StudyGrowKnow

Loving People is a Learned Attribute

June 6, 2011 at 11:41 AM Leave a comment

In a previous blog post, I noted the differences between liberalism and legalism.  In no way did I cover the gamut of both areas.  All I did was simply touch on a few things.  I could go on and on about that, but for now, I’ll stick to the basics.

Since having left the last church I attended, I have learned some good lessons about loving people.  You see, when I was involved in the Church of the Legalistic Aire, I believed then (and still do) that I was correct biblically.  I mentioned that in my last blog.  Being doctrinally correct is absolutely important, but so is loving people with the compassion that only comes from above.

Since we have begun attending our new church (which by the way is not perfect; no church is), I have seen how correct doctrine can be married to a loving, compassionate desire to serve one another.  Most importantly, I realize that when I look back on my time in our previous church, I often fell into the trap of being legalistic.

I found myself holding grudges when I should have been quick to forgive.  I actually remember wanting certain people to feel God’s passionate (though loving) wrath, an oxymoron to be sure, since He does not pour out His wrath on His own.  This is tragic, but it is an often quickly learned trait when a person becomes part of a church or institution in which the letter of the law is emphasized.

This is not to say that the church I previously attended was devoid of love.  I believe there were and are people who, by God’s grace, manage to love others in spite of the legalism that tends to abound.  The tendency in churches like that though, is to try to get God’s will to take place without depending upon His strength, grace, love, and patience.  It’s all done through human strength, something that God finds exceedingly offensive.

As I mentioned previously, in settings such as that, God’s Word often becomes a weapon and while the Bible itself describes itself as the “sword of the Lord,” it should not be used as a weapon against other Christians.  In fact, when we correct others, we should do it with the utmost care and humility, or we ourselves will be in danger of failing and falling, since pride goes before a fall.

Pride tends to be the problem in many churches we would classify as legalistic and I noticed it in myself on numerous occasions, much to my dismay.  I remember saying things to myself like, “I know the Scriptures better than him!”  Really?  Maybe not since it was obvious I had become a bit prideful about my own knowledge.

Legalism has a tendency to be the ultimate “trickle down” theory.  Someone pounds another over the head with the Bible and before you know it, that person is trying to find someone else to pound, and so it goes.

Unless the church has a strong, loving pastor who knows the Word, yet is not afraid to stand up to people who make it their joy in life to create problems (another sign of legalism), this type of attitude and demeanor will continue unabated and the pastor and deacons will forever be putting out fires, instead of setting the tone.  This tends to leave the church in constant turmoil because there is always some small fire to deal with and once that is under control, another one or two pop up requiring attention.

That happens because of individual personalities in the church that often take center stage.  If they are tithers, the problem is enhanced because who wants to offend people who literally support the church?  But you see, people who genuinely love as God loves us (and that is a learning process that continues throughout our earthly lives), are far more forgiving and accepting of others simply because they have gained a glimpse of their own filthiness and how much God loves them in spite of it.  They have begun to understand what it cost Jesus to provide salvation.

Love that is genuine is quick to forgive and quick to forget (1 Corinthians 13).  For the legalist, they believe they do love, unfortunately, it is often nothing like God’s love.  They have their own definition of love.  They unfortunately keep track of wrongs and they tend to harbor grudges.  As I mentioned, I did that, so I know that I was not loving as God loves me.

The pastor is the one individual who sets the tone and it is his responsibility to ensure that people love one another, while adhering to biblical doctrine.  This can sometimes be very difficult depending on the “sheep” in the pasture he has charge over and his own personality.  Many pastors in legalistic churches are one extreme or the other.  Either they are exceedingly rigid that any movement to the right or left causes tremendous tension, creating a tyrant instead of leader, or they become a milquetoast, simply going this way or that; wherever the strongest person at the time pushes or pulls them.

The last church I attended, the pastor was a wonderful man in many ways, yet he often gave into the same people repeatedly solely because their personality was far stronger than his.  During the time I was there, I saw the same people creating the same problems.  The only thing that would happen was that the pastor or the elders would “talk” to that person, warning them that their behavior was a disruption.  Never mind that this same individual had chased many other good people out of that church over the years with their caustic remarks and rejoinders to newcomers.  That didn’t seem to matter and over time I realized why I believe that was the case.

