Faith is What Counts - Pastor Tom Loghry
In Galatians 5:2-12, Paul tells the Galatians to be wary of false teachers who would make them believe that works of the law are necessary for salvation.
Transcript:
Our scripture is taken from the book of Galatians, chapter 5, verses 2
through 6. Mark my words, I, Paul, tell you that if you let yourselves be circumcised, Christ will be of no value to you at all. Again, I declare to every man who lets himself be circumcised that he is obligated to obey the whole law. You who are trying to be justified by the law have been alienated from Christ.
You have fallen away from grace. For through the Spirit we eagerly await by faith the righteousness for which we hope. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any value. The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love.
I'd like to sponsor a late bid for me to qualify for the 2024 Olympics. Oops.
Here we go. The Olympics. What event? Well, you're going to find out in just a second. So unfortunately, they don't have a preaching, you know, part of the Summer Olympics, but I have an idea. So, this might come as a surprise. I have a plan that could get me on the USA track and field team as a runner. The plan is this, and here's where you come in.
You need to buy me these shoes, Nike Vaporflies. I don't exactly have the coin to purchase them at $269, but if I have them, I'll be sure to be a winner because that's how it works, right? You get the best shoes, and you win. No, of course, that's not, that's not how it works. But one would think that shoes must count for something.
But I have a picture I want you to examine. So, apart from a different number and skin complexion, I want you to pick out what sets apart the last runner in this picture from the rest. All right. He's, yes, exactly. He is barefoot. His name is Abebe Bikila, an Ethiopian runner who participated in the 1960 Rome Olympics.
Now, one would think he remained in last position given his lack of footwear. The other runners seemed to have the gear you would need to win. But that's not what happened. Now, Bikila didn't run a sprint barefoot. He ran a marathon. Now that's 26. 2 miles barefoot. And he won the marathon barefoot, beating his opponent by 25 seconds and breaking a world record.
In the end, despite what everyone thought, all of us would think, the gear didn't count for anything. His ability won out. Now I'm taking us to the Apostle Paul in this letter that he's writing to the Galatians. Something we should understand about the Apostle Paul is that he has a certain affinity for racing analogies.
And in Galatians 5, he uses this kind of imagery to call the Galatians back to the truth of the gospel. But before we get to that precise instance, we're going to first look at those first opening verses, verses two through six in Galatians five. Now, Paul is very emphatic in these verses and making clear that it's one or the other.
He says, mark my words.
Either you depend on circumcision, or you depend on Christ. He says, if you let yourselves be circumcised, Christ will be of no value to you at all. Now, you might ask, well, why would that be the case? Why couldn't it be the case that someone could pursue circumcision as a means of justification alongside Jesus? Maybe just kind of, you know, covering their bases kind of thing.
Well, the reason why Paul says this is, he says, it's because if you're saying that you're obligated to hold this one aspect of the law, circumcision, then you're in fact required to uphold all the law. Now, of course, the inherent problem with that is none of us do that. None of us are able or have upheld God's law in its entirety. And so, the path of circumcision is a path that leads to condemnation. Now, Paul's writing this letter because some of the Galatians have actually done this. Some of them have actually pursued the route of the law instead of remaining faithful to the means of Christ as their salvation. And so he's writing to the church of Galatia as a whole, and he offers some sobering words to those who have chosen this path.
He says, you who are trying to be justified by the law have been alienated from Christ. You have fallen away from grace. Now this raises a question in our minds. Is Paul saying that these persons were previously Christians and that they have fallen out of grace? Or is he saying something else? Now this is a passage that has been widely debated for, for hundreds of years.
For my study of this passage and from the rest of scripture, I don't think what Paul is saying is that these persons were formerly Christians and that they are now non Christians. I do think, though, that he's saying that they have had an encounter with the grace of Jesus Christ. Otherwise, you couldn't, that's the only way you could make sense of him saying that they've fallen away from grace.
They've had an encounter with Christ. Maybe they've even participated in the life of the church on the outside. Everyone would think that they are Christians, but in fact, that's not the case. Now, the reason why I came to that conclusion is really from the rest of scripture, because we have indications from the rest of scripture that those who belong to Christ do not fall away.
And that it is in fact possible that there are those who are in the church who would appear to be Christians, but who are in fact later proven to not be Christians. So, kind of to that first count, the confidence that those who belong to Christ don't fall away. Jesus says in John 10, 27 through 28, he says, My sheep, listen to my voice.
