Am I Enough? (Part 3)

In Parts 1 and 2 of this miniseries I've sought to show how our attempts to answer the question of whether we are enough are works-righteousness, and how the gospel frees us from such a hopeless situation. The question before us now is "where does that leave us?" Since our justification is no longer based on obedience to the law, should we now just cease worrying about obedience? Paul deals with this question in Romans 6:

"Now the law came in to increase the trespass, but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more, so that, as sin reigned in death, grace also might reign through righteousness leading to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it?" - Romans 5:21-6:2

In short, Paul's answer is "no." We should not now neglect obedience to God. Actually, it's because of this salvation, because we've died to sin, that we should not continue in it. God still calls us to live lives of holiness (1 Peter 1:15-16) and faith without works is dead (James 2:17).

Now as I type that I sense I will get two different responses. I sense this because I've had both responses at various points in my life:

1. Dang, more requirements, more burden. I thought this law stuff was over! Can't we just leave our message at grace and not talk about our response?

2. Go get 'em Mike! So many people out there just think God is going to forgive them but they're still a bunch of sinning idiots. I'm sick of hearing about mercy and love, condemn me and the rest of these idiots already!

In theological terms, (1) is called an antinomian, and (2) is called a legalist. My brief description and response:

1. Antinomianism basically defines any belief system that teaches that its adherents have no duty to follow some moral standard. For those of you with this response, I feel you. I think we feel our burden lifted in knowing that Jesus paid for our sins, but then we get hit with more commands and the burden comes back. It'd be easier to just punt the law, stick to what Jesus did, and not it let it change our lives. Nonetheless, we see this is not the Biblical picture.

2. Legalism basically defines any belief system that teaches that its adherents must obey the law to be declared righteous. This obviously fails to produce an actual righteousness by the test of Galatians 3:10. Most of the people I describe in (2) realize this and would bawk at my suggestion that they might be legalists. But I again do this one from experience. I find often times my anger at others' lack of holiness is because I feel like I'm working hard and I deserve a better reward than they, so if I see both of us getting saved it makes me angry. On a deeper level, I think I also hate myself so much that condemnation comes more naturally than grace. You telling me I suck makes sense because I feel worthless, you telling me God loves me anyway sounds like sugarcoated nonsense, a result of the positive thinking movement. Nonetheless, God says He loves me while I suck (Romans 5:8, 1 John 4:10).

I believe the gospel destroys both of these wrong ways of thinking. In (1), the problem is we feel extra burden when more commands come in. But because Jesus took our curse, there should not be any burden in any command we receive (1 John 5:3-5). Since we no longer need to obey perfectly to earn God's favor, we can obey out of joyful gratitude (cf. Psalm 1: "his delight is in the law of the Lord"). To fix our thinking in (1), we actually just need to believe the gospel more so that new commands no longer feel like a burden that needs to be resisted, but rather the good will of a loving father that can be joyfully accepted.

In (2) we feel like we deserve a reward for our efforts that others should not get if their efforts don't measure up. We're saying "since God's love is something I earn by what I do, you shouldn't get it if you don't do it." Again, the solution is that in the gospel God's love is not something we earn; He gives it freely. If He gave His love to us who did not deserve it, then surely we have no reason to oppose His giving it to others. Realizing this also humbles us as we see that no matter how much we think we can do, it would be never be enough to earn God's favor. Only Jesus can do that for us. To fix our thinking (2), we need to believe the gospel more so that we see our relationship with God as a gift of His grace, and can rejoice with God as His grace is extended to others rather than get angry because those people aren't trying as hard as we think we are.

On the other hand, some of those in (2) are there because they feel so worthless that condemnation is more natural than grace. The solution here? You guessed it. When we view ourselves as too worthless to receive God's love and grace, we say two awfully wrong things at minimum: 1. We have higher standards than God. God may be willing to love us as sinners, but our standards are so high we won't let ourselves be loved as the sinners we know we are. 2. God is not free to do as He pleases. God must play be my rules. I say He can't love me because I suck, therefore that's the way it has to be. But here's the reality in the gospel: God is way holier than we are and He has still chosen to love us and send His son to pay the penalty for our sins. I say God can't love me because I suck, God says He loves me because I suck. So to fix my thinking in (2), I need to believe God's love for me in the gospel.

