It has been four hundred eighty-three years since Martin Luther hung his Ninety-Five Theses on the church house door to begin the Reformation. Unfortunately, all of that effort, has been negated here in the United States of America as we approach the new millennium in the year two thousand and one.I would like to challenge all serious Christian Theologians to consider and openly debate the following points:The pure gospel has been subjugated by the secondary doctrinal concerns of various sects and denominations so as to render it another gospel or no gospel at all. Thus, the natural flow of grace producing the fruit of the Spirit, (Paul called it godliness in Titus 2:11-12), is thwarted. Saving faith is such faith in Jesus, that one can trust that Christ alone is sufficient for salvation; that his death was the entire price that can be paid for sin, and that God is truthful in announcing that Jesus alone is our righteousness. Saving faith believes that God has imputed to the believer the righteousness of Christ Jesus as a free gift. Saving faith recognizes the utter impotence of ones self in attaining salvation, and the total need for Jesus and his righteousness at all times. Saving faith has a continuous hope for eternal life and glorification. This hope is placed on the eternal security of God's promise. It is believing what Paul wrote in (Romans 10:9,10, KJV) "9 That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. 10 For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation."Saving faith is scorned by the Knowledge of good and evil. This disease inherited in the garden gives man the false sense of knowing what is right and wrong but not before God. This is why the writer of proverbs stated that "there is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof is the way of death." Saving faith is at odds with the natural mind. It cannot be understood without the grace of God. It can only be given to one by God's Holy Spirit through the preaching of the gospel.Therefore, human effort, inspired by the knowledge of good and evil, is of necessity, a stench in the nostrils of God. This is why religion and self righteousness are so repugnant to God Almighty. Jesus was harsh with the Scribes, Pharisees and Sadducees for this reason. Why else would the Righteousness of God be apart from the law? God's righteousness is true righteousness because it is the very nature of God. Because true righteousness is the nature of God, and because humanity lost the capacity for this in the fall, God out of love for mankind chooses to impute righteousness for faith.Knowing then, about the righteousness of God, it is blasphemy to believe that one can maintain the righteousness of God by human effort. On the contrary, one can only maintain the righteousness of God by continued faith. Faith in what? you might ask. Faith in the fact that God imputes righteousness to sinful man for trusting Jesus. It is important to realize that this act of faith does not become a work. It is rather a dependence on God's promise through believing the gospel message. The only true worship of God flows from the spiritual knowledge of one receiving the righteousness of God by grace through faith. The knowledge of ones reconciliation to God produces a love for God which results in true worship. John 4:23, KJV 23 But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeketh such to worship him.Worship becomes a response to God's love demonstrated by the death burial and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. Knowing that one is so loved by God, that He would send His only begotten Son to earth, to die for ones sin, and was raised from the dead for ones justification and eternal life, and that for believing in Jesus, one gets His righteousness as a free gift, produces a love for God and a peace with God. This causes one to be able to fulfill the greatest commandment. One can honestly say that they love the Lord their God with all their heart. Now as long as man is in the flesh this love can never be complete. There will always be an element of limitation of the love one can have for God until one is taken to glory and receives a glorified body. Then we will be able to love completely because we will see Him as he really is because we will be just like him but nevertheless, in the flesh this response to God's love is the only way to truly worship God.What is meant by Paul when he states? Romans 7:18, KJV 18 For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not. or what about Psalms 14:2,3, KJV 2 The LORD looked down from heaven upon the children of men, to see if there were any that did understand, and seek God. 3 They are all gone aside, they are all together become filthy: there is none that doeth good, no, not one. Is this not proof positive of the total depravity of the flesh. If, once I'm saved, I can maintain my right standing before God by the works of the law or the flesh, then I naturally can find a reason to glory in my efforts. Pride glorifies man and his efforts, and is a sin for this reason. (1 Corinthians 1:29, KJV 29 That no flesh should glory in his presence.) This is why man needs faith in the foolishness of the cross.Sanctification is a work of the Spirit. (1 Peter 1: & 2 Peter 1:3-4) It is through faith in the righteousness of God our Savior Jesus Christ that we can become partakers of His divine nature. Thus, Sanctification is an outgrowth of faith in our complete and unconditional justification granted in Christ Jesus by God's grace alone.True sanctification is a process of spiritual growth in dependency upon Jesus. This can only come from the sabbath rest spoken of in Hebrews 4:9. One must quit working in the flesh and believe the promise of God which is that Christ's righteousness is a free gift to those trusting in Him. When one begins to work in the flesh toward sanctification they become unbelievers. This is precisely why Paul told the Galatian believers that he was fearful for them and that they had fallen from grace.(Gal 4:11) Now to the true believer, God will at some point reveal through the trials of life, that they must enter His rest.