WWUTT 1768 Children of God By Faith, Part 1 (Galatians 3:21-29)

The Gospel of Grace and the Purpose of the Law

As has been said over and over in our study of the book of Galatians, we are not saved by anything good that we do, because we can't do anything good. We are saved by faith in the one who is good, when we understand the text.

This is When We Understand the Text, a daily Bible study in the word of Christ. For he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. Tell your friends about our ministry at www .wutt .com.

Once again, it's Pastor Gabe.

Thank you, Becky. We come back to our study of the book of Galatians, chapter 3, and we are on to verses 20 to 29. We're going to do part one of this sermon today, and then part two will be on Monday.

This is part one of the sermon entitled, Children of God by Faith. The apostle Paul wrote to the churches in Galatia, is the law then contrary to the promises of God? Certainly not. For if a law had been given that could give life, then righteousness would indeed be by the law.

But the Scripture imprisoned everything under sin, so that the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe. Now, before faith came, we were held captive under the law, imprisoned until the coming faith would be revealed.

So then, the law was our guardian until Christ came, in order that we might be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian. For in Christ Jesus, you are all sons of God through faith.

For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek. There is neither slave nor free. There is no male and female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ's, then you are Abraham's offspring, heirs according to promise.

Let us pray. Our Heavenly Father, as we open up your scriptures today, we desire to hear your word spoken to us. The promises that have been given from heaven, and this promised seed that was first promised to Abraham was fulfilled in the coming of Christ, who came and died on the cross for our sins and rose again from the grave, so that all who believe in him will have everlasting life.

There was a law that had been given. It was the perfect law of God that still rests upon our hearts today. This law served a purpose, and may, as we come to this text today, come to understand what that purpose was.

And we don't dismiss those things, and we don't cut a part of the Bible out, thinking that it no longer pertains to us, but that we understand it rightly, so that we may please you according to what you have said, and according to what you have commanded of us, so that we may be worshipers of God, sanctified and cleansed, holy in your presence, waiting for that day when we will be with Christ forever in glory, in which that process of sanctification of being shaped in the image of Christ will come to an end.

I pray that we see Christ in this word today, and we pray this in Jesus' name, and all God's people said, amen. Thank you. You may be seated. We're picking up the section that we were studying last week in Galatians 3, verses 15 through 29, and I have to stop in the middle because it's just too much information to fit it into one sermon.

So let's do a brief recap of what it was that we looked at in verses 15 through 20. So Paul said to the churches in Galatia, to give a human example, brothers, even with a man-made covenant, no one annuls it or adds to it once it has been ratified.

So God made a covenant with Abraham, and that covenant was established, and it has not been changed. There is nothing about that covenant that was somehow annulled or canceled out. Even when the law was given, and the law came then to Moses and was given to the people of Israel, it didn't mean that that covenant no longer applied or was even added to.

Because once you added the covenant, it becomes something different. Once it's been ratified, it is established. And this is, of course, Paul using a human example, but yet we apply these to spiritual things.

Verse 16, now the promises were made to Abraham and to his offspring. It does not say, and to off springs, referring to many, but referring to one, and to your offspring, who is Christ. Christ was ultimately going to be the fulfillment of that promise.

This is what I mean, Paul says, the law, which came 430 years afterward, Abraham was given a promise. That promise was Christ. The law wouldn't come about for another several centuries. But even though that law did come, it does not annul a covenant previously ratified by God so as to make the promise void.

For if the inheritance comes by the law, it is no longer by promise, but God gave it to Abraham by a promise. And that same promise has been given to us, that all who believe by faith in Christ will be saved.

Salvation has always been by grace, through faith, and not of works. It was that way in the Old Testament. It is that way even now under the new covenant. And we considered that last week when we went back to the story in Genesis chapter 15, the manner in which God made this covenant with Abraham.

And he made the covenant, and he put Abraham to sleep. And then there was the symbols of God, that burning torch, the burning oven that passed between the sacrifices that Abraham had prepared. This was God showing that he would ratify this covenant by himself.

Abraham had no part in it. He did not do anything or play any work in order to ratify the covenant. But God was both the one who made the covenant and the intermediary who was the witness to the covenant.

Abraham was put asleep so that he would not even have a part in establishing that covenant. But God made that covenant by himself with Abraham. And so he would fulfill it because God is good, not because Abraham did anything good.

God would be faithful to his own promise. He unilaterally established this covenant. Verse 19, Paul then says, why then the law? So if the covenant was made by a promise and it is not dependent upon any work that we have done over and over, over the course of Galatians, Paul has reminded the readers that it is not by works of the law that you are saved.

In fact, if anyone comes to you teaching works of the law or even faith plus works, that's a different gospel. Christ died for nothing. If you can do something in order to merit your salvation, what would be the power in the blood of Christ in that case, if it was not sufficient to pay the price for every sin?