I know them and they follow me. I give them eternal life and they shall never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hands. So if it's possible that someone has truly belonged to Christ, but now they no longer belong to Christ. It appeared to be in defiance to what Jesus is saying that, in fact, no one's able to snatch those who belong to him out of his hands.
Interestingly, you know, this is from the Gospel of John, so the Apostle John is writing this record of what he heard Jesus say. In his letter, 1 John, the Apostle John writes of how we can anticipate that there will be those who depart from us, who appeared to be Christians, but are proven not to be. So, in 1 John 2, verses 18 through 19, it says, Dear children, this is the last hour.
And as you, as you have heard that the Antichrist is coming, even now many Antichrists have come. So that's just a little interesting aside here. We get so fixated very often on like this singular figure of Antichrist. But what John's letting us know here is that, in fact, there are many Antichrists, and I mean, we're going back 2, 000 years now.
Moving on to what we're really looking at here. This is how we know it is the last hour. They went out from us, but they did not really belong to us. For if they had belonged to us, they would have remained with us. But their going showed that none of them belongs to us. So what the Apostle John is saying is that even while for a moment it appeared that they were part of us, their departure, in fact, proves that they were never part of us.
Because if they had, they would have remained. Now again, like I said, this is something that is widely debated among Christians. I don't think it's something that should divide fellowship. But I think the testimony of Scripture is saying that those who belong to Christ remain with Christ. And so in the case of these Galatians, they have had an encounter with the grace of Jesus Christ.
They have heard the gospel preached they have fellowshiped with the church, but now it's being revealed that they aren't truly members of his body. Now what Paul is reminding them of here is that the righteousness that they're seeking in the law is, in fact, only found in Jesus Christ. He says in verse 5, For through the Spirit we eagerly await by faith the righteousness for which we hope.
So he's not necessarily maligning the motives here of those who are resorting to the law. At least on the surface it appears that they are seeking righteousness, but the fact remains is that true righteousness does not come from the law. The law just stands as judge, ruling that we are all guilty and fall short of the righteousness of God.
It cannot produce that righteousness within us. In his letter to the Romans, in Romans 9, he says, Verses 30 through 32, Paul talks about this anticipation of this coming righteousness, um, that the Jews were looking forward to, and that the Gentiles have been brought into. He says, What then shall we say, that the Gentiles who did not pursue righteousness have obtained it, a righteousness that is by faith?
But the people of Israel who pursued the laws, the way of righteousness, have not attained their goal? Why not? They pursued it not by faith, but as if it were by works. They stumbled over the stumbling stone. So what Paul is saying here in Romans, what he is saying here in Galatians is that the only path to true righteousness is the path of faith in Jesus Christ.
And that righteousness is twofold in kind of its dimensions. So, in Jesus Christ, we are counted righteous on the basis of Christ's own righteousness. And we're also restored to righteousness, so that we begin bearing forth good fruit in our lives. And we see this, I think, most clearly stated in Ephesians 2, verses 8 through 10.
Again, you have this perfect marriage between grace and the works that flow from grace, Paul says, for it is by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not from yourselves. It is the gift of God, not by works so that no one can boast. So clearly you're saved by grace. It's a gift, not works. But then he says this in 10, he says, for we are God's handiwork traded in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
So there's a purpose here. We receive our salvation. I want to talk to you today about the law. The law is defined as a gift of grace from God and Jesus Christ. And that's only because of who Jesus is because he is righteous. But it is for this purpose that we would be made into a new kind of people.
From whom good works are flowing out from. Now this stands in stark contrast to the law because when we're talking about the law again, it's important for us to make some, I think some precise distinctions. Because obviously Jesus Christ, even within our lives, you know, He fulfilled the law completely, but within our lives, He is fulfilling the very heart of the law, that we would actually live out the righteousness that the law was calling for.
So we're not talking about a complete removal of the law. But what Paul is actually specifying here, in speaking to the Galatians, is those particular aspects of the law. That would have been identified as means of achieving righteousness, so thinking about circumcision. There's nothing inherently righteous about circumcision, but it was given as a means of marking out God's covenant people.
And in the minds of the Jewish people that they thought, okay, if we do the circumcision, if we obey the dietary laws, if we follow these sacrificial rituals, that this will actually result in real righteousness. But none of it did. And so Paul is saying, these were all signs pointing to Christ. And so we no longer follow them because they can't actually produce that righteousness.
They're an insufficient means. There's also a distinction to be made too because the righteousness that's fleshly strength. We are God's handiwork. It's Him working within us. And that's in contrast to the righteousness that would come by the law, where, and you're trying to do all those things, circumcision, dietary law, the fast, all of that.