(Phil 3:15)Why is it that no one teaches that the fruit of the Spirit (Ga 5:22-23), is the same as the good works spoken of in (Eph 2:10)?Jesus stated in John 13:35, KJV "35 By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another." This love one to another is rare and difficult to find. The reason is that only the pure gospel can produce this spiritual fruit. The heart needs to be established in grace. (Heb 13:9)Also, when James asks the question,(James 2:14-17, KJV) 14 What doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say he hath faith, and have not works? can faith save him? 15 If a brother or sister be naked, and destitute of daily food, 16 And one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit? 17 Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone. Isn't it obvious that he is referring to the fruit of the Spirit agape, and not works of the law and the flesh?The commandments of Jesus are to believe that he is the Savior and to love one another. (1 John 3:23) When Paul states in Colossians 2:14, KJV, 14 Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross; he is not merely referring to ceremonial law. Martin Luther stated in his The Bondage of the Will that St. Jerome deserved hell rather than sainthood for such a concept. Peters speech in the fifteenth chapter of Acts eliminates the possibility that the New Covenant merely set aside ceremonial law when he said in Acts 15:10, KJV, 10 Now therefore why tempt ye God, to put a yoke upon the neck of the disciples, which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear? The ceremony was the only thing that they could keep and bear. They could sacrifice doves, they could eat the Passover meal, and they could wash their hands and cups. What they could not do was love God. They could not love each other. They could not control their lust. They could not control their anger, hatred, and violence. This was the yoke they could not bear. They needed supernatural help. They needed Jesus to do it for them so that they could in turn rest in Him. With their focus on Jesus they could begin to love one another. Romans 13:8-10, KJV 8 Owe no man any thing, but to love one another: for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law. 9 For this, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt not kill, Thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not bear false witness, Thou shalt not covet; and if there be any other commandment, it is briefly comprehended in this saying, namely, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. 10 Love worketh no ill to his neighbour: therefore love is the fulfilling of the law. Paul referred to this in Galatians 6:2 as the law of Christ.The Christian walk should be evidenced by the fruit of the Spirit in ones life. Obedience to the "law of Christ" becomes automatic to one being led by the Spirit. (Gal 5:16-25)The New Covenant was ratified and put in full force at the death burial and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ.(Matt 26:28) Hebrews 8:13 should not be a source of confusion. At the time of the writing the temple still was in operation. But, the Old Covenant was in fact already obsolete though it had not vanished. It did however vanish with the destruction of the temple in AD70. While no one would argue that the Decalogue is not God's law for mankind, one must assert that fulfilling the law was done for us by Christ. Therefore, since we are bought with a price, we are indebted to fulfill the law of Christ. As stated earlier, the law of Christ is to believe that we are redeemed by him, and allow our redemption to produce love in us. That is, love for God and love for one another.The lawful use of the law of God, is for the gospel preacher to use it as a tutor, to teach fallen mankind of its total depravity. When one is forced to look at the lawful requirements of Holy God, one becomes aware of the need for mercy and grace. The law then is a schoolmaster to drive one to Christ for the righteousness of God's This is what Paul referred to in 1 Timothy 1:8-11.I will quote a hymn by Edward Mote, My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus blood and righteousness, I dare not trust the sweetest frame, but wholly lean on Jesus name. On Christ the solid rock I stand, all other ground is sinking sand- all other ground is sinking sand! The institutional evangelical church proclaimed its final apostasy when it eliminated all the great gospel hymns from its worship services.The simple gospel message is gone from the earth. This is not to say that it is not proclaimed from time to time or that there are not those preachers who consistently proclaim it. Rather, it is relegated to an unimportant position by preachers of sanctification messages, or by preachers of a prosperity gospel. It has had to take the back seat to guaranteed healing and deliverance from all sorts of fleshly infirmities. It has been pushed aside by legalism. The gospel needs to be preeminent. With the good news of Jesus Christ, there is no room for anything else.When the gospel is not proclaimed in its simple purity, God removes His Spirit from the activities of the church. (2 Thess 2:7). Thus man is left with the flesh to accomplish his goals. This is precisely why there is an absence of revival in this country today. This is why the church suffers from the same statistics of divorce, immorality, and infidelity as does the rest of the worlds population. True holy living can only be produced by the Spirit of God in one, as a response to believing the message of the gospel. The pure gospel becomes difficult to embrace when people are confused by the legalistic doctrines that are present all around them.The definition of legalism is as follows: First, it must be stated that legalism describes a broad category of concepts that includes a variety of beliefs and behaviors. Any time one subscribes to any written standards of behavior, that are deemed to make one worthy before God, that individual can be categorized as legalistic. Legal of course has to do with law. Even when one believes that behavior can give one the right of fellowship with God it must be deemed legalistic. The writer of Hebrews explains this in Hebrews 4:10-16. For one to be obedient to the gospel, the trust in Jesus must be such, that even in the weakness of the flesh and personal sin, Jesus the Word, knows about it, and as a High Priest that can sympathize with our weakness though sinless, will advocate for us, so that we can boldly go to the throne of grace when we need it most. All efforts of fleshly obedience to God's words, ends up being a statement of unbelief to this passage of scripture. Legalism is unbelief and as such, it is sin.The only message for the church to proclaim is the good news of the death, burial, and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. How can preachers justify preaching sanctification messages in light of 1 Cor 1:17-18, Romans 1:16-17, 1 Cor 2:1-2, and Mk 16:15?How can anyone argue that the unregenerated human can make a decision for salvation in light of John 15:16?