In light of the gospel we don't need to be antinomians or legalists. Instead we can try to obey God's will, try hard in sports, work hard in school, and pursue women in the way God intended us to. Since we don't need to feel like we are enough in these areas, we don't have to get out of them for fear of failure and we don't have to pursue them the wrong way to make sure we feel like we are enough. We can pursue them in their proper place out of joyful gratitude for what God has done for us.

Am I Enough? (Part 2)

In Part 1 of this short blog series I tried to connect some dots between the question that tends to have a controlling influence in the lives of men: "Am I enough?" and works-righteousness. Having concluded that all of our attempts to answer that question in the affirmative by something we do is works-righteousness, I'd now like to share some thoughts on how I see the gospel applying to and freeing us from this situation.

In Part 1 I kinda shared two quotes to support my main idea: one from Tim Keller and one from the Bible in Galatians 3:10-12. In both cases I neglected to comment on the whole idea presented there. In Keller's quote he mentions the freedom in the gospel. After Galatians 3:10-12 comes verse 13:

"Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us—for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree” - Galatians 3:13

The first way the gospel applies is that Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law! In v. 10 we read that the curse of the law is basically this: if you choose to try to save yourself by observing God's law, the only way you can actually achieve salvation is if you obey it to perfection. Therefore if you fail even at one point of it, you are under a curse. We've all sinned, so we are all under a curse. What we need then if that curse is ever to be removed from us is for someone to take it in our place. This is what Jesus does when He is crucified. On the cross Jesus is cursed by God in the place of all those who would believe in Him, so that we no longer have to live under the curse of the law. The requirement of perfection on our end is thus lifted, so we can stop seeking justification by what we do (v. 12), and instead live by faith in what Jesus has done (v. 11).

So am I enough? If I'm trying to answer that question "yes" by what I do, the answer will always be no. I can't be perfect. But if I'm living by faith in Christ, God's answer is "yes," because Jesus paid for all my failures to be enough for God. The only way we can get a definitive yes to our question is if we stop trying to earn it ourselves, and believe that Jesus earned it for us.

That's one way I see the gospel freeing us: obedience to God's law is not how we become enough. But in Part 1 I talked about how obedience to God's law is not the only form of works-righteousness; it's anytime we try to feel like we are enough by something we do. The examples given were sports, academics, and women. How does the gospel apply to these systems of works-righteousness?

The answer in my mind is that on one hand it doesn't, and yet in one major way it does. How doesn't it? Well, Jesus only paid the penalty for my sins, Jesus only bore the curse for my failures to obey God's law. That means Jesus did not pay the penalty for my failure to win a game, get an A grade, or pick up a girl. Why didn't Jesus pay the penalty for these things? Because there is no penalty for these things! What we've actually done in an attempt to justify ourselves and feel like enough is rejected God's law and created one of our own, one that's filled with demands that God has never put on us (can you think of any Bible passage that would support the idea that it's a sin or a failure to obey God to lose a sporting event? cf. Micah 6:8). In many cases we've done this because we know God's law is too hard or because our systems seem more fun or attractive. We may also feel the system we've developed deals with our "real problem." For instance, if we think our "real problem" is loneliness, the law of getting the most girls possible is the system we will create. But our real "real problem" is our failure to obey God's law and the curse that puts us under. In this narrow sense, the gospel does not apply to our failures to live up to standards that aren't God's. There is no curse for these failures, so Jesus didn't take it on Himself.

So how does the gospel apply then? You see the problem with the systems we've created is that they are still works-righteousness, and they still demand perfection for us to ever feel like we are enough. No matter how many games we win, there will always be more. No matter how good the team we beat is, there will always be one better. No matter how many A's we get, there will always be more, harder classes. No matter how much money we make, we could always make more. No matter how many girls we pick up, there are always more. We can never rest in such a situation; our systems of works-righteousness continue to demand more and more of us. We will never really achieve that sense of "enough."

The fact then still remains: the only way we will achieve that sense of "enough" is through faith in what Christ has done for us in taking our curse, namely through faith in the gospel. There God dealt definitively with our actual curse because of our actual failure to obey His actual law. In Christ we are actually "enough," so we don't have to try to make ourselves enough by any effort of ours, whether that be by obedience to God's law or some law we made up. The gospel applies in a major way to these issues!

