in the same chapter as our first
hour, Galatians chapter two, if you'd like to follow along. Now what we have discovered and
determined, it's been written thus far, is that the church
of Galatia had fallen into a distressful situation because there was some
men that came in and they tried to preach another gospel to these
individuals, And they believed it. They believed it. Paul wrote
them in the first chapter and says, he says, he was perplexed. He was bewildered. He said that
you would, who has done this, that you'd be bewitched. He's
like, that you were so soon removed from the gospel that I sent to
you. He's like, and these men preach another gospel. And he
loved how he puts it parentheses. He says, which is not another
gospel, just so you know. But here in this chapter, we
see the heart. of the issue. And I can go ahead
and tell you what the problem was. They were saying Christ
is all in salvation and or but you have to be circumcised. Otherwise,
you're not a believer. That was the only thing they
did. But the magnitude of that simple Um, requirement man-made
requirement is that it brought them into bondage. As we heard
the first hour, they were no longer free from the law. They
were under the bondage of the law. See, if we add one thing
to, or take away one thing from the finished work of Christ,
we're guilty of the whole law. Can't just be partly guilty.
You're guilty of the whole law. So here in our text, we have
the heart of the matter, the entire book of Galatians, the
pinnacle, the pinnacle of the entire book of Galatians and
the message. He's talked about his work that
the Lord had given him and his ministry that God had called
him to. He's talked about all the things that he had been through,
who he had been with, what he preached to validate that his
calling was of God. And now he's going to get to
the message of Galatians, the message. It's the remedy for
their unbelief. It's law and grace mixing. The
remedy for law and grace mixing. And Paul begins to tell them
the problem with an account he had with Peter at Antioch back
in Acts. He goes over this problem that
Peter had. Barnabas got caught up in also.
Then he gives the solution. So let's read this together.
Galatians 2 verse 11 through 21. But when Peter was come to
Antioch, I withstood him to the face, because he was to be blamed. For before that certain came
from James, he did eat with the Gentiles. But when they were
come, he withdrew and separated himself, fearing them which were
of the circumcision. And the other Jews dissembled
likewise with him, insomuch that Barnabas also was carried away
with their dissemination. But When I saw that they walked
not uprightly according to the truth of the gospel, I said unto
Peter, before them all, if thou being a Jew, livest after the
manner of the Gentiles, and not as do the Jews, why compelst
thou the Gentiles to live as do the Jews? We who are Jews
by nature, and not sinners of the Gentiles. And here it is,
here's the solution. Knowing that a man is not justified
by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ. Even we have believed in Jesus
Christ that we might be justified by the faith of Christ and not
by the works of the law. For by the works of the law shall
no flesh be justified. But if, while we seek to be justified
by Christ, we ourself also are found sinners, is therefore Christ
the minister of sin? God forbid. For if I build again
the thing which I destroyed, I make myself a transgressor.
For I, through the law, am dead to the law that I might live
unto God. I am crucified with Christ. Nevertheless, I live, yet not
I, but Christ liveth in me. In the life which I now live
in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God who loved me
and gave himself for me. I do not frustrate the grace
of God, for if righteousness came by the law, then Christ
is dead in vain. So here we have a story, an event
that took place. A group got together, as we do
sometimes, as we do sometimes, they had feasts of the church.
And at this feast, Barnabas and Peter were sitting with the Gentiles,
who are also referred to as the uncircumcision here. And as they're
sitting with the uncircumcision, men had already came in, the
men at wolves and sheep clothing, as we talked about the first
hour and told them, no, you have to be circumcised also. Well,
Paul, or I'm sorry, Peter and Barnabas did not necessarily
agree with that, but their language put so much emphasis on it that
it made it look like that that was actually the truth. So the
men come in, the Jews come in. Now the Jews are here. Now we
have the Gentiles and all the Jews at the Gentile table get
up, including Barnabas and Peter. Now I would remind you that Peter's
the one that stood on the day of Pentecost and declared the
Lord's gospel on Pentecost and the Lord saved 5,000 souls. That
day alone, it was the start of the church. This was the man
that walked on water, but yet he denied the Lord entirely.
So we see the Lord doesn't change our nature, does he? Why did
he leave the Gentile table to go to the Jew table? He was afraid.
