Christian Liberty
Reformed theology leads to Christian liberty because the doctrines of the Reformation liberate God’s people from enslavement to the doctrines and commandments of men both in their justification and sanctification. The Reformers formulated the doctrine of Christian liberty over and against the backdrop of the abuses of papal authority. They understood that when people insert themselves between God and others, they bring harm because they rebelliously set themselves up as little gods. Such tyrants demand that people follow their unbiblical or extra-biblical rules, falsely promising rewards for obedience and threatening consequences for disobedience. Their promises and threats tempt people to obey them over Christ and His sufficient Word. They try to make others conform to their self-asserted dictates, which have no basis in the nature of God, His Word, natural law, or any transcendent reality. Tyrants and authoritarians issue arbitrary doctrines or commands to accomplish self-serving ends.
While authorities in the home, church, state, and other institutions could rule tyrannically, ordinary members of these groups might also assert their wills in such a way that they gain a following, unlawfully usurp power for themselves, and tyrannize legitimate leaders and other members. In other words, while a leader may be a wolf, an ordinary member within an institution can be a wolf, too. Furthermore, sometimes individual Christians tyrannize themselves. They lay up heavy and unbiblical burdens on themselves due to misunderstanding the Bible or poor or confused teaching in the past, or because they have a tormented conscience. It has been said, “There is a pope in every man’s heart.” The Reformed doctrine of Christian liberty was formulated from the teachings of Scripture to address such errors.
John Owen said,
The second principle of the Reformation, whereon the Reformers justified their separation from the Church of Rome, was this, that Christian people were not tied up unto blind obedience unto church guides, but were not only at liberty, but also obliged to judge for themselves, as unto all things that they were to believe and practice in religion and the worship of God.106
Samuel Bolton (1606–1654) wrote,
There are two great things Christ hath entrusted into the hands of his church: First, Christian faith. Secondly, Christian liberty. And as we are to contend earnestly for the maintenance of the faith, as the Apostle says, Jude 3. So also for the maintenance of Christian liberty, against all oppugners and underminers of it.107
Christian Freedom from All Bondage in Christ
Reformed theology teaches that Jesus frees us from every kind of bondage. John 8:36 says, “If the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.” Christ frees us from the dominion of the guilt of our sins, the power of our sins, and the punishment of our sins. This is freedom from the law as a covenant of works. The great biblical doctrine of justification declares that we are free from the guilt of our sins. We are justified by grace alone through faith alone because of Christ alone. Romans 8:33–34 says, “Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn?” God also frees us from bondage to the power of sin as He sanctifies the believer over a lifetime. Additionally, God so frees the saint from liability to punishment that we are delivered even from the evil of our sufferings. While Christians suffer, our sufferings cannot destroy us, which is why they are not evil. Rather, God always causes them to lead us back to Him in the end. In Luke 4:18, Jesus says, “He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives” to sin. In John 8:32, He says, “You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” Romans 6:22 says, “But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the fruit you get leads to sanctification and its end, eternal life.” Galatians 5:1 exhorts us, “For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery” to righteousness based on law.
Christian liberty, in its broadest sense, refers to freedom from the dominion of all of our enemies: Satan, the world, and the flesh. The Lord Jesus frees us from this present evil age, and to the glorious age to come in the new heavens and new earth. In the new covenant, Christ also frees us from the slavish demands of the old covenant (Acts 15:10–11; 13:39), especially from the requirement of ceremonial purification to draw near to God in worship (Heb. 10:1–10). Second London Confession 21.1 says:
The liberty which Christ has purchased for believers under the gospel, consists in their freedom from the guilt of sin, the condemning wrath of God, the severity and curse of the law, and in their being delivered from this present evil world, bondage to Satan, and dominion of sin, from the evil of afflictions, the fear and sting of death, the victory of the grave, and everlasting damnation: as also in their free access to God, and their yielding obedience unto Him, not out of slavish fear, but a child-like love and willing mind.
All which were common also to believers under the law for the substance of them; but under the New Testament the liberty of Christians is further enlarged, in their freedom from the yoke of a ceremonial law, to which the Jewish church was subjected, and in greater boldness of access to the throne of grace, and in fuller communications of the free Spirit of God, than believers under the law did ordinarily partake of.
