1/14/14

From Jim McGuiggan... The ethics of reconciliation

The ethics of reconciliation

Many evangelicals (and especially if they hold Reformed views) when they hear talk about the ethics of reconciliation get nervous because it seems to them that salvation by free grace should be completely severed from ethics. They would tell us that salvation is one thing and "sanctification" is another. The words are certainly distinct and we need to maintain the distinction but they are not to be severed one from another as if they can or do exist one without the other.

We're supposed to keep ethics and salvation completely severed because anyone who thinks his ethical/moral accomplishments contribute to the ransom price is wrong at a fundamentally important level. This is true--self-salvation in any shape or form or degree is contrary to the plain teaching of the scriptures. But maybe instead of severing ethics and salvation completely we ought to sever a particular way of viewing ethics from salvation. That's what the scriptures would do.

The Bible is unafraid to link obedience with salvation and life in Christ. It will say Christ became the author of salvation to those that obey (Hebrews 5:8) or it will say God gave the Holy Spirit to those who obeyed (Acts 5:32) or that obedience is unto righteousness (Romans 6:16). In a blunt pronouncement Paul says God will destroy those who will not obey the gospel (1Thessalonians 1:8-9). The apostle of grace threatens with eschatalogical wrath and indignation those who do not obey God's truth (Romans 2:8) and Christ makes it a condition of friendship with him that his disciples be willing to obey his commands (John 15:14). In another place he flatly declares that there's little point in people professing him to be their "Lord, Lord" when they won't do what his Father commands (Matthew 7:21). We could go on with this but there should be no need. Obedience is firmly linked to life with God and life with God is only found in relationship with him through Jesus Christ.

There are those who talk too much about obedience and not nearly enough about God's free and abundant grace but down-playing the place of holy obedience is not the cure for such an error. In fact, in some ways, it's the ceaseless harping on the freeness of salvation that provokes unwise people to talk too much about obedience. It's unbridled speech like, "Obedience has nothing to do with being saved," that encourages some to speak as if obedience had everything to do with being saved. After all, there are lots of scriptures that look suspiciously like they connect being obedient with being saved.

My own reading of the situation is that as sinners we underestimate our desperate state before God because of our sins. So many of us, "decent sort of people," are sure that Christ is the Saviour but we so tend to think that our decency contributes to the ransom price. Or at least it shows that God is a shrewd judge of character when he saved us rather than some other degenerate. I suppose this Pelagian tendency will be with us until the end. There's the other end of the spectrum where people are so anxious for God's grace to be magnified that they can't bear to hear someone say, "What must I do to be saved?" without going into a tirade against legalism and self-salvation. Such a question never seemed to bother Christ or Peter or Paul (see Acts 2:37-38; 16:30-31; 22:10,16). And since we hear so much about Jewish legalism you would have thought that it would have been appropriate to preach a sermon that could have begun with, "Ah, well, that's your first mistake because there's nothing you can do to be saved." In fact it was a Jewish law-teacher that asked Jesus what he had to "do" to gain eternal life and instead of rebuking him for legalism Jesus urged him to do what the torah said (Luke 10:25-28, 37).

For sinners, reconciliation with God is reconciliation with a holy Father. Reconciliation involves a relationship and that relationship requires a realignment of the heart and life with the holy Father. It's all accomplished in and through Jesus Christ and received by faith but it is a relationship with an ethical structure and demand. Reconciliation is not just a gift or a status--it's a restored relationship, a holy relationship that has holy fruit and consequences. Where the nature of the relationship is defied and denied there is no relationship and no reconciliation with God.

©2004 Jim McGuiggan. All materials are free to be copied and used as long as money is not being made.

Many thanks to brother Ed Healy, for allowing me to post from his website, the abiding word.com.