Truth Magazine

By Mike Willis

From time to time one reads that a person who does not obey the letter of God’s law is nevertheless acceptable in God’s sight because he has the “spirit of obedience.” In periodicals which I have read, application of this has been made to those pious unimmersed who are honestly and sincerely mistaken about water baptism but who have a sincere and honest desire to please God. These articles state that such men who have not complied with the letter of the law but have complied with the spirit of the law are acceptable in God’s sight. Other periodicals which are not so consistent in the application of the premise stop short of application to water baptism but relate it to those issues which have divided brethren. They assure us that many of those who participate in churches which support human institutions (missionary societies, benevolent societies, hospitals, old folks homes, etc.), practice the sponsoring church form of ecclesiastical organization, engage in church sponsored recreation, and other unauthorized items are sincere and honest (which I do not deny). Hence, they comply with the spirit of the law in spite of violating its letter. Since they manifest the “spirit of obedience,” they are acceptable in God’s sight in spite of their failures to comply with the letter of the law.

In such teaching, the “spirit of obedience” somehow supplies the deficiency of failure to comply with the letter of the law. The “spirit of obedience” is not the same as obedience. We need to ask whether God will accept the “spirit of obedience” in place of obedience. As a means of studying this question, let us examine 1 Samuel 15, the record of King Saul’s mission to destroy the Amalekites.

The Historical Record

In 1 Samuel 15, God is recorded to have sent King Saul on a divine mission of Judgment against the Amalekite people. He commanded, “Now go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass” (15:3). The command must be understood in the context of God’s moral government of the universe. The Amalekites had apparently degenerated beyond any hope of redemption (they are described as “sinners” in 15:18 and the conduct of King Agag is described in such a way as to imply wickedness in 15:33). The principle of God’s moral government is this: “Righteousness exalteth a nation: but sin is a reproach to any people” (Prov. 14:34; cf. Prov. 16:12; 21:31; 29:2,4,14; Jer. 18:7-10)(1) Specific reason also given for this judgment was the assault of the Amalekites upon Israel when she was just leaving Egyptian bondage (15:2; cf. Exod. 17:8-16). Hence, King Saul was sent to administer God’s judgment against this wicked nation.

Saul went to obey the Lord’s command. He attacked the Amalekites, smiting them from Havilah to Shur (15:8). He slew all of the Amalekites, except King Agag. He killed all of the cattle except the very best which was brought back to Israel for the purpose of offering sacrifice (15:9).(2) Then he returned from his mission, convinced that he had obeyed the Lord’s command (15:13). Indeed, he had obeyed the “spirit” of God’s commandment, even if he had not obeyed the “letter.”

The Lord spoke to Samuel, telling him of Saul’s disobedience. He said, “It repenteth me that I have set up Saul to be king: for he is turned back from following me, and hath not performed my commandments” (15:11). God sent Samuel to rebuke Saul.

When the judge and the king met each other, Saul said, “Blessed be thou of the Lord: I have performed the commandments of the Lord” (15:13). Samuel retorted, “What meaneth then this bleating of the sheep in mine ears, and the lowing of the oxen which I hear?” (15:14). The facts demonstrated that Saul had not obeyed the Lord’s commandment.

In his defense, Saul justified himself on two bases. (1) The people had pressured him to bring back the very best cattle for sacrifice to God (15:15,21,24). (2) The cattle were to be used for the purpose of sacrifice (15:15,21). Saul seemed fully persuaded that he had obeyed the Lord’s commandment (15:13,15,20-21).

Here is proof that a man may be blinded by his own self-will, and that he may imagine that his own way is right, while it is leading him to the gate of death (Prov. xiv. 12; xvi.25). It is not enough for a man to be approved by his own conscience; but is necessary to regulate the conscience by God’s Will and Word (Acts xxvi.9; 1 Tim. 1:13) (quotation of Wordsworth reproduced in Lange’s Commentary on I Samuel, p. 213).

And so he had in the half-way in which men generally keep God’s commandments, doing that part which is agreeable to themselves, and leaving that part undone which gives them neither pleasure nor profit . . . . Saul’s justification of himself is remarkable, as he seems entirely unconscious of having done anything wrong (E. Payne Smith, Pulpit Commentary, IV, p. 266).

Samuel replied to Saul’s defense saying, “Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord?.Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams. For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbomness is as iniquity and idolatry. Because thou has rejected the word of the Lord, he hath also rejected thee from being King” (15:22-23).