Liberty of Conscience
There is a distinction between Christian liberty and liberty of conscience. Christian liberty, or Christian freedom, is a broad category, including every kind of freedom Christ bought for us through His life, death, and resurrection. Liberty of conscience is a subset of Christian liberty. Liberty of conscience means that God alone has the authority to define sin through His law, and that our consciences are free from the arbitrary laws of men. Scripture says, “For the law brings wrath, but where there is no law there is no transgression” (Rom. 4:15, emphasis added). Similarly, Romans 3:20 says that “through the law comes knowledge of sin.” God’s law, not our own personal law, not the law of the church, not the law of a husband or a father, or of anyone else, determines what is absolutely right and wrong. We are, therefore, only guilty, or liable to punishment, when we break God’s law. It says in 1 John 3:4 that “sin is lawlessness.” The Baptist Catechism rightly asks and answers, “Q. What is sin? A. Sin is any want of conformity unto, or transgression of, the law of God.” Our consciences should, therefore, only feel guilt when we break God’s law, not when we violate arbitrary or tyrannical commandments imposed by men.
It is also important to understand that any truly necessary logical consequences of God’s law are also God’s law. That which is “necessarily contained” in God’s law is God’s law. For example, it is bearing false witness to accuse someone of wrongdoing without two or three witnesses or two or three independent lines of evidence. A necessary logical consequence of this biblical law would be that it is wrong to accuse your child of lying and to discipline him for it without two or three witnesses or two or three lines of evidence. This is true even though the Bible does not expressly say that you must parent your children in this way. In other words, when the Bible limits sin to transgressions of God’s law, it does not deny the subordinate use of the light of nature, or reason, to arrive at necessary logical implications and applications of God’s law for a whole life ethic. That having been said, we ought to be extremely cautious about enforcing our fallible human deductions about sin from God’s law upon others, and we should not give our consciences away to the fallibly reasoned conclusions of others.
The New Testament teaches liberty of conscience throughout. In 1 Corinthians 10:29, Paul asks rhetorically, “Why should my liberty be determined by someone else’s conscience?” Galatians 2:4 warns of “false brothers secretly brought in—who slipped in to spy out our freedom that we have in Christ Jesus, so that they might bring us into slavery.” We are in great sin if we give our consciences away to any other human being. Rather, our consciences must be captive to Jesus Christ, speaking in His good and all-sufficient Word.
Second London Confession 21.2 and 21.3 helpfully express the biblical teaching on liberty of conscience. It says:
21.2. God alone is Lord of the conscience, and has left it free from the doctrines and commandments of men which are in any thing contrary to his Word, or not contained in it. So that to believe such doctrines, or obey such commands out of conscience, is to betray true liberty of conscience; and the requiring of an implicit faith, an absolute and blind obedience, is to destroy liberty of conscience and reason also.
21.3. They who upon pretense of Christian liberty do practice any sin, or cherish any sinful lust, as they do thereby pervert the main design of the grace of the gospel to their own destruction, so they wholly destroy the end of Christian liberty, which is, that being delivered out of the hands of all our enemies, we might serve the Lord without fear, in holiness and righteousness before Him, all the days of our lives.
These two paragraphs teach five truths about liberty of conscience. First, only God has authority to bind the human conscience. God created us in His image and, therefore, we belong to Him and not to any other. Second, all of God’s commands that are needed for life and godliness are necessarily contained in the Bible. Third, any teaching or commandment that contradicts the Bible, or adds any doctrine or command not necessarily contained in it, has no authority to bind our consciences. Fourth, when people allow anyone else, whether it be a father or mother, pastor, teacher, or even an angel from heaven, to bind their consciences apart from the Word of God, they commit a great sin against God. To give any mere creature that kind of authority is to violate the first commandment and to make that person into a god. Fifth, true liberty of conscience is never lawless but always seeks to honor God and His law by the exercise of liberty.108
Liberty, Law, and Wisdom
Christian liberty is not an absolute liberty. It is “Christian” liberty. Extreme liberalism, or we might say consistent liberalism, teaches that freedom to choose is in itself the highest good, even when there is no absolute or transcendent moral content governing that freedom. In this way of thinking, people are free to choose their morals and their greatest loves, whether or not their morals and loves correspond to human nature or to the character of God Himself.
