What is Legalism?

I was sharing some dinner with a group of friends of mine a few days ago and we were circling around the subject of prayer. What we as Christ's disciples like or dislike about prayer. Some of the ways we practice this discipline or don't.  The fact is that the problem is not that we don't pray, it is that we are not consumed with God's mission on a day-to-day level in our lives. Being a part of God's mission will drive us to living a life of prayer.  But how do we engage in the practice of prayer and not become Legalists? There are plenty of those out there even in christian circles.   Following our discussion this week, as the group was processing the area of 'spiritual discipline' this question was asked "Where do you draw the line between a spiritual discipline and legalism? What I mean is I know I should be praying but if I do it only because I know I am supposed to does that make it legalistic?  As I processed this in a deeper way I came across this great article "What is Legalism?" It is a great reminder of the self-effort that we are prone to rely on for our salvation and requires our repentance and awareness.   My personal prayer is that my default mode would automatically be "Salvation is of the Lord" and not "I have to work harder, and do more!"  Through God's grace he is revealing this to me at an ever increasing frequency. Deep down I realize it is "What I am" that is most important, not what I do!

What is Legalism?

Legalism could be defined as any attempt to rely on self-effort to either attain or maintain our justification before God. In Paul's Epistle to the Galatians he warned them sternly about such false understandings of the gospel when he asked the offenders: "After beginning with the Spirit, are you now trying to attain your goal by human effort?" (Gal.3:3). Legalism always seems to have one thing in common: it's theology denies that Christ is sufficient for salvation. That some additional element of self-effort, merit or faithfulness on our part is necessary. As an example, those who erroneously teach that a Christian can lose his or her salvation are, in essence, denying the sufficiency of Christ to save to the utmost. They believe sin to be greater than Christ's grace. But Christ's righteousness which he counts toward us is not only efficient for our salvation, but sufficient. His once for all sacrifice put away sin for all time in those He has united to Himself. His salvation also means that he not only saves at the beginning but preserves us to the end, sealing us in His perfect righteousness whose blood "reminds the covenant God" not to treat us as our sins deserve. Any attempt to add our covenant faithfulness as part of the price of redemption after regeneration is an "attempt to attain our goal by human effort" and thus a complete misapprehension of the fullness of the gospel of Jesus Christ. We must, therefore, reject any and all attempts to maintain a judicial standing before God by any act on our part. Salvation is of the Lord.

Kevin