There is a prevailing attitude out there; elitism, really, that believes that if you have the holy spirit, it makes what you do… somehow “matter more.” For example, if two people, side by side, do the exact same thing for the exact same reason, most think the person who has the holy spirit is “obeying God,” and “blessed for his righteousness,” while the person who did not have the holy spirit is cursed for having righteousness that is “as filthy rags,” because it is not “special” righteousness inspired by the holy spirit.

Quoting Isaiah 64:6 out of context, they say “all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags!” – telling us that no matter WHAT righteousness WE do, it is filthy rags to God; meaningless, except perhaps in some abstract sense. And no matter WHAT a man does to please God it is USELESS unless God is IN us, doing that act for us. They support that by quoting a few other scraps of scriptures out of context, like “nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me” (Galatians 2:20), using that to mean that no matter what things WE do, it is worthless; only if Christ lives IN you can anything you do matter.

Basically the conclusion they draw is that every good thing we do isn’t US, it’s just the holy spirit working in us; and without that, no righteousness, no good act for any reason can please God. They believe that the holy spirit is rather like a transmission; without the holy spirit your transmission is in neutral and you can rev your engine and work and work and all you get is a cloud of smoke out the tailpipe; but with the spirit of God IN you, it ENGAGES that engine, connects your WORK to God and NOW you can really go places!

And… all of that is wrong. Every single word. Not one concept outlined above has any basis in the Bible whatsoever. I treat the concept of filthy rags fully in other articles, such as “Be Perfect!” and “What Is Self-Righteousness?”; but to summarize here, filthy rags righteousness isn’t really righteousness at all; filthy rags righteousness is obeying traditions of men, laws that men made up and treated like God’s laws, as Jesus condemned in Mark 7 and Matthew 15, which you can see is the context of Isaiah 64:6.

There, Isaiah speaks of people who are UNRIGHTEOUS, who have forgotten their God, and are simply obeying empty traditions (Isaiah 1, Matthew 23) which God hates and which are a stench to His nostrils; THAT so-called righteousness IS filthy rags to God! But never in the entire Bible does it say that obedience to the Ten Commandments is filthy rags. Every scripture they use to show that must be quoted grossly out of context and twisted to make it say that.

Romans 7:14 For we know that the law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin.

The Ten Commandments are a SPIRITUAL law. They are not a carnal law. The Ten Commandments are meant to be, and CAN be, obeyed in the spirit. But the laws of Moses can only be obeyed in the flesh; you can’t spiritually put yourself outside the camp if you’re unclean; you can’t spiritually sacrifice a dove in your heart; you can’t spiritually wash this or that pot; they are works that are meant to be obeyed in the letter. Those things have various symbolic meanings, but at heart they are works of the flesh, not works of the spirit.

But the Ten Commandments CAN be obeyed in both the letter, and the spirit. They were designed to be used in the spirit, and they are a spiritual law. Now phrases like “spiritual law,” are grossly misdefined and no one really knows WHAT they mean; most people believe it’s a law that “only God’s spirit can obey,” or something like that, but that’s not it at all. Yes, God has a spirit, but SO DO YOU!

Job 32:8 But there is a spirit in man: and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth them understanding.

A fleshly law just means a law that was intended to be obeyed by the flesh – the body. Your body. A spiritual law means a law that was intended to be obeyed by the spirit – your spirit. In practice, it ISN’T obeyed by your spirit as a rule, but it was MEANT to be.

Matthew 5:21-22 Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not kill… But I say unto you, That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment…

And John makes it clearer…

1 John 3:15 Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer: and ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him.

Hating your brother does NOT break the commandment “thou shalt not kill,” IF it is treated as a “carnal law,” a law that applies only to the outside body! But it DOES break it if it is a spiritual law, one which applies to your SPIRIT!

Those people I mentioned up front would have you believe that if you have the spirit of God and obey the “spiritual law,” and some heathen obeyed that EXACT same law for the exact same reason, you’d be loved and they’d be treated like soiled toilet paper! That is not fair, or at all consistent with scripture!

