Differentiating Holiness from Legalism

One of the most emotionally divisive issues between Christian brothers and sisters is something hotly labeled legalism. But ask nearly anyone to define what legalism actually is, and the explanation quickly gets vague. The old joke is that legalism is anything to the right of me! Worldliness is anything to my left. Unfortunately, in real life that’s often the actual, nebulous scale by which Christians gauge one another’s holiness.

At the root of this definitional difficulty is the fact that Scripture itself doesn’t use the term legalism, let alone explain it. That’s not to say that it’s not a useful word. Theism, millennialism, liberalism, and many other such religious words are also terms which we find to be helpful even though they’re extra-biblical. But whenever there’s a debate about the appropriateness of the applications of these kinds of words, it’s critical to the Church’s unity that we agree upon their meanings. It’s simply not righteous to define a fellow believer or his behavior with terms whose meanings he vehemently contests.

Toward an Understanding

Conventional usage employs the word legalism for describing a misuse of law; more narrowly, misusing God’s Law. We seem to have two kinds of misuse in mind.

First, there’s the use of law(s) in any way whatsoever to attempt attaining justification. This is the misuse which Scripture explicitly exposes and condemns. It is described in Galatians 5:4b as seeking to be justified by the law, and then condemned in the strongest terms: Christ is become of no effect unto you … ye are fallen from grace (Gal. 5:4a,c). Obviously, therefore, Scripture allows for no differing opinions between true Christians about this kind of legalism.

It’s the second apparent misuse over which Christians tangle: using law(s) in sanctification. The most extreme critics of any use of law-keeping in sanctification are antinomians. But antinomianism, like legalism, can be a slippery label. It’s often defined simply by etymology: against (anti) law (nomos). Though handily describing antinomianism’s general posture, this approach appears not to recognize its nuances. In a recent work entitled Antinomianism: Reformed Theology’s Unwelcome Guest?, Mark Jones traces the historical spectrum of antinomian theology. J. I. Packer helpfully summarizes that spectrum in his forward to the book.

Antinomians among the Reformed have always seen themselves as reacting in the name of free grace against a hangover of legalistic, works-based bondage in personal discipleship. Characteristically, they have affirmed, not that the Mosaic law, under which Jesus lived and which was basic to is own moral teaching, does not after all state God’s true standards for human living, but that it and its sanctions have no direct relevance to us once we have closed with Christ [emphasis mine].

But in most cases dividing Christians over the issue of law-keeping in sanctification (the second form of legalism), the debates aren’t really over the direct relevance of the Mosaic Law to believers. The controversy tends to be centered elsewhere. Here are five descriptions of legalism which illustrate this. In order to avoid unintentionally distracting our focus away from their content, I’ve omitted their authors’ names. But all are respected, conservative Evangelicals. The emphases are mine.

• One typical definition of “legalism” is “an obsessive concern with rules.” It may also be defined as “a tendency to pay more attention to the letter of the law than the spirit of the law.”
• You come up with your own rules for what is spirituality. For what it is to be a good Christian. The Bible’s not enough. You want to add to what the Bible says. And you come up with a list of do’s and don’ts that are not found in Scripture and make that the standard that someone must keep in order to grow in grace. It is legalism. … There is no church that is more immature in the world than a church that is legalistic. That comes up with its own lists about movies and lipstick and television and this and that, and this and that, and this and that, and this and that, that have nothing to do whatsoever with what Scripture has prescribed.
• Legalism is behavior motivated by the false notion that sinners can earn favor with God either before or after salvation, through legal means — obedience, ritual, self-denial, or whatever. … Legalism says, “Earn this,” whether it’s salvation or sanctification. Legalism says that the presence of certain behaviors or the absence of other ones can make us more favorable to God, more worthy in God’s eyes, than we might otherwise be.
• A Christian judges other Christians for not keeping certain codes of conduct that he thinks need to be observed. … Now, we want to make it clear that all Christians are to abstain from fornication, adultery, pornography, lying, stealing, etc. Christians do have a right to judge the spirituality of other Christians in these areas where the Bible clearly speaks. But, in the debatable areas we need to be more careful, and this is where legalism is more difficult to define. … As long as our freedom does not violate the Scriptures, then everything should be okay.
• To abstract the law of God from its original context. We are supposed to obey God because we love him, because he is the one who has given the laws. It is possible, however, to turn God’s law into nothing but a series of rules, and forget the Person behind them.

