This episode challenges believers not to adopt a welfare mentality towards Christian growth, in which the principal means of grace are neglected. The Word of God, prayer, and corporate worship are the mediated means of grace essential to Christian growth. The author of Hebrews decried the welfare mentality of his recipients: "By this time you OUGHT to be teachers... you have come to need milk and not solid food." This spirit of dependency that doesn't advance to maturity manifests among modern Christians who neglect Scripture, prayer, and corporate worship. Grace is mistakenly viewed as unmediated, coming directly from God, so diligence in cultivating the MEANS of grace is not an urgent priority. This childish welfare mentality describes many American Christians, whose only encounter with God's Law is negative, void of the positive cravings for the Law experienced by the psalmist in Psalm 119. The clear application of Psalm 119 for Christians is the diligent embrace of God's Law resulting in delight. The psalmist's attitude was the antithesis of the welfare mentality common today.
Saved to Think like Christ
This episode challenges Christians to have a holistic Biblical understanding of salvation. The superficial perspective of many believers sees Christianity primarily as a means of deliverance from the penalty of sin. While many genuinely battle against the flesh, they fail to see the effort as part of a greater objective of salvation, thinking like Christ. Paul exhorts the Philippians to put on the mind of Christ. (Phil 2:5) When thinking like Christ becomes the goal of believers, and not merely the forgiveness of sins, appreciation and love of the Law are natural bi-products. Doing God's will is largely informed by God's Law, and the one who delights in God's Law seeks to do the will of the Father, perceiving it as "food." Christ said his food was to do the will of Him who sent Him. The goal of Christianity is therefore doing the will of God, informed by the Law, the food we crave, and this is tantamount to having the mind of Christ.
Fawning after God and His Law
This episode spells out how the cultivation of love of God and His Law is the means of gaining victory over the flesh. This love is metaphorically captured in Psalm 42:1: "as the deer pants for the water brook, so my soul pants for Thee, oh God." Victory over the flesh is not found in merely knowing about God and His Law, but victory manifests when we PANT after God and His Law. It becomes an insatiable craving. New Testament believers, who delight with the Law of God in the inner man, can potentially have substantial victory over the flesh by setting their minds on the Spirit. (Romans 8:6) This is key to falling in love with God and His Law. And it also makes sanctification much easier. When God and His Law become our delight, His commandments are not burdensome, and crushing the deeds of the flesh becomes instinctive and natural. We pant after God and His commandments, and we do anything to satisfy our thirst.
Loving the Law Presumes Knowing the Law
This episode elaborates on the reasons why many Christians fail to fall in love with God's Law, as the psalmist did in Psalm 119. In addition to failing to embrace holistic salvation promised in Romans 8:2, leading to a convoluted appreciation of God's Law, many modern believers do not intentionally set their minds on the Spirit. They presume that regeneration automatically makes them spiritual. Survey evidence by George Barna indicates widespread Biblical illiteracy among evangelical Christians, resulting in an inability to accurately discern flesh from spirit. (Hebrews 4:12) Since Scripture is substantially an expression of God's moral Law, failure to love God's Law partly stems from ignorance of the Scripture.
The Law Helps to Think God’s Thoughts after Him
This episode exposes the fleshly arguments that some use to justify continued expression of the flesh. The argument largely rests on using Paul's own words in Romans 7 as an excuse for not forcefully advancing spiritually. Paul himself describes himself as a prisoner of the law of sin and death in verse 23. In verse 25 he observes 2 warring principles within, and neither is ascendant. Selective proof texting of Romans 7 is naturally a convenient rationalization for Christians bent on tolerating a fair degree of carnality. Romans 8:2 thoroughly debunks the flesh's convenient co-opting of Paul in Romans 7, insisting that substantial victory is available for Christians who set their minds on the Spirit. Love of God's Law also becomes the lens of the mind set on the Spirit.
Life in Christ Trumps Sin and Death
This episode spells out the answer to the question raised in the previous broadcast: "Why do many REGENERATE believers have less appreciation for God's Law than the UNREGENERATE author of Psalm 119? The short answer is that many Christians' theology of sanctification is the pessimistic lens of Romans 7:14-25. Perpetual war between the flesh and the Spirit is the defining description of their sanctification experience and critically, their perspective hasn't been qualified by the clear promise of Romans 8:2: "The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and death." Paul set up his argument for Christian freedom in Romans 7, where Romans 8:2 is the optimistic conclusion. The key to growth and spiritual victory is verse 6, where the "mind set on the spirit is life and peace." Based on what Paul just declared in verse 2, the mind set on the spirit is stronger and more powerful than the mind set on the flesh. Christian failure to appropriate victory is sometimes a casualty of bad theology where the pessimistic lens of Romans 7:14-25 is divorced from the optimistic conclusion of Romans 8:2. With respect to appreciation of the Law, a pessimistic adoption of Romans 7:14-25 as the final word understandably colors one's view of the Law. A holistic love for God's Law is one of the many benefits believers should experience when their sanctification expectations are informed by Romans 8.