Plain and simple. What was he afraid of? Controversy,
confrontation, disapproval. What are we afraid of most of
the time? Is that not kind of the same things we run from?
This is what Peter was doing. He gets up from the table, fearing
man. And this is sufficient evidence that God's people can be persuaded
for a time to have fear and act upon that fear. But the good
news of God is he says that he keeps us by the power of God. We don't keep ourself. We're
not our own. Brethren, we're not so able in our flesh to withstand
the logic of legalism. Our flesh loves it. Now what's
legalism? Legalism is something you do
as part of your righteousness. Something you do that you think
makes God approve of you in your life. That's what legalism is.
Legalism. It's going to the law in some
way, shape, or form. Now, it may not be the Ten Commandments,
but there's many laws. There's the moral law, the civil
law, the ceremonial law. Going to the law in any way,
shape, or form, and that's those three right there, sum up the
whole law. It's how you live your life, how you treat others,
and how you worship God. That's the three. Now, if you
believe that you treat others good enough and God will accept
you, then you're going to the civil law in order for justification. You see what I'm saying? So all
of those are wrong. All of those are wrong, but legalism
in itself is the problem. It's wrong. God is not looking
at your life. God is not looking at your sacrifice. He's looking to the sacrifice
of his son. He's not looking to your works. He's looking to
the works of his son. And if I am not in Christ, I'm
in bondage. I am not saved. I am not, I don't
know him yet. He's going to have to cause me
to look to Christ alone, Christ alone. Now, Peter, you won't
read Peter in Barnabas actually says, yes, circumcision actually
is necessary for salvation. You won't find that in scripture,
but their actions spoke louder than their words to those who
are around. I forgot to tell you the title of the message
is Freely Justified. Freely Justified, I just remembered
that. Freely justified. We are not able to withstand
this flesh. The logic of legalism, we crave it. It craves the look
at me mentality. Look at me, I don't do this.
Look at me, I don't do that. I'm better than others. I don't
do what this person does or that person does. That's justifying
yourself based upon others. You know who the standard is?
It's not the flesh. It's not people. It's not the
world. It's the Lord Jesus Christ. He
is the standard. Am I living up to his standard.
Well, how do I do that. You have to be in him. That's
the only way to live to his standard that you live to God standard,
you have to be found in Christ to be perfect to be perfect looking
to him as all your righteousness. If left to ourself, we too will
look for evidence of salvation. We'll get mixed up in foolish
tradition. And that's what this was, this foolish tradition.
This was a tradition that goes all the way back to the Old Testament.
Shortly after, as you were reading, Rob, where the Passover was given,
the Ten Commandments were given just a few chapters later. This
all started, well, the first time circumcision took place
was Abraham. So it was a tradition that was
carried on by the Jews up until even through the Passover and
they passed it down. It was a token that they were
God's chosen people. And they thought, okay, well
we still need to do that then if we're followers of Christ.
But Christ is the end of the entire law and he's the end of
what that, he's the end of the covenant of works. That's the
whole point. The circumcision wasn't for righteousness. The
circumcision was for The Lord made a covenant. He said, this
is a token. That's all it was, is a token. This is my promise
to you. He gave the rainbow to Noah as a token of salvation.
Do we go around wearing rainbows? And there's nothing wrong with
that, I guess, but we don't do it for righteousness. Do you
see what I'm saying? That's the whole point. What we do doesn't
determine our righteousness. No, the circumcision was a token
of the covenant of grace. Grace that you'd be saved by,
not works. The Lord says, don't get mixed up in foolish tradition.
That's why the Lord said, don't get near the church. Come out
from among them and be separate. Don't go to places that preach
the false gospel. Don't do it. Don't enter the
church building. Thankfully, the Lord will not
leave us to ourself. And I'm getting to the heart
of the matter as quickly as I can here. The Lord won't leave us
to ourself. He keeps us. He keeps us. Now this act of
cutting away the skin that these men were doing may seem minuscule
to us. Why was it such a big deal? Why
did that one little thing really even matter? Anything that diminishes
the accomplishment of Christ, that adds to or take away It's
life and death. Do we understand the severity
of that? It's life and death. If we take away from the finished
work of Christ, that's life and death. That's the difference.
