The Perversion of Grace

The current fundamental misunderstanding of the Kingdom of God, the poison that weakens the will of the Christian to resist sin, to overcome the devil, and that has led to so many other destructive teachings and practices, is the perversion of the Apostle Paul’s doctrine of grace.

The Divine grace in Christ has been grievously distorted and misapplied among us Gentiles. We do not understand that Paul was contrasting the works of the statutes and ordinances of Moses, such as circumcision, with the grace of God in Christ. Instead we are assuming Paul was contrasting godly behavior with the grace of God in Christ.

Grace As Currently Defined by Many Believers
Grace Is God’s Provision for Sin
Grace As Defined by the Scriptures
Conclusion'

Introduction

Therefore it is of faith, that it might be by grace; to the end the promise might be sure to all the seed; not to that only which is of the law, but to that also which is of the faith of Abraham; who is the father of us all, (Romans 4:16) The Apostle Paul, who often was contradicted by Jewish teachers who could not grasp the fact that God was doing something new among men, especially among the Gentiles, taught us concerning "grace."

The other writers of the New Testament emphasized godly behaviour rather than imputed (ascribed) righteousness. But to the Jew of Tarsus was given by the Spirit of God the understanding of the Divine grace that has been brought to the elect through Christ. The doctrine of salvation by grace through faith is emphasized in the Book of Romans, Chapters Three through Five.

It is difficult for a Gentile believer to appreciate how radical a change is experienced when a devout Jew passes from trust in the works of the covenant given through Moses to faith in the finished work of Jesus.

Grace and truth have come to God’s elect through Jesus Christ; not just truth, but grace and truth (John 1:17).

It is the writer’s point of view that the Divine grace in Christ has been grievously perverted and misapplied among us Gentiles.

Notice, in the following verses, that Paul was not comparing Divine grace with godly behaviour but Divine grace with the works of the Law of Moses.

Behold, thou art called a Jew, and restest in the law, and makest thy boast of God, (Romans 2:17)

Thou that makest thy boast of the law, through breaking the law dishonourest thou God? (Romans 2:23)

Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin. But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets; (Romans 3:20,21)

Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law. (Romans 3:28)

Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law. (Romans 3:31)

What shall we say then that Abraham our father, as pertaining to the flesh, hath found? (Romans 4:1)

For the promise, that he should be the heir of the world, was not to Abraham, or to his seed, through the law, but through the righteousness of faith. (Romans 4:13) (For until the law sin was in the world: but sin is not imputed when there is no law. (Romans 5:13)

Moreover the law entered, that the offence might abound. But where sin abounded, grace did much more abound: (Romans 5:20)

Know ye not, brethren, (for I speak to them that know the law,) how that the law hath dominion over a man as long as he liveth? (Romans 7:1)

Paul was referring to the Law of Moses, not to godly behaviour, when speaking of the superiority of grace.

It is impossible for Paul or anyone else to contrast godly behaviour with the grace of God in Christ because the grace of God in Christ always will produce godly behaviour if it is applied correctly.

Paul also pointed out the difficulty our flesh has concerning observing the Ten Commandments. But it never was Paul’s intention to leave the Christians with the impression they now are without law. Rather, the point is we are dead to the Law of Moses in order that we may be married to Christ.

We do not save ourselves by keeping the Law of Moses or any other religious or moral code. But when we are married to Christ and are living in and by Him we are free from the Law of Moses and now are able to keep the commandments given by Christ and His Apostles. As we keep the commandments found in the New Testament, Christ is formed in us.

As Christ is formed in us we keep the moral law of God by nature because of the Divine Life being created in us. If we do not obey Christ and His Apostles such that Christ is being formed in us we are not dwelling in the true grace of God. We are not "being saved."

