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Balancing Act: Pursuing Personal Righteousness, Part 2

Last Time On …

The last time I graced you with an article we talked about legalism, its negative effects, and how our generation tends to do a pretty good job of shunning it. We then discussed how said shunning strangely causes us to embrace legalism's ugly twin, licentiousness; instead of doing the dirty work of figuring out how to follow God's commands well and for the right reasons, we ditch His commands and do whatever we please. That, we decided, is just not OK.

Our conclusion: We have to find balance between the two Ls.

I finished last time by saying we must pursue the Christ-like life, that is, personal righteousness, in tandem with authenticity.

And now we're caught up. So, let us get on with things. In this second article, let's talk about why it matters that we follow God's commandments. And then let's discuss this whole transparency thing.

Onward and upward, as they say.¹

Why Following God's Commands Truly Matters

In John 14:15 Jesus says, "If you love me, you will obey what I command" (NIV). Again in verse 21 He pronounces, "Whoever has my commands and obeys them, he is the one who loves me." Clearly, Jesus places a high priority on the following of biblical commands. If we're going to be followers of this Christ, then so should we. But how do we do that without becoming legalistic?

It's all about the Benjamins. Wait, no. What I meant to say is it's all about motivation.

We don't follow God's commands for the sake of following rules — for the sake of feeling like we're earning God's favor, which is legalism. Instead, we do it to foster relationship — for the sake of love. (This will make sense in just a bit. Stick with me here.)

In Matthew 22, a group of inquisitive Pharisees asks Jesus to name the most important commandment of the Law. Jesus replies, "'Love the Lord Your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments" (vv. 36-40).

Let's camp out on this love-as-commandment idea. Doesn't it seem a little mysterious, a bit strange perhaps, that Jesus commands us to love God? Does Jesus seriously find it productive to command love? (Try that one on your special someone: "Baby, I command you to love me." Let me know how far you get.)

Our problem, I fear, is we in our culture hold to a very myopic view of love. We perceive of love, and experience it, then, in terms of emotion. But the biblical view of love is broader: Yes positive sentiments do come into play, but the foundation of love is commitment to relationship.

And commitment is not static. For all you physics majors out there, love is a truly kinetic thing. Love — commitment to relationship — hates to stand still. It has to jump around and be active. It must, by its very nature, do whatever is best for the other and that which complements his or her character.

It follows, then, that if we have committed ourselves to God, our actions will conform to His commands, de facto — that is, they just will. We become, as Dallas Willard puts it, "the kind of persons whose deeds naturally conform to the law."² That's part of how love and commandment interact. And it's how Jesus can claim that love accomplishes all the other commandments. (Remember: "All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.")

Problem is, it's easy to do the right thing when your emotions for God match your commitment to Him. What about the times your humanness takes over (as it surely will) and you just don't feel like being a command follower?

The simple but oh-so-hard answer is, follow them anyway.

It's the same love for God — the one that makes us want to do the right thing — that compels us to right action when the fallen parts of us are lured away toward sin. In his seminal work, God in Search of Man: A Philosophy of Judaism, esteemed rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel has this to say on doing the good deed just because:

The way to pure intention is paved with good deeds. … It is the deed that carries us away, that transports the soul, proving to us that the greatest beauty grows at the greatest distance from the center of the ego.³

In other words, it's in the times where we don't feel like doing the right thing that we must, because it's in the doing that our focus shifts away from our sinful desires and we remember why we're doing it in the first place: our commitment to Christ and His work in our lives.

In essence, God's commandments are an invitation to accomplish by His Spirit what we cannot do on our own. When God tells us not to covet our neighbor's donkey (even if that donkey has great gas mileage or comes with all the options), it's a reminder that our commitment to Him frees us from the trappings of materialism and other kinds of covetousness. When Paul enjoins the reader not to be drunk on wine but be filled with the Holy Spirit instead, he's reminding us that the escape alcohol temporarily affords isn't necessary — we're able instead to offer our pain to Jesus.

It's a mysterious vortex of relationship, this commandment to love: Our commitment to Christ causes us to follow His commands, which reminds us of our love for Him, which compels us to follow His commands … and the cycle continues and our relationship with God deepens.

Why Living Transparently Really Matters

Simply following God's commands isn't enough, however. We don't live in a Christian commune (even if you attend a Christian college and bemoan the fact that you think you do). Our generation is pretty cynical; young people expect hypocrisy at every turn, especially from the Church. That being the case, we're likely to interact with people who label our attempts at living rightly as rule following for rule following's sake — legalism — which is the very thing we're trying to avoid.

Does that mean, then, that we should stop pursuing righteousness in order to appear more loving? To invoke the words of the Apostle Paul (again), "May it never be!"⁴

To overcome the stigma that Christians are hypocritical and judgmental (the point of which is to remove any barriers to someone's coming to know Christ) we have to be honest and real about our humanness. We have to be authentic.

In part 1, I referred to this kind of living as "transparent righteousness." For me, that phrase means pursuing God's commands while being completely honest with ourselves and the rest of the world about our failures, both the ones from our past and the ones we are sure to commit in the future.

If we are to truly love others, as the second of Jesus' greatest commandments calls us to do, it means entering into the dirty, neglected spaces of others' lives, consistently "being there" for them. But it also means letting others into our own less admirable places, too.

Author Jim White explains this idea well:

The only way to regain our footing is to remind ourselves — and others — that an authentic Christian is simply someone who has made the decision to believe in Jesus as his forgiver and then attempt to follow him as his leader. But nowhere is this series of events is perfection or sinlessness. Rather, there is simply the intentional effort and sincere desire to recognize God as, well, God.⁵ (emphasis original)

If we as Christians do pursue righteousness, even for Christ's sake, but fail to be honest about our own sinfulness, people will continue to believe our faith is only about following rules. They will fail to see that our faith is really about salvation, and, ultimately, relationship with the Creator of the universe. Only honesty will effect conversations about grace and truth and the gospel of Christ.

In Conclusion

C O F F E E  S H O P

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How do you find the balance between legalism and licentiousness?

Join the discussion!

So, instead of complaining about legalism and then doing the equally God-dishonoring thing of living however we please, let's get at the hard work of finding the balance.

First, let's get serious about following God's commands, because we know that's how we show Him our love; it's how we deepen our relationship with Him. And secondly, we must maintain a posture of honesty, being quick to acknowledge our faults.

That, my friends, is what righteous living is about. It's what a generation starved for commitment and genuineness and real love — our generation — needs most.

It is, in essence, the way of Christ.