THE LIVING WAY OR THE LEGAL WAY?
DeVern Fromke
I BELIEVE that we have reached a place in our conference where we do one of three things. We will either break out in rebellion and say 'No!', or we will break down in despair and say 'it is too difficult!', or we will break through into the life in the Spirit. You know, as you move around various companies of the Lord's people you find some who have learned the secret of a spiritual edge to their life, but even among so many who say they really love the Lord there is such a tendency to a spiritual sag, or let-down. I want to share with you this morning a principle which I believe will help us to live with a keen, sensitive edge to our spiritual life.
I will begin with a story about Billy. One morning, when Mother was leaving home, she turned to her son, Billy, and said: 'I have made some candy which you may cut when it is hard, but be sure to save twenty-four pieces for a party I am going to tonight.' At last the candy was ready to cut, and Billy cut some big pieces, but, after eating and eating, he counted and there were only twenty pieces left. He said: 'It is good that I cut such big pieces. If I cut them in half there will be forty pieces left, and I can still eat sixteen more!' After he had done all this there seemed so few on the plate, so he decided to spread them out a little. When Mother came home he could rest in the confidence that he had fulfilled the law -- there were twenty-four pieces. He kept looking at his mother all the afternoon, wondering if she would say something. That night, just as she was about to leave for the party with the candy, he came running up to her in tears, saying: 'Mother, my conscience doesn't bother me, but something else deep within tells me that I am so selfish!'
With this story as background, I want you to turn to 1 Corinthians 8. We want now to see how many Christians there are who are content to live in the place where their conscience cannot bother them, but they hardly move up into the place where they live with sensitivity to the Holy Spirit, so we will look at a problem in the church at Corinth. There were some younger believers who were saying: 'Oh, we could not eat meat that has been sacrificed to the idols in the temple!' They kept thinking of these idols as a reality, so their conscience, wrongly trained, bothered them. Then there were the other group who had more understanding, but they were very selfish. These older Christians were saying: 'We know that an idol is nothing in the world, and if we want to eat this meat we are at liberty to do so.' Thus we see a conflict between those who were more or less ignorant and those who were more or less selfish. Here this may be a problem that deals with the eating of meat sacrificed to idols, but the principle will fit into all the practices of the Church.
We must see that there are three levels, so to speak, where people can live. At the bottom there are those who want to break out all the time and they have to have the law, or something that forbids them. Then there are those who live in the middle plane, where they fulfil all that their conscience demands, saying: 'It is lawful.' Then there are those who push up to live in the 'expedient' level, and we shall see what that is.
How does Paul deal with this problem in Corinth? There are those who would like him to write a little book of laws, saying: 'Thou shalt not do this!' They are the ones who would fit into the bottom group; but Paul writes to these weaker believers who are ignorant, and to these others who are selfish, and let us see what he says in verse 1 of this chapter: "Now as touching things offered unto idols, we know that we all have knowledge. Knowledge puffeth up, but love buildeth up." Remember that we were saying last time that there is a knowledge that the mind can get hold of, and it is this knowledge that 'puffs up', but we are going to see now that there is a fuller, inward knowledge. These weaker believers had this outer knowledge. They knew some things about God but they were still very conscious of idols. These others who had been going on with the Lord longer had a fuller inward knowledge that an idol was nothing in the world. In verse 7 Paul says: "There is not in every man that inward knowledge: for some with conscience of the idol unto this hour eat as a thing offered unto the idol; and their conscience being weak is defiled." He sums up the conflict by saying: 'It is true that you have this fuller knowledge, and you have liberty to eat this meat', but I want you to notice what Paul says now. He seems to say: 'I do not live in the middle, "lawful" plane, taking my liberty. While I could have my liberty, I move up to a plane where I am His love-slave.'
You see, the way that Paul teaches them is not the legal way of imposing restrictions, but it is the living way of love. Can you not see how some of them who had an inward knowledge were even using this revelation for their own selfish interests? They would say: 'Oh, we have had a revelation. The idol is nothing in the world, so we can eat this meat.' The one who talks in this way is still the centre of his little world, making every good thing just serve himself. Paul sums up the situation in verse 13: "If meat make my brother to offend, I will eat no flesh while the world standeth, lest I make my brother to offend." People are always saying: 'Oh, this teaching gets people under bondage.' Well, there is the bondage of the rebellious mind, but there is the wonderful bondage of love.
Now we move to chapter 9 and see the very same principle in operation. These people could not understand the strange, poured-out life of the Apostle Paul, and in verse 3 Paul says: "Mine answer to them that do examine me is this:" Briefly he is saying: 'I have my rights as a servant of the Lord', and then he names three rights that he has. In verse 4 he says: 'I have the right to enjoy normal food like others.' In verse 5 he says: 'I have the right to have normal relationships, a family and children', and in verse 6 and onwards he is saying: 'I have the right to have normal remuneration as a servant of the Lord.' Now he is going to prove that these are his rights. In verse 8 he says: 'Do I not say these things as a man, or does not the law also say the same?' In verse 9: "For it is written in the law of Moses, Thou shalt not muzzle the mouth of the ox that treaded out the corn. Doth God take care for oxen?" Look at the oxen as they are treading out the grains on the threshing floor! They were not permitted to put a muzzle on the mouth of these oxen. Why? Because when they went around treading out, they could stoop down and eat some of the grain. And does God just give rights to the oxen, or does He also give rights to the servant of the Lord? And if other servants of the Lord partake of their rights, does not Paul also have that privilege?
