Consecrated To The Law Of God

Thank you for subscribing to the Shepherds Church podcast. This is our Lord's Day Sermon We pray that as we declare the

Word of God that you would be encouraged Strengthened in your faith and that you would catch a greater vision of who

Christ is May you be blessed in the hearing of God's Word and may the Lord be with you as you'll recall from last week the majority of our time in the sermon was actually covering why

Confession is so important and that's especially true in the corporate gathering where we read the law each week

And we confess our sins Once a week here in this place and we remember the pardon that we have in Jesus Christ Now as I mentioned earlier over the course of several years

I've tried to Explain what these different laws are That we look at like the civil law where it's property law where nations are governed by it and that's 3 ,500 years ago type of legal code, you know, like when we drive down the street and we see the the posted speed limit that's our 21st century law that's there and our law is is

Way too large You know all the libraries in this building wouldn't be able to hold all of the books that somehow are on the books

You've got laws like in Boston where you can't snore with the window open I'm just saying maybe our law code maybe need some revision

But I think we can also agree that if the law in this country was built upon and and was and Pointed to the law in Scripture that our country would actually be much healthier much happier and much holier

Would it not if we would scrap the immoral and perverted law code that we have and we would just pattern our laws after the

Old Testament We would find that they aren't antiquated at all. We would find that it would actually heal our land the second kind of laws the ceremonial law

Which is the temple the sacrificial system the priest the clean and unclean laws the the shrimp

Which have been fulfilled by Christ when we see in Acts chapter 10 when

God brings this vision to Peter and all the animals are made out and in God says

Peter take and eat and Peter says I dare not do that Lord. Those things are unclean and God says don't call unclean what

I've made clean and Jesus Christ the ceremonial law has been fulfilled Because he's our true priest

He's our true temple He's a true and greater sacrifice. His blood is better than the bull the blood of bulls and goats.

He's the better Passover He's the better all of these things. He is the one who actually Makes us clean

Not the washings and the anointings and the blood offerings and any of those things Jesus has made us clean

Now what's our relationship to the ceremonial law we don't throw it out We look at it.

We study it. We love it Why because we see God's heart underneath these commands because God gave these commands to a people at a particular time

And he had a reason for giving these commands and his reason was is that they would be a shadow that would point to Christ So why would we throw out all of the

Levitical laws that we see there because that's an opportunity for us to worship Now it's not it's not as easy reading as it is in like say

Matthew or Mark or Luke But when we see the Day of Atonement sacrifice

When we see the Passover When we see all of the different feasts and we see how they point to Jesus We don't throw those laws out.

We don't we don't go to Passover anymore We don't practice the Day of Atonement sacrifice if you do, hopefully you cook the animal afterwards and if you do call me

But we remember these things because they point to Jesus they point to Jesus So When you have celebrity pastors who say we should unhitch ourselves from the

Old Testament as New Testament Christians We should ignore what the Old Testament says because it's confusing.

I Take offense to that Because everything in this is pointing to Christ The third kind of law is moral law

These laws have no expiration sticker These laws continue to remain valid and they have relevance for the life of the believer and guess what we are still commanded to obey them

Just like the Ten Commandments, that's moral law Now the reason

Why this is so important is Because the moral law actually does something very unique in the

Bible I don't want to teach you this so that you'll be able to see it the moral law every time you see that a command is

Moral, I'll tell you how you can know that that's the case because it's not just rolling the dice

It's like I don't know. Does it sound like ceremonial? Does it sound like civil? Does it sound like moral when you're getting into these passages?

I'm gonna tell you how you know you'll know because God always pairs his character with the moral law

He says things like this command is for all generations and because we know God is not a liar

Then that command is a moral law it's for all generations or he'll say things like I am the

Lord your God do not do this When God says that I am he's saying his name

And do you know what the name of God means? I am It's the Hebrew word Yahweh It's translated as I am that I am

Which is pure being or I will be who I will be

Many Hebrew scholars actually believe that this word has a past present and future Undertone that I was who

I was I am who I am and I will be who I will be all Time is covered by the name of God.