How an Exclusive Romans 7 Theology Undermines Delight in God’s Law
This episode provides another possible reason why many Christians do not have a full appreciation of the Law, and this lack is made more salient because the psalmist in psalm 119 wasn't even born again. The psalmist was nevertheless beside himself with love and delight in God's law. So how is it that NT believers, who by definition are born again, have less delight with the Law of God than the unregenerate psalmist in Psalm 119? The episode first addresses the presumption of many that the psalmist was born again, showing that the Scripture indicates regeneration is a result of the resurrection (1 Peter 1:3) and the glorification of Christ (John 7:39) Believers consequently were NOT born again in the Old Testament. They nevertheless put their faith in God and even delighted with the Law of God, based on the influence of the Holy Spirit. So again, how is it that the unregenerate psalmist, who is INFLUENCED by the Spirit, delighted more with the Law than many REGENERATE Christians today? The episode contends that the sanctification expectations of "Romans 7" Christians stunt appreciation of God's Law. If Christians are at best divided souls, where the fleshly and spiritual principles are intractably at war, WITHOUT the expectation that the Spirit gains the upper hand, then the natural consequence is that these believers can never attain a holistic appreciation of God's Law. But this purely Romans 7 theology collapses in light of Romans 8:2, "For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and death." The episode closes by exhorting believers to embrace the substantial victory of the Spirit over the fleshly principle and as a bi-product holistically delight in God's Law.
Are You a True Believer or a Mercenary?
This episode addresses the purely "transactional" understanding of salvation by mercenary Christians. "Transactional" Christians are professing Christians who have made a calculated decision to "follow" Christ, not because His way is better, but because He's the only One who can satisfy their sin-debt. While elements of this perspective are also embraced by genuine believers, true Christians follow Christ because they actually see Christ's way as so much better. They reflect on their false ways by contrast, and repent. Like the Psalmist, they have two encounters with the Law of God: one challenging and convicting, the second delightful and instructive. Mercenary "believers" are likened to the wicked, lazy "servant" in the parable of the talents. That servant also had a transactional understanding of "accepting" Christ. He took care of his sin-debt problem by ostensibly trusting Christ and then went off and buried his talent in the ground. He never fell in love with Christ and never delighted with the Law of God in the inner man. The other 2 servants delighted in the gifts of the Master and invested those gifts to honor Him. A transactional, mercenary view of Christ and the salvation He offers is consequently not salvation at all, for the wicked lazy servants ends up in hell.
Are You a Worshiper of Christ or a Mercenary?
This episode bluntly calls into question the professed "salvation" of some believers, based on a transactional, even mercenary view of Christianity. This superficial acceptance of Christianity acknowledges that Christ paid our sin-debt in full so that we would not have to pay those wages in hell. So a logical response, based on self-preservation, is to "accept" Christ. Well this simplistic mercenary picture of Christianity, where one sides with Christ SINGULARLY to escape consequences, does not correspond to the whole gospel presented in Scripture. While the fear of hell, the ultimate consequence of breaking God's Law, motivates a surface "acceptance" of Christ, genuine repentance and faith in Christ is the response of those who renounce their way in favor of God's Way, Christ Himself. Fear of consequences isn't their only motivation, but a genuine disgust with themselves coupled with devotion to Christ. This is precisely the dynamic present in the Psalm 119 where the psalmist turns to the Lord in faith because he loves God and His Law, though he has in fact suffered severe consequences for breaking God's Law. True believers would follow Christ even if the ultimate destination of heaven or hell wasn't an issue.
The Law Expresses the “Beauty of Holiness”
This episode is a recap of the previous week's teaching on Psalm 119, emphasizing the common threads of God's work in establishing our way, ultimately leading to a genuinely positive delight in God's law. Since the law is a reflection of God's character and beauty, love of God coupled with disdain for God's Law is inconceivable. While true believers would never seek to justify themselves by keeping God's Law, they nevertheless delight in that Law based on being born again. Romans 7:22 affirms that they "delight with the Law of God in the inner man." The episode closes with Jonathan Edwards' phraseology describing believers' delight in God's holiness described in the Law. Christians alone can apprehend the "beauty of holiness."