SENT - Part 3 | Letting Go of Legalism | Acts 15:1–12

But but legalism tries to add to what Jesus has already done. That's what happens in verse one. When they start saying, well, you need Jesus plus circumcision. They are adding to what's already been done. These people that were Jewish Christians, they had grown up under the faith. They knew about these 613 laws that had made up the Mosaic covenant. They knew about the 10 commandments. Here's the crazy part, not only could they not keep them, but they would twist them to make it easier for them to do. [00:11:06] (41 seconds)  #NoAdditionsToGrace

Here's the next one friends. Legalism promotes our performance. Can you hear it in the text? They need to come like us. They need to do what we've done. We went we we went through all of this and we we killed this. We we they need to do the same. Legalism promotes our performance by by human nature, by our sinful nature. We love to prove stuff, validate stuff. We live in a culture and a world that's all about competition and beauty and looks and athletics and winning and achieving and accomplishing. [00:18:00] (35 seconds)  #FaithNotPerformance

Legalism causes division because it makes you measure people based on whatever list that's in your mind they ought to be living up to. Whereas grace promotes unity. Grace promotes unity. As a matter of fact, the reason that grace promotes unity is because you begin to realize that the ground is level at the foot of the cross. [00:08:01] (30 seconds)  #GraceUnites

Paul teaches us, if we wanna overcome legalism, we gotta be willing to see our own sinfulness and brokenness. We must never allow pride or our own egos to make us think we are better than somebody else because someone may look different on the outside. The truth be told, all of us in the room are on the are are are chief sinners. We all are broken. We all have made mistakes. We all have missed the mark. We all have lied still, cheated, and everything else. But the grace of God didn't leave us in our sinfulness, but he picked us up. [00:09:42] (44 seconds)  #HumbleBeforeGod

See, legalism is about impressing people and showing people and looking holy. It don't have no authenticity to it. It just puts on a good show. It it will it will it will it it just it just it wants to look the part. It it wants to look holy. You know, the problem is that that legalists have become they've perfected how to pretend and package their hypocrisy. [00:25:27] (34 seconds)  #AuthenticityOverShow

Every time you choose to walk with humility, you are choosing to embrace the work of grace in your life. And every time you choose pride, you are choosing legalism in your life. This whole chapter is about this battle. I love that as they have this conversation about legalism and grace, they decide to choose grace. They decide to choose grace. That's my hope for you today. [00:34:07] (28 seconds)  #ChooseGrace

The issue they were trying to deal with was legalism. Legalism is any time we try to add to what God has already said. Legalism is any time we try to put in our traditions and made man laws to try to equivalent or to try to make people measure up to our standard, not necessarily God's standard. [00:04:57] (24 seconds)  #NoManMadeRules

And whenever we become focused or addicted to legalism, we miss out on the call God has on our lives. We miss out on what the church has been called to, and we miss out on living the life God has called us to because we're so busy pointing out all the laws, rules, and traditions. [00:05:21] (21 seconds)  #DontMissTheCall

Legalism promotes division. Legalism promotes division. I mean, you you don't you don't have to go far in the text when you watch these them saying those new people coming in, they not like us, they need to also do circumcision. That typically happened in the early days of a baby's birth, male child's birth. They would cut away the foreskin. Now these new believers come, they say listen, they gotta be just like us. Legalism always promotes a division in Christianity and in the church. [00:05:57] (29 seconds)  #DivisionOfLegalism

The problem with this performance approach to our faith is that either it makes you incredibly prideful and arrogant, or it makes you despondent and depressed, And neither one of those reflect what God wants us to look like. Either way, you end up on one side looking high and mighty when you had a good week. Or you end up despondent and depressed when things didn't go your way. That's the problem with legalism because you're always trying to check a list, check a box, make sure you've done everything you could do. [00:20:37] (35 seconds)  #FaithNotChecklist

We can easily begin to believe you can earn God's love or earn God's blessing or earn God's favor or even earn salvation. So every day you can end up waking up saying I gotta earn God's love today. You can wake up saying I'm not gonna I'm not gonna cuss today, I'm a hold my tongue. Even when they trade my compulsion, I'm not gonna cuss, I'm a hold my tongue. It's it's a it's a treadmill headed to nowhere as you keep trying and trying and trying and trying. Not it's almost as though I remember on one time, I was I was at a restaurant and they sold sandwiches and every time you went, they would punch a hole in your cart. [00:19:11] (56 seconds)  #StopEarningGrace

Then you get into chapter 15 verse one, where someone from Judea comes to Antioch and begins to say seeing what's happening with people coming to faith says, listen, they they can't they can't just come to God that way. No. They need to be circumcised first before and obey the Mosaic Law before they can come to Jesus Christ. [00:03:17] (23 seconds)  #JesusIsEnough

And so this causes all kinds of confusion in the church as you just read. Barnabas and Paul are in a debate with these individuals who say that Jesus is not enough. They need Jesus plus something else. They keep going back and forth having words, and because they can't solve the issue, they then say, why don't Paul and Barnabas go to the headquarters at the church at Jerusalem and see what they say about this matter? And there, when they make it to Jerusalem, Acts 15 is called the Jerusalem Council. [00:03:49] (35 seconds)  #CouncilForGrace

Some would claim if you don't act a certain way or talk a certain way. Some even claim that you need to keep the Sabbath as the old testament has said, even though we have been freed from those laws because of the finished work of Christ. There are some that say you're supposed to worship on the Sabbath day. What they fail to recognize is that when Jesus rose on early Sunday morning, the day of worship changed. We no longer worship on the last day of the week, we worship on the first day of the week because that's the day that Jesus rose from the dead. [00:12:26] (36 seconds)  #ResurrectionChangesWorship

The principle of Sabbath and rest is valuable, but the whole Old Testament laws don't hold on us. Some would say you you that Christians shouldn't celebrate holidays, and some would say the longer you pray, the holier your prayer is. Some claim that wealth means you're blessed. Some think that the more poor you are, the more poverty you are, the more righteous you are. Some would say singleness means you're incomplete. [00:13:02] (28 seconds)  #FreedomInChrist

Grace while while legalism promotes unbiblical standards, grace promotes biblical standards. Grace says, go to the scriptures and see what God says about it. That's exactly what happens in this text as they're debating, do we need circum do we not need it? The text says that Peter makes it clear, and James will as well in verse 11, chapter 15. [00:15:54] (27 seconds)  #ScriptureOverTradition

These all demonstrate to us that legalism can be poisonous to the Christian life and can be poisonous to the mission of the church. Legalism is the belief that following rules makes you right with God. It is this belief that God only accepts us based on our ability to check all the boxes, or based on our ability to follow all the rules, the laws, and the traditions. Legalism is not only an issue today, but it also was an issue in the early church. [00:02:02] (34 seconds)  #GraceNotRules