He is pure existence He never changes past present future and into eternity

Now unless God changes his mind like Barack Obama in 2008 When he flip -flopped on the issue of homosexuality

Unless God changes his mind, which we know that he doesn't That command still exists.

And this is why it's important because you'll have people today who will say The command to not be in a homosexual relationship.

For instance, that's not a moral law That's not a law for all people at all times. That's outdated

That's a Hebrew civil law that governed their society, but now God's enlightened Now God knows better our society has graduated to love is love

And then you can rebuke such a foolish claim by pointing to Leviticus 8 18 21 through 22

It says you shall not give any of your offspring to offer them to Molech Nor shall you profane the name of your

God. You see how his character now has been brought into the middle of it It's not just a command Israel. This is you shall not profane the name his name that is everlasting

And then he says I am the Lord so he uses his divine name And then he says you shall not lie with a male as one who lies with a female.

It is an abomination We get a two -for -one here Because two great sins that our nation is staking their future identity on its homosexuality and abortion

Here God says I am the Lord your God. These things are abominations to me Killing and murdering a baby in the womb is an abomination to God That's not something that has an expiration sticker and that's not something he's graduated on from and now he thinks oh, no, this is different now

The same thing is true with homosexuality The immutable changeless God has given a changeless command and he's wedding that command with his character

So that now this still applies do you see how do you see how I pulled that out of the text This is not a civil law

This is not a ceremonial law This is a moral law for all people at all times

So when people say things like well, the Bible also says you can't eat shrimp You can point to them and say you don't understand the law

There's three kinds of laws. That's a ceremonial law that Christ fulfilled. This is a moral law that lasts forever

And you'll hear you'll hear it smart atheist make this kind of ridiculous claim about the scripture because they don't understand what's going on in the law

I'll bring this up Not just because I want you to win debates with atheists Not because I want to empower you to be a keyboard warrior on Facebook.

I Don't want you to be skittish about the law. I don't want you to be afraid of the law I don't want you to be confused by the law.

I want you to understand it and In understanding it when you read Leviticus the reason why we don't read

Leviticus is because it's confusing I want you when you read Leviticus to have your piece of paper out and say, ah, that's ceremonial.

Ah, that's moral. Ah, that's civil Because there's so much benefit in knowing that and so much benefit in how we interpret that But in the midst of that Now that we understand these three categories.

I want to do what I always do and add three more. I Want to heap on you even more Those three categories today though are not

Categories like the ones we just talked about they're not kinds of laws There are ways to apply the law because one of the things

I realized That we really haven't done yet is we haven't talked about how to apply the law of God we've talked about what these three categories are, but we haven't talked about how to apply it and It just so happens that in today's message on consecration this theme actually works quite well

So what I want us to do is I want us to look at the three Kinds of laws that there are and and how do we apply them to our life?

I want us I want us to today understand what our relationship should be to the law of God I Want us to understand whether we should obey the law or whether we should throw it out whether it saves us or whether it sanctifies

Us and I want us to understand where Christians should rightly fall on the issue of obedience to the law

So with that we're gonna go through three things today The first thing we're gonna go through is we're gonna go through two wrong approaches to the law that churches all over the world have adopted

Then we're gonna go into the three right approaches to the law Which we should adopt and then we're gonna talk about how this church thinks about the law

And then we'll close and we'll go home with joy in Christ. So let's pray

Lord Jesus Few things in the Bible seem more daunting and complicated to us than the law

Maybe the minor prophets maybe some Sections of Ezekiel or Isaiah or Jeremiah, but Lord the law is a con or is a is a daunting part of the scriptures to most of us

Lord, I pray that that this sermon would be able to help and it would be able to show us Not only that there are three kinds of laws, but there's three ways to apply them

Lord. I pray that that would be helpful And Lord, I also pray that this we as a church

Would avoid the error that So many churches have adopted The two distinct errors in fact

Lord, I pray that you would protect us today. You would protect us this year You would protect us moving forward and Lord.