You can't, as I said the first hour, you can't preach a half
truth and it be the truth. We can't preach Christ is all
and then add one thing to it. But you have to do this. No,
the Lord said, all that I require, I provide. And I provided everything
in my son. Somebody says, well, you gotta
believe. But is not believing the result of being given faith
by God to believe? It's not for salvation, it's
because you've been saved if you find yourself believing. When a matter of disagreement
divinishes the accomplished work of Christ, it becomes a matter
of eternal significance. When a matter of disagreement
becomes The issue of diminishing the finished work of Christ,
it becomes a matter of eternal significance. This was a significant
issue because of what it represented. It represented that Christ was
not sufficient in and of himself. We have to do something in this
flesh to please God. That's what it represented. That's
what Peter erred. That's what the scripture says.
He erred by going over to the Jews. He was afraid of the Jews.
It literally says he's afraid. But what he did was he gave his
seal of approval to all those who had came in to spread the
lie. Now this was not some, It's what a bunch of things. This
was just one thing. And that's what the whole message
is this morning is either you're justified freely, either we're
freely justified, or there's one thing that's our justification
outside of Christ, which is not a justification at all. It's
a condemnation. It's a condemnation. There's a good example of this.
There's men who believe in a flat earth. I don't know if you all
know about that. Scripture is very clear that the earth is hung
on her circumference. I'm not even going to argue the matter.
But men believe that they're flat. Even former men that I
would call brethren, they say that the earth is now flat. And
it wasn't a gospel issue at first, but then it became a gospel issue.
Well, yeah, we believe Christ is all, but if you don't believe
the earth is flat, you're not one of his. And that's what happened.
So what's their righteousness then? It's this newfound knowledge
of the earth being flat or they think it's flat. That's what
their righteousness is. This is one thing. I'm talking
about one thing. We don't fellowship anymore because
now it's not Christ is all. It's that one thing that they
hold to. It's the one thing. Paul rebukes Peter in front of
everyone. Doesn't whisper it to him in
his ear. It's serious, serious. This is two apostles of the Lord
Jesus Christ. He rebukes him openly in front
of everybody. Gives us the most comforting news, the comforting
words that you and I will ever hear by doing so. He doesn't
just say, you're doing it wrong. He actually says, this is the
reason you're doing it wrong. You're justified freely by grace
alone. That's it, Peter. That's it. By grace alone. Turn with me
to Romans chapter three. Chapter three, verse 21 through
31 says, but now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested
being witnessed by the law and the prophets, even the righteousness
of God, which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon
all them that believe for there is no difference for all have
sinned and come short of the glory of God. being justified
freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ
Jesus, whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through
faith in his blood to declare his righteousness for the remission
of sins that are passed through the forbearance of God. To declare,
I say, at this time his righteousness, that he might be just in the
justifier of him which believeth in Jesus Christ. Where is boasting
then? Where is boasting then? It is
excluded by what law? The law of my works? Nay, but
the law of faith. Therefore we conclude that a
man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law. Is he the
God of the Jews only? Is he not also the Gentiles? Yes, of the Gentiles also, seeing
it as one God which shall justify the circumcision by faith and
uncircumcision through faith. Do then make void the law through
faith? God forbid, yea, we establish
the law. How is it that we establish the
Law through faith? Because Christ is the end of
the Law because of righteousness, for righteousness sake. Christ
is the end of the Law for right. So therefore we establish it
by doing what? Believing on the Lord Jesus Christ. But how shall
they believe in whom they've not heard? And how shall they
hear without a preacher? And how shall they preach without being sent?
It's the Lord that gets all the glory in this. All the glory.
If you hear It's because he said here. If you see, it's because
he said see. This is a spiritual matter, not
a physical matter. The Lord doesn't look upon the
outside. He looks upon the inside. Justification cannot come through
and by the law because the law was not given for righteousness. It was given to expose our condemnation. It was given to expose our sin.
