Gospel Living According To Galatians
Sunday, October 7
Galatians
I want to feed on God’s Word, do an extended expositional series
As we saw in Dt 6, we’re to be obsessed with God’s Word (talk about it when we sit and rise, teach it to our children). Jn 17, God’s Word is an indispensable part of the life of a follower of Jesus.
I want to explore the Gospel and Christian Living
We want to be renewed, transformed by God’s Word, and the Gospel
Galatians is one of the best explanations of the Gospel, doctrinal teaching
Paul is passionate and zealous for the Gospel.
He is yelling on paper, he is confrontational, he is calling down curses.
There is urgency and emotion; one commentator calls it “compassionate rage.” In Galatians, Paul is in the heat of a controversy and he gets emotionally upset that these churches have turned from the Gospel, that they’ve distorted the Gospel, that they are not living in light of the truth of the Gospel. For Paul, the Gospel is everything, and so he is fiery when the Gospel is being undermined and compromised.
And through this problem, we get a careful and extended explanation of the Gospel of Grace.
I pray we also would come
to a deeper understanding of the Gospel, and that we also would catch
some of that passion. Maybe we could better see what the Apostle
Paul saw so clearly. We also would find the Gospel to be more
precious and powerful in our lives.
Today I just want to give a
general overview and 3 themes/lessons from the book as a whole.
(Lord willing) we’ll walk through the verses starting next week.
1. We gain God’s favor through faith not through the law.
Jesus was a Jew, all the disciples were Jews. At the beginning there was no such thing as a non-Jewish (Gentile) follower of Jesus. But now the Gospel was spreading to Gentiles, and so what are these Gentiles to do? There was growing concern that as the number of Gentile Christians increased, what would be done to preserve and protect the ethical, moral standards of the church? Jews did not have a high regard for Gentile morals.
Paul is addressing a problem. There have been opponents of Paul who had been preaching that these Gentile Christians needed to observe Mosaic law, or more specifically, they should be circumcised. This was a big and controversial issue in Paul’s day.
Some men
came down from Judea to Antioch and were teaching the brothers: “Unless
you are circumcised, according to the custom taught by Moses, you cannot
be saved.” (Acts 15:1)
These “trouble-makers”
would saying that Paul got the gospel wrong, that he was compromising
the message to accommodate the Gentiles. They were discrediting
his authority—Paul was not one of the original disciples. You
need to listen to the church in Jerusalem, not to this renegade Paul.
Outline of Galatians
1-2 Paul’s Defense of His Apostleship
biographical sketch, how he became an apostle
this Gospel comes directly from God
Peter was not associating with Gentiles, and Paul confronts him, “not in step with the truth of the Gospel”
Justification by faith, not by obeying the law/works
Argues how the law gives a curse not salvation
We’re living in a promise, not a works/merit system
We’re living as heirs, not slaves
Then what is the purpose of the law for us?
We are free, not free to indulge our sinfulness, but free to love one another
The Gospel does not lead to loose or licentious living, but love and godliness
The answer to how we’re
going to live loving and godly lives is that we must live by the Spirit.
It is not law, it is life in the Spirit. It’s not about circumcision,
but about becoming a new creation.
Most commentators suggest this
book is about Paul defending his apostleship so that he has authority
to defend the doctrine of justification by faith alone. Our obedience
to the law, our good works do not gain us salvation or favor from God.
And that does sum up the first two sections very well.
A few years ago, I would have
heard this and thought, Yes, but I already understand that. I
understand that we’re not saved by good works. Teach me something
I don’t know, something I don’t already understand.
But Galatians is a defense not to nonChristians but to Christians. Paul is passionately explaining the Gospel to Christians, not for their conversion, but for how they are living.
Peter is rebuked from not
wanting to eat with uncircumcised Gentiles. Paul says he was “not
acting in line with the truth of the Gospel.” We want to spell
out the implications of this Gospel so that our Christian lives are
living in light of it.
We need to understand the Gospel. We have a tendency toward self-reliance, self-salvation.
Just like Ge 3, we try to solve our own problems, find our own solutions instead of turning to God, putting our trust in Him.
In the Christian life, I’m like this, we think, well, what do I need to do. Tell me what I should do so I can try to go do it. It is a subtle from of self-reliance. We’re still trusting ourselves.
And we have a tendency toward self-centeredness. We think it’s all about me. It’s about what I do.
Jesus Story Bible. I told Elijah, the Bible is not a book about great people we should be like. Be like David or Moses or Abraham. Instead, the Bible is a book about what God has done for us. We read story after story of how God rescues us, how God provides for us, how God delivers us from our troubles/enemies. The main message is not telling us what to do, the main message is about what God has done for us. This is not a book of morals, this is a love story, a rescue story.
We want to explore what
God has done for us. And when we see His grace, His love, His
beauty, His worth, we lift Him high! It’s not about me.
It’s about God.
2. We move from enslavement to freedom.
The image that Paul gives as
he explains the gospel is freedom, being freed from slavery. “Freedom”
is the expression for living out the gospel. What word would you
use to describe your Christian life? Is it “freedom”?
. . . some false brothers had infiltrated our ranks to spy on the freedom we have in Christ Jesus and to make us slaves. (2:4)
So you are no longer a slave, but a son; and since you are a son, God has made you also an heir. (4:7)
It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery. (5:1)
You, my
brothers, were called to be free. (5:13)
We are free from the law, free from rules and regulations.
We are free to love.
We live in slavery to laws, regulations, obligations, religion. We live in guilt, fear, and shame.
We live in slavery to our
selfishness, self-centeredness.
You, my brothers, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature; rather, serve one another in love. 14 The entire law is summed up in a single command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” (5:13, 14)
For in
Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any value.
The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love.