But liberty without law is the flawed modern concept of pluralism. Pluralism says that each person and group is free to choose their beliefs and loves without respect to God, absolute truth, goodness or beauty. One problem with pluralism is that without God’s moral law of love, it inevitably leads to irresolvable strife between people and groups. It promises freedom and happiness but leads to conflict. When people and groups choose apart from God’s absolute law of love, they freely oppose, dislike, and disagree with each other. The only way to have true love, peace, and unity among people is by means of God’s absolute law of love ruling and restricting liberty. The freedom to choose all by itself, as taught by pluralism, is ultimately self-centered, unloving, and dishonoring to God.
The Word of God warns us against licentious abuses of Christian liberty. Galatians 5:13 says, “For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.” In other words, we should be more careful about loving our brothers and sisters in Christ, according to His commands, than practicing our liberties. Lawfulness comes before liberty, and liberty only exists within lawfulness. As 1 Peter 2:16 says, “Live as people who are free, not using your freedom as a cover-up for evil, but living as servants of God.”
In my pastoral ministry, I have run across Christians who were raised in legalistic fundamentalist families and churches. Then they discovered the wonderful doctrine of Christian liberty and liberty of conscience. They understood that they were freed from the petty rules of their past. That was a very good thing! But I have found that some of them practice certain lawful liberties to excess. It is possible to practice a liberty for the purpose of indulging one’s sinful passions, and to love one’s liberties more than God, which is idolatry. Christians might even allow themselves to become enslaved to their liberties, rather than exercising them out of love for God and others. The invisible sins of self-centeredness, pride, covetousness, and idolatry of the heart easily creep into the practice of liberties when a Christian is not careful to make sure that his eyes are set upon the Lord Jesus Christ, love for Him, and His good Word.
It is foolish to use liberty without the virtue of moderation or self-control. Those who live in submission to Christ always seek to restrain their liberties to ensure that nothing gets dominion over them and that they are not enslaved or addicted to anything in this world. In 1 Corinthians 6:12, Paul says, “‘All things are lawful for me,’ but not all things are helpful. ‘All things are lawful for me,’ but I will not be dominated by anything.” What he means is that while all lawful things are lawful, not all lawful things are helpful, and we should never be ruled by anything, even if it’s lawful.
Similarly, if liberties draw us into self-indulgence and away from love for others, then we are no longer using our liberties lawfully. Paul adds, in 1 Corinthians 10:23, “‘All things are lawful,’ but not all things are helpful. ‘All things are lawful,’ but not all things build up.” We should practice our liberties in ways that edify ourselves and others in the Lord Jesus Christ. Love is the rule of liberty.
Christian Ethics
Thus, true Christian liberty and liberty of conscience are always restricted and governed by God’s transcendent moral law and its wise application. Christians in the new covenant look not only to God’s moral law to govern their lives, but also to the positive commands and teachings of the new covenant (public worship, mutual love within a local church, etc.). Liberty of conscience must always be understood within the context of Christian responsibilities and duties, especially within the God-given structures of the home, the church, and civil government.
Biblical Christian ethics involves three elements. First, a morally good act requires the right motive. The Lord Jesus teaches that our motive in all things ought to be love for God and love for others. As 1 Corinthians 16:14 says, “Let all that you do be done in love.” Second, the action itself must be good. The law of God defines right actions for humankind. It reveals the rights we must justly give to others. Good works are strictly defined by the revelation of God’s Word, particularly in His law. Third, a morally good act requires the right end or goal. The proper end of all ethical actions should be the glory of God. As 1 Corinthians 10:31 says, “So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.” That is, the goal of the believer should be to shine forth the character and likeness of God toward others.
The question of whether or not to engage in a liberty falls in the realm of wisdom. A wise act is performed under God’s law with an understanding of human nature and the world in which we live. A wise person fears God. He is not only deeply acquainted with God’s Word, but he also understands people and wants to live in a way that honors God and loves people. Wise people are careful not to enflame or irritate others unnecessarily by the practice of their liberties. Instead, they use their liberties to love God and other people. They have learned by constant practice how to live in this world, under God and for His glory.
