. They didn’t care. for Paul’s
theological foundation here, that the kingdom of God is not
eating and drinking, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy
Spirit. They would have had disdain for
Paul’s position here that promoted that everything created by God
is good and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with
gratitude. Now, there’s a balance there,
we know. We don’t know exactly what was going on in Colossae,
but there was something going on, something that was being
pushed and promoted in this realm of food and drink. The reason
I say this, something was going on, watch what Paul does. He
points to three kinds of events, annual, monthly, and weekly.
He likely is referring to annual events when he mentions festivals. The Jewish people certainly had
their celebrations, Passover, the Feast of Tabernacles, and
the Feast of Pentecost. Those were the big three for
the Jewish people, but other cultures also had their feasts
and festivals. And not only would participants
want others to join them, they would pull out all stops to get
them to do so. Likewise, with regard to the
ceremonies of the new moon, these were the monthly observances.
It’s the only time this word is used in the New Testament,
so there isn’t a lot of information here about this. But the worship
of the new moon was common among the heathen. and it was forbidden
among the Jews. Nevertheless, Israel found herself
influenced by other cultures, which both Isaiah and Hosea rebuke. The new moon must also have been
tied to some semi-religious recognition, a feast, a ceremony, a ritual
of some sort. And this, too, was an attempted
addition to the Colossians’ Christianity. You’re not coming to the New
Moon Festival this afternoon. So there were these additional
religious expectations annually, monthly, even weekly. And Paul
adds a weekly one here, a Sabbath day. This is the same kind of
thing for which Paul rebuked the Galatians. You observe days
and months and seasons and years. And the day that he is pointing
to there was very likely the Sabbath day. He calls them at
the end of his discussion of Galatians, weak and worthless
elemental things. Now, the Sabbath was indeed a
Jewish observance, commanded by God himself. But here too,
there was a measure of syncretism in other cultures, adopting measures
of Sabbatarian practice. And even we are not unfamiliar
with the pressures that attend other people’s observance of
this day. The Jewish Sabbath was a day
which God had prescribed for their worship. And I often understand what people
mean when they refer to our Lord’s Day as the Sabbath. And we should be gracious there.
But other than being designated as the day of worship, respective,
the respective groups of people, the Jewish Sabbath was not expected
of the Gentiles. And it’s not applicable to Christians.
Even at the Jerusalem Council in Acts 15, the Jewish Sabbath
wasn’t imposed on Gentile converts. perfect opportunity to say, you
know what, make sure they observe the Sabbath. Believers get themselves
embroiled very quickly into controversy when they begin to press their
modes and methods of observing the so-called Sabbath, the Lord’s
Day. In the first place, the Jewish Sabbath was explicitly
designated to be observed on Saturday, not Sunday. what the
New Testament designates as the Lord’s Day. But the Sabbath as
given to the Jews, it doesn’t carry over to the church. The
New Testament never commands the church to observe the Jewish
Sabbath. A Christian is at liberty to honor the Lord’s Day as his
conscience dictates. There’s liberty. This is what
Paul is imparting in Romans 14, 5. We just read it. One person
regards one day above another. Another regards every day alike. Each person must be fully convinced
in his own mind. There are principles that we
may observe and adopt from the Jewish practice of worship, but
there’s no firmly laid out list of rules on the Sabbath. Over
the course of my Christian walk, I’ve observed some terrific skirmishes
over this issue. People being criticized for having
a dinner party on a Sunday. Taking a walk because it quickly
turned into a hike. It wasn’t just a walk, it was
a hike. Going to a store. on a Sunday, and on and on and
on and on it goes. From time to time, rather, people
ask me if I’m a strict Sabbatarian, and I quickly tell them, no,
I’m not a strict Sabbatarian. But I will usually tell them
what the bare minimum is for observing the Lord’s day. The
bare minimum for the Lord’s day is corporate worship. I do like the old outline. How
should we conduct ourselves on the Lord’s Day? Deeds of service,
deeds of mercy, public and private acts of worship. There isn’t
