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.