Should We Ditch Standards?

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• Dr Desmond Ford
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Dec 31, 2014 1941

By Desmond Ford

What is surprising is not that men and women who know not God should ditch standards but the fact that many professing Christ have done the same – at least in their theology. Standards have been equated with legalism and ridiculed.

The tragic record of history is that with every revival of the gospel has come a revival of antinomianism – opposition to law. It happened in the days of Martin Luther, when in the Peasant’s Revolt multitudes raged without control, bringing devastation in their wake. It is true to say that literally millions of professed Christians will go to hell with puny standards.

The fact that those who claim to believe in the imputed infinite righteousness of Christ, have simultaneously cherished in their own lives a shocking low level of practical righteousness is a proof of the deceitfulness of sin. Our Lord warned us of all this in the ordination sermon which we call the Sermon on the Mount (see Mt 7:21-27).

Human nature is proverbially one-eyed. It seems mysterious that some people can read the first half of every letter of Paul about salvation by grace alone and yet ignore or misunderstand the second half of those same letters which call for the dedication of body, soul and mind to the Redeemer.

– Des Ford. Rom 8:27–32 (From “To Hell With Standards!”)