Upon hearing that he had been rejected as King, he said, “I have sinned: for I have transgressed the commandment of the Lord, and thy words: because I feared the people, and obeyed their voice” (15:24). Nevertheless, his “repentance” seemed more intended to keep the kingdom than to be reconciled with the Lord (cf. 15:30). The Lord did not change His mind about taking the kingdom from Saul and giving it to another man.

Lessons From The Narrative

1. The spirit of obedience is not accepted in the place of obedience. Saul’s intentions in bringing back the best of the cattle were the highest – to offer them in sacrifice to God. There does not appear to have been any selfish motive in his disobedience. Hence, one could surely argue that Saul manifested the “spirit of obedience.”

The probability is that he was conscious of uneasiness, but had no true conception of the enormity of his sin. His feeling was that he had no wish to disown the authority of God, that it was a mere matter of detail, that his general conduct was exemplary, and that he followed the inner light which seemed just then to indicate another way of ultimately and substantially carrying out the command. So do men tone down their sins and regard them as venial (C. Chapman, Pulpit Commentary, Vol. IV, p. 274).

Samuel charged him with disobedience (15:22). The modern religious concept that the letter of the law is unimportant so long as one manifests the “spirit of obedience” stands in stark contrast with the words of Samuel. For Saul had indeed obeyed the “spirit of the law”; he had destroyed the Amalekites. Yet he had violated the letter of the law in bringing back King Agag and the best of the cattle alive. Despite his good intentions – his desire to offer the best of the cattle in sacrifice to God, his act was wrong. The end did not justify his means.

2. Disobedience frequently springs from having too exalted opinion of oneself. Samuel called Saul’s sin rebellion and stubbornness, comparing it to witchcraft and idolatry. In what Saul had done, he had manifested sinful human pride. While returning from his conquest, he set up a monument to himself at Mt. Carmel (15:12). When Samuel rebuked him, he said, “When thou wast little in thine own sight . . .” (15:17). This was in contrast with his present estimation of his importance.

Most human disobedience springs from having too exalted opinion of oneself.

Opposition to God is compared by Samuel to soothsaying and oracles, because idolatry was manifested in both of them. All conscious disobedience is actually idolatry, because it makes self-will, the human 1, into a god (Keil and Delitzsch, Commentaries on the Old Testament, p. 157). It makes man a worshiper of himself rather than of God (C. Chapman, Pulpit Commentary, Vol. IV, p. 274).

Men elevate their own personal thoughts higher than God’s spoken revelation. We have seen the same thing duplicated in our day in the Lord’s church with such things as involving the church in recreational activities as a means to reaching greater numbers with the gospel. Human pride is evident in subtle form when man thinks that he can devise a better way to win the world to Christ than the great God of heaven has revealed. Like Saul, many who comply with the “spirit of obedience” (they bring the masses into captivity to Christ) have not obeyed the letter of the law and for the same reason, they have too exalted an idea of their own human ideas, projects, and plans.

3. Men are reluctant to accept personal responsibility for sins. Saul blamed the people for his sin (15:15,20-21). Yet, Saul was the king, not the people. This was but a device of Saul’s defense mechanisms to avoid acceptance of his own personal responsibility for his sinful conduct. The same ploy was followed by Adam in the Garden of Eden when he blamed Eve for his sin (Gen. 3:12). Each of us is ready to blame someone else or the circumstances for our own sinful conduct. Human nature has not changed.

4. Men sometimes deceive themselves into thinking that they have done God’s will when they have only done the desires of their own hearts. Saul’s case reminds us that “all the ways of a man are clean in his own eyes” (16:2) and that “there is a way that seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death” (16:15). This seems to be forgotten or not believed by some who think that so long as a Christian (why limit it just to Christians?) is good, honest, and sincere that he is acceptable in the sight of God.

Conclusion

The gospel which is being preached by some is a watered down substitute for the real thing. Instead of preaching that obedience is necessary for salvation (Heb. 5:8-9), some preach that the “spirit of obedience” will suffice.

There is a gospel which is often preached in our day that divests God wholly of the rigid, judicial character; it clothes Him with no attributes but those of kindness and love; it presents Him in a countenance ever smiling, never stern. It maintains that the great work of Christ in the world was to reveal this paternal aspect of God’s character, to convince men of His fatherly feelings towards them, and to divest their minds of all those conceptions of indignation and wrath with which our minds are apt to clothe Him, and which the theologies of men are so ready to foster. But this is a gospel that says, Peace! peace! when there is no peace. The Gospel of Jesus Christ does indeed reveal, and reveal beautifully, the paternal character of God; but it reveals at the same time that judicial character which insists on the execution of His law. That God will execute wrath on the impenitent and unbelieving is just as much a feature of the Gospel as that He will bestow all the blessings of salvation and eternal life on them that believe (W.G. Blaikie, The Expositor’s Bible: The First Book of Samuel, p. 242).