And, even just the basic stuff, the basic things of loving your neighbor, loving God, all those things. You're trying to do it from your own resources. That's not what's offered us in Christ. Jesus doesn't come along to say, here, I'm going to make it so you can get there on your own strength. Jesus comes along and says, you can never do it by your own strength.
I've paid it all. And now I'm going to make my home in you. The Holy Spirit is going to transform you. So any good fruit that you see in the life of the Christian is not a credit to themselves. It's a credit to the God who has worked within them.
And so, because of this, Paul's very comfortable saying that circumcision or uncircumcision, no matter which way or the other, none of it has any value. Because that was never the point. He says the only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love. And, this is, it's important for us to understand what he's saying here.
Faith expressed in love. What he's trying to help us understand here is, he's not talking about easy believism. He's not talking about just putting your faith in Jesus for your salvation, and then nothing changes in your life. Because that's not genuine faith. If you've truly put your faith in Jesus Christ, in the way that he described in Ephesians 2, God's going to work on you.
He's going to change you. And the ultimate change that he wants to make is the orientation of your heart. What do you love most? So Paul, well, actually, um,
I jumped a little bit ahead of my notes. Sorry about that. So in talking about faith expressing itself in love, Paul is actually bringing together here three of the virtues of the Christian faith. You have faith, hope, and love. So you see in verse five how he talks about faith and hope, and it finally culminates here in love.
And so in 1 Thessalonians 1: 3 he says, We remember before our God and Father your work produced by faith, your labor prompted by love, and your endurance inspired by hope in our Lord Jesus Christ. And this brings us to where I was jumping ahead to, which is that genuine faith always manifests itself in its fruit, in deeds.
The Apostle James says, But someone will say, You have faith, I have deeds. Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by my deeds. And the very heart of those deeds that faith is producing is what Jesus talks about in Mark 12, as far as what are the greatest commands. And Mark 12, he basically says this, he says, love God with the entirety of your being.
And the second is love your neighbor as yourself. There's no commandment greater than these. So you could identify all the different parts of the law saying, okay, you gotta do this, that, and the other. But it really all just boils down to are you loving God with everything that you are? And are you loving your neighbor as yourself?
And the thing is, is all of us have come short of those two basic commandments. But it's those two basic commandments that Christ is actually beginning to work out their fulfillment in our own lives, even as he has fulfilled it completely in his own. We're being conformed to be like Jesus. So that like Jesus, we love God with all that we are, that we love our neighbors as ourselves, so that we lay down our lives for each other, just in the way that Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. Moving on to verse 7, Paul applies a racing analogy to express his concern for the Galatians present confusion. So he says, you were running a good race who cut in on you to keep you from obeying the truth?
That kind of persuasion does not come from the one who calls you. A little yeast works through the whole batch of dough. I am confident in the Lord that you will take no other view. The one who is throwing you into confusion, whoever that may be, will have to pay the penalty. Brothers and sisters, if I'm still preaching circumcision, why am I still being persecuted?
In that case, the offense of the cross has been abolished. As for those agitators, I wish they would go the whole way and emasculate themselves. So, Paul, again, I said it in the introduction, Paul loves his racing analogies. We see this in 1 Corinthians and also in 2 Timothy, uh, in talking to the Corinthian Christians, he says, Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets a prize?
Run such a way to get a prize. And then thinking about his own life in 2 Timothy 4. He says, I have fought the good fight. I finished the race. I've kept the faith. Now there is in store for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge will award to me on that day. And not only to me, but also to all who have longed for his appearing.
So this is a very appropriate way for us to think about our journey of faith. It's a race you're running. You're pursuing Jesus Christ. You're fixing your eyes on him. But in the case of the Galatians, Paul says that someone's gotten in their way. Someone is caught in front of them. Now, when we watched the Olympics, everyone's got their nice, neat tracks.
They all stay in their own lanes. They're supposed to anyways. That's not how ancient racing was done. It was more kind of like a car race where they could all run in front of each other and get in each other's way and slow each other down. It And so Paul's picking up on this imagery that would have been familiar to them that someone has gotten in their way and is slowing them down from running to Jesus Christ.
Someone's getting in the way of them living in obedience to the truth, which is that salvation and righteousness is found in Christ alone.