It was given to expose what we are by nature, that we can't
please God in and of ourself, that nothing we can do. can please
God, but Christ fulfilled that law, and Christ is the end of
the law for righteousness sake. Someone may say, well, you have
to choose to believe. Well, that's the same as the
flat earth people, that's the same as the Galatians with circumcision,
it's all the same thing. The individual argument's void
because a dead man can't choose to believe. Did you know that?
And the scripture's very clear, we're born dead in trespasses
and in sin. What does dead mean to you? Dead
means dead. Dead means dead. Lord's don't
mince words. Lord's very serious about his gospel. Dead means
dead. If we're dead and trespassing and sin, how are you going to
make a choice? Well, I can make a choice in my flesh. Well, they that
are in the flesh cannot please God. Can't do that. Whose choice are
we looking to? Now, if I make a choice, does
that not become my righteousness? Will I not say, okay, I made
that choice. I made that choice. The Lord says, no, you're not
going to get any glory in my salvation. You didn't choose
me. I chose you. That's what he told
his apostles, his disciples. Somebody said, yeah, well, he
was just talking to the disciples in that category. Everything the Lord chose, not
just the disciples. He chose his sheep. He chose
his He's chosen people. He chose the sun to be where
it's at, to make it by speaking. He chose the earth to move upon
his axis. Lord chose to do everything. He's the sovereign creator of
this universe. And if I'm going to have any
part with him other than damnation, other than hell, other than eternal
torment, it's going to come through and by one way, being freely
justified by his grace. We don't have the ability to
change. our transgressions. We don't have the ability to
change our trespasses and our sin. We don't have the ability
to change our iniquity. Not by choice, not by choice. The scripture is very clear.
When Christ had by himself purged our sin, he sat down on the right
hand of God. See, the sin were taken for the
Lord's people on the cross of Calvary. They're put away. In
time, the Lord reveals his truth. The Lord reveals his gospel to
his people. He calls them out of darkness
into light. We know what 2 Timothy 1 9 says, God first saved us,
then he called us, not according to our works, but according to
his own purpose and grace, which was given to his people before
time ever began. That's the gospel, isn't it?
That's the gospel. Good news is this, brethren,
Ephesians 2 8 9, for by grace are you saved, through faith, and you know what
he says after that? It's not of yourself. It's not
of yourself, it's not of you, and it's not of me. That means
it's not a choice I make, a prayer I pray, a thought I think, a
handshake I do, it's not a place I go, it's not something I consume
or I don't consume, it doesn't matter. Not of yourself, it is
the gift of God. And then he reiterates it, not
of works, lest any man should boast. God doesn't do all the
saving and all the justifying, none will be saved, none will
be justified. Thanks be to God that he says
here, we're justified by the faith of Christ, the faith of
Christ. Why? Because Christ is our justification. It was Christ's faithfulness
that justified his people. It was Christ's life that justified
his people. It was Christ's death that justified
his people. As we heard about the Passover
lamb, it was the blood that justified the Lord's people. This is how
God did it freely. It was free for you and I, but
it cost the Lord his life on the cross of Calvary. God had
to die. Have you ever thought about that? Our Lord had to die. That means God had to die. That's
the eternal God. Do we understand the significance
of what it costs for you and I to have this eternal life?
God is not going to give his son as a ransom for everybody
without exception, and then some of those people will go to hell.
That doesn't make any sense. What would the death of Christ
have to even do with salvation? I would be God making the choice.
I would be God making the blood effectual. What a blasphemous
thought, that I'm the one that makes God's blood effectual?
That I'm the one that makes God's blood, that it's not gonna work
until I do my part. No, no, turn with me back to
Galatians chapter two. Oh, the Lord said, my sheep hear
my voice and I know them. They follow me and I give unto
them eternal life. That's so clear, isn't it? I give unto
them eternal life and they shall never perish. My sheep shall
never perish. That's what he said. Galatians 2.16 says, knowing
that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by
the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus Christ,
that we might be justified by the faith of Christ and not by
the works of the law for by the works of the law shall no flesh
be justified. Someone says, so my faith is
my justification. That doesn't say your faith in
Christ, it says the faith of Christ. Whose faith is it? It's
Christ. Where does it come from? Christ.
