Our boast is in the cross
Notes
Transcript
Good Morning,
Today we are in our final message in the book of Galatians. Next week we begin to celebrate Advent, we will be looking at the hope, peace, joy, and love we find in not only Christ’s first coming but also His future second coming. We will have a season long bible readings available, I encourage you to grab one of those so we as a body can be unified in our reading of scripture. This reading plan also contains the scriptures for the Sunday sermons if you want to do a little work ahead and read it before coming to church on Sunday. Following Christmas, Lord willing we will be starting a new book series. While not 100% concrete we will likely be going through the Gospel of Luke, if you have concerns or desires you can tell me or email me and while I make no promises, I will prayerfully consider them.
Today, like I said we will be in Galatians and we will be looking at chapter 6 verses 11-18.
Let’s open with a word of Prayer.
Pray 3+
If you are in Galatians 6 please follow along as I read verses 11-18.
Galatians 6:11–18 “11 See with what large letters I am writing to you with my own hand. 12 It is those who want to make a good showing in the flesh who would force you to be circumcised, and only in order that they may not be persecuted for the cross of Christ. 13 For even those who are circumcised do not themselves keep the law, but they desire to have you circumcised that they may boast in your flesh. 14 But far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. 15 For neither circumcision counts for anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creation. 16 And as for all who walk by this rule, peace and mercy be upon them, and upon the Israel of God. 17 From now on let no one cause me trouble, for I bear on my body the marks of Jesus. 18 The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit, brothers. Amen.”
Why is verse 11 significant and what does it tell us about Paul?
Why is verse 11 significant and what does it tell us about Paul?
We do not live in the time of the writing, so there are several things we have to understand in order to fully understand the significance of verse 11 and everything that follows. The first part we have to understand is that Paul like many in his day used a scribe to write most of his letters. Here Paul begins his postscript and does so with his own hand, he understands that this letter was going to be read in multiple places and one part of this is to make that distinction. The second part of the significance is that this part is likely of great importance. Paul does not include any of the attention to the large writing in any other place and because of that it is thought that this is much like us typing an email in bold or all caps. It emphasizes the point and if you get nothing else from the email or in this case a letter you will get this part.
Lastly and probably the most important part to notice is the length of this and what follows. By cultural standards of the time Paul’s letters were long. The average personal letter at the time was somewhere around 90 words and the average literary letter was around 200 words. This was Paul’s longest postscript with 121 words. Paul’s postscript is over half the length of the average longest letters and he did this all by hand. We see in this closing the deep love for God’s people and the desire Paul has to see them again following the truth of the Gospel. It is the same love he showed for them in chapter 4, as he plead with them as a parent pleads with a wayward child.
Everything in this letter has been for the good of those in Galatia, so that they might be more like Christ. He has lived out the act of love he called them to in 5:14 when he said:
14 For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”
This letter was one that while it might at first cause pain was for their ultimate good. Paul is their friend and brother. Proverbs 27:6 “6 Faithful are the wounds of a friend; profuse are the kisses of an enemy.” He knows these words might wound but he is doing it out of his love for them.
Now he takes the pen in hand and compares that to those who were trying to force them to be circumcised and again warns the churches in Galatia. Paul tells the believers that the reason these men would have them circumcised is purely selfish. It is not that it would make the believers more like Christ or benefit their spiritual walk in any way. It was simply to avoid being persecuted. It was all for selfish motives. They wanted all the benefit of Jesus without any of the suffering Jesus promised. They were boasting that they were getting others to submit to the Law. Not that they were fulfilling the Law, we won’t spend a lot of time on this aspect as we have talked pretty extensively about any of our ability to fulfill any sort off law by our own ability or by the flesh.
We live in a time quite different in some ways than they did these teachers had to infiltrate their fellowship and build relationships with them to begin teaching and misleading the churches in Galatia. That is not the case now, thanks to the internet and YouTube, we can watch people teaching from all over the world and anyone in the world can set themselves up as a teacher almost instantly. So this is just as vital a question as it was then if not more so, but we have to ask:
What are our teachers boasting in?
