The False Gospel of Legalism

Legalism is a pointless and self-defeating exercise in self-righteousness. On the outside, the ritual of following rules and regulations may give one, as Paul says in his letter to the believers in Colossae, the "appearance of wisdom in promoting self-made religion and asceticism and severity to the body" (Colossians 2:23), but it accomplishes nothing in the way of transforming the inner life of one whose mind is set on indulging the desires of the flesh. Outward appearances mean nothing when God peers into the inner depths of one's soul and finds only corruption and carnality. All the boasting about "asceticism and worship of angels, going on in detail about visions" is not the fruit of a life surrendered to Christ but, rather, the outward manifestation of the inward orientation of a person who is "puffed up without reason by his sensuous mind" (Colossians 2:18).

The superficial phonies who promoted this kind of self-centered legalism were a constant source of antagonism for Paul and a constant obstacle to the growth in grace of all those to whom he proclaimed the Gospel of Christ. There was nothing life-changing or transformational about the alternative (false) gospel they proclaimed. It was merely a rehash of dead Jewish legalism; a feeble attempt by the party of the Judaizers to impose upon the Gentiles the same rules and regulations which had proved so burdensome for the Jews. Paul insists that such human-centered tradition is not only unnecessary, but also obsolete because of Christ. To continue to observe such outward practices was to walk not according to Christ, but according to the flesh. By his death on the cross, Christ "cancel(led) the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands" and "disarmed the rulers and authorities," those demonic forces which seek to oppress us, "and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them in him" (Colossians 2:14-15).

Why, then, Paul asks,would anyone want to diminish the triumph of Christ by reverting back to the rituals and practices which were only "a shadow of the things to come" (Colossians 2:17)? Now that Christ, to whom belongs "the substance" to which all else was only a shadow, has appeared and triumphed over sin and death, the purpose of the law has been fulfilled. The life of the believer is not defined by outward appearances, but by the inward presence of Christ through the Holy Spirit, working to perfect the whole person in holiness; a holiness that cannot be achieved through outward ritual, but by the filling of one's whole being with him in whom "the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily" (Colossians 2:9).

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