So who gets all the glory for it? Christ. Christ gets all the
glory for it. The focal point of faith, the
object of it, the substance of it. is our justification. What's
the focal point? Christ. What's the object of
it? Christ. What's the substance? Faith is the substance of things
hoped for. What's that substance? That's the Lord Jesus Christ.
Faith is the evidence of things not seen. Somebody says, oh,
well, you need to look for evidence. No, faith is the evidence. If
you're looking to Christ, that's the evidence. Evidence of what? The evidence that God has made
me, enabled me, look to Christ. And you know if the Lord has
given you that ability, we'd like to look at him all the time,
wouldn't we? We'd like to constantly keep our eyes upon him all the
time. But is it not true, as soon as we leave here, we get
out on the streets, and I'm not gonna use the driving thing this
time like I normally do. But you know it won't be two seconds.
Something's gonna distract our mind. Our mind's not gonna be
on Christ again. Why? Because we have two natures. We have
two natures. That's why Paul said, oh wretched
man that I am. Not that I was. Who shall deliver me from this
body of death? No, going to the law was just being under bondage. You're not freely justified then.
Lord, I want to think on you more. I want to look to you more.
I want you to be my constant focal point. Well, here's the
good news. That new nature constantly looks to Christ. It never looks
away from Him. Don't you love that? God sees
the new man created in righteousness, born after the seed of God in
Christ Jesus. That's what the Lord sees. He
don't see this flesh. Why? Because we died in Christ
Jesus. So we're dead to the law. We're
dead to death, dead to death. Don't you love that? And now
we're alive in Christ Jesus. That's what the resurrection
shows us that he was raised because of our justification. Not so
we might be justified, but because of it. Because it was accomplished
on Calvary's cross. We don't look for evidence of
faith, brethren. We look to Christ, and faith
is the ability to do so. We're not saved because we have faith. I want you to think
of this. We're not saved because we have
faith. We have faith because the Lord saved us. Do we see
that? We don't have righteousness because
we have faith. We have faith because we've been
made the righteousness of God in him. It's the fruit of justification. It's the fruit of righteousness. It's the fruit of salvation.
And whose fruit was it? It wasn't mine and it wasn't
yours. It's the fruit of the Lord Jesus Christ freely given
to his people all by grace. We're justified freely, freely
justified. I love that God's elect are enabled,
and I didn't stop with just enabled, I put forced, made, compelled
to not look at the deeds done or not done in the flesh as any
part of our salvation anymore. We are made to look to Christ
as all our wisdom as all our righteousness, as all our sanctification,
as all our redemption, as all of our justification. These are
all the things found in Christ alone. We can't find them anywhere
else. They don't exist in this world
outside of him. They don't exist in eternity
outside of him. He's the sum and substance of
all of that. He's the source. He's the sole source of it. God's elect are made to look
on the Lord Jesus Christ. And think about just for a moment,
and sometimes we blow through that really fast. We've been
enabled to look on the Lord Jesus Christ as our salvation, but
when we stop for a moment and think about what the Lord had
to do in order for us to be enabled to look to the Lord Jesus Christ,
in order for us to be justified, in order for us to see him, not
with these eyes, and hear him, not with these ears, but to be
made perfectly righteous before God's holy law, before God's
holy throne, before the eyes of God, for him to see us as
perfectly righteous, spotless, sinless, holy. What all it took
for him to do that, we should stand in awe. We should stand
in awe. We would be like those in Revelation
that said all glory and honor and praise unto the Lord forever
and ever and ever. We're made to look to him, not
with these eyes. We're made to see, Lord, I would
not have chose you had you give me the choice. My flesh is bound
to my nature. My nature of sin, my nature's
corrupt. The flesh chooses itself. Somebody
said, I don't believe that. Well, let's talk about the thermostat.
What's your favorite temperature? It's not gonna be the same as
others, and which one would you prefer? My wife and I argue about that
sometime. It'll be too cold for me or too hot for her or vice
versa, and it's, Are we not selfish creatures by nature, choosing
ourselves? How about parking spots whenever
you go to the store? That was a real one. You want
a front parking spot or at the very, very back of the parking
lot? Anybody ever pick the very, very back? If you do, I mean,
that's fine. I've never heard of anybody that
really wants to pick that far all the way back. I'm not talking
about just away from cars, so don't hit your car. I'm talking
about all the way. But that's another thing, too. So you don't
park beside somebody because you don't want your car hit.
