Hi May,

Thank you for the recommendation of Boyd's sermon. In the sermon (which I listened to with interest), Dr. Boyd appears to me to relate the same basic arguments he sets forth in Repenting of Religion (which I have also studied with interest).

While I can in many ways understand his sentiments on this subject as stemming from the apparently quite negative legalistic experience he had in his Oneness Pentecostal background, in my judgment, he simply paints with too broad a brush, and in fact, is rather blatantly antinomian and quite ironically hypocritical and judgmental himself of those he classifies as "Pharisees." While claiming to be "non-judgmental," in fact does nothing EXCEPT judge those HE judges to be judgmental.

Quite ironically, to even offer a critique (judgment) of this sermon is to lay oneself open to the charge of being a "Pharisee." Nevertheless, in the interest of truth and candor, I offer my remarks here, however hesitantly.

While it is obviously true of any and all true legalists that they are not in fact saved, for righteousness comes not by works of the law but by the hearing of faith, according to Galatians 3, if the assertion made by Boyd is that anyone who stands for righteous living cannot be doing it for any other possible motive than to somehow seek to "get life" from their performance of religion, as Boyd says, then it how would it not be true as well that Boyd has in this rather absurdly condemned every last one of the APOSTLES of CHRIST, including CHRIST himself, who preached that people must "be perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect."

The Apostle Peter, who echoed the Old Testament command, "Be ye therefore HOLY, in all of your conduct," would, according to Boyd's thesis, by definition himself be guilty of the most egregious form of Phariseeism. The presumption in Boyd's argument is that no one CAN be holy in this life, and therefore anyone who calls others to holy living is by definition "a Pharisee".

The Apostle Paul would fall into precisely the same category of "legalism," according to Boyd's reductio ad absurdum, for it is well known that Paul said such things in his epistles as "Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? GOD FORBID!" and "If ye live according to the flesh, ye shall die, but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the lusts of the flesh, ye shall live."

The foremost reason I stand against the abominable practice of men having sex with men and women having sex with women is simply because the scriptures themselves do so. I don't "get life," as you seem to think, from simply proclaiming God's own word about sin.

Finally, Boyd errs if he thinks there is any scriptural distinction between love and holiness. To be sure, many, many religious groups have confused things on this issue, but the fact remains that true scriptural holiness is nothing more and nothing less than being perfected in LOVE. It seems to me that it is on precisely this point that his "love, not judgment" theme falls completely flat. As if to judge precludes a motive of love. Isn't God LOVE? And doesn't scripture reveal that God is "the JUDGE all the earth?" How does the "love, not judgment" philosophy apply to GOD, one has to wonder?

True scriptural holiness of heart and life is definitely NOT legalistic in nature, and simply cannot be, or else what we have is NOT true scriptural holiness at all. scriptural holiness is nothing EXCEPT godly love, which does not wither under the pressure of a sin-loving world and professing church.

1 John 3:3 And everyone who has this hope {fixed} on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure. 4 ¶ Everyone who practices sin also practices lawlessness; and sin is lawlessness. 5 You know that He appeared in order to take away sins; and in Him there is no sin. 6 No one who abides in Him sins; no one who sins has seen Him or knows Him. 7 Little children, make sure no one deceives you; the one who practices righteousness is righteous, just as He is righteous; 8 the one who practices sin is of the devil; for the devil has sinned from the beginning. The Son of God appeared for this purpose, to destroy the works of the devil. 9 No one who is born of God practices sin, because His seed abides in him; and he cannot sin, because he is born of God. 10 By this the children of God and the children of the devil are obvious: anyone who does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor the one who does not love his brother.

The Apostle John was apparently a total legalist, according to the "love, not judgment" crowd--doesn't he know that nobody can ever help but sin basically all the time? The nerve of that Apostle John, to say that "he that sins is of the devil," and that "he that is begotten of God does not sin." What a totally blinded Pharisee the Apostle John must've been.

Post Edited (JEE) : 1/12/2005 5:26:19 PM (GMT-6)