Paul's Passing Thoughts

There are only two people groups in the world; those under law and those under grace. These are not only two categories of existence, but two different mindsets. Primarily, under law will focus on not doing bad things against the law. Under grace will have a positive focus on loving God and others. It asks, “Did you love today,” not “Did you sin today?” One will focus on whatever people are doing against the law, viz, fault finding, the other will focus on people’s positive points. The under grace mindset will weigh a person’s contributions against faults and focus on the contributions. Under law focuses on faults. The problem with fault finding under law follows: people have a tendency to add their own laws to all other laws that exist leading to an impossible standard for living. Unfortunately, the wellness of most marriages are evaluated by the degree of which a spouse breaks any number of laws and categories of laws. Under the law mindset, in many cases, personal preference will become a law of higher significance than God’s law or any other law. Murder is often the sentence for violating someone’s personal law too many times.

The reason religious people under law focus so much on not breaking the law is because they are also under the condemnation of the law which is not a good thing. The focus is escaping condemnation, not loving. If you focus on love, condemnation is piling up in the background. So, it’s a life driven by fear of condemnation. Those under law are enslaved to sin and a futile endeavor to escape it. This is why Christ came to end the law and its condemnation: law-keeping doesn’t fulfill the law; only love fulfils the law. Our goal is love, not law-keeping to prevent condemnation.

Church, whether Protestant or Catholic, and all stripes that flow out of both are under law. Protestantism is primarily predicated on what is called, “Covenant Theology.” What’s a covenant? Right, it’s a law. Unbelievably, according to this theology and in overt contrast to Pauline theology, the relationship between Adam and God was based on a “covenant of works.” Once broken, Christ came under the “covenant of grace” to restore the original covenant (law) broken by Adam. It’s purely law-based in opposition to “the promise” given to Abraham and Christ.

Accordingly, everything about church is remaining just before God by keeping covenants. In the keeping of these covenants, Christ in turn fulfills the covenant of grace in our stead as a way of restoring the original covenant of works. The lesser covenants that invoke Christ to keep us just by fulfilling the major covenant of grace in our stead varies according to various church traditions. In other words, the lesser covenant of Catholicism is going to differ from the lesser covenant of Protestantism. In either case, these lesser covenants predicated on the horizontal traditions of men are referred to as “the means of grace” or the means of salvation. If people would stop long enough to ponder this notion on its face value, it would be revealed for what it is: in-your-face works justification.

Hence, as Protestant orthodoxy comes full circle in our day, prominent evangelical leaders are openly stating that being part of the body of Christ is synonymous with being faithful to a covenant with a local church; i.e., formal church membership and probable signing of a “church covenant.” This is a lesser covenant efficacious for salvation. The keeping of this lesser covenant, the church covenant, involves being faithful to the “means of grace.” Again, this is overt law-based salvation by works.

And marriage, one of the church covenants, is fulfilled by either remaining in the covenant or not remaining in the covenant…period. Whether the church covenant or the marriage covenant, the covenant is fulfilled, leading to Christ fulling the covenant of grace, by remaining in the covenant REGARDLESS OF ANYTHING. If you listen carefully to what the churched say in various and sundry situations, these elements are continually confirmed by what proceeds out of their mouths. Furthermore, judgement (condemnation) is pronounced on all those who supposedly break these covenants that are not valid to begin with. God never made a covenant with Adam. In every case where God makes a covenant with anybody—it’s called a covenant specifically. The covenant of grace is based on Genesis 3:15, but in that passage, God is speaking to the serpent!

What happens in a church or in a marriage is almost entirely irrelevant; faithfulness to the covenant is all that matters. And folks get the message; how is it possible that churches still exist regardless of their rotten fruit? Because the rotten fruit is irrelevant while covenant keeping (law-keeping) is the bottom line. It’s an exact reflection of the very same religious system that Christ railed against when He ministered on earth.

Those under grace are not under law and are not enslaved to the law and its condemnation. In our day and church culture, this is particularly relevant to wives. Church culture demands that they be keepers of the home and children with home schooling being part of the package. Large families are encouraged resulting in the wife being consumed with nothing but being a homemaker. Not only is she condemned if she leaves the church covenant and marriage covenant, but she would have to leave multiple children behind. Not only is mega-birthing encouraged to increase the church army, but it further enslaves the wife who rarely owns anything individually.

She is trapped and enslaved. At this point, a church husband can treat her anyway he wants to and there is not anything she can realistically do about it. She can’t leave with six to ten children, she has no car, no house, no education, no money…no nothing.

However, according to the apostle Paul, any marriage not built on oneness is an illegitimate marriage. Marriages under law are not valid; in the context of this post, the husband is an unbeliever who is not pleased to dwell with the wife for legitimate purposes. The wife, if she is under grace, may divorce.

She is not in bondage to law, particularly the lesser covenants based on the traditions of men, and the church has no authority to condemn her.

paul

On the way to writing another post today I stumbled onto this article about the Hollywood actor Debra Messing. The article is a revelation concerning the abuse actors are willing to endure to “realize their dreams.” Read…”desire” and whatever drives that desire or desires.

Most of the abuse in that venue comes from movie directors and producers that decide who makes it or doesn’t make it in that industry. It’s fairly evident that Hollywood is a brutal hierarchal food chain. In reality, it is a cesspool totally controlled by errant desires to succeed at all cost and desires to dominate others for the self-fulfillment of other errant desires.

This is why I find the arrogance of movie stars so stunning; in most cases, they sold their self dignity to get where they are, and looked the other way in regard to criminal debauchery in order to prevent being blacklisted.

I wonder aloud: when we hear about famous personalities who have it all, yet commit suicide, what did they barter away that robbed them of happiness? I suspect the answer is self dignity.

If everything in the Messing article is true, she allowed a director to totally disrespect her like a piece of trash laying on the sidewalk. Furthermore, she gave license for this director to do the same to others. This is a matter of self respect and respect for others. Self respect is earned, this is true, but accomplishments that build self respect do not allow for selling yourself out to a tyrant and contributing to the success of despotism.

Not long ago, I was sitting atop a major career opportunity at a facility. For whatever political reasons that I am unaware of, I was made 100% guilty in a situation where I was 100% innocent, and spoken to very disrespectfully. The following was obvious: the administration assumed I would look the other way because I was one day short of qualifying to sit for a state test for my career advancement. That was also brought up in the meeting, and I was reminded of the favor at hand accordingly. With one day of clinicals left for the company sponsored program, the thought that I would take a stand was the farthest thing from their minds.

Would passing the state test and becoming a medication aide been a deposit into my self respect account under those circumstances? No, because the legitimacy of the process was compromised; allowing others to disrespect you unjustly is not a valid payment for success. Furthermore, playing the game in this way contributes to the success of tyranny and informs the tyrant that this form of coercion will work.

The priceless look on the administrator’s face when I turned in my 2-week notice after the meeting was hardly enough to temper the pain of that decision. I loved that facility and thought I had a home there. It’s still painful to think about. But I believe the following: God will, in time, bring about a better opportunity.

I believe ultimate success comes by pushing the envelope of uncompromise for ourselves and others. Yes, it will appear that we are shooting ourselves in the foot and will therefore never realize our dreams, but a dream purchased with compromise is not worth having and will not contribute one mite to your own self respect and respect for others.

paul