Legalism&Antinomianism .. it is the reason for obedience that is important.

Serving Christians Seeking to Live a Holy Life

Legalism and Antinomianism
"Two Gutter Balls" Leon L. Combs, Ph.D.

Salvation is by faith. But what kind of faith saves? The faith that saves is a faith that has the right object and the right qualities. A faith that holds Christ and his atoning work as its object and a faith that is application-oriented, these compose saving faith. There are those who hold the wrong object of faith. These are those who put faith in their works. Then there are those who claim to believe the right thing, but have no applications to their faith. Among these later ones are what are called antinomians. They take that doctrine of salvation by faith alone to the extreme. The Protestant faith isn't simply mental assent to a set of doctrines, but rather a faith that is application oriented - Faith being the source, and works being the inevitable outcome.

Catholic theology can be represented by the equation Faith + Works --> Justification.

Protestant theology can be represented by the equation Faith --> Justification + Works. Perhaps we can even extend this last equation to lead to sanctification by indicating it as:

Faith --> Justification + Works --> Sanctification. Of course the sanctification is never complete while we remain in this present state. The completed process will actually be glorification, again done by God, Himself.

Let's think about this topic by imagining that we are bowling. Let the figure below represent a bowling lane with the triangle the pen setup. For those of us who have bowled, we remember with embarrassment the throwing of gutter balls. We want to make a strike, but we sometimes throw a gutter ball. In the Christian walk we also always want to throw strikes, but we also sometimes throw gutter balls. One gutter ball that we sometimes throw is gutter ball left as indicated below: legalism. Another gutter ball that we sometimes throw is antinomianism as indicated below as gutter ball right.

Most Christians are familiar with the term "legalism", which applies to someone who is trying to achieve justification before almighty Holy God by his/her own works. It doesn't take a lot of Biblical knowledge to understand how futile such an effort is. However it is easy for a Christian (saved by faith from God and due to no work of his/her own) to fall into legalism, so it is something that we need to always be on guard against.

However, perhaps not as many people are familiar with the concept of antinomianism. The word comes from "anti" meaning against and "nos" meaning law. The New American Dictionary defines antinomianism as "The doctrine or belief that the Gospel frees Christians from required obedience to any law, whether scriptural, civil, or moral, and that salvation is attained solely through faith and the gift of divine grace." Or "The belief that moral laws are relative in meaning and application as opposed to fixed or universal."

The antinomian has taken "sola fide" to an extreme not ever meant by the reformers. A faith that doesn't work or one that is even anti-"good works" is not saving faith as the Bible describes it, but rather is a dead faith, as we find in James 2:17, "faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead."

We must always remember that God alone justifies as indicated in the Scripture below.

Mark 10:45 "For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many."

Also we must also always remember that God is the one who regenerates us as stated below.

Eph 2:4 But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us,
Eph 2:5 even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved),
Eph 2:6 and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly {places}, in Christ Jesus,
Eph 2:7 in order that in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.

But we are not justified and regenerated to just sit in a pew and do nothing as indicated below (underlines and bold is my addition).

Eph 2:8 For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, {it is} the gift of God;
Eph 2:9 not as a result of works, that no one should boast.
Eph 2:10 For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

Note that Jesus also said that we have work to do as indicated in the following Scriptures:

Luke 9:23 And He was saying to {them} all, "If anyone wishes to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me.

Luke 6:46 "And why do you call Me, 'Lord, Lord,' and do not do what I say?
Luke 6:47 "Everyone who comes to Me, and hears My words, and acts upon them, I will show you whom he is like:
Luke 6:48 he is like a man building a house, who dug deep and laid a foundation upon the rock; and when a flood rose, the torrent burst against that house and could not shake it, because it had been well built.
Luke 6:49 "But the one who has heard, and has not acted {accordingly,} is like a man who built a house upon the ground without any foundation; and the torrent burst against it and immediately it collapsed, and the ruin of that house was great."
Matt 10:22 "And you will be hated by all on account of My name, but it is the one who has endured to the end who will be saved."
Matt 5:20 "For I say to you, that unless your righteousness surpasses {that} of the scribes and Pharisees, you shall not enter the kingdom of heaven."
John 14:15 "If you love Me, you will keep My commandments."
John 14:21 "He who has My commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves Me; and he who loves Me shall be loved by My Father, and I will love him, and will disclose Myself to him."
John 15:10 "If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love; just as I have kept My Father's commandments, and abide in His love."
Matt 25:31 "But when the Son of Man comes in His glory, and all the angels with Him, then He will sit on His glorious throne.
Matt 25:32 "And all the nations will be gathered before Him; and He will separate them from one another, as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats;
Matt 25:33 and He will put the sheep on His right, and the goats on the left.
Matt 25:34 "Then the King will say to those on His right, 'Come, you who are blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.
Matt 25:35 'For I was hungry, and you gave Me {something} to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me drink; I was a stranger, and you invited Me in;
Matt 25:36 naked, and you clothed Me; I was sick, and you visited Me; I was in prison, and you came to Me.'
Matt 25:37 "Then the righteous will answer Him, saying, 'Lord, when did we see You hungry, and feed You, or thirsty, and give You drink?
Matt 25:38 'And when did we see You a stranger, and invite You in, or naked, and clothe You?
Matt 25:39 'And when did we see You sick, or in prison, and come to You?'
Matt 25:40 "And the King will answer and say to them, 'Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did it to one of these brothers of Mine, {even} the least {of them,} you did it to Me.'
Matt 25:41 "Then He will also say to those on His left, 'Depart from Me, accursed ones, into the eternal fire which has been prepared for the devil and his angels;
Matt 25:42 for I was hungry, and you gave Me {nothing} to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me nothing to drink;
Matt 25:43 I was a stranger, and you did not invite Me in; naked, and you did not clothe Me; sick, and in prison, and you did not visit Me.'
Matt 25:44 "Then they themselves also will answer, saying, 'Lord, when did we see You hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not take care of You?'
Matt 25:45 "Then He will answer them, saying, 'Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to Me.'
Matt 25:46 "And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life."

Note in Matt 25:40, Jesus refers to them doing work for "one of these brothers of Mine". Of course not every human being is a brother of Jesus; it is only the ones who have justified and regenerated that are brothers of Jesus. So Jesus here is telling us that we need to do the works that He mentioned to fellow Christians.

Or as Paul clearly states:

Rom 5:20 And the Law came in that the transgression might increase; but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more,
Rom 5:21 that, as sin reigned in death, even so grace might reign through righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Rom 6:1 What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace might increase?
Rom 6:2 May it never be! How shall we who died to sin still live in it?
Rom 6:3 Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death?
Rom 6:4 Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, in order that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.

Certainly all of the above Scriptures tell us that antinomianism is not acceptable behavior for a Christian. We love Jesus so we want to obey Him and do the work that He has prepared for us. However in doing those works, we must guard against falling into legalism. Another question remains: "How do we know all the works that we are to do?" The answer is to study the Word of God and we will quickly and easily see many commandments that we are to obey, including 2 Peter 1:5,6 for this is a command. You can quickly find many more as you allow the Holy Spirit to guide you in your study of Scripture.