I pray that your church That all of us here Would be blessed by the law as it's rightly administered in Christ's name.

Amen Now there's two wrong ways that churches

Have essentially viewed the law of God The first is that it saves you they have to obey it in order to be saved.

That's called legalism and Then the second way is that now we're Christians. We don't have to read the

Old Testament We don't have to do anything with the Old Testament. So we punt it and we say that this is not for us

Legalism says that we have to obey God in order to be accepted by God And this is not just a thing in the

Hebrew roots movement Which basically says that I need to obey all the feasts all the sacrifices all of this or I'm not going to be saved

This happens all over the place. So for instance if you're familiar with the term Arminian Arminian sort of the opposite of Calvinist and Arminian who says that you can lose your salvation is

Adopting a legalistic gospel because if you don't obey you lose your salvation, that's legalism

Anyone who says that you can lose your salvation is appealing to obedience to save you

When you think about Pentecostal churches where they say if you don't have big faith, God's not gonna bless you.

They're appealing to obedience For blessing that's legalism when you look at Catholic churches where you have to sit inside of a

Confessional booth and you have to tell your sins to this person and or you have to you know Be baptized as an infant or you're not saved or you have to be you have your last rites before you die

Or you're gonna go to purgatory. That's legalism When you listen to evangelical sermons even

Where they say do this and do that obey this obey that Ten laws on how to be sexually pure but they give no gospel

They give no Christ did that so that you were healed and you were purified that's legalism

When you tell someone to obey the law without giving them the hope of the gospel, you've given them no hope

You've tied a millstone around their neck and you've basically told them to swim We do not obey in order to be accepted by God We do not perform in order to get

God to choose us I remember there was this time back in North Carolina where my wife and I went to go pick out a puppy and These dogs were wagging their tails and they were showing off and they were like pick me pick me and They manipulated me and we went home and we picked we picked poorly the dog that we picked

Bless her heart was a good dog, but we picked poorly My point in that example is that we don't treat

God that way Where we perform and where we do all kinds of things and look up and say I hope he picks me

I hope he chooses me. We can't manipulate God with our lackluster obedience

Unless we're trusting in the finished work of Jesus Christ. We have no hope Unless we're trusting in Christ for our salvation.

We are chasing after the wind That's the first error legalism the second error though seems a

Bit better, but I will tell you that it's just as destructive in the life of the church in fact

It's almost easier to convince a legalist to trust the gospel than it is to convince an antinomian to obey the law

This error comes from two words in the Greek ante and namas Auntie means no or against namas means law.

So it means that you're against the law of God Christ has fulfilled the law.

He's abolished it. He's fulfilled it So I no longer have to go about worrying about obeying God. God is he saved me.

He's sanctified me He's done all of that and this is how this game sort of morphs into this

Destructive tendency because then when we believe that we start saying things like I don't really need to work

I don't really need to get too serious about my faith I remember when I was a brand new believer and I was overjoyed about Jesus somebody looked at me and said we're kindle all things in moderation and I was like that might be true for oxygen

That might be true for hamburgers. That might be true for a beer that's not true for Christ and Yet we have that sort of mentality where it's okay

God loves me just as I am. So I get to go play golf today and it's fine Or I'm hungover and I have a headache and I don't feel like going to church.

It's fine Or I can skip worship altogether because God's not gonna notice because his blood forgave me of all my sins we play this game with God where we treat the things of God as if they're optional or as if they're not that serious and Then we basically say but he forgave me of all my sins

We lean into the forgiveness of God with pre -planned sins It's not retroactive where we say

I did it again God, please forgive me. It's like I'm going to do this God's covered it.

