Hymnal number 27. Let's all stand
together. ? Free from the law's great curse
? In Jesus we are free ? For Christ became a curse for us
? And died upon the tree ? The rituals of the law ? And all
the law's commands have been fulfilled in Christ the Lord,
established by His hands. No covenant with the law can
now with us exist. Complete in Christ we stand by
grace, both free and ever blessed. No more the dread of wrath. No more constrained by fear. ? We worship and we serve our
God ? With gratitude and cheer ? In Jesus we are free In Jesus
we are free. Free from all sin and from all
guilt, we live in liberty. We'll join the happy song with
all the blood bought from and sing the praises of the lamb
whose grace makes us his own. Please be seated. What a blessed hymn that is. And we're going to be looking at
our freedom in Christ. And I'd like you to turn with
me in your Bibles to Isaiah 61. Isaiah 61. The Lord Jesus said, if the Son
shall make you free, you're free indeed. to be free from the curse
of the law and all the demands of the law, to be led by Christ. Here's what he came to do. You
know, when the Lord began his public ministry in his hometown
of Nazareth, he went to the synagogue and he opened the scroll and
he read this passage of scripture. And he said to them, this day,
and these scriptures have been fulfilled in thy sight. Isaiah 61, verse one. The spirit
of the Lord God is upon me because the Lord hath anointed me to
preach good tidings unto the meek. He has sent me to bind
up the brokenhearted to proclaim liberty to the captives and the
opening of the prison to them that are bound, to proclaim the
acceptable year of the Lord. That's the year of Jubilee. The
year of Jubilee, every 50 years, all slaves were to go free, all
debt was to be canceled, and all property was to return to
its original owner. When the Lord came, that's what
he did. He canceled our debt. He set the captives free. And
he returned us to our original owner. To proclaim the acceptable
year of the Lord and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort
all that mourn, to appoint unto them that mourn in Zion to give
unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the
garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness." All of the sorrow
and conviction of sin is changed to rejoicing, thanksgiving. that they might be called trees
of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that he might be
glorified. He is all the glory, doesn't
he? Diane Etheridge's surgery was successful today and she
was supposed to go home. I don't know if she did yet or
not, but I talked to Michael and they were very thankful.
They were hoping she could actually walk on our leg in a few days. Also, I spoke with a young man
in Venezuela last night. For about an hour, Hugo translated
for me. We were doing a Zoom call. And
I was very encouraged with what the Lord is doing for this young
man. And I told him that we would
pray for him. His name is Rafael Rodriguez.
And he's preaching the gospel to a very small group of people
in his home. And I told him that we'd be remembering
them in our prayers. So let's pray together. Our Heavenly Father, thank you. for giving liberty to those who
are captive to their sin, unable to believe, unable to see, unable
to rejoice, unable to look in faith to Christ. Lord, what a
miracle of grace it is that you would bring us to that place
where we could see and where we could believe, and where we
could rest, and we could be free. Lord, we pray that you would
strengthen that grace in our hearts tonight. We ask that you
would cause your word to be sharper than any two-edged sword, that
it would heal, cut, restore, expose the thoughts and the intents
of our hearts and show us the glory of Christ or that we might
leave this place rejoicing that you would get all the glory.
Thank you for Diane. Thank you for the for the good
surgery and Lord pray for your hand of healing to be upon her.
Lord, we pray for Rafael and for those that meet with him
in Venezuela. And we asked Lord that you would
that you would bless them, that you would minister grace to their
hearts, that you would open the eyes of their understanding,
that you would enable Raphael to lift up Christ, Lord, that
there would be a gospel light there in that part of the world.
We ask it in Christ's name, amen. Number 300 in the hardback hymnal,
300, let's all stand together again. ? More secure is no one ever ?
? Than the loved ones of the Savior ? ? Not yon star on high
abiding ? ? Nor the bird in home nest hiding ? ? God his own doth
tend and nourish ? ? In his holy courts they flourish ? Like a
father kind, he spares them. In his loving arms, he bears
them. Neither life nor death can ever
from the Lord his children sever, for his love and deep compassion
comforts them in tribulation. Little flock to joy then yield
thee, Jacob's God will ever shield thee. Rest secure with this defender,
at his will all foes surrender. What he takes or what he gives
us shows the Father's love so precious. We may trust his purpose
wholly, tis his children's welfare solely. Please be seated. Let's open our Bibles to Matthew
17, Matthew chapter 17. I've titled this message, The Children
are Free. The Children are Free. You'll
see why. chose that for our title tonight.
