As we have seen, it is not the law or the fulfillments of the added "do's and dont's" that make us real Christians. It is actually the justification by faith in accepting Christ's atonement on Calvary. Unfortunately, many preach and intermingle these add-on requirements of legalism and attempt to justify them by saying the scriptures promotes these teachings. I will like to talk about some of the more known "add-on" rules that we have used as benchmarks to judge one's Christianity as "Christian" or as "apostate and heresy". Here are some of the Galatias we live in today:

• Marital Status of Singleness: Recently in the church, the church of today has been swept away by one man's book that states in order to be seen as pure and blameless singles before God, we must "Kiss Dating Goodbye" and re-embrace courtship to marriage. Like the teachers of the law did in Galatia with making "add-on" rules as part of the requirements for true Christianity. Many have embraced one man's ideology and taught it to be the theology of all singles. To date is now seen as being "loose with no morals" To not date is seen as "the remant people of God". God explicitally tells us what true sexual purity is. The Bible does not say "do date" or "do not date". The Bible tells us to remain pure and that sex is reserved for the marriage covenant. If you want to date, that is fine. If you choose not to date, that is fine also. It does not matter if you date or not. All that matters is that you present yourself as a living sacrifice pure and holy to God and maintain virginity until marriage.
• Clothes Make The Holiness: There are some who are still convinced that women can not wear makeup, jewerly, dresses below their knees, a diamond engagement ring, short hair, etc. in order to live a life that is pleasing to God. There are some who are convinced that men must wear three piece suits, ties, oxford shirts, wingtip shoes in order to be seen as holy before God. I know that this practice is still manifested in the "old time religion" churches to the point where people are refused in the house of God because they do not adhere to the dress code. However, the standards are still kept as a sign of "holiness". Many Christian colleges uphold these same standards as rules of the dress code claiming holiness and to deter promiscuity. Clothes and jewerly in and of itself does not make you holy or less than holy, nor does it make people have sex with each other. It is the attitude of the heart. If your heart is pure and holy and you maintain the personal holiness in all areas of your life. It doesn't matter how you dress.
• American Christianity vs. Other Nation's Christianity: In America, we have this mentality that the only form of Christianity that is acceptable to God is the American way of Christianity. We view Christians from other countries as "liberal" and "compromising" because they do not "do as the American's do". In fact, many missionaries from America going overseas are so busy trying to "Americanize" the other nations to the point where we forget the real reason why we are here. To spread the love of God and the redemptive power of Christ to the world. We shun percussion instruments because we affiliate it with the voodoo doctors. We shun Christians who live in the British Commonwealth nations and deem them "liberal" and "apostate" because the Anglican church that ran the state did not like the freedom of religion that forced us to America. Therefore, we tend to consider most Australian and British Christians as fakes and compromising. However, if you notice in the world today, many of the latter day spiritual outpourings are occurring in the Commonwealth nations and are coming over here to America reigniting revival flames. Before Brownsville, Pensacola, and the Smithton revivals appeared, revival was going on in Toronto, the suburbs of London, South Africa, and in Australia. God is on the move today. Where we once were the instruments in spreading revival to the world, the world is bringing revival back to us to bring us out of the moral crisis we face. These Christians are my brothers and sisters who have experienced the same justification by faith.
• Speaking in Tongues: In Christianity, there exists a schizm of Christianity today where some do not believe that you have not been baptised in the Spirit until you speak in unknown tongues. To speak in unknown tongues, according to those who heavily promote this doctrine, gives you "carte blanche" access to the throneroom of God. To not speak in tongues is seen as weak and grieving the Holy Spirit. In fact, many who speak in tongues have taken this teaching further by measuring the annointing of the tongues by how many different tongues you say and by how fast you speak the tongues. Paul clearly sums this perspective up in 1 Corinthians 14 concerning when speaking in tongues edifies or does not edify. He states that it is better to edify the church by saying five words in the native language rather than thousands of words in unknown tongues.
• Our Christian Music: We have found a way to place music under the same legalism as other issues. We fight whether we should listen to hymns or praise and worship. New songs are considered not to be of God because they were not written in the times of Amazing Grace, did not have the southern country "twang", or their beat is "worldly". In fact, Amazing Grace, was written to the music of an old Irish drinking song. If this fact was well publicized, does Amazing Grace lose it's annointing? God forbid. God is moving in the hearts of his people in worship in many forms. I remember when contemporary Christian music (CCM) became popular. First, it was the Jesus Freaks of the sixties and the seventies that changed Christian music to reach the generations. Where hymns of the past dealt more with Jesus and his blood, the Jesus Freak music dealt with applying Jesus and his blood to the social issues and addictions many of the original Jesus Freaks were trying to walk through. The early CCM pioneers were called compromisers for their new style of music. When artists like Stryper were able to reach secular markets with the message of God, Christianity decided to forsake these musicians and brand them as heretics and backsliders and refused to help and pray for these Christian musician's outreach ministry. We benchmarked one's annointing and spirituality based on the style of the music instead of the justification by faith that took place within their individual hearts. Now the debate continues with the new punk and ska styles that are common in today's culture. Are these styles inferior? No. Bands like the Supertones help reach cultures for Jesus that the average church can not reach. Hallelujah.
