Word of Salvation – Vol.44 No7 - February 1999
Faith Alone
Sermon by Rev A Quak on Galatians 3:10-14
Scripture Reading: Galatians 3:1-14 (H.C. LD 23 –q/a 59-61)
Suggested Hymns:
Bow 119b; 372; 427; R 523; R 335
Beloved in the Lord Jesus Christ.
Are you right with God? Martin Luther sought to be right with God by crawling on hands and knees in freezing snow up the front stairs of a Cathedral. He spent many cold, long nights in prayer mentally beating himself for his sins. He deprived himself of everything to have total focus on God. But Luther failed in his search. The followers of cult leader David Charesh sought to be right with God. They obeyed their leader without question. They would give their bodies, their minds and their souls for their leader. They were prepared to die for him, all in an effort to bring them closer to God. They, too, failed in their search. And what about ourselves? How are we faring in our efforts to be right with God? Well let's look at ourselves and start making a few evaluations. We're a bit rough around the edges - particularly in areas which we have successfully hidden from the gaze of others.
When we compare ourselves to spiritual giants like Paul, or Jeremiah, or John, or Noah, we confess that we are spiritual pygmies. In a quest to be right with God we find ourselves pressed into the witness stand with our conscience accusing like the devil's lawyer. We don't need to read Galatians 3:10-12 to know the truth - we know the truth through our experience. There are times when we can almost feel the oppression of the curse. Our conscience constantly accuses us of being out of favour with God. You haven't done your devotional this week - you're slacking off. That's the third time today you disciplined your child unfairly - would Jesus be so harsh? How do you ever expect to be a good witness when you can't even bring yourself to tell people you are a Christian? The accusations flow one after another, you try and stop them, but you can't. It's as futile as trying to stop the flow of a river with a piece of flyscreen wire -- it just keeps coming.
We know we have not fulfilled all the commands of God and we can feel the curse of failure. We know that on our own we have no right to stand before God and claim even a small amount of credit for the life we live. We are fully aware that if God decided to judge us on the basis of our ability to fulfil the law, we're lost. The Catechism expresses our experience in a nutshell... my conscience accuses me of having grievously sinned against all God's commandments and of never having kept any of them... I am still inclined toward all evil.
Are you right with God?
Through Galatians 3:10-12, Paul lays down for all readers of Galatians a grim but realistic picture. We are cursed when we look to the law for salvation. We are cursed because we cannot do all the works of the law. We are cursed because we have been given death rather then life. in such a state of mind we are driven with fervency to ask a question of eternal significance, “How can I - I who fall short, I who judge myself unworthy, i who have knocked myself out of the ring - how can I be right with God?"
When we see Christ going from town to town, village to village, preaching the coming of the Kingdom in obedience to God, we are seeing Him absorb the curse for us by fulfilling the law. When we see Christ leaning over the dead daughter of Jairus and raising her to life, and when we see Jesus healing the naked, demon-possessed madman who lives among the tombs of the dead, we are seeing Him absorb the curse for us by fulfilling the law. When we see Christ in the garden of Gethsemane, prostrate before His Father because He is almost overwhelmed by the enormity of the duty that lies before Him, and when we see Him get up totally determined to go to the Cross, we are seeing Him absorb the curse for us by fulfilling the law. We can take any aspect of Jesus' life: His active obedience as He consistently and perfectly fulfils the Word of God; His passive obedience as He submits Himself to the anguish of the cross.
We can take any page out of the book of Jesus' life and that page will be like blotting paper, it will have the ability to absorb the curse because Christ is fulfilling the law.
Are you right with God? In your search, know that Jesus is absorbing the curse by doing what we could never do. Cursed is everyone who does not continue to do everything written in the book of the law. But what if they can do everything written in the law? More to the point, what if there is One who can do this and then pass the credit onto us? It's a great question to ask, because if it is possible to pass on credit, it means we are no longer cursed but we are blessed.
Is it possible? Is it possible for someone outside of ourselves to fulfil the law and pass the credit onto us so that we are no longer under the curse of the law?
The Heidelberg Catechism certainly expresses the possibility: ...nevertheless, without my deserving it at all, out of sheer grace, God grants and credits to me the perfect satisfaction, righteousness and holiness of Christ, as if I had never sinned nor been a sinner, as if I had been as perfectly obedient as Christ was obedient for me.
Galatians 3:13 gives us an answer: Christ! Just as we plunge over the cliff of hopelessness, a beautiful transformation occurs. A transformation that starts with Christ. We're on a quest to be right with God and, as we do so, Christ becomes the hinge on which a successful quest is hung. When you spill port onto your carpet, one way to remove it so that it doesn't leave a stain is to put salt onto it. The port soaks up into the salt and the stain is absorbed. We, too, have a stain - it's the curse of the law. If we want to remove the stain of the "law curse", we have to turn to Christ knowing that He absorbs it for us.
Can such a claim be supported by Scripture? Of course it can. Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, says Galatians 3:13. This is law-curse' absorption in action. We call this work of Jesus His “justifying work” or “our justification”. Justification occurs when Jesus changes our state in the sight of God.
Perhaps a good way to understand the effect of justification would be to imagine a Dutchman immigrating to Australia. When he steps off the piane in this new land he is still in every respect a citizen of the Netheriands both in his state and in his condition. As far as his state is concerned, he is legally a citizen of the Netherlands. According to current Australian law he is not a citizen here, therefore he has no rights and privileges.
But also he is a Dutchman as far as his condition is concerned. He looks like a Dutchman. He sounds like a Dutchman. He's got zoute drop' in his pocket and a packet of 'beschuit' and 'hagelslag' in his bag.