So where does that leave us now? Should we quit trying to obey God's law? Should we give up trying to win in sports? Should we slack in our academics and jobs? Should we never pursue a girl? Part 3...

Am I Enough? (Part 1)

This weekend I had the privilege to travel with 60+ male students from the Penn State Navigators to our annual men's retreat. In the past years it was always held at the famous McNutt farm, but this year we were scheduled to be at a different location. I was skeptical to say the least.

However, in terms of content alone, it was the best men's weekend I've been a part of. On the car ride down on Saturday we listened to Mark Driscoll's Marriage and Men sermon, which I can't recommend highly enough. Then on Sunday morning Dave Bowman, one of the campus staff with the Penn State Navs, shared a message from the first 3 chapters of Genesis on the effects of the fall on men.

One of the aspects of man's curse that Dave pointed out was that his work would basically rebel against him in the same way that he rebelled against God (Gen. 3:17-19). Also man's fellowship with God was broken as a result of the fall (Gen. 3:23-24). This leaves man in an interesting predicament. Rather than receiving fulfillment from a relationship with God and carrying out his duty to work for God's glory, man would now seek fulfillment through his work. Yet because his work would rebel against him, this fulfillment can never be realized.

Men then live their lives plagued with the question, "am I enough?" Basically this is man asking "ok I see that I want fulfillment through my work, but I also see that I'm prone to fail. Do I have what it takes to make this work?" So the controlling factor in life becomes feeling like we are enough. Men tend to respond to this in one of two ways: working harder and harder until they achieve enough to feel like they are enough, or giving up and punting their responsibilities so they never have to deal with the reality that they aren't enough. As Dave was sharing it reminded me of this quote by Tim Keller:

“At the root of all our disobedience are particular ways in which we continue to seek control of our lives through systems of works-righteousness. The way to progress as a Christian is to continually repent and uproot these systems the same way we become Christians, namely by the vivid depiction (and re-depiction) of Christ’s saving work for us, and the abandoning of self-trusting efforts to complete ourselves. We must go back again and again to the gospel of Christ-crucified, so that our hearts are more deeply gripped by the reality of what he did and who we are in him.” - Timothy Keller, Paul’s Letter to the Galatians (Redeemer Presbyterian Church, 2003), 61. (Taken from Of First Importance)

Every way we try to achieve the feeling that we are enough apart from Christ is simple works-righteousness. Alot of times when I think of works-righteousness I make the mistake of thinking that it only applies to trying to obey Bible commandments to earn God's favor (e.g. having enuogh quiet times, serving at a homeless shelter, not killing anyone, etc.). While that is certainly one form of works-righteousness, most of us who have been around Christian communities for some time have heard Ephesians 2:8-9 enough to know we aren't supposed to do that. But works-righteousness is really much broader than that; it is any system whereby we try to feel justified, or right with God, or "enough" by something we do. We are trying to feel justified by works, we just may not be calling it that.

The world we live in today does not explicitly presuppose God and morality the same way the culture of Jesus' time did, especially the Judaism of Jesus' time. It may then be hard sometimes for us to see how every non-believer is relying on works for salvation and is therefore under a curse (Gal. 3:10-12). We may think as I often have, "this person is not trying to earn salvation, they are simply unconcerned with salvation because they don't believe in God etc." But make no mistake about it, all of us naturally try to earn our own personal salvation to cope with the pain of our consciences as we realize we are not enough, we just may not be calling it that.

Dave pointed out that men tend to do this in 3 ways: Sports, academics/success, and women. So yes, any time I work like crazy to win a game so I can feel like I am enough, I am living in a system of works-righteousness. Any time I study like crazy for a test so I can feel like I am enough, I am living in a system of works-righteousness. Any time I work my butt off for the highest paying, most prestigious job so I can feel like I am enough, I am living in a system of works-righteousness. Any time I try to get a or many girl(s) to like me so I can feel like I am enough, I am living in a system of works-righteousness. The list goes on.

Among the many problems with this, one sticks out: We still haven't dealt with failure! If these things are going to be our righteousness, we need to be perfect in them, or else we'll never actually achieve the feeling of "enough":

"For all who rely on works of the law are under a curse; for it is written, “Cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the Book of the Law, and do them.” - Galatians 3:10

The gospel of Jesus Christ really is our only hope of escaping this curse we find ourselves under. I'd like to talk about that more in Part 2.