• Generation Gap: We have used the generations as a benchmark of Christianity. The establishment Christianity of the 1960's viewed the Jesus Freaks as spiritual zombies because of their clothes, hair, music, and their problems. The establishment was not prepared for the harvest and looked on the outside and deemed the Jesus Freaks as "not meeting" the benchmarks of the "add-on" requirements they worshipped. Most Jesus Freaks went back into the world while some became the younger version of the establishment that now denounce the new Jesus Freak movement prevalent with Gen Xers today. How quick did they forget that at one time, they were on the other side being exuberant and zealous to reach others for God. The styles and cultures are different but the change of heart and the justification by faith is the same.
• Racism Within The Church: In Christian America, the time between 10AM and Noon is the most segregated hours of the week. Blacks and whites have to communicate with each other daily on the job, daily in commerce, or on the athletic fields playing sports. Meanwhile, Blacks go to their Black churches and Whites go to their White churches on Sunday. Where the white church concentrates on topics that only influence the upper middle class. The Black church concentrates on social issues and oppressions within society. White Christians tend to view their black brothers and sisters in Christ as inferior and always asking for a handout never sastisfied with what they have. The Black church views the White church as condescending, aloof, and cowards for failing to address problems in society. Many feel that some of the members of White churches are the ones who create problems they face. Therefore each side, through their benchmarks, have a disdain for the other side and refuse to come into unity for the gospel. Both sides fail to realize that each other went through the same justification by faith experiences and therefore our brothers and sisters in Christ. We tend to think that the problem of racism within the church is solved already. This is either done by reconcialiation meetings of overcompensatory measures or the annual unity service held once a year to appease the status quo and to show the press "we're together now" but next Sunday, we pick back up where we left off and continue the schizm further.
• Education: In conservative Christian America, education is now used as a benchmark to establish holiness, seperation from the world, and to show an elitist mentality. Parents of kids in homeschools / Christian private schools tend to see their children not only as superior students, but as superior Christians when compared to their public school counterparts. Many parents encourage their kids to hang out only with other kids that are homeschooled or attend Christian private schools fearing that kids who attend public school will somehow contaminate the innocent minds of their child. What is even worse is that many hard working middle class parents desire to place their kids in Christian schools, but lack the financial resources to do so. Then both the parents and the kids are seen as inferior. The parents are told they lack faith because they are not rich and the kids are seen as being brainwashed, demonized, and humanized against Christian morals by the liberal education curriculums. Therefore, we widen the gap, and create a form of racism and seperatism based on a legalistic "add-on" instead of praying for our schools. These same parents have the audacity to tell us how to vote in the elections and how the schools should be ran and then refuse to subject their children to the educational system they urged and successfully voted in. The problem is not when prayer was taken out of the public schools that the schools degraded, the problem got worse when we gave up on our schools and refused to be the light in the school in fear darkness will overcome the light. The ideas we use to protect and to benchmark ends up inhibiting the flow of the gospel to the ethnic cultures around us. It's not if you homeschool or if you don't homeschool, it's the true intentions of the heart to worship Jesus that matters.
• Politics: In Christian society today, we see the deep chasm getting deeper and wider in reference to politics. On one side, we have the "Republican Religious Right". On the other side, we have the "Democrat Demonic Dysfunction". We try to legislate righetousness. We now register people to vote at our churches. Our churches sell their membership rolls to Christian Political Organizations to where you receive a "voters guide" telling you how to vote or experience hell, doom, or the communists. We used this benchmark to judge salvation. For a Christian to confess that they are a Democrat means ridicule, fear, damnation, and inferiority. In fact, this subject interrelates with the Racial Galatia. Most white churches tend to hold a Republican viewpoint while their black counterparts hold a Democrat viewpoint. This nation, instead of praying for their President, decided to make him fail at all costs by refusing to submit to their authorities, refusing to pray for him, and look for evil in every action he did. I am not saying that Bill Clinton is perfect and/or just. But the Christians just "gave up" on this country in order to make the country go to the lowest denominator in order to have ammunition for the next election. In the Reagan years, Christian America prayed for him daily and blessed him with respect. In the Clinton years, Christian America betrayed him and failed to interceed for him and then turned it around by saying "He betrayed us in moral turpitude". We did not give Clinton a fair chance to be our leader. We doomed him from the start because of his political affiliation and cursed him and this nation because we did not get our way like spoiled brats. It's not that the Christians did not get out and vote, God has His hand on us. If a Republican gets elected, our moral crisis will not change overnight. The Republican and the Democrat christian experiences the same justification by faith. God does not care if you are a Democrat or a Republican. God wants your heart and not your political garments.

Click Here for part six of The Galatia We Live In.