What are our teachers boasting in?
This includes myself, Marc, Doug, any Bible teacher we sit under in person, or listen to on the internet. We have to ask ourselves where is their boast. This is sometimes very difficult because God will use sinful people to bring about good. There are some very large churches with very eloquent pastors were people are finding salvation, all while the pastor teaches something not in line with scripture. They boast about how many people they are saving or how they grew the church. These are only things that God can do and I will admit sometimes these are words misspoken, but if it is always them and never God we have to seriously evaluate their teachings and reject them. This is part of what these false teachers were doing, they were boasting saying look what we did, look how we were able to get all of these people circumcised.
But there was a different part of their boast that we see far more often today, their boast was ultimately though that they were able to make Jesus and the flesh compatible. That they could marry the world and Jesus together. Their claim was that they did not to be persecuted because they fit together, because Jesus was not mutually exclusive to salvation but needed the Law to be complete.
We see this in many progressive “churches” today. We see these teachers pushing ideas and thoughts that the church has historically deemed heretical. They claim this teaching that was simply because they lived in a time of closed-mindedness or did not know enough about psychology. They just were not as smart as we are now, and the bible doesn’t really mean that, because God is love. So they try to marry the world and Jesus together and boast that they have found a way to do it. They boast to the world that we can live both in line with Jesus “true” teaching and live in harmony with the world and all of its systems. They use their Bibles in much the same way that Thomas Jefferson did where large sections are removed because the world doesn’t like them and neither do they.
The problem with this is that these two systems of living are mutually exclusive, they do not mix.
14 But far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.
Two weeks ago when we looked at the fruit of the Spirit we saw when we who belong to Christ have crucified the flesh, here we see that the world has been crucified to us as well. This world along with all if its so called pleasures and lures will perish. In Paul’s mind like our flesh, like the two men on the cross who while the were yet alive were as good as dead, should be considered dead. Our hope should be found solely in Christ. There is another part of this that Paul points out and this part is something that those who want to live in both the world and in Jesus should look at more closely. Those who claim the name of Jesus are crucified to the world. We who find our hope solely in Him are his and are given the peace and mercy that Paul will talk about in verse 16, but those who try to live in both the world and by Christ are rejected by both.
We are going to look at a couple of verses to illustrate this point.
Turn with me to Genesis 19, I will begin reading in verse 15.
Genesis 19:15–17 “15 As morning dawned, the angels urged Lot, saying, “Up! Take your wife and your two daughters who are here, lest you be swept away in the punishment of the city.” 16 But he lingered. So the men seized him and his wife and his two daughters by the hand, the Lord being merciful to him, and they brought him out and set him outside the city. 17 And as they brought them out, one said, “Escape for your life. Do not look back or stop anywhere in the valley. Escape to the hills, lest you be swept away.””
Then jump down to verse 23
Genesis 19:23–26 “23 The sun had risen on the earth when Lot came to Zoar. 24 Then the Lord rained on Sodom and Gomorrah sulfur and fire from the Lord out of heaven. 25 And he overthrew those cities, and all the valley, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and what grew on the ground. 26 But Lot’s wife, behind him, looked back, and she became a pillar of salt.”
Many here know this story, but two angels came into to the town of Sodom and the men there wanted to violate and rape them. Lot, his wife and two daughters were the only ones who were allowed to leave, but they were given a very specific instruction in verse 17. It said escape for your life. Do not look back or stop anywhere. But in verse 26, Lot’s wife looked back, we however have to unpack these couple of words a little bit. The word choice for this in the Hebrew gives us a little more depth than we see here. She didn’t obey and that was enough, but when it says she looked back it implies she looked at Sodom with a strong desire to go back or she it was a place she regarded with pleasure. She longed for the world rather than for God.
Jesus repeats this idea in Luke 17 when he is describing his second coming. Luke 17:31–33 “31 On that day, let the one who is on the housetop, with his goods in the house, not come down to take them away, and likewise let the one who is in the field not turn back. 32 Remember Lot’s wife. 33 Whoever seeks to preserve his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life will keep it.”
