Living Stones – Saturday, January 20, 2018
Lawless practice
Matthew 7:23
“…depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!”
Lawless, technically, describes a condition where there is no regulation or control of activities based on the law; or a situation where the established law is being violated by a person or persons in the practice of deviant behaviour. This could easily describe someone who deliberately disobeys the traffic signals or some youth who defaces the neighbour’s fence with graffiti.
In our everyday conversation, when we use the term lawlessness we, more often than not, aren’t thinking of traffic violations or errant youth with spray-paint, rather we conjure up images reckless and drunken debauchery. We don’t think of the violation of the governing laws of the state or country, we think instead of the violation of the unwritten codes of good and decent behaviour.
Jesus condemns the practitioners of lawlessness. In the closing stages of the Sermon on the Mount, the passages we have been looking at for the last few days, Matthew 7:15-20 & 21-23, Jesus seems to be combining a description of current conduct and future decisions. We get the sense that He was addressing the people about wolves in sheep’s clothing in that particular time, but also showing how, at the judgement in the last day, some would be turned away from the Kingdom.
The same frames of reference obtain today, there are wolves in sheep’s clothing practising lawlessness now, but we are assured that, even if justice doesn’t come to their house now, justice delayed is not justice denied, as they say, justice will come. However, the idea of justice in the future is often little comfort now for those who are victims of lawless men.
Of course, the context for Jesus’ speaking on this matter is not the heathen, not those who don’t know God. Jesus was, in fact, speaking of the church. His statement that the persons who are the practitioners of lawlessness did things in His name is confirmation that these are members, leaders rather, of the church.
It’s heartbreaking to think that practitioners of lawlessness would be in the positions of authority and leadership in the church, yet, we see it every day.
If you watch the international news on TV you are very familiar with the efforts being made from time to time by some countries, and by international bodies, to rescue persons who have become victims to brutal regimes in their own countries. Sometimes these regimes are their national government and at other times these are “rebel” forces controlling parts of a country. Almost everyone within a few feet of a TV set or radio has heard of Boko Haram in Nigeria as an example.
We, the church, have to mount a rescue mission to recover the saints who have been trapped in the clutches of lawless practitioners of the ministry. The Scriptures are very clear about how such lawless men could be identified, and they are also very clear that these men should be avoided.
Paul tells Timothy that “perilous times will come” and he describes for him the lawless practitioners writing, “For men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, unloving, unforgiving, slanderers, without self-control, brutal, despisers of good, traitors, headstrong, haughty, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having a form of godliness but denying its power. And from such people turn away!” 2 Timothy 3:2-5
The Apostle Peter, who was no doubt present at the Sermon on the Mount and a participant in the subsequent discourses with Jesus on the subject, amplifies for us who are the lawless practitioners and what it is that they do, in the second chapter of his second letter as we noted yesterday. There he describes their deception, their doctrines, and their doom. It is instructive to read the entire chapter.
Peter is scathing in his description of the false prophets and teachers writing that they “will secretly bring in destructive heresies” and that by “covetousness they will exploit you with deceptive words.” Peter is unrelenting, he goes on to say that they are, “spots and blemishes, carousing in their own deceptions while they feast with you, having eyes full of adultery and that cannot cease from sin, enticing unstable souls. They have a heart trained in covetous practices.” 2 Peter 2:12-17
Peter eventually closes with these descriptions, “they speak great swelling words of emptiness, they allure through the lusts of the flesh, through lewdness,” and while “they promise them liberty, they themselves are slaves of corruption.” 2 Peter 2:18-19
These men, in their own minds, do not think of themselves as lawless, this is because they have become a law to themselves. Romans 2:14. And from such people turn away! As Jesus promised, their judgement, in the end, is sure, we, however, can spare ourselves now.
Think on these things:
- Reading this now, do you know any minister or ministry that fits these descriptions?
- Are you or anyone you know attending a church where members are in this kind of bondage?
- If you are not in anything like this, do you have a good enough understanding of the scriptures to help someone out of this trouble?
Prayer focus:
Let us pray today for those who are under the spell of practitioners of lawlessness and that God would show us how to rescue any that we know of.
In His Grace
Pastor Alex