Three Lies and the Truth

As Christians we must confront three specific lies so that we can walk in the truth.

Most of us have played the game, “Three truths and a lie.” After we narrate three true things about ourselves and manufacture one fiction, our friends respond and attempt to guess which statement is actually untrue. Where’s the lie, here?

“I grew up in California, I have been pulled over for drunk driving (even when the hardest thing I’ve had to drink was Mountain Dew),  I lived in Canada for a year, and I’ve met a presidential candidate while they were running for office.”

The game’s key is to make the lie sound convincing, and sometimes, we find, the lies can seem very convincing indeed. (The lie is the fourth one, by the way).

The same holds true with Christian teaching. Sometimes we find it difficult to discern truth and error, false Christianity from true Christianity. But we must learn to discern lies and the truth, because it’s too important not to. To do this work of discerning true Christianity I want to use a three-part framework that Amos Yong has developed: orthodoxy (faithful beliefs), orthopraxy (faithful actions), and orthopathy (faithful affections). In other words, true Christianity gets the whole person involved in the action: the head (belief), the heart (affection), and the hands (action). We must believe the right things, do the right things, and love the right things. Losing any one of these is like losing one of the wheels on a tricycle—it will at the best stop your progress and at the worst cause a damaging crash. The wheels can come off the trike in three ways. We must confront these three ways, three specific lies, so that we can walk in the truth. (And for each lie there is also an overcorrection that pushes us into danger in an opposite direction.)

Lie #1: Legalism

Legalism =  Correct beliefs (orthodoxy) + Obedient action (orthopraxy) - passionate affection (orthopathy)
(or)
Legalism =  Head + Hands - Heart

Legalism simmers when we get our doctrinal and biblical truth lined up in just the right places, assembling a system of theological truth that aligns with God’s Word. Let’s illustrate this point by thinking about a car. The doctrine is like the engine, everything is tuned and calibrated and built with the precision and performance that would inspire pride in an Italian engineer. Combine this with an outward appearance of obedience, a good aesthetic design, quality materials and paint. Think of a Ferrari, spraying sunlight off its beautiful bodywork.

Legalism has the engine of orthodoxy (correct beliefs). It believes in the Trinity, justification by faith, and could recite confessions and creeds and books of Scripture from memory. It also tends looks like folks think a Christian should look, giving time, ability, and financially to the work of the church, refusing to smoke or drink or chew (or to hang out with those who do). Legalism, like that Ferrari, looks stunning and impresses.

But imagine: you approach that perfectly tuned Ferrari, with a beautifully designed and buffed body; you get up close, cup your hands around your eyes to see through the tinted windows, and you see inside and—nothing. There is no seat, no dashboard, no steering wheel. It’s a shell. It’s empty. Aesthetically and mechanically everything is exactly as it should, except you can’t drive it.

This is a picture of legalism. It believes the right doctrines, it does the right actions, but there’s no love for God on the inside. It’s a shell of Christianity, without affection for the Lord or for his people.

It’s all knowledge and activity, but it’s empty.

Orthopathy, or correct Christian affection or correct Christian love, is required for faithful Christianity. We must have deeply embedded and expressed love for God and for our neighbors. Some streams of Christianity tend to fall into legalism, especially ones that prize the Bible and sound doctrine. Now, we want to get our teaching right and we want to obey God. And we also want to be people and a place of love. No one wants to be a part of a family that has a nice house, good jobs and good grades, but you sit at dinner and it’s clearly cold and no one affectionately loves one another.

Now, some other streams of Christianity avoid this danger, as they should, but they overcorrect, so elevating the affections and the heart that they tumble into the danger of emotionalism. It’s all about feelings and chasing the elusive and momentary experience of God.

We don’t want to fall into the danger of legalism or to overcorrect into emotionalism.

We want to be faithful Christians.

Lie #2: Liberalism

Liberalism =  Obedient action (orthopraxy) + passionate affection (orthopathy) - Correct beliefs (orthodoxy)
(or)
Liberalism =  Hands + Heart - Head

Liberalism is the attempting to get action and affection in order, but without a framework of biblical and orthodox Christian belief. Let’s go back to our Ferrari. Here we see in the driveway a beautiful yellow supercar. (or pick your favorite color, mine is yellow); and we open the door to find perfectly stitched leather and hand-crated aluminum. Everything is perfect, at least, as far as we can tell, the finest Italian craftsmanship. But when we try to start the car, nothing happens. We discover that there is no mechanical or electrical powertrain installed. It looks and feels like a Ferrari, but it doesn’t have the engine of a Ferrari.