Though these descriptions were probably not intended by their authors to be technically definitional, they nevertheless contain elements that can be isolated analytically. Those identifiable components seem to include:

1. Obsessing over rules (biblical or otherwise).
2. Adding extra-biblical rules to the Bible as standards for growing in grace (or measuring its growth).
3. Attempting to ensure or improve God’s disposition toward us by rule-keeping.
4. Judging others by extra-biblical rules.
5. Keeping rules out of some motive other than love for God.

What are we to conclude from these? Are they valid descriptions of misusing law in Christian living? Are they good tests by which to detect defects in someone’s understanding of gospel living? Do they legitimately critique a kind of legal, spiritual bondage?

As in approaching most, if not all behavioral issues, it’s vital to begin by differentiating between absolutes and excesses. An absolute wrong is something that is unacceptable in all cases. Idol-making, treachery, arrogance, injustice—these are wrongs absolutely and universally. But an excess is something that is wrong only to certain degrees or in certain amounts.

The question here, then, is whether these various descriptions accurately portray behaviors or attitudes that are misusing law or God’s Law absolutely. For instance, is it universally true that we should never judge the rightness or wrongness of our own behavior, let alone someone else’s, by standards which are not explicit in the Bible? Or that we should never attempt to influence God’s disposition toward us by our performances, good or bad?

Some Scriptural Components of Holiness (1 Pet. 1:14–17)

A passage in 1 Peter 1 furnishes a helpful touchstone for attempting to answer the questions before us.

As obedient children, not fashioning yourselves according to the former lusts in your ignorance: But as he which hath called you is holy, so be ye holy in all manner of conversation; Because it is written, Be ye holy; for I am holy. And if ye call on the Father, who without respect of persons judgeth according to every man’s work, pass the time of your sojourning here in fear.

Clearly, this is a call for scriptural holiness, complete with a quotation from Leviticus 20:7. Even a cursory glance at these verses yields certain impressions about components of that kind of holiness. I’m going to list a few of these and emphasize certain words for the sake of focus. For instance, according to these verses, scriptural holiness

• prohibits Christian conformity to pre-Christian lusts (14).
• would inform pre-Christian ignorance about those lusts (14).
• calls Christians to a holiness that encompasses the totality of their lifestyle (15).
• urges that God’s holiness is to be the standard for our own (16).
• confirms this Divine standard for our universal holiness from the Old (not just the New) Testament (16).
• motivates Christian conduct by the certainty that we shall be judged by our works (17).
• calls for Christian conduct that is motivated, at least in part, by fear (17).

Scriptural Balance

There are many important things that could be discussed about the details of these generalities. But we ought to be able to raise certain legitimate questions in light of these broad observations alone, beginning with questions about scriptural balance.

First, is it scripturally balanced, in light of a passage such as 1 Peter 1:14–17, to draw hard, absolute distinctions between the letter of biblical commands and applicational standards attempting to conform to their spirit? Is drawing up a list of do’s and don’ts that are not found in Scripture and [making] that the standard that someone must keep in order to grow in grace always a misuse of law, a kind of legalism? It could be, of course, but is it always the case? In other words, is it the case absolutely, or only when done excessively?

