Galatians 3:19-21
For I through the law am dead to the law, that I might live unto God. 20I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me. 21I do not frustrate the grace of God: for if righteousness come by the law, then Christ is dead in vain.
As I mentioned earlier, the word “law” in the New Testament is referring to the self effort that a believer does to please God. You might be wondering what is wrong to please God by our self efforts, adherence to the law, or by our performance. Some of you may already have stopped reading and stamped this as heresy, or view this as a teaching that leads to sinful life. Read carefully, I did not advise you to get away from the good habits of reading the Bible, praying, tithing, going to church etc, but my advise is not to put your trust in those actions or habits as a means of justification.
Why should we not use our performance as means of justification? It is because it never can never reach God’s standard of justification and you will fail. But God is so good; He does not want to fail you, which is why He set the standard of righteousness by faith.
Galatians 2:16 says that
16Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law: for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified.
The law was never given to humanity to measure the individual performance and grant justification in proportion to their performance. The law was given to Moses to reveal the humanity that we have fallen from the original created status and that we need a savior to get back to God. A fraction of the Old Testament believers used these laws to the purpose of it was given for; they sacrificed animals, they observed Sabbath etc as a corresponding action of their faith in the coming perfect sacrifice (crucifixion of Jesus). They were looking forward to this great sacrifice of Jesus.
But the majority of the Old Testament believers used law as means of justification. They made a religion out it. The scribes, Pharisees and Sadducees were originated from this misunderstood sect, they studied the law and become masters of the law, forgetting or ignoring the purpose of the law and were stuck in the letters of the law.
The true believers always have the same focus “Perfect Sacrifice”, the Old Testament believers were looking forward to this perfect sacrifice, while the New Testament believers are looking backward to this perfect sacrifice. Sadly, this misunderstood group still dominates the church with their philosophy and vain deceit, beware of them! (Colossians 2:8).
We must run our Christian life by “Looking unto Jesus the Author and Finisher of our faith” (Hebrews 12:2); any teaching that takes our eyes off from Jesus and encourage putting our eyes on our performance, is originated from this misunderstood pharisaical mindset. It sounds logical to fallen mind, holy and acceptable to the flesh, but is an abomination in the sight of God.
So, am I against the self effort or performance? No, never. But I am against any self effort that we do as a means of justification. Our self efforts must be to build intimacy with Jesus, by separating ourselves from the voices of the world. To build an intimacy with Jesus and to have a revelation knowledge about the perfect work on the cross; we may sometimes have to abstain from watching TV and spend time reading the Word, meditating the Word, praying in the spirit, pray with understanding, attend the church, fasting etc.