Today a friend and I met to talk for a couple of hours. We talked some about church history, current local church dynamics, specific individual and family situations, as well as several Bible passages that came up over the course of our discussion. Regardless of the particular topic we were pursuing, a common thread emerged throughout: that people (us included) love to run away from grace and toward law whenever possible.

It takes a lot, nothing less than a work of the Spirit, to convince us that we cannot save ourselves and need, through grace, the righteousness of Christ. Unfortunately, the battle against works doesn’t stop there. Having been saved through grace, we still find ways to sneak works in the back door. We judge ourselves on the basis of our performance and, having so judged, give in to sorrow or pride accordingly.

We see the notion of cheap grace, which produces so-called “carnal Christians,” and rightly reject it as unbiblical. Jesus and the Apostles agree that the same grace that saves also transforms us and, by extension, our behaviors. We reject antinomianism (“against the law”) because Jesus rejected it. We embrace, by the Spirit’s help, God’s call for us to be holy. Holiness is love in action and Scripture commands us to love. We go this far on the issue of law because Scripture does.
But in reality, we often go a step further. We try to use our performance, good or bad, as justification for God’s attitude toward us. If we think we’re performing well we believe God is right to be pleased with us and that his grace toward us was reasonable. If we think we’re performing poorly (“why do I still sin like this?”) we deny the possibility that God could be pleased with us because we’re fakes and God knows it, even if the people in church with us don’t. Back and forth we go, swinging between the heights of the pendulum’s arch.

So which is it? It is that because of God’s grace we should be entirely unconcerned with obedience? Or is it that because of God’s commands we should not presume on his grace while we’re still sinners? The answer, of course, is neither. Both matter – total dependence on God’s grace and a desire for holiness and law-keeping.

Both matter – but the order is critically important. Scripture constantly reminds us of it in passages like Romans 5:6-10: “For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly…God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God.”

Jesus did not bring us into the presence of his father because we deserved to be there. Prior to his sweeping us into that holy place we did not act like people who belong in the throne-room of God. Jesus brought us there anyway. God knows that we could never have fulfilled the requirements to “belong there,” at least not in ourselves. Therefore, he fulfilled the requirements for us, credited that righteousness to us, and brought us near to God. Notice that nothing of our own doing could be credited with our admission into that place. Likewise, there is nothing we can do to earn the right to stay there. We belong there because has declared it so. We belong there because he has brought us close. This is why we use words like “saved,” “rescued,” and “delivered;” we’re trying to describe something that has been done to us and for us rather than something we’ve done ourselves.

Having been brought into the throne-room, indeed into the family of God, apart from our performance is an amazing thing. Knowing that we don’t have to meet a certain standard in order to stay is nearly mind-blowing. Once given to us, there is nothing we can do that will separate us from the love of God in Christ. God brought us here and he brought us here to stay.

This means that we approach the subject of holiness and works from a very different perspective. We don’t need to behave in order to keep our place in the family. We don’t have to measure up to God’s standard (perfection) because Jesus has done it for us already. We don’t have to measure up to human standards (sub-perfection) because they have no authority to condemn. This is why a right understanding of justification, that God’s grace brought us here, gives us a right understanding of sanctification, “what do we do now?”.

In sanctification we talk not about what we have to do but about what we want to do. What do you want to do for God? The answer, of course, depends on what you believe God has done for you. If you understand justification – the events I described previously – I’d wager that what you want to do for God is to love him. If you understand justification, you cannot help but love him.

What struck me most today was the sad irony of our frequent attempts to run away from grace and toward works. What we think we’re doing is showing God how much more we love him than those who aren’t as obedient as we. What we’re actually doing is running away from the very thing that could make our love genuine: the full experience of his grace.