And yet you then had to do something to try to merit your salvation. Paul says that's a false gospel. The person who teaches it is accursed. Do not listen to anyone who says it is by faith and works. And to make the case that it is always been by grace through faith that we are saved, he even goes back to the original covenant that was made between God and Abraham.

So then he presupposes the question, if salvation is by faith and we've been given a law, what's the point of the law then? If the law doesn't save us, why do we have it? That's the question that Paul answers in verses 19 and 20.

And we started to answer that question last week as it pertained to the permanence of the promise. But we didn't finish answering that question as it applied to the purpose of the law. So verse 19, why then the law?

Paul says it was added because of transgressions. Now when we read that it was added because of transgressions, this does not mean that the covenant was added to. Remember, we're not talking about the law being added to the covenant, but rather it came alongside the covenant.

Why? Because of transgressions. There was a reason for the law. It was added because of transgressions so that you might see the promise. So you might consider that the covenant, the promise, and the law are two sides of the same coin.

Like you think of a coin, you pick up a quarter and you've got the head of George Washington on one side and you turn it over and you've got the image of the eagle on the other side. Well if you look at one side, it makes you want to turn the coin over and see what is printed on the other side.

There's the eagle. If you were looking at the eagle, you want to turn it over and you see what's printed on the front side of the coin. So there's an image on one side, we would assume there would be an image on the other side.

The gospel, or the promise, and the law work the same way. The law makes us want to anticipate the promise. The promise makes us want to know the law. The law makes us want grace. Grace makes us want the law.

As an example of that, consider David. In Psalm 119, Lord, how I love your law. It is my meditation all the day. Why did David pray that? Did David pray that because the law was his salvation? No. God was his salvation.

And because of the grace of God that had been given to David, he loved God's law. He didn't love the law because it was his salvation. He loved the law because he had been saved and it was the perfect revelation of the holiness of God.

And so how do I keep myself from transgression? We find that in the law. Why then the law? It was added because of transgressions until the offspring should come to whom the promise has been made and it was put in place through angels by an intermediary, the law of Moses given to the people of God, added because of transgressions.

And as I mentioned last week, this has two possible understandings. Added because of transgressions could be to prevent a person from transgression or it could be to reveal transgression. And as I said last week, it applies both ways.

The law works to prevent transgression, to prevent sin as a guardian, which is the example that Paul is going to go into next. And the law also reveals transgression. In this particular case, and as we looked at it last week, verses 19 or 20, we considered it as it revealed transgression.

We look into the law and we see our sin because we realize that we have disobeyed the law. Paul says in Romans 7, I didn't know what it was like to covet until I saw in the law, you shall not covet. And then I knew I was a covetor, but I was not aware of this sinful desire that was in me until God's perfect law said to me, this is sin.

Suddenly I became aware of, I've done that. And therefore I know I have transgressed the law of God. So in this way, the law added because of transgression revealed the sin that was within us so that we would desire the promise.

We become aware of our need for a savior. And through this revealing of sin, because of the law, we now know that we need someone to pay the penalty for this transgression we've committed against God.

And the one who has paid that penalty for us is Christ. The gospel of Jesus Christ is good news. That's in fact what the word gospel means. It means, literally translated, good news. But you cannot know the news is good until you know the bad news first.

And what is the bad news? All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. And God's wrath is burning against all the unrighteousness of men. As Paul says in Romans 2, Peter says in 2 Peter 3, God's wrath is being stored up for the day of judgment on which he will pour out fire on the earth.

And we hear about this and we realize, that would include me. Because I have disobeyed God and I am among the wicked that would be consumed in the holy fire of God on that day of judgment. I would not be able to stand before God on that day.

Even the apostle John understood this in Revelation when he was looking at the judgments of God being poured out and it caused him to say, who can stand against the judgment of God? And the only way that we can be saved from God's wrath is by faith in Jesus Christ.

You understand, we call Christ Savior. And we say that we have been saved. Saved from what? If we're going to call him Savior, what has he saved us from? Our sins? Sure. Yes. All have sinned and fallen short of God's glory.

He saved us from death? Yes. Romans 6 23, the wages of sin is death. Even more than this, Christ has saved us from God's wrath. His wrath that is going to be poured out on unbelieving, wicked, sinful, rebellious men.

Which as Paul had already established earlier in Galatians chapter 3, this is everyone who relies upon their own works instead of the work of Christ. Paul said in Galatians 3 10, for all who rely on works of the law are under a curse.

For as it is written, and we go back to Deuteronomy, cursed be everyone who does not abide by all the things written in the book of the law and do them. That's us. That's every person. Everyone has transgressed the law.

And because God is so holy and so good, he will not allow his creatures, which he has made, to think of themselves as being as good as or higher than God. And that's what we think of ourselves whenever we try to do righteousness on our own instead of relying on the righteousness of God.

We are blaspheming God with every breath that we take. We say to God, I can do this fine without you. Look at me. Look at how righteous I can be. Why do I need God? And it is through the law that we come to realize that we have sinned.