Paul directly contradicts that idea when he says…

Romans 2:14-15 For when the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these, having not the law, are a law unto themselves: Which shew the work of the law written in their hearts…

Those people are afraid of these scriptures; they try to backpedal and say “well, I suppose that they have SOME reward for being righteous, but it’s still NOTHING compared to the reward those have who have God’s holy spirit!” – do you see the recurring thread? To them, the SPIRIT is a magic pill that makes those who have it BETTER than those who don’t. It makes their righteousness COUNT more than those who don’t have it. But look very closely at what this scripture says;

If the Gentiles, which do NOT have the law (i.e. they know nothing of the Ten Commandments), do by nature the things the Ten Commandments SAY… they show the work of the law written ON THEIR HEARTS! They are obeying the law in their SPIRIT – in their MIND! And now back up a verse and read WHY Paul said this…

Romans 2:13 (For not the hearers of the law are just before God, but the doers of the law shall be justified.

As Paul continues later in this chapter, those Jews who thought they were special because they were Jews – who thought they could get by with disobeying the law because they were “God’s chosen people,” were WRONG. And that Gentiles, or ANYONE, who did the right thing got the credit.

Paul was saying that it DOESN’T matter WHO you are, it’s who OBEYS the law who is justified; whether Jew or Gentile (and with or without the holy spirit), God is all about results; if you obey the law in the SPIRIT as God expects you to do, no matter WHO you are, you are justified.

Now that phrase – “with or without the holy spirit” – is sure to raise your hackles, so let me explain. Yes, you certainly DO need the holy spirit – everyone does. But you don’t need it for the REASONS most people believe!

Psalms 119:172 My tongue shall speak of thy word: for all thy commandments are righteousness.

Righteousness is obedience to the law. No matter who obeys God, they are righteous. No matter who is righteous, they are respected equally.

Acts 10:34-35 Then Peter opened his mouth, and said, Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons: But IN EVERY NATION he that feareth him, AND WORKETH RIGHTEOUSNESS, IS ACCEPTED with him.

So righteousness is righteousness, plain and simple; having the holy spirit, having a demon, or being a heathen, it can’t change righteousness one bit and make one person’s obedience any more special than another. It simply doesn’t matter to God. IF you obey Him, you’ll be accepted equally.

But there is a factor of motive which does affect how God treats your obedience. The Ten Commandments can be obeyed two ways, outside or inside; with your body alone, or with your body AND your mind. Not stealing because you’re afraid of being caught, and not stealing because you love the truth and hate the idea of stealing is seen as identical… but only IF you’re obeying the Ten Commandments as a CARNAL LAW!

They are indistinguishable because a carnal law, by definition, only affects and observes that which happens on the OUTSIDE of the body – not what goes on in the mind! And so when someone obeys God, even for completely wrong reasons, under the old, carnal covenant – God rewards them.

Psalms 78:36-38 Nevertheless they did flatter him with their mouth, and they lied unto him with their tongues. For their heart was not right with him, neither were they stedfast in his covenant. But he, being full of compassion, forgave their iniquity, and destroyed them not: yea, many a time turned he his anger away, and did not stir up all his wrath.

And so God – knowing FULL WELL that their heart was not right, and that they only were flattering Him to get Him to stop punishing their nation – still, because they returned and sought Him, and obeyed Him – He forgave them. KNOWING they didn’t mean it, and KNOWING that their hearts would go right back doing evil very soon! Knowing that they were LYING to Him, He forgave them – because all that mattered was WHAT THEY DID! Not what they thought! And right then, at that second, they were obedient and that’s what counted!

Why you obey God is meaningless under the old covenant! There is no such thing as a spiritual sin; you can hate your brother and it doesn’t break the commandment not to kill! So no matter WHY you obeyed God, you were rewarded.