And what Paul wants to tell them here is that they should have no tolerance for that. He's He says in verse 9 A little yeast works through the whole batch of dough. And then he just keeps moving on. His use of this phrase might be lost on us, but what he's talking about and using this imagery of yeast is, he's talking about the fact that this evil, this false teaching in their midst, it's just going to grow and grow if they don't address it. Um, you might be familiar that when the Jewish people celebrate Passover, they remove all the yeast from their house. And this is symbolic of the removal of evil. Yeast is a common symbol of evil, of sinfulness. And so Paul's picking up on that and talking about removing yeast and, and comparing this to yeast growing and growing, working through the whole batch. It, it's, it's kind of this idea of one bad apple can spoil the bunch.
And so the basic point of this is that they should not tolerate false teaching on essential matters. You know, as Christians, we have to be careful of, you know, rushing to declare that someone who disagrees with us is, you know, offering false teaching, because that's a really strong charge. We can have some differences of opinions on things, but then there's matters of the faith that are essential, that if we don't address, are going to divide the church.
But more, even more important than that, and that's really important, it's going to put people in spiritual peril. Because, once again, he's talked about how those who have resorted to the law have fallen away from Jesus Christ, from the grace of Jesus Christ. And if that's the case, then they are standing under the condemnation of the law, and they will not be saved.
We need to take doctrine that seriously when it comes to the essential matters of the faith. Now it's interesting, you know, as much concern as Paul's expressed up to this point, in verse 10 he says, I am confident in the Lord that you will take no other view. And this might be a little bit of a rhetorical ploy, to like, I trust, like, you guys are wise, you're gonna see this, you're gonna, you know, listen to the instructions that I'm giving you here.
It could also be that Paul's expressing his trust in the fact that the Spirit really is in their midst. And while there might be some who are falling away, there's going to be others that are going to heed what he is saying. And once again, just underscoring just how seriously Paul is taking this, he's saying, he says that the one who's throwing you into confusion, whoever that may be, will have to pay the penalty.
Now, he's not talking about a penalty of this world. He's not saying, okay, you guys are going to have to take this guy out and start flogging him. He's talking about a penalty that is going to come on the final day when that person stands before Christ as judge. Now, it's interesting, um, in verse 11, we kind of get a little bit of an insight as to perhaps what was going on in Galatia.
It had led them to believe that adopting circumcision was okay. He says, brothers and sisters, if I'm still preaching circumcision, why am I still being persecuted? In that case, the offense of the cross has been abolished. On the basis of what Paul's saying there. It sounds like there was rumors going around that in fact, Paul did teach circumcision.
And that maybe he was holding back from the Galatians. You can imagine some false teachers coming into their midst saying, well, Paul just gave you the start. Now let's give us, give you the rest so that you can come to full maturity. He just didn't know if you were ready for the whole thing. This is what the Christians back in Judea do.
And you can imagine the argument being fairly strong because Christianity is hand in hand with the Jewish. There wouldn't have been, especially in the early years of the church, there wouldn't have been a strict division between Judaism and Christianity because Jesus is the promised messiah.
Eventually, you do see that clear division between the two. And so in their minds are thinking, well, all the Jews get circumcised, so they're making a strong argument here. But Paul's saying, no, no, no, no. That's not what I teach. Because if that was the case, why do I continue to be persecuted? Very often, the persecution that Paul suffered was not from the pagans.
Later on in Christian history, the pagans start pushing back against the Christians. But very often in Paul's journeys, he goes to a city, he teaches in the synagogue, some of the Jewish people. People believe and become Christians, others don't and get really upset with him, especially when he starts telling Gentiles that they can be brought into the household of faith and they, they cause problems.
They drive Paul out of town. They might cause problems with the authorities. We do see Paul has some issues with in Ephesus with some of the idol makers there, but all that to say. The reason why Paul is suffering quite a bit is because of him drawing a line here and saying that it's not necessary for you to live out these symbols of the law for you to be saved.
It's just Christ alone. He says, if that was the case, then the offense of the cross has been abolished. The offense of the cross? In what way is the cross offensive?
In his letter to the Corinthians, Paul gives us some indication of what he's thinking about here.
It says, Jews demand signs, and Greeks look for wisdom. But we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles. But those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ, the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom. And the weakness of God is stronger than human strength.
So the cross is problematic for Jew and Gentile alike. For those who are Greeks, the cross appears foolish. It's a slave's death. How could there be any glory in this? There's no, it defies the philosopher's wisdom. For the Jew,
the cross is a stumbling block because of its weakness. The Greeks would have picked up on that as well. And also because Christ suffers the curse of the law in order to say that he has paid it all. He has fulfilled the law completely. And that, simply by turning and trusting in Him, a person can be saved.
