The Value of Rules

More thoughts from Friday, while we’re on the subject of law….

Do laws serve as a means to curb sin?  Do rules help to restrain the flesh?  The Bible refers to rules as ‘elementary’.  Speaking to the Galatians who were submitting to teaching that required a return to observing the Law, the apostle Paul compared the Law to ‘elemental things’, things that are fit only for children.

So also we, while we were children, were held in bondage under the elemental things of the world. Galatians 4:3

He went on to point out that rules and laws are not only elementary, they are also weak and worthless.

…how is it that you turn back again to the weak and worthless elemental things, to which you desire to be enslaved all over again? Galatians 4:9

What exactly are rules weak and worthless for?  What have we been trying to accomplish by obeying them? We’ve been attempting to keep our flesh from indulging in sin and to curb its desires.  We’ve been paying close attention to the do’s and dont’s  as a means to subdue the flesh.  So, is this approach effective?  Does it work?  Herein is the reason the apostle Paul called rules weak and worthless.  It is because they are worthless in helping you restrain your flesh.

If you have died with Christ to the elementary principles of the world, why, as if you were living in the world, do you submit yourself to decrees, such as, “Do not handle, do not taste, do not touch…

These are matters which have, to be sure, the appearance of wisdom in self-made religion and self-abasement and severe treatment of the body, but are of no value against fleshly indulgence.  Colossians 2:20-23

Simply put…rules (the do’s and don’ts) won’t curb your flesh!  They have no value and are worthless for this purpose.

So, if they are of no value against your flesh…what is?  The answer might surprise you…

Awake unto righteousness and sin not.  I Corinthians 15:34 KJV

This might not be the method we’ve thought would work to overcome sin, but God’s ways truly are higher than ours. Rules might be weak, but there’s nothing weak about the righteousness that dwells within us.  So, wake up to that righteousness.  When we become mindful of righteousness instead of rules, we find that our flesh finally comes in line.

Don’t miss the P.S. (“post” script) here