Hedging your bets (spiritually speaking)

Galatians 5:1–6

Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage. Indeed I, Paul, say to you that if you become circumcised, Christ will profit you nothing. And I testify again to every man who becomes circumcised that he is a debtor to keep the whole law. You have become estranged from Christ, you who attempt to be justified by law; you have fallen from grace. For we through the Spirit eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness by faith. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything, but faith working through love.

We like guarantees. We like to know that if we have made a bad decision, it won't hurt us too badly. We want to be sure that we won't fall victim to "buyer's remorse." So a guarantee can be a good thing.

But wanting a guarantee is evidence either that we're not really sure that we are making a good decision or that we don't have total faith in the promises made by the product or service we are purchasing or the commitment we are entering into. And since we are not sure, we look for a guarantee to mitigate our losses—to hedge our bets.

Jehovah Jireh – my Provider

But God is not in the habit of giving us guarantees. If we truly know God's character, we will have complete and total trust in his ability to provide the things he has promised. The Jewish term Jehovah Jireh expresses this aspect of God's character—his ability to provide.

And yet we look for guarantees with God. I have discussed Christianity with some people who say that they will try all the different faiths in order to make sure that they're okay with God when they die. "One of these religions must be right, so if I have tried them all I'll be assured of going to heaven when I die."

That's not the way to handle it. In fact, that's a good way to ensure a trip to a different destination after death.

In conservative Evangelical circles we hedge our bets a bit differently. Rather than trying out Christianity and Judaism and Taoism and Buddhism, we try to earn God's favor by following a strict set of rules. We try to work hard in the church. We hold to strict standards of dress. We make sure our hair is cut just so. And then, in an effort to leverage the favor we are seeking from God, we force those standards on everyone else around us and indicate by our actions and our speech that if others do not hold to these standards they are not as righteous as we are.

When we do this, we reveal that we don't fully believe or trust in the blood of Jesus Christ. It is evident (even to the lost) that we are seeking a guarantee by working to curry God's favor. We don't truly believe that simply turning to God on the basis of the shed blood of Jesus Christ will get us into heaven. No matter how loudly we proclaim it with our words, our actions are preaching a different gospel.

Mom (circa 1970)

Actions speak louder than words

But Paul directly addressed this in Galatians 5. And he didn't like it. Paul said: "Indeed I, Paul, say to you that if you become circumcised, Christ will profit you nothing. And I testify again to every man who becomes circumcised that he is a debtor to keep the whole law. You have become estranged from Christ, you who attempt to be justified by law; you have fallen from grace."

Paul is saying here that if you try to "hedge your bets with God," that you have fallen from grace and must keep the whole law. In other words, if you follow man made rules in order to attain righteousness, you will not gain heaven when you die. We have five thousand years of history in the Bible laid out to show us that we are not capable of following the law of God. Man is not able to attain the standard of holiness and righteousness that God has set out. That is the whole reason that Christ had to die—we couldn't do it on our own.

Screen capture from a web site

So if we try to attain righteousness by using a particular Bible version, or by dressing in a certain way, or by doing acts of charity we will be required to fulfill the entire law or else we're hell bound.

It's all in the attitude

But Titus 2:15 says that God is preparing a people for himself—a people "zealous for good works." How can we know whether we are doing our works in order to attain righteousness or we are doing them because we are zealous for good works"? The answer is in our attitude. If we do our good works because we are driven to them out of love for God and love for others, we are zealous for good works. But if we look at others and say, "that person is not worthy" because they are not living up to the standard we have set in dress, in action, or in anything else other than faith in Jesus Christ, then we are trying to attain righteousness by our good works. And that, according to the Apostle Paul, means we are not Christians.

Do we sometimes look at another person and say, "She's probably not a Christian because she wears halter tops"? Do we say, "Because he listens to secular rock music he is not a Christian"? Do we say, "she needs to stop watching the TV shows she watches in order to have a good testimony to her neighbors"? Do we say, "His desire for more and more money shows that he is not Godly"? If we say any of those things, we are responsible for the whole law and have "fallen from grace."

God does not view legalism lightly. It is a terribly dangerous thing. We must be ruthless in our efforts to root our own legalism out of us.