Matthew 17, beginning of verse 24. And when they were come to
Capernaum, they that received tribute money came to Peter and
said, doth not your master pay tribute? And he saith, yes. And when he was come into the
house, Jesus prevented him. The Lord Got Peter aside. What thinkest thou, Simon? Of
whom do the kings of the earth take custom or tribute? Of their
own children or of strangers? Peter saith unto him, of strangers. And Jesus saith unto him, then
are the children free. Children are free. Notwithstanding, lest we should
offend them, go thou to the sea and cast a hook and take up the
fish that first cometh up. And when thou hast opened its
mouth, thou shalt find a piece of money that take and given
to them for me and thee. The Lord has blessed me in the
last this recent past, by giving me an opportunity to speak with
three men. And all three of them are now
about the same age that I was when I first heard the gospel.
And all three of them are in the exact same place that I was
when the Lord first revealed to me the wonder of his grace. They're all three coming out
of reform, legalistic Baptist churches. And the freedom that the Lord
has given them has been such a reminder to me and an encouragement
to me because without, All three of these men have left everything. One of them lives in Canada and
he basically has to leave his family, his work, his church,
his culture, everything. But to rejoice with him in the
liberty that he now has in not being under the law, and to be
free in Christ is just a blessing to my soul. Another one lives in Fort Myers,
and the third one I talked to last night, Hugo translated for
me, and we spoke to Rafael for about, oh, I don't know, 45 minutes
last night on a Zoom call. And Rafael lives in Venezuela. He's 39 years old. He has three children. And did
a little research on Venezuela. I found out that 55% of the people there live in abject
poverty. The dictator there has pretty
much destroyed the economy. And they have no freedoms like
we have. And yet the worst thing that
Raphael has experienced is not the struggles of living in a place
where he doesn't know anything of the liberties that we enjoy.
But the real problem that Raphael had was the last 11 years that
he spent in a Reformed Baptist church under the demands and
the the structure of elders and legalism that kept him from being
able to rejoice in Christ. And last night, he's only been,
he left three weeks ago, and he's on his own, and he has a
couple other families meeting with him in his home. But to
see the joy on his face and to hear the delight in his heart
as he spoke to me about what God had taught him and how he
was looking to Christ and how Christ was everything in his
salvation. All three of these experiences
have warmed my soul and reminded me of what the Lord has done
for all of his children The children are free. They're just free. And it's what we see so oftentimes,
we just read it in Isaiah 61, he's come to set the captive
free. We are captive to sin, we are unable to believe, we're
unable to see, we're unable to rejoice, we're unable to follow,
we're unable to love until the Lord comes and delivers us. And the Lord told us, he said,
if you know the truth, the truth will set you free. And if the
Son sets you free, you're free indeed. And where the Spirit
of God is, there's liberty. There's no liberty apart from,
if grace is not free, it's not grace. It has to be completely
free. We can't make any contribution
to it. And that's the problem that these men were having. And it's the problem that we
all have by nature. We are all born thinking that
there's something we need to do in order to earn favor with
God. And the amazing thing is that
even in these reform groups who claim to believe in the sovereignty
of God and they claim to believe in sovereign election and they
claim to believe in free grace and then they turn right around
and use the law to measure men's growth. They use the law to monitor
their behavior. They use the law to motivate
their commitment. And in the end, all of the preaching
ends up being something that causes men to look to themselves. You have to look within to see
if You know, if the Lord has saved you, and there's no freedom
there. Because if we're honest, the
more we look to ourselves, all we can see is our sin. All we
can see is our unbelief. And the only time that we have
any liberty, and the only time that we have true freedom, is
when God, by His Spirit, enables us to look outside of ourselves.
and to set our affections on Christ, and to rest all the hope
of our salvation in Him and in His finished work. And anything
else, anything else is bondage. The Lord says to Peter, the children
are free. They're free from the curse of
the law. The condemnation of the law, the judgment of the
law. Christ bore that curse for us. They're free from the demands
of the law. We love God's law. And if we
could, we'd live in perfect obedience to every bit of it. But the demands
of the law are that you have to have perfect obedience. A believer can't honestly look
in their heart and see that they've ever perfectly obeyed any part
of God's law. That's the demand of the law.