Two years down the track ne applies for and receives Australian citizenship. There is a change in his state. As a recognised citizen of Australia he has access to all the rights and privileges of citizenship. Yet, as far as his condition is concerned, he is still Dutch. He still looks and sounds like a Dutchman; he still loves 'zoute drop' and 'beschuit' with 'hagelslag'.
Through justification Jesus changes our state in the sight of God. It's a step in the process which makes us right with God. No longer are we citizens of darkness, we are now citizens of heaven. No longer are we children of Satan we are children of God. We have moved from being those who will suffer an eternity of punishment to those who will be blessed with an eternity of God's favour. And yet, as far as our condition is concerned, we hardly look any different, even when we are justified. Justified sinners have times when they look and act like unjustified sinners.
There are times when we are a bit rough around the edges, when the same temptations seem to sucker us in again and again. There are times when we don't see a growth in Christian walk, when we wonder if we are really trying our hardest for the Lord. There are times when we feel we are going backwards, when God seems far from us. There are times, when we compare ourselves to spiritual giants like Paul, or Jeremiah, or John, or Noah, we confess that we are spiritual pigmies.
Even justified saints find themselves pressed into the witness stand with their conscience accusing them like the devil's lawyer. If we are God's children, why is it that we still do wrong. If we are called to live in the light, why are there times when we do deeds of darkness? And then the doubts start coming, don't they?
Am I really a child of God if I act like this? Would a real Christian do what I do? What do we do against such accusations in the face of these accusations, and mental beatings, and failures, we allow faith to speak into the microphone and say with confidence, "I cannot be condemned because Christ is my righteousness”.
How is that possible? Because the curse of the law has been taken for us. Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us. He went to the cross to give me eternal credit in God's sight. He calls me by name to make me a member of God's family. As a Gentile I was formerly outside the covenant family of God. Now I have been given the blessing given to Abraham.
Mine is a righteousness that doesn't come through obedience to the law, but which comes by faith. Mine is a righteousness that doesn't depend on the condition of my life, but on the state of my soul – and my soul has been justified.
I believe the promises of God when He says I am justified. Just as if I had never sinned. Neither Paul nor the Catechism says anything about me having to make it work. I just need to humbly and thankfully accept that it has happened. And do you know what that means? It means we can cry out in praise and thanksgiving and hope, “Yes! We are right with God."
Justification by faith - it's a wonderful message of life. Christ absorbing the curse for me. Christ assuring me that I am His. Christ comforting me when I fail. Christ blessing me as His child. Christ giving me everything because I couldn't do it myself. Does that mean that those who are justified by faith now have a right to ignore all the laws in God's Word? Not at all.
In John 14:15 Jesus says, “If you love Me, you will obey what I command." And again, in John 14:23, "If anyone loves Me, he will obey My teaching." And, of course, when Paul says in Galatians 5:25, "Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit...." we also remember that Scripture didn't have its origin in man but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.
Through Christ we have the blessing of Abraham - We are part of God's covenant family. As part of God's family, we are given the Spirit which helps us become what God intended us to be. And the Spirit uses the Word and applies it to our lives so that we know what God intended us to be like.
So what does it mean, then, to no longer live under the curse of the law? To discover the answer we need to look at the broader context of Galatians. Paul is writing this letter to warn the church of Galatia against the teaching of a group of people known as the 'Judaizers'. The Judaizers did not see themselves as opponents of Christianity but they were threatened by the message of Paul. They could not understand how one could find God's grace without becoming socially conformed to the law.
This meant being circumcised, eating the right or 'kosher' food, and keeping oneself separated from Gentiles. The religion of the Judaizers was a 'Christ plus' religion. Paul was against the legalistic religion of the Judaizers because they were putting themselves under the curse of the law.
We, too, are called to be free from the curse of the law as we live by faith. Any practices which detract from the all-sufficiency of Christ must be opposed. Any practices which build walls between people who believe in Jesus Christ must be torn down. Any practices which seek to supplement trust in Christ must be cleared away.
There are days when we have a hectic schedule, and we find it impossible to read our Bibles - maybe we haven't done so for some time. What is the common result? Maybe we feel unloved by God, distant from Him or in need of forgiveness. But is that not a legalistic “Christ plus" attitude? Personal Bible reading is important, but it does not make us acceptable to God. Justification means we are loved, accepted, and forgiven even when we don't read our Bibles – any approach contrary to this places us back under the curse of the law and is therefore a distortion of the Gospel.
There are times when we have had an exciting spiritual experience, one that may have even transformed who we are and how we live. We have spiritual experiences all the time - a sense of being especially close to God at that moment. It may happen when we pray, when we worship, when we are particularly touched by the Word. The problem arises when these experiences become the centre of one's relationship with God. Justification means we are loved, accepted, and forgiven even without these experiences - any approach contrary to this places us back under the curse of the law and is therefore a distortion of the Gospel.
Theological knowledge is good, but I place myself under the curse of the law when I make such knowledge necessary for true spirituality. Our church is a great place to be a member of, but we place ourselves under the curse of the law when the message we send to outsiders is “join our church" rather then “surrender to Christ”.
Life in this church would be a lot easier if everyone thought like I did, but they don't. I place myself under the curse of the law when I insist otherwise and act upon that insistence.
Are you right with God?
As we make this quest, the quest to be right with God, let us be guided and challenged by the truths we have spoken about today. If you are making this quest on your own strength, you will not succeed. If you think your condition as a "good Christian" is all you need, you will not succeed. If you are taking a "Christ-plus” approach, you will not succeed. However, if you are relying totally on the justifying work of Jesus - having faith in God's promises - then the answer to Question 59 of the Catechism is an answer you can say with boldness:
"What good does it do you, however, to believe all this?"
"In Christ I am right with God and heir to life eternal."
Amen.
