Things I Never Said

Someone came to me recently after I had spoken about our freedom in Christ and said, "I don't agree with you that it isn't important to read the Bible and pray." "I never said that reading the Bible and praying isn't important," I responded. "I said that when we turn those things into laws, we rob ourselves of the blessings we can know from the Bible and prayer."

It always amazes me to see the capacity people possess to misunderstand the teaching of grace. It really shouldn't come as a surpise though. Everybody who has every taught the pure, undilluted grace of God has been misunderstood.

The Apostle Paul wrote, "And why not say (as we are slanderously reported and as some claim that we say), "Let us do evil that good may come"? Paul never said that we should do evil so that good can come from it, but he apparently taught grace in such a strong way that some people thought that's what he was saying.

Others thought he taught that sin didn't matter and that since grace covers it all anyway, it was okay to go ahead and sin. He answered that one in Romans 6:1 when he said, "What shall we say then? Shall we keep on sinning since grace abounds? Perish the thought! How shall we who died to sin keep doing that very thing???"

The great Bible expositor, Martyn Lloyd Jones wrote:

The true preaching of the gospel of salvation by grace alone always leads to the possibility of this charge being brought against it. There is no better test as to whether a man is really preaching the New Testament gospel of salvation than this, that some people might misunderstand it and misinterpret it to mean that it really amounts to this, that because you are saved by grace alone it does not matter at all what you do; you can go on sinning as much as you like because it will redound all the more to the glory of grace. If my preaching and presentation of the gospel of salvation does not expose it to that misunderstanding, then it is not the gospel.

Whew! I'm glad to read that a man of his stature said that! It encourages me to stay the course, knowing that I'm not alone in the misunderstandings I've experienced through these past 17 years I have been teaching this amazing and radical grace of God.

It seems that the most common misunderstandings that have been "slanderously reported" against me are that I am teaching:

1. It doesn't matter how we behave.
I've never said such a thing because I don't believe that statement to be true. It does matter how we behave, but our behavior must flow from the indwelling Christ. Anything else is just "dead works" regardless of whether we are preaching sermons or getting drunk. It's not the activity that defines its value; it's the source of that activity that makes all the difference.

2. The Old Testmanent Law is bad and grace is good. Antinomianism is a word often used by those who studied somewhere just beyond the point of Sunday School and think they've nailed those who teach grace. It means to be "against the Law" and I'm not. I've never said the Law is bad. I have said that the Old Covenant of the Law is now obsolete, but I'm not the first one to say that. Hebrews 8:13 says, "When [God] said, 'A new covenant,' He has made the first obsolete. But whatever is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to disappear" (emphasis added)..

The Law is out and grace is in! That's what God's Word says! Furthermore, the Apostle Paul said, "you also were made to die to the Law through the body of Christ". Was he lying? Of course not. The Law isn't bad, it's just faulty.

That's right - it is faulty. I have no doubt that if a person trapped in legalism reads this, he will be breaking out in a rash about now. But, wait. Do we believe the Bible or not??? If so, please read this verse and tell me what it means:

Hebrews 8:7 For if that first covenant had been faultless, there would have been no occasion sought for a second. For finding fault with them, He says, 'Behold, days are coming,' says the Lord, 'when I will effect a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah.'

The whole book of Hebrews is about how the new covenant is better than the Law.

3. The grace walk is a passive lifestyle. When people have accused me of teaching this I find it laughable, considering the schedule I keep. The grace walk isn't a lazy lifestyle. It is an active one, but our activity is animated by Him and not by hyper-active, religious flesh. What the legalist calls motion is often nothing more than religious commotion. I have done more under grace than I ever did living as a legalist, but it's not me, but Christ who lives in me who has done it. I could never have made happen the things He has done through me. No, the grace walk isn't passive, but it can appear that way to those who are afflicted with the chronic-Christian-convulsion syndrome they believe they need in order to prove their "commitment to God."

4. Because of grace, we need to be "soft on sin." I've never said anything of the sort. Sin is why Jesus died. I've never said we should be soft on sin, but I have said that we should be soft on people who have sinned. By that, I mean that we should be long on compassion and short on criticism. I have never said that it is never appropriate to confront sin in the lives of other people. I have said that if we do confront their sin, it should be with tears of love that overwhelm them. I have said that, except for rare occassions, we should have earned the right to speak into their lives. I have said that we should realize that they have done nothing we aren't capable of doing too, apart from the protecting grace of God in our own lives.

Do you know what the worst sin is? Somebody elses. Of course, I'm using sarcasm here to make a point and the point it this: "Let him that thinks he stands take heed, lest he fall." Be careful what you say and how you act toward those who have sinned. It might come back to bite you one day.

Our default setting needs to be to love people who have sinned. That doesn't mean we love sin, just that we are being Christ to those who have.

Those are a few things I never said. Are there others you have been falsely accused of saying as you have shared the message of the grace walk? Don't be discouraged. The accusations prove that we are on-track and are declaring God's grace in its glory.