But not under the new covenant. Anyone under the spiritual covenant is bound to obey the spiritual law. And for those people, God looks on the heart; if the heart is not right, if the motives are not right, the actions are meaningless. But if the Gentile obeys the law not to steal because he believes stealing is wrong and hurts people, and YOU obey the law for that EXACT SAME REASON, the Gentile is credited with the SAME amount of righteousness as YOU are!

His righteousness and his noble intent is no less valuable because the spirit of God is not with him; the holy spirit doesn’t make ANY difference in that regard; it doesn’t magically change “filthy rags” righteousness to “white linen” righteousness!

Ephesians 5:9 (For the fruit of the Spirit is in ALL goodness and righteousness and truth;)

Most assume this means the spirit GIVES you righteousness – somehow helps you, gives you the strength to BE righteous. They also believe that somehow, when you receive the holy spirit, the “fruits” of the spirit… love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance… are in some ethereal, incomprehensibly indefinable way “put in you” – thereby you receive righteousness, faith, peace, etc. This is painfully, horribly, destructively wrong!

To keep with our car metaphor from the beginning, the holy spirit is not the transmission; the holy spirit is the MAP! What you RECEIVE when you get the holy spirit is only the ABILITY to get these things. The GUIDE to finding them!

These fruits are all the product of simple obedience to the law of God. But the carnal mind, by itself, won’t be able to do this; YOUR spirit lusts to envy, it LOVES to do evil, “because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be” (Romans 8:7).

Your spirit doesn’t know what right and wrong are! It has never been in contact with the law of God, it knows only what it wants and what it is trained by society to believe! It is CARNAL, sold under sin. It knows no better, and without the spirit of God as a guide, it CANNOT know better!

The holy spirit DOES NOT help you obey the law. It doesn’t “give you the strength to obey.” Nor does it “possess” you. It will NOT make you obey something you don’t want to obey.

1 Corinthians 14:32 And the spirits of the prophets are subject to the prophets.

You have CONTROL over the spirit, NOT the other way around! All the spirit can do is TELL you the right way to go – and then let you CHOOSE to do it or not. For example, the holy spirit will cause you to think “I shouldn’t have done that,” and then you have a choice; you can obey it, say “oops!,” and stop; or you can justify yourself, ignore it, and go on with your life. But IT IS A CHOICE! A choice that YOUR SPIRIT must make; a choice between what makes sense and what God says… and what you WANT and what everyone else says! And the job of the holy spirit is merely to PRESENT you with that choice!

If you choose to overrule YOUR spirit and listen to the correction of the holy spirit, you will be one step closer to God. But the holy spirit DIDN’T help you obey! It only told you what you should do. YOU either chose to OBEY, or you DIDN’T.

The spirit will then repeat this process again, and again, and again. The FRUITS of this process of eliminating errors in your character will be love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, and temperance!

Without the holy spirit, you might occasionally stumble upon one or two of these traits; if you do by nature those things contained in the law, you would be a law unto yourself and be rewarded for obeying that law; but you could not achieve ALL of them; you could not pattern yourself to the mind of God because you would have no template from which to build!

Because without the holy spirit to offer you that choice and show you the proper road to take, you could not discern right from wrong. Your own conscience cannot do this! YOUR spirit is carnal and CANNOT tell you right and wrong! It has no clue what righteousness is, and so while you may accidentally, “without the law obey those things contained in the law,” you can never obey the FULL law without the holy spirit because you simply WON’T KNOW WHAT IT IS!

But whatever it is that you DO obey will be JUST as valuable as a person who has the holy spirit! You just can’t go as far because you lack a roadmap! The holy spirit is a template; a pattern to refer to; it shows you what a perfect, righteous spirit, tested in all points like as we are and yet without sin, is like.

It gives you a BASELINE. God’s conscience in your mind, so you can compare your ignorant, carnal spirit to something perfect and see what you NEED to change in order to obey ALL the laws with the right MOTIVES!

But if you think you have the holy spirit and that somehow it makes your obedience more valuable, don’t kid yourself:

The same act and thought takes on no greater significance and merits no greater reward because you have the spirit of God.