Why? Because it's yours. We're self-absorbed. We would not choose
God if he said, what choice do you want to make? And you won't
find that in scripture. You won't find that scripture.
You know what the Lord actually told the Pharisees? You will not come to me that
you may have everlasting life. You won't. Why? Because you're
of your father, the devil. That didn't sound like an opportunity
of salvation. It sounded like the Lord told them where they
were going and where they came from. Doesn't it? I mean, it really
does. You won't choose me. Why won't they choose you? Because
you've not been given faith to believe. You're not given a heart
to believe. And men have convoluted and changed this up just like
they did here. And they say, no, it's your faith that you
have to exercise. You won't find those words in scripture. You
won't find the word exercise faith in scripture. No, it's
not, we don't take our faith to a gym. I mean, think about
that, it's silly. This faith looks to Christ is
all, this faith believes on the Lord Jesus Christ is all, and
this faith comes from him, comes from him, he must give it. And
that's what the Lord's people are given that reveals they have
been justified freely, freely. The Lord did not, If the Lord
did not confer with us when it came to the foundations of the
world, when it came to the birds of the air and the fish of the
sea and the oceans and the sun, the moon, the stars, the sky,
the flowers, everything's budding, everything's coming out looking
beautiful. And you and I couldn't have thought that up if we'd
have wanted to or made it happen if we thought it. If he didn't confer
with flesh and blood for that, what makes us think he's going
to leave salvation up to chance? He's not a God of chance and
you won't find a single time In Scripture, where God left
something up to chance, not one time, everything He purposes
comes to pass entirely. And He purposed the salvation
of His people and accomplished it. How do we know? Because when
the Lord Jesus Christ said, it is finished on the cross of Calvary,
what He was saying was, is your salvation is accomplished. The
people that He died for on the cross, the people that He shed
His blood for on the cross, your salvation is accomplished. The
elect's justification is accomplished. Sanctification is accomplished.
Redemption is accomplished. Perfect righteousness is accomplished.
Perfect communion with God is accomplished. It is finished. Freely justified. Freely justified. This is what God actually accomplished
on the cross of Calvary. That's why the Lord was declaring
it's finished. Every person given to Christ in the covenant of
grace before time was redeemed that day on the cross of Calvary
in time. And I love that he's called the
Lamb slain before the foundation of the world, and that we were
given to him before the foundation of the world, and that it was,
the Lord's never seen his people outside of Christ, never seen
his people outside of Christ. We're eternally, freely justified. I want to say this very clearly.
Justification is not by men, It's not by man, and it's not
by the will of men, but it's of God. It's of God, by his determinate
counsel, by the sacrifice of Jesus Christ alone. What does
that mean? That means you and I cannot determine
our justification by what we do or what we do not do, period. We can't determine our justification
by where we go or where we don't go. We can't determine our justification
by what we believe or what we don't believe. Because it's not
our faith the Lord's looking to, it's the faith of the Son
of God. And if He's given that faith, that's who you're looking
to as your justification. That's who you're believing in
as your justification. Now, justifications by God on Calvary's cross, when
Christ was made sin for us who knew no sin, we were made the
righteousness of God in Him. That happened then, that happened. He's not waiting on us to do
that. That was accomplished. Christ has only offered himself
one time to anyone or anything for that matter. And it was God.
Christ offered himself to the Father and the Father was well
pleased in so much. He freely justified his people. Freely justified. So justification is not something
we do. It's something done for us on the behalf of God's elect.
done for us, it's given to us freely, it's the gracious act
of God, the basis, the basis, brethren, thereby is solely and
completely and entirely 100% reliant on the finished work
of Christ. It revolves around it, it hinges
upon it, there's nothing else that has a factor in it but the
finished work of Christ. By his finished work, God, And
we use that word a lot, don't we? The word God, people use
it loosely. We've gotten away from the authority
that's in that word. I think a lot of times in society,
people use it so frivolously, but the eternal I am, the sovereign
creator and sustainer of life, the God, God himself. The one that every man and woman
will have to do with. The one where every man and woman
will stand before the throne of God and have to give an account,
whether their deeds be good or whether their deeds be evil.
