Mike of Smiths Falls, Brethren of the Brethren, bowdlerizing Paul the
apostle, to everyone raised Plymouth Brethren.
You have no excuse, O man, every one of you
who judges. For in passing judgment on another you condemn yourself, because
you, the judge, practice the very same things. We know that the judgment of God
rightly falls on those who practice such things. Do you suppose, O
man—you who judge those who practice such things and yet do them yourself—that
you will escape the judgment of God? Or do you presume on the riches of
his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God's kindness is
meant to lead you to repentance? But because of your hard and impenitent
heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God's
righteous judgment will be revealed.
He will
render to each one according to his works: to those who by patience in
well-doing seek to know God, he will give eternal life; but for those who are
self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey empty acts of religious piety
and following of rules, there will be wrath and fury. There will be
tribulation and distress for every human being who acts badly, the Brethren
first and also the Pentecostal, but glory and honor and peace for everyone who accomplishes
good, the Brethren first and also the Pentecostal. For God shows no
partiality.
For all who
have sinned without knowing the Brethren teachings and lifestyle will also
perish without knowing the Brethren teachings and lifestyle, and all who have
sinned under the Brethren teachings and lifestyle will be judged by the Brethren
teachings and lifestyle. For it is not the hearers of the Brethren teachings and
lifestyle who are righteous before God, but the doers of the Brethren teachings
and lifestyle who will be justified. For when Pentecostals, who do not
have the Brethren teachings and lifestyle, by nature do what the Brethren
teachings and lifestyle requires, they are a Brethren teachings and lifestyle
to themselves, even though they do not have the Brethren teachings and
lifestyle. They show that the work of the Brethren teachings and lifestyle is
written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their
conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them on that day when, according to
my gospel, God judges the secrets of religious men by Christ Jesus.
But if you
call yourself a Brethren person and rely on the Brethren teachings and lifestyle
and boast in God and know his will and approve what is excellent, because
you are fully instructed in the Brethren teachings and lifestyle rules; and if
you are sure that you yourself are a guide to the blind, a light to those who
are in darkness, an instructor of the foolish, a teacher of children,
having in the Brethren teachings and lifestyle the embodiment of knowledge and
truth— you then who teach others, do you not teach yourself? While you
preach against sectarianism, do you form a sect? You who say that one
must not lie, do you tell lies? You who abhor division, do you divide? You
who boast in the Brethren teachings and lifestyle rules dishonor God by breaking the Brethren
teachings and lifestyle rules. For, as it is written, “The reputation of the Brethren is
impugned among the Pentecostals because of you.”
For no one
is a Brethren person who is merely one outwardly, nor is being in fellowship
outward and physical. But a Brethren person is one inwardly, and being in
fellowship is a matter of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the letter of
commendation. His praise is not from man but from God.
Then what advantage has the Brethren person? Or what is the
value of being in fellowship? Much in
every way. To begin with, the Brethren persons were entrusted with knowledge of
the bible, and sound doctrine. What if some
were unfaithful? Does their faithlessness nullify the faithfulness of God? By no means! Let God be true though every Brethren
person were a liar, as it is written,
That
you may be justified in your words,
and prevail when you are judged.
What then? Are we
Brethren persons any better off? No, not at all. For we have already charged
that all Christians, both Brethren persons and Pentecostals, are caught up in empty
shows of religious piety, as it is written:
None is right, no, not one;
no one understands;
no one seeks for God.
All have turned aside; together they
have become worthless;
no one does anything meaningful Sunday mornings,
not even one.
Their throat is an open grave;
they use their tongues to deceive.
The venom of asps is under their lips.
Their mouth is full of passive
aggressiveness.
Their feet are swift to excommunicate;
in their paths are ruin, misery and divided families,
the way of peace they have not
known.
There is no fear of God before their
eyes.
Now we know that
whatever the Brethren teachings and lifestyle rules say, they speak to those who
are under the Brethren teachings and lifestyle, so that every mouth may be
stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God. For by following
the Brethren teachings and lifestyle rules no human being will be justified in
his sight, since through the Brethren teachings and lifestyle rules come
knowledge of sin.