A Practical Example
So what does the practice of liberty of conscience look like, under the law of God? Consider the act of playing the piano. The Bible never forbids or commands playing the piano. That means playing the piano is good in itself and is a matter of liberty. Some might say you should only play the piano if you are playing hymns or other Christian songs. That may sound spiritual, but the Bible never teaches it. Therefore, a Christian is free to play the piano and to play all sorts of music. Anyone who says you may only play hymns on the piano is going beyond what the Bible teaches. We are not to add to the teaching of Scripture (1 Cor. 4:6). Someone might say that all music, including the music of the piano, is of the devil. They may warn you against developing any skill in musical arts and suggest that if you do so, you are opening yourself up to attacks from Satan. Of course, the Bible never teaches such a thing, and teachings that go beyond the Bible, or what is necessarily contained in it, violate liberty of conscience.
But even though the act of playing the piano is good and is a liberty in itself, it must always be done with the motive of loving God and others and with the goal of glorifying God. Consider a scenario in which you might play the piano with wrong motives. What if you are playing the piano in your home to keep from doing other responsibilities? If that is the case, then your motive is not love for others to the glory of God. Instead, you are selfishly avoiding the work God has given you to do. Or perhaps you are playing a particular tune on the piano that you know someone in the house sincerely dislikes, and you are only playing that tune to annoy them. That would be an unloving thing to do. As 1 Corinthians 13:5 tells us, love is not rude. So playing the piano is a liberty, but if you do it from a wrong motive, then your conduct is sinful, even though the specific act of playing the piano is good.
Now consider a scenario where you are playing the piano with a wrong goal. Let’s say you are playing the piano to get so good at it that you can be the center of attention and have everyone stand in awe of your abilities. You are not learning how to play so that you can give glory to God, but you are trying to excel in your skill so that you can have all the glory for yourself. That would be a terribly sinful goal, and you do not have the liberty to play the piano with such a goal.
Or let us say you have decided to play the piano inside an abortion clinic. The abortion workers hired you because they say live piano music provides them with a soothing atmosphere, helping them to do their work peacefully and quickly. Even though you personally disagree with abortion, you decide to take the job because you need the money. You know abortion is wrong, but you are in a difficult place financially and, after all, God knows you do not approve of abortion. But if playing the piano at such a place provides a helpful atmosphere for the abortion workers, you are providing direct support to something evil. Ephesians 5:11 says to “take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness.” And 1 Timothy 5:22 says not to “take part in the sins of others; keep yourself pure.” All of that is to say that playing the piano is a liberty in itself. It is never a sin in itself. But you must practice your God-given liberties within the boundaries of God’s moral law (summarized in the Ten Commandments) with the right motive (love for others) and the right goal (the glory of God).109
Liberty and Human Authorities
The Reformers understood that one of the major applications of liberty of conscience has to do with the authority of the church. Liberty of conscience means that church members are free from any church authority coercing their beliefs or practices in the name of God. It does not follow, however, that the church may issue no practical rules, or positive laws, for the sake of good order in the church. The church has to make practical rules to govern its worship and practice. As 1 Corinthians 14:40 says, “All things should be done decently and in order.”
Liberty and Authority in the Church
The Bible teaches that the church must meet on Sundays. That is God’s law. But God does not tell us exactly what time or how many times the church should meet. Rather, the Bible charges the church’s elders to decide such circumstances of the church’s assembly and worship (Heb. 13:17). Similarly, Christ commands the church to read and preach the Word of God when it gathers on the Lord’s Day. He does not say exactly how long the sermon should be; nevertheless, the sermon must have some length. The Bible does not tell us what to preach each Lord’s Day, but every sermon must have some text of Scripture. Christ commands His churches to do many things in the worship service—such as sing, pray, observe the Lord’s Supper, practice baptism, collect offerings, etc.—but the Bible does not provide an exact order of worship. The elders have no choice but to decide such circumstances.
I am trying to show that while God gives us His law, human authorities often must order the circumstances for a group in which God’s law is obeyed. Such circumstances should be ordered wisely according to the light of nature, or human reason (2LCF 1.1). These man-made rules are liberties because they are a matter of wisdom and might be decided differently in different churches. There is more than one way to do things. Some kind of rule has to be followed, but the rules themselves are morally indifferent. Elders should try to order the church and its worship as simply and conveniently as possible for the benefit of the church as a whole, in order to accomplish Christ’s commands.