anything else that’s explicitly forbidden. That much is clear
in the New Testament. So Paul, having admonished these
believers to disallow anyone from acting as their judge, he’s
brought clarity to the kinds of things, food and drink and
various celebrations, but why? Why does Paul urge his readers
to remain free in these areas? Well, he tells us in verse 17,
would you glance there? Therefore, no one is to act as
your judge, regard to food or drink, respect to a festival,
new moon, Sabbath day, things which are a mere shadow of what
is to come. But the substance belongs to
Christ. This is the foundation of our
freedom. The substance The reason that Christians are not to allow
others to judge and manipulate their spiritual practices is,
in short, the principle of substance versus shadow. This is the reason
they cannot allow others to judge them. The first portion of this
reason that Paul provides is that these things, these observances
and restrictions and celebrations, they’re a shadow, a mere shadow,
he says, of what is to come. No matter what the ritual, no
matter what the religious rite is, no matter what a particular
celebration day represented, at the end of it all, it was
a forecast. It was a shadow. It was a harbinger
of what was to come. Even our Christian baptism does
not save us. It does not do the saving. It
is symbolic merely of what God has already done in the believer’s
life. These things, these rituals and
observances, they were a recognizable representation of what was to
come. But they were not the thing that
they represented. When someone or something casts
a shadow. I did this the other day in my
backyard behind my granddaughter. I walked up behind her, and the
afternoon sun was behind me. And it cast a very large shadow,
and she noticed it. When someone casts a shadow,
it has a recognizable likeness to that individual. She knew
it wasn’t her shadow, but it’s an intangible image.
A shadow is nothing, really. And in that sense, it wasn’t
real. These dietary laws, these scruples
about food and drink, legalism surrounding the special observance
of days, all of them were shadows, empty shadows. And yet these
shadows were symbols of some great and future reality, in
many cases. They were only fleeting shadows
if they were representatives of something wonderful and certain.
And in that sense, all of these shadowy rituals and observances
were solidly prophetic. They promised something tangible. In all of the Jewish rites and
rituals, they were only faint shadows, however, of the fulfillment
of God’s plan of redemption in Christ. So the second portion of Paul’s
reasoning here is that final statement of verse 17. Not only
does Paul say that these rituals and festivals are a mere shadow
of what is to come, but he also tells us that the substance belongs
to Christ. Literally here, Paul says that
the body is Christ. The one casting the shadow is
Christ. just as a physical body correctly
positioned in the sun casts its own shadow, so also Christ is
the one casting the shadow over all of these rituals and symbols. Christ is the substance. Christ
is the tangible reality. Everything else is a mere shadow. Think through this. That Old
Testament priesthood? That was a shadow. Christ is the high priest. The Passover? It was a shadow. Christ, our Passover, has been
sacrificed, 1 Corinthians 5-7. The Sabbath? A shadow. Christ
is the believer’s Sabbath rest. The entire and elaborate sacrificial
system? A shadow. Christ is the ultimate
sacrifice for sinners. The law, Hebrews 10.1 tells us,
was only a shadow of the things to come, but Christ has come
once for all, Hebrews 10.10. As I said earlier, it’s possible
that some of these rites and observances were at least drafted
from Jewish rituals. But if those Jewish practices
were mere shadows, how much emptier are the man-made rituals that
are so plentiful. In closing, let me tell you how
I see this. It is as if the Lord himself,
Jesus Christ, is with us, seated in our living room, and we are
enjoying fellowship with him. I mean, can you even I probably
have got you stumped because once you get there, I mean, you
can’t even conceive of anything else. Jesus Christ is with us
sitting in our living room and we are conversing, fellowshipping
with our beloved Savior. Can we even imagine for a moment
suddenly slapping our knee and excusing ourselves because we’re
late to go and participate in some ritual? some feast, to observe
some religious rite? How foolish would that be? Here
is our Savior to whom all of these things point. Should we
abruptly duck out to go attend to some shadow of Him? Would you humble yourself before
the Lord?