I preached on being “Under Authority” on Sunday from 1 Corinthians 2:6-14. The basic idea is that the Bible is not some myth invented by humans to perpetrate their own religious cult-like values, nor is it just a polemic to discredit other philosophical or religious ideals. It is the revelation of the very inner thoughts and purposes of God from all eternity, revealed to broken human beings. The result is that every true believer is under the authority of God’s Word to live by its truths and principles.  In our morally relative culture this is a problem. Obviously our culture lives by, but is not limited to, other premises: “be true to yourself,” and “what works for you is great but that might be different from what works for me.” Everything terminates with self and is highly relative.

Believers do not have that luxury, or better stated “convenience,” of these two cultural principles.  We have chosen to submit to the Lord’s authority and live by His revelation. Being that He created everything and is the architect of all life then God has the right to tell us how that life should properly operate.

“Being true to yourself” – This is very problematic because it is not biblical. There is nothing from the Bible that indicates that “being true to ourselves” is equal to God’s standard of righteousness:

14 For the love of Christ controls us, having concluded this that one died for all, therefore all died; 15 and He died for all, that they who live should no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died and rose again on their behalf. (2Cor 5:14-15 NAS)

The standard of the believer is: to be true to living according to God’s righteousness as a child of God. The only inference of being “true to self” is the new self which is created in Christ Jesus:

“… and put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth. (Ephesians 4:24 NAS)

 In either case, the believer’s faithfulness is not self-defined but Christ-centered, and righteousness is always God’s righteousness, not our own.

“What works for you may not work for me” – To be honest, it is very inconsistent to live with such relative standards and no one can actually be consistent doing it. That is, of course, the beauty of this thought process. A person can change the rules whenever they want, simply to feel free to do what they want, and not feel guilty. In actuality all that matters in this system is not the determination of what is true, but the only guide for life that has any value is the one that I choose to embrace at this moment for my own sake. Of course the Bible speaks to the problem of the heart and the complexity of being “true to self” –

“Thus says the LORD, ‘Cursed is the man who trusts in mankind and makes flesh his strength, and whose heart turns away from the LORD.'” (Jeremiah 17:5 NAS)

“The heart is more deceitful than all else and is desperately sick; who can understand it?” (Jeremiah 17:9 NAS)

We cannot expect anyone other than followers of Christ to submit to the authority of God’s Word, so don’t expect those who do not know God to live by the Bible. That is silly; but every true believer must be committed to accept and live by the truth God has revealed to us by His Spirit.