But pastors and churches should never speak as though practical decisions about church order and worship are moral commands from God. They should never make rules about polity or an order of worship that go beyond what is absolutely required to accomplish what Christ commands. I have heard of a religious group that requires all the women to wear their hair in a very specific style of braid. Other groups forbid the eating of certain foods or drinking of certain drinks. Others require specific kinds of dress. Some may be strict about entertainment choices or insist upon peculiar or idiosyncratic practices in the home. Such man-made rules violate liberty of conscience because they have nothing to do with what is necessary for good order in the church under Christ’s biblical commands. Rules like that are dangerous because the leaders are binding the consciences of church members in things indifferent and irrelevant to the commanded elements of church worship and order. Leaders who make such rules are sinfully adding to God’s law. In Mark 7:7–8, our Lord Jesus says, “‘In vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’ You leave the commandment of God and hold to the tradition of men.”
What if church members disagree with a decision their elders make? Perhaps the elders decide to change the worship time on the Lord’s Day. They made the choice to accommodate the unique circumstances of their church’s membership, but perhaps you do not agree with that decision. The new times make attending the worship service a little more difficult for you, even though it makes it easier for others. Church members are perfectly free to disagree with their elders on such things. If a church’s elders were ever to claim that any practical judgment is the only right way to obey God, they would be usurping God’s authority, and the whole church should refuse to follow them. To obey a church’s elders out of blind obedience is a sin.
Christian liberty also means we are free in Christ to submit to decisions with which we disagree out of love for the brethren and to keep the peace in the church, as long as it is not sinful to do so. This is what the Bible requires church members to do. Hebrews 13:17 says, “Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your souls, as those who will have to give an account. Let them do this with joy and not with groaning, for that would be of no advantage to you.” And 1 Thessalonians 5:12–13 says, “We ask you, brothers, to respect those who labor among you and are over you in the Lord and admonish you, and to esteem them very highly in love because of their work. Be at peace among yourselves.” These passages are not saying that elders have absolute authority over church members. Rather, they are teaching that the elders have authority to teach the Word of God to the church and, under the Word of God, to manage the circumstances of church worship, order, and discipline for the good of the church as a whole.
On the other hand, if an individual church member insists on his own way and demands that the elders or the church follow him in his individual views, then that member is himself acting in an authoritarian way. Strangely, in such cases, the member often claims that the church is authoritarian, or legalistic, for not agreeing to follow the individual member. But in reality, if the church is holding to its agreed-upon confession of faith and constitution, then any member who attempts to draw a following after himself is violating Christian liberty and asking the whole church to violate its conscience in favor of the demanding individual. If the church were to submit to such an individual, it would be surrendering its conscience and sinning against God.
In confessional Reformed Baptist churches, not every doctrine is equally important. Primary doctrines include those you must believe and not deny in order to go to heaven. Such doctrines include the Trinity, the doctrine of Christ and His work, justification by faith alone, repentance, and the authority of Scripture. Secondary doctrines involve all the doctrines of the church’s formal confession of faith, which summarizes the Bible, the whole counsel of God. These are the doctrines that the church believes the Bible teaches are necessary for the health of a Christian and the church. Examples of such doctrines include the doctrines of grace, regenerate church membership, baptism, and other ecclesiastical distinctives. Tertiary beliefs and practices are important matters of Christian liberty and wisdom that are not addressed by the church’s confession, such that Christians may differ even within the same church. Examples of tertiary doctrines and practices include the specific timing of eschatological events and the doctrine of Christ’s descent into Sheol, along with practical matters such as the education of children, questions of modesty, etc. In confessional Reformed Baptist churches, non-confessional matters are matters of Christian liberty.