I am convinced that much which is approved and defended under the “spirit of obedience” is nothing other than rebellion and disobedience of the same nature as Saul’s.

Endnotes

1. Some of this conclusion is based on inference, not specific statement. My process of reasoning is this. One can learn God’s method of dealing with the nations from such studies as the flood (Gen. 6-8), His action toward Sodom and Gomorrah (Gen. 19), His dealings with the nations in Canaan during the Israelite conquest (Gen. 15:16; Lev. 18:24-25; 20:21,-27), His conduct with Israel throughout the Old Testament, and passages in the prophets. Once one has learned the principle of God’s conduct, it applies in every case, whether specifically mentioned or not (unless some exception is mentioned). A comparison which might illustrate this is the purpose of water baptism. We learn the design of water baptism from such passages as Mark 16:15-16; Acts 2:38; 22:16; 1 Peter 3:21; etc. We deduce that the purpose of water baptism was the same in every case, even though that purpose might not be specifically stated in the text, unless some specific reason for concluding otherwise is mentioned (such as in the case of the baptism of Jesus in Matt. 3).

2. The conduct of the Israelites stands in stark contrast to the general practice of plundering by invading forces. None of the booty was taken for selfish purposes based on greed or avarice. Saul and his army conducted themselves as an army under a divine mission.

Guardian of Truth XXVIII: 7, pp. 194, 212-213
April 5, 1984

By Luther Bolenbarker

Two people were discussing the affairs of state. One man was quite concerned and said to the other, “You know there are two serious problems in our world today: ignorance and indifference!” The other man replied, “I didn’t know that but I don’t really care.” That says something to us doesn’t it?

These two problems are not new or just a problem of our times, but rather, they have plagued the religious world for centuries. Hosea cried out for God, “My people are destroyed for a lack of knowledge” (Hosea 4:6). God said in Hosea 6:6, “1 desire … the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.”

Ignorance is devastating in any endeavored area of venture. Who would want a school teacher instructing our children who had very little knowledge of the “3 R’s”? Who would want a doctor to treat them who knew very little about medicine? Paul wrote about people who had a “zeal for God, but not according to knowledge” (Rom. 10: 1-3).

The attitude of indifference caused Jesus to say to the Laodicean church, “I know your works: you are neither cold nor hot” (Rev. 3:15). Jeremiah wanted Israel to work with vigor so he wrote, “Cursed is he who does the work of the Lord negligently … (with indifference, LB)” (Jer. 48:10).

Ignorance and indifference are still problems in the religious realm (secular, too) today. Therefore, one reason among many (besides a commandment of the Lord) for our attending Bible classes, worship services, gospel meetings, singings or special classes etc., is for us to overcome these two malfunctions that are a blight in the life of the Christian and upon the image of the church. If you will not be indifferent, you will do all you can to seek knowledge.

Guardian of Truth XXVIII: 6, p. 184
March 15, 1984

By Don Willis

Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: But made himself of no reputation, and took on him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name: That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; And that every tongue should confess that Jesus is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Phil. 2:5-11)

Jesus became man in order to die for our sins. He was equal with God in the very form of God. But Jesus emptied Himself of this nature to take upon Himself human nature in order to die for our sins. His blood is adequate for all time to cleanse man from sin. There need be no additional blood sacrifice No one can be Saved without the blood of Jesus Christ.

When Jesus had made the atonement for sin by the sacrifice of Himself, He did not cease being or functioning. The great affirmation of Hebrews is that Jesus is now our High Priest. His Priesthood is not after the order of Levi, nor of the family of Aaron. His Priesthood is after the order of Melchizedec; i.e., King and Priest at the same time. The Hebrew writer says that Christ’s Priesthood is an unchangeable priesthood. The assurance man needs is in His continuance as High Priest.

Qualifications Of A Priest

(1) A Priest must have compassion on the ignorant. (2) Merciful. (3) Faithful in things pertaining to God. (4) Able to succor (help) those that are tempted. (5) Touched (sympathetic) with the feeling of human weakness (6) Grace to help in time of need (Heb. 5:1-2; 2:17-18; 4:14-16). Jesus is such an High Priest!

Man has an unchangeable need. All sin (Rom. 3:23; 1 Jn. 1:8,10). The wages of sin is death (Rom. 6:23). Every transgression (sin of commission) and disobedience (sin of omission) receive a just recompense of reward (Heb. 2:2). Sin is real! Sin is damning! The High Priest did not and does not simply overlook sin; atonement sacrifices had to be made, both for willful and ignorant sins. Therefore. Christ is anxious to forgive sin today … but on the terms established within the law.

