Random Blog Clay Feet: September 23, 2003
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Tuesday, September 23, 2003

Legalism and Sanctification

Saul was one of the most ambitious legalists in history who had a commanding knowledge of Scripture and an unsurpassed zeal for righteousness. But it was not until he scales fell from his eyes that he began to understand the truth about God in all those Scriptures. And it was when a man who could see and who was open to and easily moved by the Spirit, a heretic, came and prayed for hem and laid hands on Saul that the scales came off not only his eyes but his heart.

Will it be that Adventists with all the true doctrines and false prejudice against other born-again children of God, will have to be prayed over and receive laying on of hands from non-Adventists or maybe newly enlightened “converts” who are far more open and advanced in things of the Spirit, before the scales of legalism can be dropped from our eyes? It is easier for truly Spirit-filled people to accept the true Sabbath and other doctrines of truth than for rigid law-keepers and EGW abusers to accept the humility and joy of the Holy Spirit. True doctrines only enhance the experience of those who are already on the track of being led by the Spirit and craving more of God's presence and knowledge of Him. But legalism blinds its adherents with pride in supposedly having all the truth, believing that having the right facts, formulas and arguments constitutes the sume of the law. Everything in the Bible is forced through this filter and squeezed/contorted into this mold.

Legalism is the counterfeit of true sanctification. The one is motivated by pride of truth and selfish ambition to escape this earth and settle in the comforts of heaven. The second is driven by a deepening disgust with one's self from a growing knowledge of our own desperate sinfulness in the light of God's overwhelming beauty and a growing, passionate craving for deeper intimacy with the God of mercy and compassion who has been lied about, maligned, and falsely represented. Heaven is only a place where intimacy with the ultimate lover can be more fully realized, not a fire escape.