Liberty and Authority in the Home
These same principles of Christian liberty and liberty of conscience hold true in the home. To understand the kinds of rules that should be made in a Christian home, we have to understand the goal of the home. A Christian home has a twofold end: temporal well-being (in the common mode of Christ’s kingdom) and pointing toward abundant life in Christ (parents are evangelists of the redemptive mode of Christ’s kingdom). The common mode of Christ’s kingdom is common, or shared, between believers and unbelievers. Christ orders His common kingdom through human authorities who lead so as to promote temporal life and well-being in this world. The redemptive mode of Christ’s kingdom, on the other hand, is Christ’s sovereign rule and grace to accomplish the eternal redemption of the elect. While unbelievers in a home are not in the redemptive mode of Christ’s kingdom, if the father or mother is a believer, then the others in the home are under the proclamation of that kingdom and are being called into it. That having been said, the primary way God ministers His Word to children is through the ordinary means of grace in the church.
Every household should be managed with household rules that direct the home to the proper ends of the household, even though the specific rules are not revealed in the Bible. For example, when it comes to temporal life, every family has to eat enough food for life and health, and someone has to do the dishes. Thus, there needs to be some kind of plan for cooking and washing. Families have to sleep, so there will be bedtimes. Family members have to wear clothes, so someone needs to do the laundry. Houses have things break from time to time, so someone has to repair them. The grass in the lawn grows, which means someone has to cut it. The children in a family need a proper education, and they also need to be taught basic manners and social graces so that they can learn how to live well with others in the world. The list goes on. There has to be some way in which such things are done, and authorities in the home must decide how to do them because these things are not revealed in Scripture, but they are to be wisely decided based on the light of nature.
In terms of ordering the home toward life in Christ, God expects fathers to lead their families in reading the Bible and praying together (Josh. 24:14–15; Ps. 78:5–6). But the times and structure of family worship are not revealed in the Bible. Parents are to discipline their children for sin (Heb. 12:9), but Scripture does not reveal every detail of the process of discipline. Husbands are the heads of their homes, and it is their responsibility to decide these things in discussion with their wives. Scripture says that both husbands and wives are required to manage their households (1 Tim 3:4; 5:14), but they should only manage their homes in a way that serves the family as a whole, including the children. Bad house rules are rules that serve only the leaders in the home and are not needed for the proper functioning and good of the home.
The moment a husband and wife turn household management rules into absolute laws, they have violated liberty of conscience. They must never imply that their rules are equal to the moral law of God and are therefore matters of godliness. While children need guidance on many things, some parents become overly strict about eating times, food choices, or clothing. Or they may become convinced of extra-biblical parenting philosophies and techniques from books they have read or conferences they have attended. I am aware of some Christian families who were persuaded that if they did everything just right, according to strict rules that are not found in the Bible, their children would most certainly become faithful Christians and live godly lives as adults. But the Bible never teaches any such thing. Such a mindset in the home has the result of turning parents into little gods, and tempting children to trust in their parents as gods or to rebel and make gods out of themselves. Children who live in legalistic homes are often crushed under legalistic rules, becoming despondent, proud, or both.
Examples of Violations of Christian Liberty
The Reformers insisted on Christian liberty over and against the papist doctrine of “implicit faith” in the church. Implicit faith is a doctrine that says that Christians should trust in the church to the extent that they are ready to believe whatever it teaches, even before they know or understand its teachings. The Reformers said that this violates Christian liberty and binds the conscience to human authorities. Rather than having implicit faith in the church, Christians should have implicit faith in the Word of God and be ready to believe whatever the Bible teaches. We should be ready to believe what the church teaches only in so far as it reflects the teaching of Scripture.
Evangelical and Reformed churches today are not likely to require an implicit faith like the papacy does. But they might violate Christian liberty by requiring Christians to obey unbiblical or extra-biblical commands.