If you have one or two families in a legalistic church doing all the work (and probably tithing or giving beyond their tithe, which makes sense if you’re a legalist), then if those families left the church, there would be a tremendous holes to fill.  Humanly speaking, it might seem impossible to fill it.  A pastor of a relatively small church would bristle at the thought of having to replace people who were the mainstays of the high school, college ministries, or even the music ministry.

Based on some situations, certain pastors find it easier to adopt an attitude that essentially says “we’ll warn that person not to do that again” and then leave it at that.  However, without a proper biblical boundary and actual biblical justice in place, that person is never going to learn anything.  They will simply continue to do what they do and I saw it too many times to note.

On one occasion, I was “called” into the office by the elders and pastor.  I had no clue what the meeting was about, but thought it was simply about church business.  I went only to find out that the meeting was about me and something I had apparently done.

I was a bit shocked and angry because the people who brought the problem to the pastor and elders had completely ignored Scripture.  They did not come to me with their concerns and so did not give me the opportunity to explain OR to confess (had it actually been something I had done wrong).

I pointed this out to the pastor and the elders and they all agreed with me that this is what should have been done.  They actually apologized to me for not insisting that the people (there were three of them) follow biblical guidelines.  Yet, this was not the end of it, because these same men were guilty of the same infraction with others later.  How could they admit they were mistaken to me, even apologizing for their sin of not following biblical guidelines and then turning around to do the same thing again?

It happened one other time with me, with respect to someone who attended my Bible classes.  I asked the elder why the person hadn’t come to me about their concern (the person took the tone in my voice in response to a question as “judgmental”).  He said that the person didn’t want to create a problem with me.  The person had already created a problem.  If I had done something so that they felt they needed to go to an elder about it, it was big enough in their mind to require some type of action.  However, they avoided using the prescribed biblical approach, preferring instead to offer a lame excuse for being disobedient to Scripture.  The person who was on the receiving end of my “judgmental” tone did not take my response to him as “judgmental” at all when I asked him about it.

The elder should have refused to even deal with it since the person bypassed the Bible in the first place, but he did not do that, so he actually contributed to making the situation worse.  In this case, the person’s legalistic view of the Bible provided them with an excuse to not have to obey it.  This is exactly what the Pharisees did.  By following the letter of the law, they appeared to be spiritual, but they were merely only legalistic.

The person who was offended at something I did should have come to me.  However, there is an even better approach they could have taken.  They could have simply let it go and not made a big deal out of it.  Instead, they chose to be offended and made it something that needed to be dealt with and in this case it was absolutely nothing at all.

Another thing that people in legalistic churches do is often focus on minutiae.  Case in point; one time during class, I was teaching something and used the expression, “my goodness.”  Well, that started a discussion on the use of swear words and the belief by one person in the class who thought that simply using substitutes was the same as swearing.  So my saying “my goodness” was the same as using a swear word or phrase to her.  Well, goodness gracious, you would think that I had actually used swear words.

The problem though is that I was not using a swear word or phrase.  It was merely a throw-away expression that acted as filler.  It wasn’t mean to offend or to take the place of a swear word.  Be that as it may though, this is a very small problem to begin with, if it is actually a problem.  Can someone argue that Jesus would never have used a “filler”?  Possibly.  However, the point is being missed.  For that woman, the focus was on the external.

I have attended more legalistic churches that I care to remember.  One thing I have noticed about all of them is with reference to the pastor’s own children.  More often than not, the pastor’s kids live a lie, deliberately.  We all live lies at times, but most of the time, we don’t like it and when the Lord brings it to our minds, we confess it.  Not so with too many PKs (pastor’s kids) who have grown up in legalistic churches.  Often, they live one way during the week, but when Sundays and Wednesdays come around, they put on their Christian clothing and smile.