We see that those who try to fit Christ into the world so they can have the world do not love Christ. They do not produce the fruit we spoke of two weeks ago and there is not love for their brother in them. And because their desire is to keep their life, live as the world lives, and avoid the persecution or the suffering that Christ promised His followers, they will lose their life.
Paul on the other hand boasts in nothing but the cross. Paul finds hope and life in nothing else and because of that he is dead to the world. Those same people who hated the message of the cross and the idea that they are not their own savior hate him. They hate the message he presents. Turn with me to John 15 and starting in verse 18.
John 15:18–25 “18 “If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. 19 If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. 20 Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours. 21 But all these things they will do to you on account of my name, because they do not know him who sent me. 22 If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have been guilty of sin, but now they have no excuse for their sin. 23 Whoever hates me hates my Father also. 24 If I had not done among them the works that no one else did, they would not be guilty of sin, but now they have seen and hated both me and my Father. 25 But the word that is written in their Law must be fulfilled: ‘They hated me without a cause.’”
The world says you have to do this or that in order to be saved, Christ says I did it for you come to me. The world says you are good the way you are, Jesus said, none are good but God alone. The world says everyone can go to heaven, Christ said he came not to condemn the world but to save it because we are condemned already. And in verses 15-16 of our passage today Paul says
Galatians 6:15–16 “15 For neither circumcision counts for anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creation. 16 And as for all who walk by this rule, peace and mercy be upon them, and upon the Israel of God.”
Because none of us are good, how we are when come to Christ does not matter. I do not need to work up to a certain righteous life first, I can come to him as I am and he will make me a new creation. The new creation is all that matters. It is those who have come to Christ and been made new, and he places His peace and mercy upon us. He like we saw two weeks ago is the one who makes the changes in our lives.
Paul then really demonstrates the difference in the commitment to Christ between himself and the false teachers. Where these false teachers wanted to avoid persecution, Paul embraced it. That is not to say he loved being beaten, but like apostles in Acts 5 Paul rejoiced that he could be counted worthy to suffer for the name of Christ. He views his scars as the bond marks for Christ. Remember all the way back to Chapter 1:verse 10 when Paul says he is a “doulos” for Christ. Remember this word often translated as servant or bond-servant, means slave, but he uses it like the slave in Exodus 21 who loves their master and doesn’t want to go free. He is then marked with an awl and forever belongs to his master. Paul views these scars and marks that same way. They remind everyone to whom he belongs and because he embraces it as opposed to avoiding it, he tells the Galatians to no longer cause him trouble. Quite doubting him and turn back to the truth rather than listening to these false teachers.
Are we willing to endure pain to glorify Christ?
Are we willing to endure pain to glorify Christ?
So I have to ask. Are we willing to endure pain for Christ’s glory? Do we belong to Him, have we like Paul submitted our whole life to Jesus? Or are we like the Judaizers and false teachers trying to live with one foot in both worlds? Jesus tells us in Matthew 6:24 “24 “No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.” While he is talking about money, this principle applies to anything that seeks to take the place of Christ. We cannot serve two masters no matter how much it looks like we can, and in avoiding the pain that Jesus promised, it shows us we are not serving Him. We are serving ourselves or the world. Is our fear of persecution preventing us from sharing the Gospel with our families, friends, neighbors, or coworkers because they might ostracize us or they might fire us or they might hurt or kill us? We like the apostles should rejoice over this, we are being made into our master’s image. We are able to participate in what God is doing on earth and like I read a little bit ago the world hated Christ enough to have him crucified, the one who lived a perfect life for the good of others, why do we think we can avoid this hatred?
We will close with Paul’s last words. He closes in much the same way he opens this letter, with the Grace of our Lord.
verse 18 reads:
Galatians 6:18 “18 The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit, brothers. Amen.”
May we find our hope and salvation in Christ alone through faith alone, not in ourselves or the works of man.
Let us close with prayer.