In unpublished lecture notes, Fred Malone describes some matters pertaining to Christian liberty in our day. He writes,
Modern-day issues concerning Christian liberty include alcohol drinking, women’s dress, education of children, insurance, women’s head-coverings, contraception, use of TV, music choices, Sunday School, youth camps, political views, etc. There is no question that Scripture must be the final determiner of these choices for the believer, but the problem of liberty arises when man-made rules and opinions beyond Scripture take on the role of law for church membership, church discipline, and church unity. The doctrine of Christian liberty is necessary to make the “strong” patient and sacrificial toward the “weak” and the “weak” charitable and respectful toward the “strong.” The Law and the Gospel gives both direction to building unity in the church on the doctrine of Christian liberty: “Unity in things essential, liberty in things non-essential, charity in all things.”110
To these we might add the observance of Christmas, Halloween, Mardi Gras, or backyard Easter egg hunts, along with healthy diets, exercise, the use of medicines and doctors, social media, vacation choices, vocation choices, etc. Churches may initially create unbiblical laws on such matters from good motives. But in reality, they are wrongly fencing God’s law, trying to make external rules that will keep Christians from breaking the law of God. The problem is that it will not work. For example, the Bible says not to get drunk (Eph. 5:18); therefore some churches and Christians conclude that all drinking should be strictly avoided. But that goes beyond the teaching of Scripture (Eccl. 9:7; Ps. 104:15; 1 Tim 5:23), violates the doctrine of Christian liberty, and cannot change the covetous and proud heart that leads to drunkenness in the first place. To give another example, the Bible teaches that women should dress modestly (1 Tim. 2:9); therefore, some churches and Christians, perhaps inadvertently, short circuit the process of learning modesty of the heart and of growing in godly wisdom by mandating certain kinds of dress for women. They also seem to forget that men must practice modesty as well. Such churches often do not address what the Bible actually teaches about modesty, but they then go beyond what the Bible teaches.
Ultimately, man-made rules about holiness, imposed upon others, come from ungodly self-righteousness and pride. Fred Malone explains,
The fundamentalist movement of the last 150 years has brought confusion about this doctrine [of Christian liberty] to the church, often creating division over strongly held opinions, or else dominating the consciences of Christians with false guilt. Pride often has been an outworking of this movement simply because emphasis upon outward behavior has created a watchful eye, a critical spirit and much self-righteousness for holding to certain behaviors. Each church must be willing to have its practice of Christian liberty examined in the light of the Law and the Gospel in order to establish true unity and love, as well as to teach each believer what is liberty and what is not.111
It is much easier to keep outward man-made rules as a standard of holiness than it is to learn to obey the law of God, under the gospel, from a heart of humble faith in Christ. Self-righteous people find it easier to obey external rules, such as the ones mentioned above (rules about drinking, dress, media, etc.), than to put on true humility and love for God and neighbor. External rule keeping feeds the sinful flesh to feel righteous. It allows people to set themselves up as judges who can condemn others when they do not follow the same made-up standard. This is the essence of legalism, a relaxation of the heart of God’s true law and the establishment of a man-made standard that has nothing to do with holiness in itself.
Sadly, some who live under such oppressive external legalism end up apostatizing from Christianity altogether. They see the pride, duplicity, and evil of outward, rules-based religion. But they sometimes end up embracing an even greater heresy, which says that Christ loves me and approves of me just the way that I am, and He doesn’t expect me to change. They turn Christianity into a religion of love and acceptance in which Christ is dethroned and each individual becomes a god to himself.
The only true answer to legalism is understanding the full rigor of God’s law, which crushes all our proud dreams of self-sufficiency or acceptability to God based on our own obedience. It is impossible to keep God’s true law perfectly, even for a moment. Thus, for the believer, the good law of God drives us out of ourselves and into the gracious arms of the Lord Jesus Christ for justification by faith alone. Jesus, then, points us back to His law, but not for righteousness. Rather, God’s law becomes our standard of love in sanctification, under the gospel, by which the Holy Spirit conforms us to Christ’s likeness from the inside out, more and more, in humble self-sacrificial love to God and love to others.
The Goal of Liberty
The goal of Christian liberty is not to free us to indulge our flesh or idolatries. God does not give us liberty so that we can secretly follow after the loves of the world. Rather, He gives us liberty so that we are free from every false god. The goal of Christian liberty is faithfulness, love, obedience, worship of the one true God, and rebellion against every human being who would set himself up as a god, against every false spirit, against anything that would attempt to replace God. Only the true God is true life and true good. Our liberty as Christians to follow Christ is vital to our very lives, both here and hereafter.