God's got it So what if I have an inconsistent reading of the

Bible with so what if I forget to pray? So what if I watch a bunch of things that I'm not supposed to watch on TV and act like the world

Jesus loves me just as I am and I'm his special little snowflake Few are that brazen to say it that way, but that's what we're saying.

That's what we're saying Whenever we live like there's no law whenever we live like that that we can just do whatever we want and that Christ didn't actually

Purchase us It says that that we now belong to him. We don't have a right over our own decision -making anymore.

We are slaves He didn't free us from slavery to Satan sin and death to make us utterly free as if we had no right

We have no master. We now have Christ as our master and Lord so therefore obedience is

Still important when we use the grace of God as if there's no law

We do what Paul says in Romans 6 1 through 2 when he says what shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin so that grace may increase may it never be?

How shall we who died to sin? still live in it and That of course brings out the dilemma that we're talking about If we don't obey to be saved, but yet we can't throw out obedience.

Then what is the right view? If we don't obey God to be saved and we can't just do away with obedience

Then what is the right way to approach obedience? And what is the right way to approach the law? And that's where I want to talk about three right ways and these are laid out by John Calvin And I believe that these are biblical ways.

These are called the three uses of the law and he lays these out I think in the Institutes Three ways that are good and right.

This is what he says on the first use of the law that the whole matter May be made clearer

Let us take a succinct view of the office and use of the moral law Now this office and you seems to me consisted of three parts first by exhibiting the righteousness of God In other words the righteousness which alone is acceptable to God and admonishes every one of his own

Unrighteousness and informs and convicts and finally condemns him This is necessary in order that man who is blind and intoxicated with self -love.

What a statement May be brought at once to know and to confess his weakness and impurity. Thus. The law is a kind of mirror as In a mirror that we discover any stains upon our faces

So in the law we behold first our impotence Then in consequence of it our iniquity and finally the curse as the consequence of both

What Calvin is saying is that the law of God rightly applied in our life should be like a mirror that we look in Where we see first and foremost the perfect righteousness of God when we open up Leviticus We should be praising

God that he's so wonderful And he's so beautiful that he gave us these sacrifices in order to be in his presence We should see his holiness his majesty

The first thing that should happen when we open the book of Deuteronomy is we should start worshiping because the beauty of God is revealed in the law of God, but then as we continue in juxtaposition with ourself

We're not that beautiful and we're not that awesome and we're not that holy

So the second thing that we see as we look into the law as we look into it as a mirror is that God is infinitely holy, but we are not

We're tainted. We're stained we're sinned Augustine says it this way

The law bids us as we try to fulfill its requirements and become wearied in our weakness under it to know how to ask for help

Isn't that beautiful That as we look at how bad we are we don't end in despair

The law is not meant to cause us to end in despair. The law brings knowledge of sins So that we'll know how to ask for help

Paul says this in Romans 3 23 because the works of the law No -flesh will be justified in his sight for through the law comes the knowledge of sin

He rebukes this idea that we can earn our salvation by obedience to the law The law doesn't do that for you.

The law was not there to justify you Jesus Christ is the only one who ever obeyed the law and There is no other there will be no other

So if you're trying to get your justification from your obedience, you will die in your sin But Paul also

Rebukes that other tendency that we were talking about called antinomianism where Paul says in Romans 7 7

What shall we say? Then is the law sin may it never be on? The contrary

I would not have come to know my sin except through the law So the law is useful to us

It reveals to us how beautiful God is and it reveals to us how sinful we are It shows us the knowledge of our sin.

It causes us to repent God uses the law of God to bring us to repentance and then in that God uses it as a tutor to us

To teach us because when we repent where do we repent to when we turn where do we turn to when we need help?

