From Shadow to Reality When a Believer Runs Back to the Law (Part 2 of 3) The Flesh Can Wear a Religious Form Why Does It Want to Contribute to What Is by Grace?

To the flesh—meaning, in Paul’s sense, the self-centered human nature not submitted to God—it is humiliating that it cannot save itself. Therefore it can flee not only into open sin, but also into religious performance. For the flesh, it is often easier to build a system than to bow in faith before the sufficiency of Christ.

Paul exposes this in Galatians:

Galatians 3:2–3 (KJV)
“This only would I learn of you, Received ye the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith?
Are ye so foolish? having begun in the Spirit, are ye now made perfect by the flesh?”

This is still a timely question. Many believers truly began with Christ by faith. But later, almost unnoticed, they switch into performance mode. They no longer think, “What God began, He will carry through,” but rather, “Now it is up to me to maintain by my own strength what I received only by grace.”

This thinking is not taking the responsibility of obedience seriously; it is replacing the source—shifting from faith to self-powered religiosity.

This is where legalism slips in wearing Christian clothing.

A person who began by faith starts trying to “finish” in the flesh. Not necessarily through gross sin, but through religious self-building. And that is exactly why it is dangerous: from the outside, it may even look like zeal.

One’s Own Righteousness or God’s Righteousness?

What Does It Mean That “Christ Is the End of the Law”?

When Paul speaks about Israel, he describes a heart-condition that is a recurring human pattern in every age. He is not laying out merely an ethnic issue, but a spiritual diagnosis:

Romans 10:3–4 (KJV)
“For they being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God.
For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth.”

“Going about to establish their own righteousness” can still happen today among religious people. The heart wants something to present. It wants to stand in something visible, measurable, comparable.

But Christ’s righteousness is not a human construction. Not a performance list. Not a spiritual results report. Christ’s righteousness is a received righteousness: a person partakes of it by faith.

It is important to understand the word “end” carefully here. In the Greek New Testament, the word is telos (Strong G5056), which can mean not only termination, but also goal, fulfillment, end-point. In other words, in this context Christ is not merely the “abolisher” of the law, but its fulfillment and goal reached for every believer in the matter of righteousness.

Therefore, at the root of legalism there is often not simply “strictness,” but a trust problem: the person does not rest in Christ, and so begins manufacturing spiritual supports for himself.

The Place of Good Works

Not the Foundation, but the Fruit

We must be very precise here, or misunderstanding easily follows. The fact that a person is not justified by works does not mean that works are unimportant.

Scripture does not play grace and obedience against each other; it puts them in the right order:

Ephesians 2:8–10 (KJV)
“For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:
Not of works, lest any man should boast.
For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.”

This is God’s order:

• salvation: by grace, through faith;
• life-walk: walking in good works.

The legalistic heart reverses this:

• “good works → acceptance”

But the gospel says this:

• “justification and standing in grace in Christ → good works”

Therefore the question is not whether there is service, prayer, fasting, consecration. The question is what these grow from. If they are used as the root, legalism will result. If they spring forth as fruit from Christ, they are blessed.

The Pharisee and the Publican

Two Ways in the Same House of Prayer

Jesus did not teach this merely in theory, but by exposing hearts. In the account of the Pharisee and the publican, two men stand before God—and something deeper than outward religious difference is revealed: what they build their approach to God upon.

Luke 18:9–14 (KJV)
“And he spake this parable unto certain which trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others:
Two men went up into the temple to pray; the one a Pharisee, and the other a publican.
The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, God, I thank thee, that I am not as other men are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican.
I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess.
And the publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying, God be merciful to me a sinner.
I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other: for every one that exalteth himself shall be abased; and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted.”

Did the Pharisee say false things? Not necessarily. Several of his statements were, in themselves, religiously proper practices. The problem was that he built identity, covering, and superiority out of them.

This is one sure sign of legalism: a person not only measures himself by it, but also measures others. Where humility in Christ is replaced by comparison, the religious heart has already drifted.

Dear Reader,
This teaching became longer than usual, so I divided it into three parts. We know that after a while, attention can become scattered, and then the message is harder to receive clearly. In the next part comes the conclusion, together with the closing thoughts and self-examination questions.