Christ has an unchangeable sacrifice. Christ … needeth not daffy, as those high priests, to offer up sacrifice, first for his own sins, and then for the people’s: for this he did once, when he offered up Himself” (Heb. 7:27). ” . . .We are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all” (Heb. 10:10). The Catholic concept of the Massrequires the continued offering of Jesus’ blood at the time the Mass is said. This denies the efficacy of the one sacrifice of Jesus, and denies the clear statement of Divine Revelation!

We now have an unchangeable law. God, at sundry times and in different manners had spoken in time past to the fathers (patriarch and Jewish) by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son (Heb. 1: 1-2). The old law had to cease before the new law could be given. Most admit the Priesthood of Jesus. “For the priesthood being changed, there is made of necessity a change also of the law” (Heb. 7:12). The law ordained Priests from the tribe of Levi; and the High Priests from the family of Aaron. Jesus was of the line of Judah; therefore, under the law of Moses, He could not have been High Priest. Admit the High Priesthood of Jesus, and one admits the necessity of a change of the law of Moses! Jesus “. . . hath obtained a more excellent ministry, by how much also he is the mediator of a better covenant, which was established upon better promises” (Heb. 8:6). It is this covenant that will face one in the day of judgment (Jn. 12:48).

Jesus fives to make unchangeable intercession for the sins of lost mankind. Praise God’s glorious name! God realizes the continuing battle between flesh and spirit, and human weakness (Mt. 26:41). God did not leave one to be lost in sins. Jesus “. . . ever liveth to make intercession for them” (Heb. 7:25). He is our Mediator (I Tim. 2:5). “If God be for us, who can be against us?” (Rom. 8:3 1). Remember, God is for you, God is not against you, he does not desire to see one ofHis own lost! Often we see only the vengeance of God. And He is vengeful against evill But God is love, and He loves His children, and I am His child. He desires to save me, He is on my sidel One of those Priestly qualifications was that He was faithful in things pertaining to God (Heb. 2:17). 1 am sorry to say that some deny this nature of the Priesthood. God’s faithfulness requires preachers to tell sinners that the wage of sin is death (Rom. 6:23). Some would loose where God has not loosed. Sin is real. Still, God is anxious to forgive. “If we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin” (1 Jn. 1:7). No one can perfectly walk in the light; therefore, one understands the area of human weakness. If one could perfectly walk in the light, he would not need an unchangeable intercession. The blood of Jesus cleanses, and keeps on cleansing the person who is walking in the light! Because our High Priest is faithful in things pertaining to God, He cleanses upon Divine terms, and not upon human terms! In the very context of I John, “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we, confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (vv. 8-9). Peter told a born again being who had strayed back into sin, “Repent therefore of this thy wickedness, and pray God if perhaps the thought of thine heart may be forgiven thee” (Acts 8:22).

Since our High Priest is faithful, He does not cleanse apart from the obedience required. It bothers me greatly to hear of brethren who would sit in the seat of God and promise forgiveness to sinful beings without obedience to the gospel; or, to sinning Christians without doing what God’s mercy informs us. Preachers are commissioned to preach, “The wage of sin is death”; and, the continuing intercession of Jesus as a faithful High Priest in things pertaining to God!

Guardian of Truth XXVIII: 7, pp. 195, 214, 218
April 5, 1984

By J.W. McGarvey

Study Of Other Books

From this brief treatment of the study of the Scriptures, we pass to the study of other books, and fist to the study of Commentaries. This is really but another method of studying the Scriptures, yet it may properly receive separate treatment.

There is a well known prejudice against the use of Commentaries, but it is confined to a small and decreasing number of persons. The man who attempts to gain a knowledge of the Bible by his own unaided powers, while the aid furnished by a multitude of learned and devout predecessors is at hand, seems to declare himself the equal in exegetical power of all who have gone before him. In no other department of human study do we reject the aid of our fellow-student; why should we reject it in this?