Where do we call upon? Who do we call? Paul says this in Galatians 3 21 through 24 is

The law then contrary to the promises of God may it never be For if a law had been given which was able to impart life then righteousness would have deed been based on the law

But the Scriptures has shut up everyone Under sin so that the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe

But before faith came we were kept in custody under the law being shut up to the faith

Which was later to be revealed therefore the law has become our tutor to lead us to Christ So that we may be justified by faith

So in in all of these passages that we've read we see that the law actually is for us

The laws to help us remember that we're sinners That we need to repent and that we need to turn to Christ Those are good things that God uses in his law if we throw away the law

We've missed Most of the gospel That we're sinners in need of a

Savior The second use of the law is to restrain evil in the world Here's what

John Calvin says about it the feeling of all who are not regenerate though in some more and other less lively is

That in regard to the observance of the law, they are not led by voluntary submission, but they are dragged by force of fear

Nevertheless this force and exhorted righteousness is necessary for the good of society in Peace being secured by a provision

But for which all things will be thrown into tumult and confusion So the law is not only a mirror for us the believer that leads us to repentance in Jesus Christ.

The law also is for society the law also teaches them and restrains them in their evil and we know

That God is not going to convert every single person in this culture But the law is there to restrain evil if you look in Romans 13, it says that is the use of government

So here you have the use of government is to restrain evil Why by applying the law of God to society as we said earlier if the laws of this land actually?

Reflected the laws that we see in the Bible then this would be happening. The reason why evil is so unrestrained right now

It's because we've moved so far away from the law of God The reason why we love sin and hate righteousness is not because that God has done something wrong

It's because we've turned our back on him in his law Now we're not going to spend a lot of time on this one

But only to say that I think it's okay for Christians to work in this society to see good laws passed

I This is a touchy subject So I probably shouldn't say it but you know me

I'm just gonna bolt right through it. I Can never vote for a Democrat in the current way that they're that they're organized because they hate children

They believe in the murder of children and they believe in everything that's opposite of us But I don't really

I'm not really fond of the Republicans either Because I don't see that hope can come from a political party.

I see that hope comes from Jesus Christ I see that this nation is gonna change when we surrender to Christ.

I Don't get excited and maybe it's because I've lived long enough to see things But I don't get excited anymore of a political people.

I want to see the nation bow their knee to Jesus Christ. I want to see the nation adopt

Jesus as their king and adopt his law as their law code and then and then

We would see this nation healed That's the second use of the law is that it restrains evil in society and praise

God for that The third use of the law which Calvin calls the chief use of the law

Is that it's not only a mirror that reveals our sin and it's not only a bridle to restrain evil in the world

But it's a guide for the believer It's not only there to lead us to Christ, but it's there to lead us after we come to Christ, which means that there's an ongoing

Relationship that the Christian has with the law of God look at Ephesians 2 8 through 10 this verse seals this

For by grace you have been saved through faith. Amen, and That's not of yourself.

It's the gift of God not as the result of work so that no man may boast

Now if we stop there We would maybe be tempted to think that he's done everything.

I don't have to do anything, but look at what Paul says For we are his workmanship

Created in Christ Jesus for good works Which God prepared beforehand that we would walk in them.

He just said we're not saved by works But yet he saved us for works.

Do you see the difference? We're not saved by good works. We're saved for good works

You and I can never obey the law of God. So Jesus did that he took away the punishment for that He took away the offense and the curse of that.

So why so that we would be free now to finally live and obey God We often treat

Salvation like God set us back at net neutral Where he forgave us and yes, that's half of it

But he also deposited his righteousness in us He gave us his Holy Spirit to lead us

It says in the Bible that we should have the fruits of the Spirit That we will have the gifts of the

Spirit that we if you love me You will obey my commandments all these verses are talking about after we are saved

The ongoing ministry of the Holy Spirit in our life is that we grow to be more like him

So as a Christian we can't throw out obedience The sin of the legalist is that they make obedience the root of the of your salvation

The sin of the antinomian is they chop off the fruit of your salvation both are wrong

