Legalism

The ancient church father Tertullian is reputed to have said, “Just as Jesus was crucified between two thieves, so the gospel is ever crucified between these two errors.” What are these errors to which Tertullian was referring? I often call them religion and irreligion; the theological terms are legalism and antinomianism. Another way to describe them could be moralism and relativism (or pragmatism).

These two errors constantly seek to corrupt the message and steal away from us the power of the gospel. Legalism says that we have to live a holy, good life in order to be saved. Antinomianism says that because we are saved, we don’t have to live a holy, good life.

This is the location of the “tip of the spear” of the gospel. A very clear and sharp distinction between legalism, antinomianism, and the gospel is often crucial for the life-changing power of the Holy Spirit to work. If our gospel message even slightly resembles “you must believe and live right to be saved” or “God loves and accepts everyone just as they are,” we will find our communication is not doing the identity-changing, heart-shaping transformative work described in the next part of this book. If we just preach general doctrine and ethics from Scripture, we are not preaching the gospel. The gospel is the good news that God has accomplished our salvation for us through Christ in order to bring us into a right relationship with him and eventually to destroy all the results of sin in the world.

“Moralism/legalism” stresses truth without grace, for it claims we must obey the truth to be saved. On the other hand, “relativism/irreligion/liberalism” stresses grace without truth, for it claims we are all accepted by God (if there is a God), and we each have to decide what is true for us. We must never forget that Jesus was full of grace and truth (John 1:14)

Timothy J. Keller, Center Church: Doing Balanced, Gospel-centered Ministry in Your City (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2012).

The impact of William Branham's legalism

The legalistic teachings of William Branham have a decidedly negative impact on believer’s spiritual development. So while there are those in the message that have experienced Christ’s redemptive work, they are weighed down by a theology that is inconsistent with Paul’s teachings regarding the grace of Christ. Paul states that such beliefs can alienate a person from the grace of God – “Those of you who try to be put right with God by obeying the Law have cut yourselves off from Christ. You are outside God’s grace.” (Gal 5:4 GNT)

A man named Simon thought that he could buy the Holy Spirit with money. It appears that some message believers are trying to buy the Holy Spirit by public demonstrations of their own righteousness.

But if the ministry that produced death—carved in letters on stone tablets—came with glory, so that the Israelites11 could not keep their eyes fixed on the face of Moses because of the glory of his face12 (a glory which was made ineffective), how much more glorious will the ministry of the Spirit be?

Paul clearly states that the ten commandments, written in tablets of stone, represented the ministry of death. Paul also was clear that Jesus did not redeem us from the curse of sin but from the curse of the law:

Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that ahangeth on a tree: That the blessing of Abraham bmight come on the Gentiles through Jesus Christ; that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.