It never was, is not, and never will be God’s intention that His grace in Christ be used as a means of encouraging sinful behaviour. The soul that sins shall die. It is only as we, through the grace of God in Christ, turn from our sins and serve God that we attain eternal life. But if, while we seek to be justified by Christ, we ourselves also are found sinners, is therefore Christ the minister of sin? God forbid. For if I build again the things which I destroyed, I make myself a transgressor. (Galatians 2:17,18)

The present-day perversion and heresy is that Christ came to forgive the sins of men so He may bring them to Paradise in their unchanged state. This is the concept held by the majority of Christians. It is not scriptural.

Christ came to save men by delivering them from the Kingdom of Satan and bringing them into the Kingdom of God. Christ destroys the works of Satan in men. Apart from the moral transformation of the individual there is no salvation. It is the moral transformation that is the salvation, the redemption from the hand of the enemy.

Jesus did not come primarily to forgive our sins and bring us to Heaven, although an initial forgiveness is necessary if we are to start on the path to full reconciliation to God. Rather, the Lord Jesus came to deliver us from our sins. Forgiveness and deliverance are different concepts.

Repentance and forgiveness remove the man from the cesspool.

Deliverance removes the cesspool from the man.

Salvation is not the bringing of men from earth to Heaven. Salvation is the bringing of men from Satan to God.

Salvation is not a change of location, it is a change of the individual. By viewing the Christian salvation as a change of location from earth to Heaven we are destroying the work of God in the earth. We are perverting the Divine plan of redemption.

God placed man in the midst of Paradise on the earth. It is God’s intention to redeem fallen man, to restore man, now transformed through Christ, to Paradise on the earth.

Man has invented a plan whereby he receives Christ, has his sins forgiven, and then goes to Paradise in the spirit realm. The motive behind the invention is to be able to avoid the painful transition from the bondages of lust and self-will to actual righteousness, holiness, and obedience to God. By inventing a gospel of forgiveness that brings us to Heaven we have managed to avoid a radical change in our personality—a radical change that is necessary if we are to be able to hold Paradise once we gain it.

Most of the Apostle Paul’s writings have to do with actual righteousness, while a lesser part of his writings explain imputed (ascribed) righteousness. But we have seized on ascribed righteousness and have made it the only righteousness of the Christian redemption. It is our fleshly desires and love of self that prevent us from perceiving the stress of the Apostle on godly behaviour.

Neither the Book of Acts nor the Epistles emphasizes ascribed righteousness except when Paul is reasoning with the Jews. The exhortations directed toward the Gentiles concern godly living. Paul declared in several instances that the believer who continues in the lusts of the flesh will not inherit the Kingdom of God.

Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these; Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness[immorality], Idolatry, sorcery, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like: of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. (Galatians 5:19-21)

The grace of God in Christ takes the place of the Law of Moses and its statutes. The grace of God does not, however, take the place of godly behaviour, the kind of behaviour that always has been and always will be required of God’s creatures. There never can be an alternative to the eternal moral law of God, of which the Law of Moses is an elementary, external form. God is holy, and man, who is made in the image of God, must be holy.

It always is a sin to commit adultery. It always is a sin to worship gods other than the Lord. The grace of God in Christ does not do away with the moral law. Rather, the grace of God in Christ establishes, upholds, the moral law (Romans 3:31).

The grace of God does not uphold the aspects peculiar to the covenant of the Law of Moses, such as circumcision or refraining from work on the seventh day of the week, except in their fuller, eternal expression. Rather, the grace of God greatly increases and establishes for eternity the moral law, the holiness and righteousness of God, of which the Mosaic ordinances were a limited expression.

Satan and man’s self-love have perverted the truth announced by Paul. The perversion of the concept of Divine grace into an escape to Heaven on the basis of a statement of belief in certain facts of theology is no small misunderstanding of theology. It has destroyed the purpose of the Gospel of the Kingdom of God.

First, let us define grace as the term is employed by many believers. Then we shall set forth what we think is the true, scriptural definition of grace.

Grace As Currently Defined by Many Believers