John Calvin goes on to say it like this. I Will warn you that he uses words that are not appropriate in our society today

But they were not inappropriate his one is referring to a donkey and one is referring to the slowing down of something

I'm gonna read them in their original context because I'm not gonna edit John Calvin But I warn you that if you chafe at some words, it's because they don't mean what they used to mean

The third use of the law being also the principal use and more closely connected with its proper end

Has respect to believers and whose heart the Spirit of God already flourishes and reigns

For although the law is written and engraven on the hearts by the finger of God That is although they are so influenced and actuated by the

Spirit that they now desire to obey God There are two ways in which they still profit in the law

For it is the best instrument for enabling them daily to learn with greater truth and certainty. What?

That will of the Lord is which they aspire to follow and to confirm them in his knowledge

Just as a servant who desires with all his soul to approve himself to his master Must still observe and be careful to ascertain his master's dispositions that he may comport himself in accommodation to them

Let none of us deem ourself exempt from this necessity for none have yet as attained to such a degree of wisdom as That they may not for the daily instruction in the law advance to a purer knowledge of the divine will let us not think we've graduated beyond obedience then

Because we need not doctrine merely But exhortation also the servant of God will derive this further advantage from the law

By frequently meditating upon it He will be excited to obedience and confirmed in it and so drawn away from the slippery paths of sin in This way must the

Saints press onward Since however great the alacrity which with under the spirit they hasten towards righteousness righteousness

They are retarded by the sluggishness of their flesh. They're slowed down By the sluggishness of their flesh.

They're made less progress Than they ought the law acts like a whip. I love that line

The law acts like a whip to the flesh urging it on as men do to a lazy sluggish ass forgive me children.

It's a donkey Even in the case of a spiritual man in as much as he is still burdened with the weight of the flesh

The law is constant is a constant stimulus pricking him forward when he would indulge in sloth

People are right like that anymore. Do they? The law is a whip to us to prod us

Forward and obedience praise God that he has given us this grace to the elect

It's like the bumper lanes at a bowling alley praise God Sometimes you just need a bumper lane because you're not gonna make it

You're gonna fall off to the left and the right. Have you ever seen a sheep? There's this wonderful video of the sheep falling into a into a crack in the earth

And a little shepherd boy comes up and pulls it out and then it jumps twice and falls right back into another ditch

That's who we are We're compared to the dumbest animals on earth Because we're dumb and if you were offended by that I Pray that the

Lord would convict you on that But we're pretty dumb. I'm dumb. We fall into sin and ruin all the time

The law is a whip to keep us on the right path with Christ and praise

God for that When I've done discipline right in my family my children thank me for it

That's hard to do it correctly, especially as humans. I Remember one time

Haley told me thank you for being strict on us because you want us to love Jesus And you don't want us to be affected by things that are going in the world.

And I just want to say thank you. I Want that attitude towards God? I Thank him for his discipline because he's keeping me on the path

Again, the law is not there to justify us The law is not there to make us righteous any more than my rules to my children don't determine whether they're my children or not

They'll be my children whether or not they obey they will not enjoy being my children if they do not obey

The same is true with God All throughout the Bible obedience follows relationship

Obedience never comes before Relationship you do not obey to get into a relationship with God once you're in relationship with God the obedience comes

Now that leads us to a question Which laws are we as Christians supposed to obey? Which laws are we supposed to?

To hold tight to to guide us. Well, I would say that all of them in a sense a Ceremonial law we talked about it earlier

We don't obey that as in attending Passover, but we do look at the law and we let it guide us in worshiping

Christ He is the true fulfillment of all those passages the civil law I Want to read the civil law.