The Lord Jesus is the only one that did that. And what freedom
and what liberty we have in resting the hope of our salvation, our
justification before God, our righteousness, our law-keeping. in the one who himself is the
end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believeth. We
are the trees of righteousness, the plantings of the Lord. The
plantings of the Lord. Free to believe. Free to worship. Free to love. Free to look. There's some debate over whether
this is a Roman tax that's being spoken of that all the Jews were
forced to pay or whether it was a reference to the temple tax
that had become a tradition as a result of what God gave the
children of Israel back in Exodus chapter 30. I tend to believe
that it's the latter. It's the temple tax. And so,
if you'll turn with me to Exodus 30, we'll look at that. It doesn't really change the
meaning of the passage. The point is that the children
are free from paying taxes. We're not talking about government
taxes given to Caesar what belongs to Caesar. That's not the reference
here, you know that. That's why I think it's probably
the temple tax because that fits better the application of what
our Lord's teaching us about he himself being our tabernacle. The Jews, well, let's read it
together. Exodus chapter 30, look with
me at verse 11. And the Lord spake unto Moses,
this was while the tabernacle was being constructed. And the
Lord spake unto Moses, when thou takest the sum of the children
after their number, that's a census, when you number the children
and divide them up into tribes, Then shall they give every man
a ransom for his soul unto the Lord when thou numbers them that
there be no plague among them when thou numbers them. Now the ransom money and the
temple tax that's being referred to here is obviously not in and
of itself an atonement. There's only one successful atonement. An atonement is a covering. The
ark was pitched within and without so that the water of God's wrath
and judgment could not come in and injure Noah and his family
that were in the ark. That's a picture of Christ. He's
our covering and he protects us from the wrath that is to
come. because he absorbed the fullness
of God's wrath and quenched it by his own sacrifice on Calvary's
cross. What the Lord told Moses to do
with the blood on the door, that's the covering. When I see the
blood, I'll pass by you. And then Aaron was to take the
blood of the sacrificial lamb and put it on the mercy seat.
And God said, here, I will meet with you. That will be a covering
for your sin. But they were all, just like
this money, they were shadows of the substance that would be
fulfilled in Christ. That blood never put away sin.
This temple tax, this ransom money that the Lord's requiring
the children of Israel to pay wasn't an atonement for their
sin, it was a It was an act of faith believing that one would
come and provide for us the ransom by the shedding of his blood.
So they were exercising their faith looking in the future for
something that God had promised. We have faith. in believing that
he's fulfilled in the past that which he promised. These are
all shadows. They're all types and pictures.
But God calls it here, he calls it a ransom for the soul. But I remind you in Psalm 49,
None of them can by any means redeem his brother nor give to
God a ransom for him. For the redemption of their soul
is precious. The redemption of the soul is
priceless. And no man by any sacrifice that
he makes, by any commitment or any effort that he puts forth
in trying to keep the law, can ransom his own soul. The ransom
of our souls is precious to God. That word precious means priceless. And the blood of the Lord Jesus
Christ is the only ransom that meets what God requires. So let's read on verse 13. This they shall give everyone
that passeth among them that are numbered half a shekel. And
this is another reason why I think this is the temple tax that was
still being practiced even though God had not required it to be
practiced beyond this time. But the Jews continued to do
it. It was an opportunity. You know, once a tax starts,
you can't take a tax back, right? So they just continue to require
the tax. But in our text that we just
read in Matthew 17, the coin that Peter took out of the fish's
mouth was a shekel, according to what the scripture tells us.
It was a whole shekel. And the Lord said, take that,
and pay your tax and my tax. So what is the ransom? What is
the temple tax? Half a shekel. You see this in
verse 13? A half a shekel after the shekel
of the sanctuary. A shekel is a 20 geras. And a
half a shekel shall be the offering of the Lord. Everyone that passeth
among them that are numbered. from 20 years old and above shall
give an offering unto the Lord. The rich shall not give more
and the poor shall not give less than half a shekel when they
give an offering unto the Lord to make an atonement for your
souls." What a glorious picture we have here. The same ransom
price is required for every soul, the rich, the poor, the one who
dedicates his life and really, you know, works hard
and the one who doesn't. The ransom prices, you see, it's
not what we give. It's exactly what Christ has
given and it's exactly the same ransom for every sinner, for
every one of God's people. Doesn't matter who we are, doesn't
matter what we've done, what we haven't done. Mary, the mother of the Lord
Jesus. Paul, A faithful servant for
years and years and ended up being a martyr. Required exactly
the same ransom price as that thief on the cross who never
did anything for God. Ransom price was the same. And
that's the way the gospel works. We can't give more, we can't
give less, can't add to it, can't take away from it. half a shackle
for every soul. That's why we can't look within
to see what we're doing. We have to look outside of ourselves.
We have to look to Christ. We have to rest all of our hope
in the ransom that he made because that's all God's looking to.