And the Holy Spirit will open our eyes and our ears to understand what is being said in the law of God so that we come to understand the transgression and our need for a Savior. Two sides of the same coin.

On one side, we see the law, we turn it over, and we see the resolution to the law, which is the gospel. Or we hear the gospel, and through the gospel of Christ, we understand what the law is, and we desire the law because it is good and righteous and holy.

Paul says so in Romans 7 and 1 Timothy 1. There is nothing wrong with the law. And that's what Paul comes into next in verse 21, where he says,. Is the law then contrary to the promises of God? If we're saved by the promise, we're not saved by the law.

And if the coming of the law did not nullify the promise as it was first given, then is the law bad? Is the law contrary to the promises of God? And look at how Paul answers this. Galatians 3 .21,. Certainly not.

That's really kind of tame, all things considered, regarding his answer. In the Greek, it is, Mygenoito, for those of you who know Greek. That is the strongest phrase of opposition that Paul can possibly give.

In English, we might translate it this way, No, no, a thousand times, no. That would be Paul's response. There is a certain brand of theology that's out there today. It's often termed new covenant theology, not to be confused with covenant theology.

But new covenant theology would teach that we are under a new covenant. So you could disregard even what is written in the Old Testament as being unnecessary for us who are under the new covenant. One of the foremost proponents of this kind of thinking and this kind of teaching is Andy Stanley.

Andy Stanley has gone this way of this phrase that has now been stuck with him over the last few years, that you must unhitch yourself from the Old Testament. And I've been very vocally opposed to the way that Stanley will say things like even the Ten Commandments do not apply to you.

He's even said that. There was a sermon of his that I watched in which he said, the Ten Commandments do not apply to you. And he has this little TV screen with him up on the stage that will kind of put up his talking points as he's preaching.

And he said, I wanted to put up here on this screen, the Ten Commandments no longer apply to you, but I knew that somebody would take a screenshot of that and it would follow me around for the rest of my pastoral teaching career.

So he said, I'm not going to put it up on the screen, but he nevertheless said it vocally, the Ten Commandments don't apply to you. And he even lamented over the fact that we have Ten Commandments monuments in front of our courthouses.

We have one here in Junction City. I don't know if you've ever noticed it, but it's out there. I stop and look at every time I go to pay my water bill, I stop and look at that monument. I'm like, I love this.

I love that the Ten Commandments are right here in front of our city building. And you almost miss it as you walk by. I'm okay with certain people in Junction City not knowing that it's there. So nobody's raising a stink about it.

But Stanley says we shouldn't have Ten Commandments monuments. He says we should raise this, crack me up. He said we should instead be making monuments of Jesus preaching the Sermon on the Mount. Now it's okay if you don't get that joke, but for myself who has studied theology and knowing that Andy Stanley has advanced theology degrees, it was incredibly ironic that he said that.

I cracked up laughing when I heard him say it. Because Jesus provides what is perhaps the best expositional sermon in the entire Bible on the Ten Commandments in the Sermon on the Mount. He preaches the Ten Commandments.

And he shows that the Ten Commandments were not just some external thing out there that you had to obey and thus ticking all these things off of a list, you could therefore transfer yourself from earth to heaven by obeying all of these commandments.

Jesus said, no, on the contrary. You have heard it said, thou shalt not commit adultery. I tell you, if you have even lusted after someone in your heart, you have committed adultery with them in your heart.

Jesus was showing just how you've disobeyed the Ten Commandments. Maybe you can say, I've never cheated on my wife. Ever lusted after anyone? You've committed adultery in your heart. He goes on to say, you've heard it said you shall not murder.

But I say to you, if you've even hated your brother, you've committed murder in your heart. Have you ever called anyone names? If you've said you fool, you are guilty of the fires of hell. Everyone has disobeyed the Ten Commandments.

And why did Jesus find it necessary to have to preach on that? Because he gets to a point in Matthew chapter 7 in the Sermon on the Mount where he says, enter through the narrow gate. What does it mean to enter through the narrow gate?

It means that you live in upright holiness and righteousness. Right at the end of Matthew chapter 5, after he just went through this exposition of the Ten Commandments, he says, be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect.

That's the narrow gate. We must be perfect in order to enter the kingdom of God. But as I said to you a few weeks ago, the thing that God demands of us is the thing he gives to us. He demands righteousness.

He gives righteousness through his son. Everyone who believes in Christ receives the righteousness of God by faith. It's that transference of righteousness. Jesus in Revelation chapter 3 saying, I will clothe you in righteousness in white garments so that when God the Father looks at us, what does he see?

Not someone who is the object of his wrath, but now a child of God who is the object of his mercy and his love.

The Law Reveals Transgression and Drives Us to Christ

You've been listening to When We Understand the Text with Pastor Gabe Hughes. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, Gabe will be going through a New Testament study. Then on Thursday, we look at an Old Testament book.

On Friday, we take questions from the listeners and viewers. Tomorrow, we'll pick up on an Old Testament study, When We Understand the Text.