But now Paul drops his bombshell. Listen to what he says in verse 12: 'If others be partakers of this right over you, do I not have this right also? Nevertheless, we have not used this right; but suffer all things lest we should hinder the gospel of Christ.'
You see, in chapter 9 Paul is saying: 'I do not live in this "lawful" plane, claiming my rights, but I have moved up to the "expedient" plane, where all I am concerned about is His rights in me.' He goes to great length here to prove that he has his rights. In verse 14 he says: "Even so hath the Lord ordained that they which preach the gospel should live of the gospel", and goes on in verse 15 to say: 'But I have not claimed any of my rights, neither am I hinting now that you should give me my rights.'
I think we must see that in the Old Testament there were two kinds of servants. There was the hired servant who had his rights and certain recourse when he was wronged, but there was also the bond-slave, who had no rights, no remuneration, and no recourse when he was wronged. The Hebrew people were never allowed to make bond-slaves of their own people, but they could go out and capture other nations and make bond-slaves of them. It is so wonderful how the Lord Jesus laid aside all His heavenly rights and came down to earth to become a bond-slave; and now Paul uses this very same Greek word in verse 19: "For though I be free from all men, yet have I made myself a bond-slave unto all."
Can you not see, in the midst of our fellowship with one another, how often folks say: 'I know my rights!'? And when people live in My liberty' or in 'My rights' on the 'lawful' plane the conscience cannot get at them. Look at a tree with its fruits, for a moment. The fruits on the tree are the things that I do. The conscience works in the higher plane to tell me that what I do is wrong, but it cannot get below the soil to the roots of the tree. It is the work of the Holy Spirit to show me, not so much what I do, but what I am. Paul says of the Corinthians that some of them had a weak conscience because they only lived by the outer mind but when the Holy Spirit comes to work alongside of my conscience with enlightenment, then I can have a good conscience working on the basis of the inner seeing, or the inner revelation. Oh, there are so many people today who are saying: 'My conscience does not bother me. I know my liberty and I know my rights.' They are the centre of their little world and they relate everything to themselves, but when we break through into the higher level, where God is our centre and everything is related to Him, then even the questions we begin to ask are different.
I remember one morning, after I had spoken along this line at a meeting, a young Bible College girl came to me. She asked 'Do you think it all right for me to go to such-and-such a place? Is it all right for me to do this, or that? Is it all right for me to wear this or that?' I did not say anything, but I just stood there and smiled. She looked up and said: 'Well, what is wrong with my questions?' I replied: 'Have I wasted the whole morning? Don't you see that the very questions you ask tell me the level on which you live? Can't you see how you are the centre and you are relating everything to yourself?' Tears ran down her cheeks and she walked away.
Now in chapter 10 we will see the reason for this. There is so much here, but we will begin with verse 23. Now please notice that when Paul says, "All things", he is talking about all this eating of meat, all 'my liberty and 'my rights'. All that is in the context here. There are some things that are definitely forbidden in the Scripture, but in this verse he is saying: 'This eating of meat, and my rights, are permissible, are lawful for me, but they are not expedient. All these things are lawful, but they do not build up my spiritual life. Let no man seek his own, but every man another's welfare.' And so he would say: 'I do not live in my liberty, for my rights, or just for my gain, but I am primarily concerned with His gain in me.' Verse 31 shows us how he relates everything to God: "Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God", and in verse 33 he says "Even as I please all men in all things, not seeking mine own profit (or gain), but the profit of many, that they may be served."
Oh, how my heart goes out to people when I see them so often settling down just to enjoy their liberty, their rights, and what they gain out of the Gospel. You see, if we are very legal we say: 'My conscience doesn't bother me', but this is a conscience that only works on the mind in the soul. I do believe that an enlightened conscience, sensitive to the Holy Spirit, will sense this gnawing within that something is wrong. On this higher level, then, the conscience is working on the law of the spirit of life, the inner law. There have been times when I have been in a church where there was a spiritual awakening, and people were really giving of themselves and I have anticipated that when I go back the next year they will have gone on with great fruitfulness unto the Lord, but when I got into the first meeting I sensed that the spiritual edge had gone, and they were wondering why the convicting power of the Holy Spirit was not in their midst. The constraining love of the Lord Jesus was not really gripping them. They had been content to settle down as the objects of God's blessing instead of being a channel of His blessing. Through the years I have learned that whenever the edge seems to have gone in my own life the Holy Spirit is pointing and saying: 'You have just settled down to the "lawful level.'
Is it not wonderful that no one ever demands that you must move up to the higher level? Paul says, and I think it is with real gladness, "I made myself a bond-slave." You see, it is when we have really seen something of the Lord that our whole being goes out to satisfy His heart. I think I have been like little Billy so many times -- just fulfilling the requirements and I could say: there are just twenty-four pieces. Mother said I was at liberty to eat, and I had my rights, so I enjoyed my gain.' But all the time I was talking with my lips there was something else speaking deep within. The Holy Spirit, who unveils the roots of the tree, is always saying: 'Give! Give!'
I hope that when we go back to our church, or the people with whom we have fellowship, this will become a living principle in us. The living way is the way of real joy. The legal way is the way of inward hurting all the time, because we know that we are not living unto the fullness that God expects.