For instance, Peter calls upon us not to fashion ourselves according to our former lusts in our ignorance (v. 14). But what is lust? Not in the abstract (1 John 2:16), but in concrete expression? Before conversion we are ignorant of the true nature of our lusts and of the ways in which the world pressures and constrains our conforming to them. We have to be taught and educated about these things. And not in clinical, lexical terms only, but through identifiable, cultural examples. Is it, therefore, always, categorically, a misuse of rules and standards for a church to describe and require certain things of its members—such as modest attire at its functions? Or is it nudging towards legalism for a Christian school to prohibit its students to listen to certain kinds of music or attend certain kinds of entertainments? For that church or school to explain that certain ways of dressing and certain kinds of music and entertainment are ways in which the world fashions itself according to ungodly lusts? Is it always a misuse of laws to educate about these things and to set standards of compliance for those who wish to grow out of conformity to the world in these areas? The question here is, again, whether it is scripturally balanced to label such extrabiblical standards as being always a sign of legalism?

Second, is it scripturally balanced, in light of a passage such as 1 Peter 1:14–17, to dismiss entirely the value of conscientious rule-keeping? Of dutyobedience? Is it entirely scriptural to say that anything we do that is motivated by anything less than love is a kind of legalism?

Ecclesiastes 12:13–14 urges,

Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man. For God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil. Is this entirely legalistic ground? A kind of sub-gospel admonition that leads to a bondage of conscience that is unspiritual?

Conscience is the internal moral governor, provided by God’s grace, to accuse or approve (Rom. 2:15). Is compliance with its verdicts always nothing but legalism? To take a contemporary illustration, let’s say that my son comes to me and says, Dad, I’ve been so tempted the last few weeks to go with some of the guys to a sports bar on the other side of town. It’s been such a struggle again and again not to give in. But the thing that has kept me from yielding every time has been the standards you set for entertainment and drummed into my head over and over again. My conscience just wouldn’t let me go.

Would I say to my boy, Son, I’m glad that you didn’t yield to the temptation, but I’ve just got to get something straightened out for you. Conscience isn’t the right motive for obedience. Until you learn to obey out of nothing but love for me, you’re misusing our family’s standards. You’re being a kind of legalist. Is that what I would say?

John MacArthur wrote about this issue,

The danger of overemphasis is very real on both sides of this truth. It is not quite right to say, “We obey out of love for Christ . . . and not out of duty.” Duty and love are not incompatible motives. A father provides for his children because he loves them. Yet it is also his legal and moral duty to do so. The fact that a man loves his children does not lessen his duty to them. The more he loves them, the more he will see the duty as a joy and not a drudgery. But even when the duty is a delight, it should not diminish the father’s solemn sense of duty.

Our obedience to Christ is like that. Certainly we ought to obey Him out of a deep love for Him. And the sheer joy of pleasing Him should permeate our obedience. Yet we should never think of obedience as anything less than a sacred duty. Our love for Christ does not make submission to Him elective. …

Of course, because we are still fleshly creatures, our obedience is not always joyful. And so we must realize that even when our hearts are not brimming with the joy of the Lord, obedience remains our duty. We are to obey when it brings us pleasure, but we also must obey even when we do not feel like it. Both our love for the Lord and our sense of duty to Him should motivate this obedience. One must never cancel out the other.

I fear that the church in our generation is losing sight of the role of duty in the Christian life. Multitudes see “duty” as something altogether foreign to Christianity. Compliance with the commandments of Christ is deemed optional. If you dare suggest that obedience is mandatory, you will be branded a legalist.¹

Third, is it scripturally balanced, in light of a passage such as 1 Peter 1:14–17, to assure Christians that God’s disposition toward us is never affected by anything which we do (i.e., our performance)? Since the cross, is all of God’s pleasure in His people that which He takes in us objectively, as we are positionally “in Christ”? Does He derive no delight (or its opposite) as a result of our behavior subjectively? Does this adequately account for the whole counsel of God on the subject of God’s emotional responses to His people?²

Proverbs 11:20 states, “Such as are upright in their way are his delight.” Is this “uprightness,” here and in many similar Old Testament passages, only the imputed righteousness of Christ? Is it never the actual behavior, deeds, habits, or way of life of His people?