(5:6)
There is a freedom that we
don’t understand, a gospel freedom we are called to live in.
A freedom that comes from knowing that we are hopelessly incapable of fulfilling the law but that in Christ we’re already accepted and loved by God.
It’s like me trying to become an opera singer or a rock star or a sumo wrestler [picture]—it’s utterly ridiculous. I don’t feel any pressure to try, it is impossible.
It’s like us trying to completely forgive and love our enemies, never struggle with anger or laziness or envy or lust, always be thankful and joyful and enormously generous, and passionately be more excited for God than for our new car or the new restaurant or when the Phillies made it to the playoff’s. Add that we always want to pray, we can’t stop caring for others, and our minds think about God as we go to sleep. And if you’ve failed once, you’ve failed completely. It is utterly impossible. That’s what it takes to be righteous, that’s what it takes to keep the law.
Sometimes we waterdown the law so we can make it keepable. We redefine it, we reduce it to a few rules to keep, we make it manageable. Do you see, the self-reliance, self-salvation instinct goes deep.
The truth is that true righteousness is an utter ridiculous and impossible dream. We don’t recognize the fullness of God’s holiness and glory.
But, in Christ, you
are already and completely loved and accepted by God. You’re
already considered righteous. That’s how God regards you, as perfectly
righteous. You don’t have to try to keep the law to get anything—it’s
all already given. There’s a freedom.
A freedom that comes from knowing that we’re heirs of a glorious inheritance, that we’ve been given a promise that cannot be broken.
Donald Trump [picture] is said to have a net worth of about $3 billion (wikipedia).
According to Forbes (March 2007), Bill Gates [picture] is worth $56 billion, making him the richest person in the world every year for the past 13 years.
If he spent a million
dollars/day (and didn’t earn any more), it would take him 153 years
to spend all his money.
I pray
also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you
may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious
inheritance in the saints, 19
and his incomparably great power for us who believe. (Eph 1:18)
How would you feel if I told you that you had a multi-billion dollar inheritance, and that inheritance was signed and sealed? No matter how you lived your life, not matter what you did or didn’t do, it was yours. No conditions, no terms for cancellation.
It has nothing to do with your performance, it has everything to do with God’s promise.
If I promise my life a romantic dinner on our anniversary, but in the days before she ignores me and is mean to me (not that this happened), do I still take her on that romantic dinner? Yes, because that was given in the promise, not something to be based on behavior.
This is not a wage that
you earn, this is an inheritance as an heir. You don’t have
to do anything to be an heir. You cannot sin your
way out of the promise. Nothing you do or don’t do will change
that you are an heir. There’s a freedom.
A freedom that comes from not having to protect or promote ourselves. We are free to love others.
If we are hungry for acceptance, for friendships, for love, then we’re just using people to feel loved and accepted. That can lead to
just liking people who like you, only those who fill your need
always saying Yes, because your so needy of their acceptance
being overly protected, because your so afraid of being rejected
always thinking about what other people think, because that’s where you’re looking to find your significance
If, however, you have a
Jesus who loves you already, who understands you and cares for you,
who has given you hope and significance, then instead of trying to find
more acceptance, you’re free. You’re free just to love others.
There’s a freedom.
We need to recognize the slavery
and bondage we’re living in and explore that freedom that is ours
in Christ. We may not even realize that we’re slaves because
we don’t know what it looks like to be free. We’ve never known
anything else. As we go through Galatians, may we see the freedom
Christ desires for us.
A final one: A freedom
that comes from living in the Spirit, not in our human strength.
3. Gospel Living is Living in the Spirit.
Galatians is closely related with Romans, and they share two major themes:
Justification by faith, apart from works/law
Living in the Spirit
I’d like to suggest that
these two pieces go together. Chapters 5-6 are not just an “add
on” to this “justification by faith” message. It is an integrated
aspect of it.
“Love your neighbor” as law, but law doesn’t change our hearts; we can’t (law not attainable)
We think the law is attainable, or we try to make it attainable. But that’s not the purpose of the law. To even try to love our neighbors in our own strength is the self-reliance that the gospel condemns.
“Love your neighbor” but we don’t love; this is laziness and sin
“Love your neighbor” as a fruit of the Spirit, by living in the Spirit—this is the new creation
Living by the
Spirit produce “Law” behavior, from the inside.
True righteousness is completely
unattainable. There's nothing you can do. We are not to
appeal just to our wills, our strength, our abilities. We’re
not to depend on ourselves, our efforts (legalism). We are dependent
on HS for supernatural living!!!
“It doesn’t make any
difference now whether we have been circumcised or not (external obedience
to the law or not). What counts is whether we really have been
changed into new and different people. They are the new people
of God.” (6:15) What counts is whether God’s Spirit
is at work in us.
I explained this point to someone earlier this week and his reply was, “Well, that’s kind of scary. That means I have no control. I am completely helpless.”
That’s right. A
fundamental posture of the Gospel is, God is strong, I am weak.
He is the Deliverer, I am the one who needs to be rescued. I put
my hope in Him, not in myself.
Need to understand the
first part (chapters 1-4), or else, we’ll try to making living by
the Spirit a work of our flesh. We’ll try to produce that for
ourselves.
The only way our church
will accomplish the vision is through the work of God. We must
not be our confidence on our strategies, structures, talents and abilities.
We need God to do His work. It must be a Spirit thing, a God thing.
Gospel Living means
Turning from trying to solve our own problems to trusting God to solve the problems.
Turning from trying to keep the law (ourselves) to living in the Spirit.
Turning from slavery and
bondage to freedom.
Pray
Lord, help me understand the freedom of the Gospel. Help me experience it.
Lord, help me live in the Spirit, not in my own strength and effort. Change me from the inside.
This is not about what I do, but about what you’ve done for us. You are worthy to be praised.