God Without Religion_ Can It Really Be This Simple_ - Andrew Farley [60]
Being under the law of the Spirit of life means we’re not bound by the law of sin and death. When we sin, we don’t experience the deserved punishment from God. Sure, we experience earthly consequences because of our poor choices. But this is different from receiving the one great consequence from the hand of almighty God.
Death fell on Jesus instead.
“In and Out” Theology
Grace is a big buzzword these days, but we can’t bring ourselves to believe in this kind of grace. It can’t be true that we live in a permanently cleansed state with no strings attached! But here it is in black and white:
By one offering [Jesus] has perfected for all time those who are sanctified. (Heb. 10:14 NASB)
We find ourselves believing in some lesser punishment for sin. We think that when we sin, God gets angry with us. Perhaps we envision him in a swivel chair as he rotates his face away, just until we get our act together. Some refer to this as being “out of fellowship.”
The term “fellowship” appears a dozen times in the Bible. It describes our spiritual connection with God and other Christians. However, we often hear this term used as everyday religious jargon to describe our feelings of closeness to God at a given moment. We say we’re “in fellowship” (right with God) or “out of fellowship” (not right with God) based on our recent performance.
Fellowship is not talked about this way in the Bible. There’s not a single verse that talks about Christians going in and out of fellowship based on our recent performance. Instead, the term “fellowship” refers to regenerated saints who have fellowship with the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (1 Cor. 1:9; 2 Cor. 13:14; Phil. 2:1) and with each other (1 John 1:3, 7). Those who do not have fellowship are lost. They walk in darkness, even if they think they have fellowship (1 John 1:6).
We Christians are always in fellowship with God. Jesus was out of fellowship with the Father when he became sin on the cross. He did this so that we’d never be out of fellowship (Matt. 27:46; 2 Cor. 5:21; Heb. 13:5)! Our connection with God is certain and stable because of the “once for all.” Our fellowship is unshakable and unbreakable because of the one-time sacrifice of Jesus Christ that needs no repeat (1 John 1:3, 7; Heb. 7:25).
If we’re going to sin, then we sin while we’re in fellowship. We sin while we’re joined to Jesus Christ. We sin as we’re one spirit with his Spirit and seated right next to the Father (Rom. 6:5; Phil. 2:1; 1 Cor. 6:17; Eph. 2:6). We take Father, Son, and Holy Spirit along with us when we sin. Maybe that’s why it’s just not as fun as it used to be. Some people lie awake at night dreaming of new ways to sin. For some reason, we continually seek to escape sin’s clutches. Maybe it goes back to our new identity. New creations can afford to be totally forgiven.
New creations don’t really want to sin anyway.
When we commit sins, we experience consequences. There’s the reactions of others and our own lack of fulfillment. But Christ never leaves us. We are always in fellowship with him. Even when we are faithless, our God remains faithful (2 Tim. 2:13).
Watering Down the Wages
The false idea that we Christians somehow go “in and out” of fellowship with God involves a watering down of the wages of sin. Remember that the wages of sin is death (Rom. 6:23), not some lesser punishment. The wages of sin is not merely a bit of God’s anger expressed toward us for a day or a week. And the wages of sin is not God’s face being rotated away from us for a few short minutes or hours until we get our act together.
No, the wages of sin is death, nothing less.
Our God is not in a swivel chair, rotating his face away when we sin. Because of the cross, his face is always toward us (1 Pet. 3:12). Because Jesus was forsaken on the cross, God will never forsake us (Heb. 13:5). In the work of the Son, we see the plan of a Father who desired to be with us, in us, and for us every moment