This is just me speaking, but I think this is helpful I want to read the civil law so that I'll know how to live as a faithful citizen in this country among People who hate

God and who don't live faithfully I want to let it teach me how to be a faithful citizen And I also want to work to see our nation conform to what the

Bible says So that's how the civil law is guiding me the moral law

Is there to help us become like Christ? It's there to help us become like Jesus For instance the

Ten Commandments, that's the foundation of the moral law. That's not been abrogated by Christ Derek talked about this a few weeks ago.

Do you know the two most? abandoned laws and the Ten Commandments are It's Sabbath and it's second commandment.

Don't make an image of your God. Isn't it interesting that out of the ten? The two that we disobey the most wrong

God's side of the laws and then the ones we try to obey the most wrong man's side of the laws Ten commandments are still active for the

Christian What about the greatest commandment? Love the Lord your God with all of your heart with all of your soul with all of your mind with all of your strength

And love your neighbors yourself. Do we still obey that? Of course The law guides us

The law examines us When the Holy Spirit reveals to us, you're not loving God with all of your heart.

I Think that's true for all of us You're not loving him with all of your strength. You're not loving him with all of your mind

Evangelicalism today has abandoned this idea of Having a robustly theological

Christianity. I Don't need to study. I Don't need to think deeply about the things of God.

I just need the simple gospel The Bible talks about that love God with all your mind move on from the elementary things grow up into maturity of faith

These things are still applicable to us the Great Commission Go in all the world and make disciples of all the nations

That's one of the most neglected because how many how many of us actually want to make disciples?

How many of us actually want to help someone else grow in their faith? I Know that it's hard Because if you've been in relationships long enough, you know that when someone says that they want to grow in their faith sometimes they really don't want to grow in their faith and Then before long you're become jaded you become frustrated or you become anxious and you become nervous and you say

I can't do that I'm not qualified for that Jesus qualified you for that by giving you the command He would have never commanded you to do something if you didn't think you were qualified for it by the power of the

Holy Spirit This law still is for us today What about the Beatitudes you don't do them to be saved?

You don't obey them in order to impress God. But now as a Christian who has the Holy Spirit now, you're growing to be peacemakers growing to be people men and women of righteousness

Did you know that? There's over a thousand commands in the New Testament That that number shocked me 1050 is how many commands there are in the

New Testament in this book where where Christ has done everything for us

Yet now that he now that we're Christians. He's called us to do everything for him He gave everything for us.

So now we can give everything for him as witnessed by these thousand commands. You can read through them There's a lot.

I Haven't mastered them and no one else in this room has either the point that I'm getting at is

That for Christians to ignore the law of God would be to cut yourself off from dynamic forms of worship

It would be to cut yourself off from having a vision of the world and how to live as a member of society and would be

Cutting yourself off from how to walk in obedience to Christ and to grow in holiness It seems to me

That the law is incredibly important Paul says this in Galatians 6 1 through 2

Brethren, even if anyone is caught in any trespass You who are spiritual restore such a one in the spirit of gentleness each one looking to yourself so that you too will not be tempted

Bear one another's burdens and therefore fulfill the law of Christ Now if the law was not important Paul would not have told them to restore their brother

Because they've sinned Paul would have said Jesus already covered all their sin. You don't need to worry about it

He's talking to believers. He said if your believing friend falls into sin restore them with the gospel

So therefore the gospel has this dual aspect to it. It's Jesus did it all so now that we can grow in what we do for him

Now the final aspect of this is how does this apply to the church? Because the church

Doesn't have freedom To just throw together a worship service with all the parts that we like and all the parts that we know everybody else likes we craft worship services according to What the

Bible says that we must do if the Bible says that we must love the law That the law is there to help us obey

Christ and that for all of us who are Christians The law is there to to be our guide and our whip

Then Churches have to take into account how to view the law. We can't ignore it. We can't unhitch ourselves from it and throw it away so the first thing

I would say that this church and As you pray for the church pray for us that we would never fall into the temptation of legalism

That we would never preach a gospel here that says you need to do do do and do and forget what

