(57) Worthless Legalism

But avoid . . . strife and disputes about the Law (Titus 3:9)

The Jewish Scribes and Pharisees were notorious for spending countless hours debating the law and adding their interpretations and man-made rules to the Law. They would then dictate these rules to the people and bind them to obedience to their rules that they added to God’s Law. Many of these rules surrounded the observance of the Sabbath and issues regarding what was clean and unclean. God gave Moses two sentences, the Scribes and Pharisees had a book. They continually debated what rules they should have. On and on it went, adding to God’s commands and demanding the obedience of the people to their rules in order to be considered godly.

Paul is referring to strife, quarrels, contention, and arguments over the Law and how to put it into practice in daily life. It is when we have come to an understanding of the words and meaning of the text of scripture, and then begin adding our personal understanding of the ways the commands are to be put into practice that get more specific than the text of scripture and are used to judge and condemn others who do differently.

Paul is refering to strife, disputes, and contention about God’s Word, not in what the Word says, but in all kinds of added, man-made rules and details that are not explicitly stated in scripture; areas of application and specific rules where scripture is more general. William McDonald gives and appropriate warning to us in this regard.

Of course, there are always traps to be avoided in the Christian ministry. In Paul’s day there were stupid disputes over clean and unclean foods, Sabbath regulations, and observance of holy days. Arguments arose over genealogies, both angelic and human. There was bickering over intricate regulations that had been superimposed on the law. Paul was disgusted with them as being unprofitable and useless.

Servants of the Lord in our day may take Paul’s advice to heart by avoiding the following tangents: Pre-occupation with methods rather than with spiritual realities. For example, the ancient debates over whether to use fermented wine or grape juice, leavened or unleavened bread, a common cup or individual cups—as if these were important questions in the Bible! Quibbling over words. Majoring on one truth, or even one aspect of a truth, to the exclusion of all else. Allegorizing the Scriptures until they become absurd. Theological nit-picking that edifies no one. Wandering from the word into political by-paths and into Christian crusades against this and that. What a tragedy to spend precious time on these things while a world is perishing!

Paul says in Colossians 2 that we think our man-made regulations and rules are wise but they have no power to control the flesh. It makes sense to us that when we see that God’s Word gives a command that we need to carefully assure we don’t violate the command in any way. And some go to extremes, almost in a paranoid fear that some minute practice could possibly violate that law. And so, a new command is issued to forbid that minute practice to assure that God’s command is not broken. It seems to make sense, and yes, we do need to personally assure for ourselves that we are putting God’s commands into practice, but it becomes dangerous and harmful when it leads to extremes and then is viewed as universal for all believers to follow.

Too often, believers establish personal, man-made rules and “standards” and seek to make other believers live by their rules. We get the mistaken notion that when we have discerned before God how He would have us specifically put His Word into practice, that we have to tell everyone else and insist they follow the same practices we do. And we harm and discourage others by putting our rules on others; rules that are not commanded in scripture.

This form of legalism becomes oppressive, and discouraging. We raise our rules to the same level of scripture and demand that others follow and live by our rules. We think we have a higher standard than others because we are more restrictive and in truth, it is simply a different standard that is not a biblical standard at all.

J. Hampton Keathley, III explains that this would also refer to “an exchange of words rather than a genuine search for truth.” Paul is not talking about discussion about what the Word of God says . . . what does this word mean?. . . what is the context of this passage? . . . what does this passage mean? These things are good and necessary. We need to discuss and debate what scripture says to understand it accurately. Our goal in discussing God’s Word should always be to discover truth, not just stir up an argument or prove our point which amounts to another form of worthless legalism.
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Next: (58) Responding to Worthless Chatter & Legalism -- Steer Clear of the Conversations