But now the
righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the Brethren teachings and
lifestyle, although the Brethren teachings and lifestyle and the Brethren of
old bear witness to it — the righteousness of
God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no
distinction: for all have fallen into empty religious observances and fall
short of God’s intention for proper Christian gathering, and are justified by
his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God
put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was
to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed
over former displays of empty religious piety. It was to show his righteousness
at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who
has faith in Jesus.
Then what becomes of our Brethren smugness? It is
excluded. By what kind of teaching and lifestyle? By a body of doctrine and a lifestyle
of sacrifice? No, but by a lifestyle of faith. For we
hold that one is justified by faith apart from following the Brethren teachings
and lifestyle. Or is God the God of Brethren persons only? Is he not the God of
Pentecostals also? Yes, of Pentecostals also, since God is one—who will justify
those in fellowship by faith, and those not in fellowship through faith. Do we
then overthrow the Brethren teachings and lifestyle by this faith? By no means!
On the contrary, we uphold the Brethren teachings and lifestyle.
What then shall we say was gained by John Nelson Darby,
our forefather according to the flesh? For if
Darby was justified by his doctrine, he has something to boast about, but not
before God. For what does the Scripture say?
“Darby believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness.” Now to the
one who works creating a body of doctrine, his wages are not counted as a gift
but as his due. And to the one who does not
work creating a body of doctrine but believes in him who justifies the ungodly,
his faith is counted as righteousness, just
as David also speaks of the blessing of the one to whom God counts
righteousness apart from works:
Blessed are those whose legalism is forgiven,
and whose shows of empty religious
piety are covered;
blessed is the man against whom the
Lord will not count his Phariseeism.
Is this blessing then only for those in fellowship, or
also for those not in fellowship? For we say that faith was counted to John
Nelson Darby as righteousness. How then was it counted to him? Was it before or
after he was in fellowship? It was not after, but before he was in fellowship. He
received the sign of being in fellowship as a seal of the righteousness that he
had by faith while he was still not in fellowship. The purpose was to make him
the father of all the gathered saints without being in fellowship, so that righteousness
would be counted to them as well, and to make him the father of those in
fellowship who are not merely in fellowship outwardly but who also walk in the
footsteps of the faith that our father Darby had before he was in fellowship.
For the promise to Darby and his offspring that he would
be the key founder of the Brethren movement did not come through the Brethren
teaching and lifestyle rules but through the righteousness of faith. For if it
is the adherents of the Brethren teaching and lifestyle rules who are to be the
heirs of what God gave John Nelson Darby, faith is null and the promise is
void. For the Brethren teaching and lifestyle rules bring wrath, for where
there are no Brethren teaching and lifestyle rules, there is no transgression.
That is why it depends on faith, in order that the promise
may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his offspring—not only to the
adherent of the Brethren teaching and lifestyle rules but also to the one who
shares the faith of Darby, who is the father of us all, as it is written, “I
have made you the father of many assemblies”—in the presence of the God in whom
he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things
that do not exist.
What then? Are we to put
ourselves back under sacrifices and mandatory shows of religious piety because
we are no longer under Brethren teaching and lifestyle rules, but under grace?
By no means! Do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as
obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of shows of religious
piety, which lead to death, or of faith, which leads to righteousness? But
thanks be to God, that you who were once actors slaving away in shows of religious
piety have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which
you were committed, and, having been set free from shows of religious piety,
have become slaves of righteousness. I am speaking in human terms, because of
your natural limitations. For just as you once devoted your lives as slaves to piety
competitions and mask-wearing Phariseeism, so now devote your lives as slaves
to inner righteousness leading to sanctification.
For when you were slaves of shows of religious piety, you
were free of righteousness. But exactly what kind of fruit were you getting at
that time, from the shows of religious piety, the things of which you are now
ashamed? For the end of those things is death. But now that you have been set
free from shows of religious piety and have become slaves of God, the fruit you
have now received leads to sanctification and its end, eternal life. For the wages earned
by making shows of religious piety is death, but the free gift of God is eternal
life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Or do you not
know, brothers and sisters—for I am speaking to those who know Brethren
teaching and lifestyle rules—that Brethren teaching and lifestyle rules are
binding on a person only as long as he lives? For a married woman is bound by
Brethren teaching and lifestyle rules to her husband while he lives, but if her
husband dies she is released from Brethren teaching and lifestyle rules
regarding marriage. Accordingly, she will be
called an adulteress if she lives with another man while her husband is alive.
