Originally published in "The Lord's Coming Herald & Wesleyan Bible Prophecy Advocate," Summer Edition 1996
Law, Grace, And The Solution To The Sin Problem
God's law is holy and just and good--a statement of His will for us, and an expression of the relationship that we are privileged to enjoy with Him. Call this relationship what you will--grace, love, holiness--a right relationship with God is the supreme purpose for all of our existences
Now in the
midst of our experience of law and grace, we find also a personal antagonism, called in the Bible the carnal mind. One way folks deal with the
antagonistic spirit they feel within themselves is to remove God's law from their experience. Modern antinomians attempt to depreciate God's law and remove it from their experience in order to alleviate
the antagonism of their carnal minds!
The true solution, however, is to allow God to
remove the carnal mind in the second definite crisis experience of entire sanctification. When the
carnal mind is gone, lo and behold, law and grace get along surprisingly well together! No wonder heart cleansing
has been called "the harmonizing experience."
Not only is entire sanctification a harmonizing experience,
it is the central idea of Christianity, and the very thing that John Nelson
Darby and his brood of "antinomian" end-time Bible prophecy theorists so totally
abhorred.
Dr. Daniel Steele perceived this issues, and called John Nelson Darby's dispensational theory "a
substitute for holiness, or antinomianism revived." The theory attracts both
the spiritual and the carnal. Circles that promote it most are most notorious in
their manner of urging the removal of the law from the experience of the
believer, rather than urging all forward in that desire to be purified in heart.
For that very reason--i.e., that it so readily attracts the carnal, Steele
warned, we do well to sift it.
Related Article Links
The Kingdom Of Grace
The Simple Bible Plan Of Full And Free Salvation
Why Daniel Steele So Strongly Opposed Dispensationalism