Grace Not Rules

I don’t like rules. That created a lot of problems as I was growing up because I was surrounded by rules. I had rules in my home, rules in my school, and rules in my church. I grew up viewing life from the perspective that it was about following rules and I knew I was not good at doing that.

When I became a Christian, I tried to follow Jesus by keeping rules.

Rules like:

Don’t lie.

Don’t cheat.

Don’t steal.

Don’t disobey my parents.

Don’t cuss.

All those rules were good, but I found myself not keeping them.

I found that I was feeling like what Paul expresses in Romans 7:21-25. It says, “I have discovered this principle of life – that when I want to do what is right, I inevitably do what is wrong. I love God’s law with all my heart. But there is another power within me that is at war with my mind. This power makes me a slave to the sin that is within me. Oh, what a miserable person I am! Who will free me from this life that is dominated by sin and death? Thank God! The answer is in Jesus Christ our Lord. So, you see how it is: In my mind, I really want to obey God’s law, but because of my sinful nature, I am a slave to sin.”

I wanted to follow the rules, but I couldn’t. I felt like giving up, and so I did.

It wasn’t that I stopped believing in God or that I stopped going to church or that I fell into gross immorality. I didn’t do any of those things. I simply decided that it was too hard to try and follow all the rules. I knew I was saved and I was going to heaven, so I decided that was enough.

I found I was still not at peace.

Then I read Matthew 5:17. Jesus says, “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.”

Look at what Jesus says: He did not abolish the Law. He fulfilled the Law.

Jesus fulfilled the Law by completely obeying every rule and every command. He obeyed all of the law.

Paul asks who will rescue him. His answer is Jesus.

Jesus did this through completely fulfilling the law and then dying on the cross as our perfect, sinless sacrifice.

We are delivered from the burden of the law as we surrender our lives over to the authority and control of Jesus.

Galatians 2:20

I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.

Jesus fulfilled the law. I can’t, so I surrender my life to Jesus and His life is lived through me. His righteousness is given to me.

Galatians 2:16 says, “Know that a man is not justified by observing the law, but by faith in Christ Jesus. So we, too, have put our faith in Christ Jesus that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by observing the law, because by observing the law no one will be justified.”

No one will be justified by observing the law!

The truth was that I could not follow all the rules.

The truth is that you cannot follow all the rules.

The truth is that no person can follow all the rules.

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is acknowledging our inability to follow God’s commands in our own human strength.

We are justified by the grace of Jesus.

We are sanctified by the grace of Jesus.

We will be glorified by the grace of Jesus.

Not only can we not follow all the rules, the Law, but we were never intended to try and follow the rules to receive salvation.

Ephesians 2:8-9 reminds us that we are not saved by works, but we are saved by God’s grace made real in our lives through faith. This is so we will have no basis to boast about our salvation. Our salvation is completely secured by Jesus’ finished work on the cross.

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is depending on God’s grace.

In Galatians 6:14 Paul says, “May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.”

Our boasting about salvation should be about what Jesus did on the cross, not about us or our worthiness for salvation or our work in following the rules.

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is boasting in the cross of Jesus.

I still do not do well at following rules.

But I have found some truths that allow my struggle not to hinder my walk with Jesus.

God looks at the heart, not at the outward appearance. – 1 Samuel 16:7

God gives us the desire and the ability to do what pleases Him. – Philippians 2:13

God’s grace saves me, not my works. – Ephesians 2:5

God has enabled me to be the righteousness of God through Jesus’ death on the cross. – 2 Corinthians 5:21

God is forming in me the image of Jesus and thus using my dislike for following rules to reject the world’s values and follow Him and His will. – Romans 8:29

Our hope is in Jesus and His grace, not our work at keeping all the rules.

Based on Grace, Not Works, Raising the Roof and Removing the Walls,

                                                    Joe