Law vs. Grace

Cheryl Johnson

Hong Kong China

June 2008

The good works we do (in the flesh) do not make us righteous, beyond this however … they often make us self righteous and legalistic, leading us to alienate ourselves from God and His ways.

The Lord is bringing fresh revelation to this—mostly highlighting how we need to differentiate between the good works of the flesh and the good works of the Spirit—and I would like to share with you some of what He has shown me.

I’d like to pray now…

Holy Spirit come Lord and bring revelation, wisdom and understanding. We need you Holy Spirit and we honour your work in our lives to teach us the hidden things of God, to bring to light the truth. You are precious and dear to us Lord. You alone know the things of God and you alone bring revelation. Open our eyes Holy Spirit and help us to see, help us to understand. We bless you and thank you Lord. Amen.

Have you ever wondered why God forbade Adam and Eve to eat from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil? What was so wrong with it? Did God not want them to be knowledgeable? Yes, He wanted them to be knowledgeable but not after the flesh. The garden has another tree. The Tree of Life. The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, which represents the works of the flesh, leads to sin and death, the Tree of Life—the tree of the Spirit, leads us to Salvation and the Kingdom.

Both the knowledge of good and the knowledge of bad that leads to the works of our flesh, bring death and a curse (Gal 3:10). Now while we all know that the bad that our flesh does is sin, many of us do not realize that the ‘good’ that our flesh does is also sin … because it is living under the law, and it makes Christ’s sacrifice worth nothing to us. We substitute the fruit of the Spirit with the good works of the flesh and when we stick to this way of living, it turns us into legalists. It turns us into a people who set down rules and principles that we follow religiously for holy living, as opposed to living holy lives because Jesus empowers us by becoming one with our spirit and living through us. It’s the difference between religion and relationship and we must not mistake one for the other. Read Galatians 3, 4 and 5.

You see … every religion that exists, including the Christian religion, has its rules for good and bad living. Man in his sinful flesh nature knows good from bad. This flesh understanding however profits nothing.

Many of us, while we seek to get rid of the bad in us, tend to do almost nothing about the ‘good’ in us (even though we are to die to everything of the flesh) and then we begin to mistake this good of our flesh to be the fruit of the Spirit. We function in the good works of the flesh totally believing that it is of God and herein lies what I think is the greatest deception of Satan, who comes disguised as the angel of light. If it’s a good idea that will work by world standards, then we decide that it is a ‘God’ idea. If it’s a positive thing, we believe it is automatically God-birthed. If it is love, kindness, goodness, generosity, self control, charity, etc., we automatically believe it is of God, yet there is a flesh version of all these things I mentioned above. You see this a lot … it isn’t only the Christians who do good things in this world, is it? For every fruit of the Spirit there is a version of fruit that is entirely of the flesh. Haven’t you ever wondered why so many non-believers are just as good people as many believers? Sometimes you can hardly tell the difference. You know why? Because often there is no difference.

You don’t have to be a Christian to live and experience a value-based life, all you need to do is follow the rules and values that many unbelievers, and people of other religions follow as well. Is it possible that we’re worshipping the same idol that they are worshipping—the works of the flesh? Is it possible then that together with them many of us are also at risk with our salvation? No? … Why? Because we said the sinner’s prayer?

The Bible says that there are those who will say, ‘Lord Lord,’ and Jesus will say to them… ‘I do not know you.’ Haven’t you ever wondered about that? How can Jesus say, ‘I do not know you,’ to someone who confesses Him as Lord? Yet the Bible clearly says that He will do this.

If you’ve never wondered about this you really should … and many already have, and there are books and teachings out there about this; read them if you like, and go ahead and read what I am sharing here too, but please … please ask God yourself. Only God saves and only God can guarantee your salvation, so rather than trust a doctrine, ask God for revelation by His Spirit. You are His sheep, you will hear His voice in whatever manner He chooses to reveal Himself to you. He will reach you in a way that you can be reached, but when He does answer, you will not doubt that you have heard the voice of God Himself, regardless of the method He chooses to reveal Himself. Why I ask you to do this is because if you ask God to bring revelation by His Spirit and don’t bother to read any other books except the Bible, you will get the truth…. Also if you ask God and then read books or ask someone who is mature in the Lord … then you’ll get confirmation of what He has already told you as well, and that is a very good thing and I highly recommend it … BUT if you don’t ask God and only turn to books or to a mentor, even if it is the truth … you’ll only have head knowledge and so you’ll know God but you won’t know God and the first ‘knowing’ is of the flesh and profits nothing … as the Bible says, it only puffs up (1 Cor 8:1). Friends, we’re all meant to have revelation understanding of God, which comes from an intimate relationship with the Father, through His Son Jesus and by the power of His Spirit. It’s only by revelation that we can really say in truth that we know God, because it is only when we have revelation that Jesus will say that He knows us (Gal 4:9)

The good works of our flesh is robbing us from functioning in the fruit of the Spirit. You know why? Because the space is filled with something of our flesh—that which is of the Spirit cannot fill it. Man’s wisdom replaces faith. In fact, faith appears as foolishness to man’s wisdom. Yet many of us know what the right or biblical thing to say is, and so do you know what many of us do? We say ‘faith’ with our mouths, but we practice man’s wisdom in our works. Whether we are doing this consciously or sub-consciously, it would be wise to deal with this before God, and to do it now rather than later.

So how can you tell if you are in good works of the flesh or in good works of the Spirit? Well, how hard is it for you to do the right thing? How hard is it for you to do a sacrificial thing? How hard is it for you to give up a certain sin in your life? How hard is it for you to love the unlovable, forgive the unforgivable, or have faith to step out of your comfort zone? Some of these things are actually quite impossible to do in the flesh, and so if you are in the good works of the flesh, you are either struggling very hard to do this, or you are really not doing it at all. By the Spirit however, even if it isn’t easy, you will find a supernatural strength helping you along, giving you victory that in the end makes you feel like it wasn’t really that difficult after all. You see Jesus, the living God, has the same commandments as the law but He brings with Himself an empowerment to obey, and it is supernatural. You will begin to love holiness, and obeying God will actually feel like freedom, rather than a restricted lifestyle. These are only some indicators I am sure … but learn to go to God everyday and learn to have a two-way conversation with Him and He will tell you if you are in the good works of the flesh rather than the fruit of the Spirit. I know because He told me, and He then enabled me to change, and I am eternally grateful.