As someone with a BA in Bible Doctrine from a small conservative college and one who fully understood (or so I thought) and preached against legalism and idolatry, I recently recognized in myself and in most other "committed believers" a legalism and elevation of extra biblical standards "based on biblical standards."

I'll attempt to explain; I heard a message one Sunday that explained that the expected behaviour towards and from those not already a regular part of your church's "core group" - those who are visiting, just joined, or anyone outside the church (saved or not), should not be Conformity > Belonging > Salvation but rather Belonging > Salvation > Conformity. I had long believed that I was practicing the later and not the former but soon realized that I quickly judge other's "propensity to be a good christian" based on their behaviour, background, and eagerness to conform to what our "core group" expected, which mostly has to do with our comfort and legalistic expectations. This stemmed from a lack of focus on the central theme of the Gospel throughout scripture. If you aren't reading and teaching scripture from the perspective that it is pointing to the Gospel in some way you are missing the message. In the past my church's leaders would talk about the Gospel and even do pure Gospel messages sometimes but it was always sort of "tacked on" at the end of a message instead of threaded throughout as the foundation for all truth.

Perhaps I'm over explaining it but the difference is subtle and easy to miss. It's almost as if you have to feel it to understand it but the difference is black and white, heaven and hell, it's that important.

Our hostile or superior attitudes and feelings toward other believers on "non-salvation" or "non-core" issues, as I would describe them, things that disarm the Gospel message of scripture or distort the image of God, stem from a lack of understanding our role in the Gospel story. Anyone who participates in anything other than healthy respect and debate towards other believers has slipped into the sins of the Pharisees and are worshiping knowledge about God in place of God himself. So unless someone is leading others to hell or a false heaven we should have nothing but mutual respect, love and be working together to spread the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Scripture teaches that the Church is what the world sees and will be the testimony of Christ, us together, no the individual.