Christ has done Pray that we would always hold fast to that distinction also, pray

That we would not throw obedience out and that we would stop preaching that the gospel has implications for our lives

I've seen so many churches do this Where it's all about the gospel this whole tagline of gospel centeredness is actually gospel halfedness

Where they've halved off the other or they've lopped off the other half of it It's all about what

Jesus has done But you go live any way you want and the pastor never says it that way But the congregation ends up living that way because they don't see that there's implications for the way that they live

Pray that we wouldn't preach that way either because I don't think that's what God wants My prayer is that we would lean into this third aspect of the law that we would preach it after we've preached the gospel that Christ has died for our sins and That we would preach this in the power of the

Spirit that we who are his would now grow to love him and obey him And I think that honors the

Lord for us We want to preach a four -part message every single week

Even if I tell you that there's 10 parts or 12 parts or however many parts I end up coming up with it's basically a four part message

Part one is I want to tell you what does the Bible tell you to do? What's the Bible command you the second part is

I want to expose how you and I can't do it You and I can't do it and we never will be able to do it the third part is

I want to show you how Jesus Christ has done it perfectly and Then the fourth part is now that you've been justified according to his righteousness

How can you grow in obedience by the power of the Holy Spirit? That's I Think a faithful sermon

How does this apply to our worship services not just in the way that we think about it Every week we come in and we're called into worship, right?

And then after that we confess our sins and then after that what we're consecrated unto Christ You see the preaching and the singing is reminding all of us what

God says in his Word, that's what we're doing So when we're preaching the word, we're actually telling all of the people of God what the

Word of God says So that we can repent and so that we can cling to and grow in our faith

Look at what it says in 2nd Timothy 4 1 through 2. This is Paul's definition of preaching. I Solemnly charge you

Timothy in the presence of God and of Christ now if Paul who's already an intense person and He looked at me and he said

I solemnly charge you in the presence of okay Let me make sure

I do this. I solemnly charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus who is that to judge the living in the dead and By his appearing in his kingdom to preach the word

Be ready in season and out of season reprove rebuke exhort and with great patience and instruction

Paul's not just telling Timothy to just preach the gospel that yes Absolutely, because if you don't preach the gospel, then it's not a biblical sermon, but he goes on he says you have to build on top of that foundation by reprimanding by centering by encouraging by reproving by by Exhorting the

Saints because because there's implications of the gospel He charges Timothy in the presence of the

Living God to preach that Another example 2nd

Timothy 316 a very popular passage, but only half of it All scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching.

Amen for reproof for correction for training up in righteousness

See God has given us a God -breathed word to change us You think about this big piece of rock that they cut the

Mount Rushmore into and how many hammer strikes it took and how many chisels that it took scraping and beating against the face of that to make

Those four presidents faces out night or South Dakota That's what

I want in my life This unformed rocky Man that I am that the hammer of God the chisel of God through the

Word of God and through the preaching of God Would begin shaping me into the image of Christ So that what so that you and I?

would grow up in Christ so that we would be corrected for our sin trained up in righteousness so that we'd be hearers and doers of the word all of these things are important in the life of the believer

My hope in all of this and this is where we'll close is that in this gathering and in our confessing of sin and in our receiving the pardon of Christ and in our

Consecrating ourself unto him through the preaching of the word that we would grow to love Christ above all else

And that we would grow to cling to the Savior above all things. Let's pray

Lord Jesus I Can think of few sermons that would be less thrilling Than a sermon on the law of God and yet that is what you kept

David awake at night Thinking about and clinging to Lord we see so many good things that the law has done it tutors us it prove it it prods us it corrects us

It shows us the beauty of you Lord help us as a church to to handle the law rightly help us not to be

Judaizers and legalist Lord also help us not to be People who cut the law out and never mention it

Lord help us to be a church That sees the law as valuable in our life so that we can repent and so that we can grow and So that we can love you more in Christ's name