God also gives Christian liberty and liberty of conscience so that we can each learn true wisdom for ourselves. Every individual Christian has to learn how to live in light of Christ with God’s good law as his guide in each trial and circumstance of life. As the believer exercises faith throughout life, trying to honor God in light of His Word, he grows in wisdom. Wisdom is a deep knowledge of how to apply God’s law practically in this broken world, even in complicated situations. Second London Confession 16.1 says, “Good works are only such as God has commanded in his Holy Word.” But it takes wisdom to know what to do in each circumstance. When the Christian learns the way of wisdom, his conscience is more and more formed by practice and observation according to what he has learned to be right from the Word of God and by constant practice of its commands, rather than simplistically submitting to authoritative rules or chafing under them. But it is impossible for Christians to increase in wisdom without the freedom to make mistakes and learn for themselves. Thus, God gives Christian liberty under His law so that we can grow more and more into the likeness of Jesus. This means that the goal of Christian liberty is knowing God and His ways to His glory.
Another reason God gives us Christian liberty and liberty of conscience is that it is absolutely essential for peace and unity within local churches. Legalism is one of the surest paths to division and disorder. There will be no end to fighting when man-made rules compete for supremacy among God’s people. But when Christ is central, and His people are committed to His moral law as well as to His positive laws in the new covenant, and when Christians understand the doctrine of liberty, then it is possible for peace and unity to reign in local churches. Such unity is essential for the mission of the church, which is to worship Christ with one voice, to mutually edify one another in Christ, and to preach the gospel to the lost both at home and among every tribe and tongue.
Fred Malone writes,
If a church is ever to come to one unity and mission, it must practice Christian liberty under Christian freedom. The church must be taught what is lawful and what is not for the Christian. It is God’s will that the strong and weak ultimately come to the same opinion about what is in conformity to God’s Law. This removes the stumbling blocks of unfounded opinions which destroy conscience and unity. It also removes the stumbling block of past offenses between Jew and Gentile for Christian unity. But the church also must be taught the Gospel and how it causes the strong and the weak to live together until they come to the same opinion. We must allow the work of God in other’s hearts to proceed at His rate, not ours. For that reason, the gospel provides the patience and grace we need to build the church in unity and mission. The Law and the Gospel, rightly understood, is the key to Christian unity, church unity and the church’s mission.112
Thus, the practical goal of Christian liberty is that the church would be enabled and strengthened to accomplish its mission.
Conclusion
The doctrine of Christian liberty is, in a sense, the culmination of the Protestant Reformation. The material cause of the Reformation is that we are justified by faith alone because of Christ alone. That implies that no human being has the authority to make up laws that determine whether we are righteous before God. No mere man has the authority to threaten us with hell or promise us heaven. God declares us righteous because of Christ, when we look to Him by faith. But Christian liberty also flows out of the formal cause of the Reformation, which is that Scripture alone is sufficient for all matters of faith and godliness. The doctrine of Scripture’s sufficiency means that no man-made rules can make us more godly. We are, therefore, free from the doctrines and commandments of men to teach us how to be holy or how to live before God.
While the Reformers denied that man-made rules can justify us or sanctify us, they still affirmed that we should submit to human authorities when it comes to the practical ends of institutions in this world. If human authorities are merely trying to order a temporal institution, rather than issuing laws for our justification or sanctification, then we can and should submit to them, even when we disagree, because very little is at stake, comparatively speaking. Furthermore, when it comes to practical choices in life, which are not clearly taught in Scripture, we should make great allowances for differences among believers. This helps preserve the peace and unity of the church so that it can accomplish its God-given mission in this world, which includes worship, mutual edification, and spreading the gospel to every tribe and tongue.
106. John Owen, An Enquiry into the Original, Nature, institution, Power, Order and Communion of Evangelical Churches, 294.
107. Samuel Bolton, True Bounds of Christian Freedom (London: Austin Rice, 1656), 8–9. The word oppugner means “opponent or opposer.”
108. G. I. Williamson, The Westminster Confession of Faith: For Study Classes (Philadelphia: P&R, 1964), 149–150.
109. In a different way, G.I. Williamson also helpfully discusses piano playing as an example of Christian liberty. See Williamson, The Westminster Confession of Faith, 153.
110. Fred A. Malone, “Law and the Gospel in Pastoral Ministry,” PT18 at Covenant Baptist Theological Seminary, unpublished lecture notes.
111. Malone, “Law and the Gospel in Pastoral Ministry.”
112. Malone, “Law and the Gospel in Pastoral Ministry.”