God Without Religion_ Can It Really Be This Simple_ - Andrew Farley [9]
Picking and choosing is not really the way the law works. It’s actually an all-or-nothing proposition:
All who rely on observing the law are under a curse, for it is written: “Cursed is everyone who does not continue to do everything written in the Book of the Law.” (Gal. 3:10)
For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it. (James 2:10)
Even if we keep the whole law and mess up in just one tiny way, we’re cursed for it! So this means we either acknowledge our failure, or we paint the illusion that we’re on our way to greatness.
The choice is ours.
Once we realize the hopelessness under the old way, we can engage in a border crossing. We can abandon religion and cross over to experience God without religion. And God shares a counterintuitive secret with us: if we jettison the old way of rules, sin actually loses its grip on us:
But sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, produced in me every kind of covetous desire. For apart from law, sin is dead. (Rom. 7:8)
Commandments give sin an opportunity. But apart from law, sin is dead. Apparently, being free from the law and being free from sin’s power go hand in hand. They’re practically one and the same.
But how do we cross the border and leave the old way of the law entirely behind? For that, we now go to live footage in the woods just outside of France.
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As the carriage comes to a halt, the Austrian ambassador announces they’ve arrived at the hand-over ceremony. Marie Antoinette exits the carriage with her dog held tightly to her chest and walks toward a well-decorated tent off the wooded path. There she’s met by a French countess who tells her it’s time to leave behind everything of her former life in Austria. The countess says she’ll be delivered to representatives of the French Court, and she is to embrace an entirely new life in France. Marie waves good-bye to the Austrian ambassador and ducks into the tent with the countess.
Once in the tent, the countess takes her dog away, asking an aide to return it to the Austrians. Marie is then stripped down. Her Austrian clothes are replaced with the finest in French fashion. “The bride must not keep anything from her prior court,” the countess says.
At that very moment, Marie is engaged to be married to the Dauphin of France, heir to the French throne. Marie is now French royalty, and there’s no place for former things in her life. Her upcoming marriage requires her to break free from all things Austria.
And there’s no returning.
Like Marie Antoinette, it’s through marriage that we make a clean break from the old way of religion. Prior to meeting Jesus, we were told that religion is a good thing and that we should do our best to abide by its rules. But now we’ve been married to Jesus Christ. Like Marie, we’ve become royalty (1 Pet. 2:9). This means our former affection for religion has no place in God’s kingdom:
Therefore, my brethren, you also were made to die to the Law through the body of Christ, so that you might be joined to another, to Him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit for God. (Rom. 7:4 NASB)
Imagine if Marie Antoinette had asked the French Court for permission to wear her old Austrian clothes alongside her new French fashions. Imagine if she’d asked to incorporate her Austrian practices alongside the new ways of France. You can bet the French would have frowned on that idea! Well, the apostle Paul did more than frown on the idea of mixing the old with the new. He actually resorted to name-calling. He said, “You foolish Galatians” (Gal. 3:1) to those who tried to mix the old way of the law with