The Short-Sighted Rule keepers

It's easy to reduce all of life to a set of rules to keep. But that always degenerates into selfish pride and self-righteousness. The truth is we all need grace!

May 23, 2025

Christ is risen!

It’s so easy to be “one-sided!” You know what I mean – “That idea is so wrong and everyone who thinks that way and acts that way is misguided.”

You may be right about that, but there is also danger on the other side.

You can become just as misguided by insisting you’re right as those who are stumbling on the other side.

It’s easy to fall into this trap.

In fact, it is one of the most common human stumbles. We often try to do the right thing for all the wrong reasons.

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And make no mistake, that pattern of thinking and doing is as destructive to your spiritual life as lawlessness. Because it is also a form of lawlessness.

It puts me beyond the heart-softening disciplines of humility and repentance and turns those who disagree with me into “enemies.” We have to be attentive enough to our own weaknesses to avoid falling into this weakness the Fathers called “prelest” or self-righteousness. When we reduce our love for God to mere rule-keeping, we run the risk of forgetting God altogether and focusing only on “following the rules.”

Make no mistake, this is a tough balance to maintain in life.

That’s why we are called to be in communion with each other. That’s why we have to regularly practice the spiritual discipline of confession so we never forget our own spiritual weaknesses and our own desperate need for grace and mercy. When we forget that, we stop offering grace and mercy to others.

This is one of the first symptoms of “just follow the rules!”

Look at our lesson today in Acts 15:5-12:

IN THOSE DAYS, some believers who belonged to the party of the Pharisees rose up, and said, “it is necessary to circumcise them, and to charge them to keep the law of Moses.” The apostles and the elders were gathered together to consider this matter. And after there had been much debate, Peter rose and said to them, “Brethren, you know that in the early days God made choice among you, that by my mouth the Gentiles should hear the word of the gospel and believe. And God who knows the heart bore witness to them, giving them the Holy Spirit just as he did to us; and he made no distinction between us and them, but cleansed their hearts by faith. Now therefore why do you make trial of God by putting a yoke upon the neck of the disciples which neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear? But we believe that we shall be saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus, just as they will.” And all the assembly kept silence; and they listened to Barnabas and Paul as they related what signs and wonders God had done through them among the Gentiles.

Here’s the first real crisis in the newly formed Church—and it’s a big one!

In fact, this moment we are reading about today is the shift, the “tipping point,” that transfigured the early Church from just one more group of Jews who differed in theology to a Church that would spread throughout the whole world. In other words, this is a big deal!

And it all has to do with identity.

Some said Jesus is a Jewish Messiah, and anyone who follows Him has to keep the Jewish Law!

Others said that this wasn’t necessary for Gentile converts.

Peter has to set up some clear principles to deal with this conflict! After all, he witnessed the first Gentiles becoming Christians when he preached to the Roman Centurion Cornelius and his family. And make no mistake, this shift in thinking is going to change everything for the future of this small group of believers. St. Peter, witnessing the conversion of St. Cornelius and his household to the Faith of Jesus, sets him up to deal with this conflict!

Notice the principle St. Peter declares: “he (meaning the Holy Spirit) made no distinction between us and them, but cleansed their hearts by faith. St. Peter makes it clear: The Gentiles became believers and now you want them to follow the rules set up for us Jews, even though we Jews were NEVER able to obey them ourselves!

Peter makes it plain that the purpose of the Law of Moses wasn’t to make us follow rules as much as prove to us we will never be able to say to God, “I’ve kept all your rules, now You have to let me into heaven.” We ALL need mercy. We ALL need to say moment by moment, “Lord, have mercy.”

AND we all need to constantly offer our lives, our daily lives, to God and ask for the strength to be Christian and not just wear “Christian” like some label. After all, the Rules are Good, especially if they reveal to you how much you don’t live up to them and need God’s mercy. We should extend that mercy to everyone else as well. The ability to keep mercy and grace at the center of our message is essential.

But be careful. As I said in the introduction, this balance is hard, and that’s a feature, not a bug!

It’s difficult because we must never try to escape the hard work of communion and relationship. And that takes patience, love, and mercy with ourselves and with others. That DOES NOT mean ignoring wickedness or “affirming” insanity. But it does mean lovingly directing others to true repentance by practicing true repentance ourselves!

In the 9th century, the Church was embroiled in the conflict over the Holy Icons. But there were several heroes of the Faith who refused to deny the place of icons in our Faith. One such hero was St. Michael the Confessor. During the reign of the heretical iconoclastic Emperor Leo V, St. Michael, who had been consecrated bishop of his home town of Synnada in Asia Minor, was persecuted, banished, and driven from place to place by those who wanted to silence his robust defense of the Holy Icons in our Faith. Eventually, his hardships and bitter pains led him to die while he was in exile.

Today, do you expect others to keep rules you, yourself, don’t keep? Do you expect God to expect you to make sure others keep the rules? Perhaps it’s time to realize I have more than enough to take care of in dealing with my own sins before I can ever judge someone else. It’s only by God’s grace that I will ever be a Normal Orthodox Christian!

The Short-Sighted Rule keepers

It's easy to reduce all of life to a set of rules to keep. But that always degenerates into selfish pride and self-righteousness. The truth is we all need grace!

In fact, it is one of the most common human stumbles. We often try to do the right thing for all the wrong reasons.

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