Majoring in Minor Things

Not too long ago I heard a sermon where a preacher said that the Lord had recently told him that the saints were majoring in minors. What he was speaking about was they were too concerned about how people dressed and appeared. Yet, this message spoke to me on a different level. Oh, I am not hung up on how people dress when they go to church. Heck, given the current state of evangelical doctrine and the error that is ever present, I am not hung up on people going to church.

So back to majoring in minors... This is at the crux of what is wrong with evangelical doctrine these days. Jesus focus was redemptive. This is obvious from John 5:39-40 & Luke 24:27, 43-45. So then, the mandate for the church as I see it is to major/focus on the gospel and Jesus. That is where all the emphasis should be placed. Methods of baptism and other creed concerns are far less important.

This is why I think that 2 Corinthians 5:17-21 is so vital in our understanding of the gospel, and in reality, the best statement of the gospel. The passage of this letter from 3:1 through 5:21 is important in understanding what the "majors" are. Paul differentiates between the new covenant and the old covenant in this passage. He starts out by calling the Old Covenant the ministry of death, and conversely gets on to the New Covenant being the ministry of the Spirit and life.  He points out in chapter 4 that the New Covenant provides something better and unique. The ministry of life is housed in earthen jars as Paul poetically points out that though we are human and flesh, Christ and His ministry is alive within us.

The "major" is not placed on the letter of the law. It is not placed in a read and do context. It is not necessitated by a legal constitutional reading of scripture. That was Old Covenant. That was wrapped in the fact that if one obeyed the legal requirements there were blessings, and if one was not obedient there was curses. We find out that Christ took on the curse/curses of the law for us. Since the Gentile was never really under the law, this was more for the Jew, but still is a benefit to the Gentile. Why? So that the promises of Deuteronomy 28 could be "yes and amen" for all, both Jew and Gentile. In essence, both Jew and Gentile can be blessed in the city and in the field, blessed coming and going. The question is not are we blessed. The question is do we believe we are blessed?

Therefore the major idea is Christ and the gospel. Yet, it seems that it is so often neglected in favor of explaining to people how they can improve morally. People are scolded and shamed about their lack of being able to measure up to the law. It would be laughable if it was not so brutally true. So you ask, why was there so much ink in the New Testament about the law and obedience? The answer is quite simple. It was before the destruction of the temple when God made his choice in who his real children were. The Jews still had the old covenant in force. Once the temple was destroyed, there was practically no Old Covenant. There was no means of atonement. The reason was that the atonement of Christ was a once for all act.

Certainly the law can inform us in what love looks like. I am not railing against the law to show us the heart of God, and how we should treat our fellow humanity. I am arguing that it is wrong to allow the law to determine our righteousness. The thing in the new covenant that determines our righteousness, our right standing before God is faith in Christ and God's grace.  Further, real true faith in the grace and love of God will produce within us, supernaturally, a love for God that will translate into us being more loving and actually more obedient,. It is strictly a matter of focus.