Good Commentaries render us important service in many ways. First they serve as a guar against blunders. Among the most egregious blunders in the interpretation of Scripture are those committed by men of inferior learning or judgment who interpret the Scriptures without aid. The use of a judicious Commentary guards us against many blunders of this kind, and it corrects many a mistake into which we fall before the Commentary is consulted. In the second place, it is a ready source of information. Multitudes of facts and references throwing flood os light upon important passages have been collected by the research of commentators, and furnished to our hand, which would otherwise be beyond our reach, or, if we reach them at all, it would be after years of toil and the reading of thousands of pages. No man can afford to decline the use of these gathered treasures. True it would strengthen his powers to gather them for himself, but he may strengthen his powers much more rapidly by gathering up these, and then by the aid of these, going ut to search for others. The speculator who wishes to make millions but never rejects the few thousands already within his grasp, but he uses the thousands as the means of getting the millions. In the third place, the use of Commentaries awakens thought. Every one that is worth consulting presents the subject in some new phase; it presents something difference from and often inconsistent with our own previously formed conceptions; and it compels us to think again over the whole ground. Such recasting of thought on a subject is necessary to intelligent confidence in our final conclusions. In the last place, Commentaries, with all the errors which may be properly charged against them, do in the main give us the right interpretation of obscure passages, and the right application of those which are not obscure. If we follow them implicitly we are but seldom led astray, and if we find in them only a confirmation of our own conclusions this gives us strength and gratification.

While I insist, however, upon the value of Commentaries, I would also insist upon a judicious use of them. When about to study a passage of Scriptures, never consult the Commentary fist. If you do you are likely to accept the author’s views, whether right or wrong, and you mind will be biased in the subsequent study of the text itself. First study the text until its words and sentences are distinctly apprehended; until all that is clear in it is understood; until its difficulties are discovered; and until your own mind has grappled with these difficulties more or less successfully. You are then prepared to consult the Commentary. As you read it you know of what it treats; you can judge of the correctness of its statements; you can see where it touches the difficulties; and you can accept or reject the explanations which it gives with an intelligent judgment.

I would suggest as another precaution in regard to Commentaries, that the young preacher take pains, as soon as practicable, to procure two or more on every portion of Scripture which he studies, lest he become a blind follower of a single guide, who, in some places, is almost certain to be a blind guide. In making selections, always choose from the more recent rather than from the older works. In all departments of literature immense advances are being made on the knowledge and methods of former times, and in no department are they more rapid than in the interpretation and illustration of the Bible.

The best commentaries in English on the whole Bible are Lange’s, and the Bible Commentary, sometimes called the Speaker’s Commentary, because the preparation of it was first proposed by the Speaker of the House of Commons. Commentaries on the New Testament, and on special portions of it, are very numerous, and many of them are excellent; but Ellicott’s works contain the finest specimens of grammatical exegesis, and Lightfoot’s the finest in the way of profound historical research.

There are some other Biblical works, the study of which is scarcely less important than that of Commentaries. Of these I will mention a few, and foremost among them all, Smith’s Bible Dictionary. This great work might be regarded as a commentary on the whole Bible arranged in the order of subjects and not in that of books, chapters, and verses. It contains the cream of all the knowledge possessed by the most cultivated minds in Great Britain, on all Bible themes, including all places and persons mentioned therein. Only in the geography of Palestine, I believe, have more recent investigations superseded it in important particulars.

Next to this in value I would place the Life and Epistles of Paul, by Conybeare and Howson. It is scarcely saying too much of this work to assert that to the man who has not studied it, it offers a new revelation on Acts of Apostles and the Epistles of Paul. As a companion to the Old Testament, Rawlinson’s History of the Seven Ancient Monarchies is of almost equal value. It supersedes all other ancient histories, and makes full use of the historical materials derived from the disinterred libraries of the ancient world. There has recently appeared in English a series of works covering in part the same ground with the Life and Epistles df Paul just mentioned, but reaching backward and forward of it in point of time, with which every preacher should become familiar. The Life of Jesus, by Strauss, followed by Bauer’s Life of Paul, and the Apostles, of Ernest Renan, opened a new era in infidel literature, one in which a large number of eminent men have undertaken the entire reconstruction of New Testament history, with all that is miraculous left out. These efforts have called forth two works in France, now found in an English dress, and three in Great Britain, which are among the best of all modern contributions to Biblical literature. They are Pressense’s Life of Jesus, and his Early Years of Christianity; and Canon Farrar’s Life of Jesus, His Life and Epistles of Paul and his Early Days of Christianity. These works, without taking the form of direct replies to the works of Strauss, Bauer, and Renan, are written from the new point of view suggested by those works, and they contain a complete vindication of the historical truthfulness of the New Testament. I sincerely regret, in regard to the profound and eloquent works of Canon Farrar, that I am constrained to modify my commendation of them by cautioning the reader against his belief in a post mortem gospel, and his inadequate conceptions of inspiration.

Guardian of Truth XXVIII: 6, pp. 167-168
March 15, 1984