This God, the judge of the universe, this God, declares that his people
are freely justified. Freely justified. How? By his
grace alone. By his grace alone. Not by works
of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy,
the Lord saved us. Why? He loves his people. He
loves his people. Here in his love. Not that we
love God, but he loves us, his people, and sent his son to be
the propitiation for our sin. I wanna circle back to this thought.
In closing, just as Peter gave his approval by going and sitting
with these others, that's how all false religion starts. It
starts by saying, okay, we're freely justified by Christ, by
grace alone, but you have to do your part. You have to pray
this prayer. You have to make a decision.
You have to go here. You have to do that. You have
to do this. That's the beginning of all false
religion. That's the beginning of being under the law. That's
the beginning of leaving the gospel completely and totally.
That's what Paul told him. How is it that you've left the
gospel I sent you? And this was one thing. But oh,
is there not perfect peace in the freely justified gospel? The gospel that proves us freely
justified all by his grace. You'll throw rocks at the other
one, won't you? Throw rocks at it. Now I can't handle that false
gospel. No, it ain't something I'd do,
it's something that he did. Somebody might think that they're
justified. Somebody might think that they're
justified because they don't do this sin or they don't do
that sin. But no, if we find ourself not doing a certain sin,
that doesn't change the fact that we're still sinners that
need a savior. When are you, I'm a sinner right
now. Now God put away that sin on the cross of Calvary and that's
how he sees it. But this body of death that we still carry
around, it's still utterly sinful from the top of the head to the
bottom of the feet. Now a man might think it's something that
they do as their justification rather than justification being
the fruit of salvation. That's what it is. It's the fruit.
That's all that it is. Another might believe that they're
justified when they give permission to God. No, that's not it either,
Peter. It's not it either, Peter. No, that's wrong too. This is
a straightening out of Peter and Barnabas, but this is a straightening
out of all of Galatia and all false religion. This is where
the heart of the issue is, is you're freely justified. Don't move a muscle. Come to
Christ, but don't move a muscle. Come to him by faith, his faith
bestowed. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, but the faith bestowed.
Don't move a muscle. Moving a muscle, that becomes
a work. No, look to Christ and live. People believe they can
obligate God to justify them because of doing this or that.
It all comes down to a bunch of buts, doesn't it? That's what
it comes down to. I'm freely justified, but. You know what
the Lord's people say? But God, who is rich in mercy.
That's the only butt we cling to. Butt gets his interjection,
it's not mine. It's not what I have to do, it's
what he did. But God who is rich in mercy. We're in his great
love if he loved us. Oh, Christ is all our justification.
Men will say that, then they'll say, yeah, but? But oh, we're
dead dog sinners. We can't do anything to please
God. They that are in the flesh cannot please God. We rely completely
upon God to interject. God's people are not looking
to things seen, we're looking to things completely invisible
to this eye. Completely invisible. We're looking to the Lord Jesus
Christ. We're looking to the substance of faith. We're looking to the substance
of faith. And we have been freely justified by his grace. All of his people have been freely
justified by his grace. Each one of his sheep, and I
love this, And I'll say this because we're
going to take communion in a minute. When the Lord sees us, each one
of his sheep, each one of his people, those who he died for,
he sees the blood and he says freely justified, freely justified. Is that your hope? It's my hope.
Let's pray. Father, we ask that you would
bless these words for your glory and honor to our understanding. Lord, we believe help our unbelief.
Thank you for freely justifying your people. Lord, as we take this table of
elements representing your body and your blood. Lord, we know that we get no
justification from these elements, but our justification comes through
and by you and what these elements represent. This is a token, Lord,
of your body and your blood. This is a representation that
you freely justified us by the shedding of your blood and by
the sacrifice of your body broken for your people on Calvary's
tree. Let us reminisce of this for a moment and cause us to
rejoice in our heart. Lord, I pray if there be one
amongst us that's not heard this good news before, that you have
not revealed Christ to and made Christ all their wisdom, righteousness,
sanctification, and redemption that today would be that day.
We ask all this in Christ's name. Amen. Blast them in if they'll
come. Take the elements.