But if her husband dies, she is free from those Brethren lifestyle rules, and
if she marries another man she is not an adulteress.
Likewise, my brothers, you also have died to Brethren
teaching and lifestyle rules through the body of Christ, so that you may belong
to another, to him who has been raised from the dead, in order that we may bear
fruit for God. For while we were trying to
govern our lives with willpower, sacrifices and rule-keeping, our smug piety,
aroused by Brethren teaching and lifestyle rules, was at work in our members to
bear fruit for death. But now we are released from Brethren teaching and
lifestyle rules, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve in
the new way of the Spirit and not in the old way of trying to use our willpower
to try to keep all the unwritten rules.
What then shall we say? That Brethren teaching and
lifestyle rules are nothing more than empty religious piety? By no means! Yet
if it had not been for Brethren teaching and lifestyle rules, I would not have
known about empty religious piety. For I would not have known what it is to be self-focused
if Brethren teaching had not said, “You shall not be self-focused.” But empty religious piety, seizing an opportunity
through the unwritten rules, produced in me all kinds of self-focus. For apart
from Brethren teaching and lifestyle rules, empty religious piety lies dead. Brethren teaching and lifestyle rules gave life to
it. I was once alive apart from
Brethren teaching and lifestyle rules, but when the unwritten rules came to me,
empty religious piety came alive and I died. The
very unwritten lifestyle rules that promised life proved to be death to me. For
empty religious piety, seizing an opportunity through the unwritten rules,
deceived me and through it killed me. But
Brethren teaching and lifestyle rules are holy, and the unwritten rules are
holy and righteous and good.
Did that which is good,
then, bring death to me? By no means! It was empty religious piety, producing
death in me through what is good, in order that empty religious piety might be
shown to be empty religious piety, and through the unwritten rules, might
become achingly empty, deathly pious and fruitlessly religious beyond measure. For
we know that Brethren teaching and lifestyle rules are spiritual, but I am trying
to keep them merely with my self-control, sold under empty religious piety. For I
do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but instead I do
the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with Brethren
teaching and lifestyle rules, that they are good. So now it is no longer I who
do it, but empty religious piety that dwells within me. For I know that nothing
good dwells in me, that is, in my willpower. For I have the desire to do what
is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want,
but the works of empty piety. What I do
not want is what I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no
longer I who do it, but empty
religious piety that dwells within me.
So I find it to be a law that when I decide that I want to
do right, empty religious piety lies close at hand. For I delight in knowing God,
in my inner being, but I see in my members another agenda waging war against knowing
God, making me captive to a code of empty religious piety that dwells in my
members. Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks
be to God through Jesus Christ our
Lord! So then, I myself want to know God, but with my self-control I serve
lifestyle rules of empty religious piety.
There is
therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the way of the Spirit of life has set you free
in Christ Jesus from the way of empty religious piety and death. For God has
done what the Brethren teaching and lifestyle rules, weakened by attempts to
keep them using self-control, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness
of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned empty religious piety in the flesh, in
order that the righteous requirement of the Brethren teaching and lifestyle
rules might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to our self-control but
according to the Spirit. For those who live according to empty religious observance
set their minds on the things of empty religious observance, but those who live
according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. For to set the mind on empty religious observance is
death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. For the mind that
is set on empty religious observance is hostile to God, for it does not submit
to God's law; indeed, it cannot. Those who are under empty religious observance
and self-control cannot please God.
You, however, are not living by self-control but in the
Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the
Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. But if Christ is in you, although there
is no life with God through empty religious piety, the Spirit is life because
of righteousness. If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in
you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your daily
lives through his Spirit who dwells in you.
So then, brothers we are debtors, not to Brethren teaching
and lifestyle rules, to live according to self-control. For if you live according
to your willpower you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the religious
deeds of your best intentions, you will live. For all who are led by the Spirit
of God are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall
back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom
we cry, “Dad!” The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are
children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with
Christ.