If I told you how many times I learned that the pastor’s kids were hellions, you might be surprised.  Such was the case with one of the last churches I attended.  I noted that there was an inordinate amount of attempted protection for the PKs.  By that I mean, if someone questioned (even innocently) the actions of one of the pastor’s kids, they were generally put down pretty quickly.  The tragedy is that because of that, it becomes clear that either the pastor and his wife know of the situation with their kid(s), members of the congregation do, or both.  Yet in spite of that, prefer to pretend that there is no problem and do their level best to turn the tables on the person asking the question or bringing the subject up.

After leaving one church, I learned that the pastor’s kids were often at parties with secular kids from their schools.  What they did at those parties was often not much different (if at all) from the kids who were secular in nature.  Yet, the way those kids could pour on the charm, the sincerity, and all the rest on Sundays and Wednesdays would have been enough to convince anyone that they were pure and innocent.

Years ago, while attending one legalistic church, I learned that the pastor’s kids  were  just as raucous, just as humanistic, and just as sinful as the non-churched kids who went to their school.  In some ways, who can blame the kids?  They are raised in a fishbowl, where all eyes focus on them, watching them to see if they have any chinks in their armor.  At the first sign of failure, they are often pounced on.  This tends to create kids who are very duplicitous and very well-versed at it.

Legalism produces nothing good at all.  In fact, it teaches people that as long as you appears as though you are living the life of an authentic Christian, you’re golden.  The plain fact of the matter is that this is what 85% of the world does; those who say they are Christian.  They live a lie and it is encouraged because of the expectations placed on them from those within that specific church.

Legalism seems to have no boundaries, because under legalism, anything goes as long as the goal is considered biblical.  In other words, it doesn’t matter for the legalist how they arrive at the goal.  It is merely important that they arrive there because then they can continue to believe that they are living up to the standards of God’s Word.

In the last church I attended, it became apparent that there were a few people who did not like me teaching.  They did not like me preaching.  They barely contained themselves when I was asked to pray or lead in the reading of Scripture.  Those few individuals would make cutting remarks or quips designed to shame me.

The biggest problem (as it turned out) was that I had not been at that particular church long enough.  One individual essentially told me (in an e-mail) that he had been there longer, the pastor had baptized his kids, who was I and why was I trying to build my “kingdom”?  He also compared me to Napoleon in that same e-mail.  I wasn’t trying to build a kingdom for myself.  I was simply trying to do what I believe God wanted me to do in service to Him.

It amazes me that there are people who claim to be Christian who are so concerned with externals and who believe they have a right to denigrate a person based on their own perceptions of what they think Scripture teaches.  Never mind, that God was trying to use me (as I believe He was) at that church.  The only thing that mattered to that person was that I was doing things he could not do.  In other words, because of some of his strange views on doctrine, he was no longer invited to pray before the congregation or teach Bible classes, etc., he didn’t want me to do it because he had been there longer.

This is the way a legalist thinks.  This is what they do and how they tend to direct the affairs of the church.  When I mentioned it to the pastor, his response was “he should not be saying those things.”  He then assured me he would keep an eye on the person.  Whoopee.  Turns out they had been doing that for years.

Folks, here is my suggestion if you are attending a legalistic church:  run.  Run away and don’t look back.  Pray that God will direct you to a church where love and compassion are solidly married to biblical correctness.  There is no reason to submit yourself to a group of people who are more concerned about the letter of the law, than the spirit of it.  If you stay there long enough, you will become one of the many fractured and broken authentic Christians lying by the side of the road.  You will have to work through years of pain and heartache because you wrongly believed that you were attending a church where God’s Spirit controlled the people and the proceedings.  Unfortunately, you were attending a church where self was on the throne and where Satan had such a strong foothold that no amount of prayer or effort on your part would move him off his pedestal.

I have learned my lesson and by His grace, I will not allow myself to become part of a church that relies on human strength to get God’s work done.  It’s too painful, too debilitating, and just plain wrong.

You can listen to Fred on his weekly program “Study-Grow-Know” on AM950 KAHI (www.kahi.com, until June 11th).  Starting July 1st, Fred will have his own page on OnePlace.com where his program will continue with new content added weekly.  He is also currently on Live365.com.

Fred has written over 24 books on a variety of theological and doctrinal subjects.  Visit his Web site at:  http://www.studygrowknow.com for more information, to purchase his books (which are also available on Amazon.com), or to donate to his tax-deductible ministry.

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