Just so liberalism has the exterior behaviors of Christianity and the seeming love for God and others of Christianity, but it doesn’t actually believe the truth of Christianity. It rejects historic Christian teaching on doctrinal and ethical themes. It rejects the Trinity or justification by faith or a biblical vision of sexuality. Liberalism is a nice and seemingly culturally safe version of Christianity that gives all the benefits of the kingdom of Christ without requiring submission to Christ the King.

Now, we can’t overreact to liberalism by retreating in an intellectualism, where we get so doctrinally focused that we only have our beliefs, regardless of actions or affections.

We don’t want liberalism or intellectualism.

We want to be faithful Christians.

Lie #3: Pietism

Pietism = Correct beliefs (orthodoxy) + passionate affection (orthopathy) - obedient action (orthopraxy)
(or)
Pietism = Head + Heart - Hands

Pietism generally believes the right things about doctrine and Scripture, and it loves God and others, but it doesn’t manifest those beliefs or affections in the world around it in a meaningful, attractive way. It focuses on worship and community but not on mission. It never shares the gospel with the lost or brings justice to the vulnerable. We can illustrate pietism with a scene from the masterpiece of cinema, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. The main character Ferris Bueller has a best friend named Cameron. Cameron’s dad has a classic Ferrari that he keeps in the garage. Ferris wants to take the car out, but Cameron protests, “He never drives it. He just rubs it with a diaper.” What a waste.

A Christian faith that believes and loves the right things but that never gets out onto the street is a waste. Pietism doesn’t do the world around it much good, because it takes the greatest news in the world and keeps it safe and refuses to put any road miles on the odometer. It covers the light of the gospel with a basket of self-protection and self-focus.

Now, some overreact to pietism by focusing almost exclusively on action in a sort of activism, which is all about doing good things but rather unconcerned with God himself.

But again, we don’t want pietism or activism.

We want to be faithful Christians.

Truth: Christianity

Christianity = Correct beliefs (orthodoxy) + passionate affection (orthopathy) + obedient action (orthopraxy)
(or)
Christianity = Head + Heart + Hands

Now the goal of our instruction is love that comes from a pure heart, a good conscience, and a sincere faith. (1 Timothy 1:5)

True Christianity is the head, the heart, and the hands working together as a cohesive whole. A Christian believes the truth about God and the Bible, loves God and what God loves, and does what God calls them to do. True Christianity is fully whole and coherent, fully “ortho” (straight, aligned). This coherence is not just true to the coherence and consistency of Christianity, but to the order of reality itself. Christianity is not just internally consistent but externally consistent.

When I was out of town recently, I rented a car that I’ve had my eye on for some time, a Kia Stinger GT. Kia has a reputation for being an inexpensive car brand, but it does not have a reputation for luxury or performance. I have to tell you, though, that Kia knocked the ball out of the park with the Stinger. The Stinger has the performance, quality, and aesthetics that make an enthusiast’s car enthusiastic. It’s the whole package.

Christians should be the whole package, worried less about labels and style and concerned more about life and substance.

We should be robust in our doctrine.

We should be passionate in our affection.

We should be intentional in our action.

So, What Now?

1. Inspect your Christianity

We all have proclivities. Some of us tend toward legalism or intellectualism, or toward pietism or emotionalism. Which of the three aspects comes most unnaturally to you? Which do you tend to neglect? Which do you tend to focus on? Personally, I’m drawn toward pietism and intellectualism. I tend to want to learn and feel the truth but sometimes have difficulty putting it into practice. I can tend to admire my Christianity in the garage rather than putting miles on it out on the street. God is kind, because he gave me a wife who has different tendencies, inclining toward legalism. Together, we are a means of God’s grace in each other’s lives. What are your leanings? Where are the means of grace in your life?

2. Learn to Discern

Just like we all have proclivities and tendencies, we also tend to toward certain types of resources and teachers. Maybe you’re drawn to strong, sound doctrinal teaching. Maybe you’re drawn toward more activist sorts of rousing of the troops. Maybe you’re drawn to more Spirit-filled, charismatic kinds of expressions.

Learn to discern the strengths and weaknesses of the various voices speaking into your heart and mind.

Years ago, I learned that you can often tell if a Rolex watch is real or cheap knock-off. If the second hand moves smoothly around the watch face it tends to be real but if it ticks in a typical start-stop movement, it’s surely a fake. To the untrained eye, they might look similar and be hard to distinguish, but a jeweler or even a novice with a bit of knowledgable discernment knows the signs of the real thing.

We must learn to discern the real from the fake, truth from lies, and to cultivate a fully “ortho” Christianity in our faith and practice.

The stakes are too high not to.