That's a stumbling block for people that have conditioned themselves. They've, they've come to believe that, by their own efforts, they could be saved rather than looking to God alone for their salvation. God was laying out those breadcrumbs. He was pointing them in that direction so that they would look to Him for their salvation, but when Christ appears, they stumble and instead continue to look to themselves as their own saviors.
Now Paul concludes this, this portion, this passage in verse 12 with a really strongly worded note.
He says, as for those agitators, I wish they would go the whole way and emasculate.
Now, I don't think I need to expand too much on this if you understand what circumcision is and you can connect the dots in what Paul is saying there in terms of them emasculating themselves. Now this is a bit shocking to us because it doesn't seem very polite and we're sometimes conditioned to believe that Christians always have to be like very polite and very nice to In the way that they speak, that they can never use, like, stark, strong language.
Clearly, that's not the case. Clearly, it's not the case that polite is always the prescription. We have examples of this in the case of John the Baptist and Jesus. Both of them refer to the Pharisees as brood of vipers. Jesus says, you snake! You brood of vipers! Can you imagine talking to anyone like that?
Maybe not, and maybe it's because you've never had to have an encounter with someone that would merit that sort of denunciation. But what's clear from the examples of John the Baptist, Jesus, and Paul is that there are occasions in which we must strongly denounce someone for the sake of the truth and protecting those who may be led astray. Paul's primary audience here is those that are at threat of being led astray. So he's not trying to persuade the people that are trying to lead them a stray. He's not trying to be winsome here. He's trying to warn the Galatians. That this is how misguided these guys are. And there's also something here, I think when it comes to the implications of emasculation on the basis of the law, because, again, if they're so fixated on the law, well, if they went all the way and emasculated themselves, Paul says in Deuteronomy, well, Paul doesn't say, he doesn't say in Deuteronomy 23, Moses records, He says that no one who has been emasculated by crushing or cutting may enter the assembly of the Lord.
So it may be that, apart from just giving a strong word of denunciation, Paul's also kind of insinuating, alluding to this reality that he's actually saying they should have no part of the people of God because of what they are doing. They should be cut off from the world. The assembly of the Lord. And if you're a little curious about that restriction, it's because in the Old Testament, they make strong, strong divisions between life and death.
Someone has been emasculated. That's a symbol of the absence of life, a certain quality of, of death. So that's the whole history behind that. Not to get into that too deeply, but the point is, I think more along the lines of the implications of of being emasculated and being cut off from God's people. And he's saying that because of their false teaching, I think they should be rejected, and that they really have no place among the people of God.
When they asked Abebe Bikila why he ran barefooted, he said this, I wanted the world to know that my country, Ethiopia, has always won with determination and heroism. I think Paul's message to the Galatians has some parallels here. In the race we run, we add nothing to Christ. We go barefooted. We fix our faith in him.
If we try to add the regulations of the law, or suggest that we can save ourselves by performing some good work, either apart from or on top of what Christ has done, then we begin collecting glory for ourselves. Bikila certainly got himself some glory by the race he ran. But that's not the Christian race.
We run barefooted because the world must see that victory is found in Christ alone. He ran the race none of us could run. His is the glory, but he invites us into his glory to share in his glory. In his reward, we run to him in faith because he is enough. And in fact, he is the only one that is enough and who is sufficient for our salvation.
Let's pray.
Dear father,
we thank you for the words that you gave the apostle Paul to speak to the Galatians. These words that continue to speak to us today, and that we are reminded
that our salvation is found in Christ alone. That there is no need, and that is in fact dangerous for us to try to mix our works together with his offer of salvation. As though we could, secure our justification for ourselves. Father, we come to you as people who confess our complete reliance upon Christ alone for our salvation.
And we do pray father that you would produce within us the fruits of that faith, that it would express itself in love. And Father, we pray that every person will be led to genuine faith and complete dependence upon Christ alone. We ask this in the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.
Hey there, Pastor Tom here. I hope you enjoyed this sermon I offered to Rockland Community Church. Rockland Community Church is located at 212 Rockland Road in North Scituate, Rhode Island, just around the bend from the Scituate Public High School. We invite you to join us in person or virtually this Sunday as we continue our series through the Letter to the Galatians. It's our joy to welcome you into our community.
Intro/Outro Song
Title: River Meditation
Artist: Jason Shaw
Source:http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Jason_Shaw/Audionautix_Acoustic/RIVER_MEDITATION___________2-58
License:(CC BY 3.0 US)