Does not God state explicitly that He has both positive and negative emotional responses to us (not just to our actions), depending upon what we are doing? Consider, for instance, the following statements.

He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him (John 14:21).

If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him (John 14:23).

For he that in these things serveth Christ is acceptable to God, and approved of men (Rom. 14:18).

Wherefore, we labour, that, whether present or absent, we may be accepted of him (2 Cor. 5:9).

That ye might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing (Col. 1:10).

That as ye have received of us how ye ought to walk and to please God, so ye would abound more and more (1 Thess. 4:1).

And grieve not the holy Spirit of God (Eph. 4:30).

There are several other critical questions that could be raised about the scriptural balance of some of the current conceptions of what constitutes a misuse of law (or rules, standards, and penalties) in sanctification. But at this point I want to go to what seems to me to be the nub of the issue.

The Heart of the Difference

The real dividing line that differentiates misusing law in sanctification from scriptural holiness may not lie where it seems to. Unquestionably, for some, keeping laws lies at the heart of their conception of spirituality. But for their critics, renouncing laws may lie near the heart of spirituality. So that, ironically, the critics are snagged in the same snare: preoccupation with laws.³ The person who protests that it is legalism to require of him anything beyond what Scripture explicitly demands may be just as focused upon the letter of things as the person whom he judges to be a legalist. He may himself be a kind of reverse legalist—avoiding much of the spirit of the Scripture’s demands by his insistence that he not be held accountable for anything other than its jots and tittles. And his critiquing of those whom he perceives to be legalists may be just as unscriptural a judgmentalism as theirs.

The true differentiation between legalism and holiness doesn’t seem to be law itself. Then what is it? Perhaps one of the finest exposures of it surfaces in the parable of the prodigal son, particularly upon his return. He determines within himself, “I will arise and go to my father, and will say unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and before thee, And am no more worthy to be called thy son: make me as one of thy hired servants” (Luke 15:18–19).

Just ask two big questions. First, whatever his attitude about his father’s commands had been before, what is it now when he says, make me as one of thy hired servants? Does that sound like he’s going to be conscientious about keeping his father’s commands? But on the other hand, does that sound like he’s going to calculate minutely so that he’s not expected to do a jot more than the explicit letter of those commands? In other words, does he sound now like either a legalist or a reverselegalist? Doesn’t his spirit sound exactly right? What has made the difference? Well, ask the second big question: What now is his attitude toward his father? I have sinned … before thee, and am no more worthy to be called thy son, he plans to say. Isn’t it this new spirit toward his father that is the root of his new spirit toward his father’s commands?

This seems to be the way to differentiate legalism from holiness. Not by focusing upon our relationship to laws, but by focusing upon our relationship to the Lawgiver. Focused in humility (not self-righteousness) upon the Lord Himself, a believer could not be anything other than conscientious about doing everything possible to please Him. His Father’s will becomes his delight.

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Dr. Mark Minnick is the pastor of Mount Calvary Baptist Church in Greenville, South Carolina, and serves as adjunct professor of preaching and exposition at Bob Jones Seminary.

(Originally published in FrontLine • September/October 2016. Click here to subscribe to the magazine.)

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Photo by August de Richelieu

1. John MacArthur, Law and Liberty: A Biblical Look at Legalism (Northampton Press, 2013), Kindle edition. [↩]
2. For a careful attempt to investigate scripturally the apparent antipathy between Divine impassibility and the Bible’s vocabulary of Divine emotions, see Rob Lister’s God Is Impassible and Impassioned (Wheaton: Crossway, 2013). Lister doesn’t discuss the relevance of that antipathy to the question of legalism. [↩]
3. For a perceptive analysis of how this takes place, see Sinclair Ferguson’s excellent book, The Whole Christ: Legalism, Antinomianism, & Gospel Assurance—Why the Marrow Controversy Still Matters (Wheaton: Crossway, 2016). [↩]