Faith is looking where God's looking. Look at verse 16. Thou shalt
take the atonement money of the children of Israel and shall
appoint it for the service of the tabernacle of the congregation
that it may be a memorial unto the children of Israel before
the Lord to make an atonement for their souls, for your souls. So now these tax collectors They
knew that it wasn't required of the law. This wasn't a perpetual
law that God gave to the children of Israel. This was something
that was done as a picture of what Christ would do, and it
was given also for the building of the tabernacle. And yet, as I said, the Jews
continued it. But they knew they could not
use the law to demand it, but everybody was expected to do
it. So they came to Peter, does your master not pay the tribute?
Peter said, yes. And the Lord took him aside,
said, Peter, Peter, they require a tribute from strangers or from
children? Oh, from the strangers. Well,
then the children are free. Turn with me to Hebrews chapter
eight. Thinking about that Old Testament tabernacle. Hebrews
chapter eight. Look at me at verse five. who serve unto the example and
shadow of heavenly things as Moses was admonished of God when
he was about to make the tabernacle for God said to him, see, saith
he, that you make all the things according to the pattern showed
to thee in the mount. It was very, very detailed pattern
that God gave to Moses as to how the tabernacle was to be
built. how long the poles were to be, what the dimensions of
it were to be, what materials were to be used to make, where
the pomegranates were, where the wood was, where the badger
skin was, where the holies of holies were. Everything was very
particular. Why? Because everything in that
tabernacle pointed in one way or the other to Christ. And he
was going to come and fulfill in his life and in his death
everything that that tabernacle pictured. So now why would the Lord say
to give for the maintenance of that tabernacle? How are you
going to give anything that's going to maintain or improve
or sustain or enable the living tabernacle of God to fulfill
his purpose? Children are free from that tax.
Let the stranger try to pay their tribute. Let the stranger try
to earn their favor with God by what they do and let them
promote the law and let the Pharisees compete with one another as to
who's more righteous. And these men I just mentioned
to you, they've all been excommunicated from their church because they
would not submit. They would not submit to progressive
sanctification. They would not submit to lordship
salvation. They would not submit to all
this legalistic stuff that the elders were forcing on them.
And the elders came to them and said, you got to go. And what's
the Lord saying? Let them pay their tribute. Those
who want to pretend that they're keeping the law, those who want
to pretend and compete with one another over who's more holy
than the next. Let them pay the tribute. The
children are free. The tax has been paid. The ransom's
been made. The atonement is complete. There's
nothing we can do to add to it. We're free, free from the law. Does that mean that we don't
serve God? No, but we serve him for a whole different reason.
We serve him out of love, out of gratitude. And we do our best and we conclude
what? We're unprofitable servants.
We could never, Lord, when did we see you naked and clothe you? When did we see you hungry? We
don't take notice of the things that we do. We're shamed of what
we don't do. And they, the strangers, oh,
they boast in what they do, don't they? But Lord, we've done many
wonderful works in thy name. We paid our dues. We put forth
our tribute. Depart from me, you workers of
iniquity. I never knew you. I never knew
you. Oh, what liberty there is in
Christ. What freedom. You have your Bibles open to
Hebrews. Turn with me to chapter nine of Hebrews and look at verse
nine. Chapter nine of Hebrews verse
nine, which was a figure for the time then present in which
were offered both gifts and sacrifices that could not make him that
did the service perfect as pertaining to the conscience, which stood
only in meats and drinks and divers washings and carnal ordinances
imposed on them until the time of reformation. Now all three
of these men that I've spoke to recently are coming out of
reformed traditions. The church was not reformed in
the 16th century. Maybe God sent a revival, I don't
know. It's hard to evaluate what all,
you know, you read some of the stuff that went on and you think,
you know, was the Lord, you know, I'm sure there was, I'm sure
there was a lot of people called out but there was a lot of remnants
left over from Catholicism. And all the denominations that
we have lingering today are the result of that, what they call
a reformation. You don't reform truth. And the
church wasn't reformed then and the people that are practicing
reformed theology today aren't reforming anything. What are
they doing? They're just going back to the
law. They're keeping that which their heroes broke from. The only time that you'll find
in the Bible the word reformation is right here, reformation. And what's the Lord telling us?
I reformed. what was a type, what was a shadow,
what was a picture to a substance. That's the reforming. I had people tell me all the
time, ask me all the time, are y'all reformed? You believe in
reform doctrine? Pretty much I tell them no. We believe Christ is all. Look
at verse 11. But Christ, these carnal ordinances,
these temple taxes, these pictures were only served to point to
Christ. And when the time of reformation
came, when Christ came, he came as a high priest, verse 11. of
good things to come by a greater and more perfect tabernacle,
not made with hands, that is to say, not of this building, neither by the blood of bulls
and goats and calves, but by his own blood, he entered in
once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for
us. So on a year after year, the
high priests would go into that holies of holies. Now, the veil has been rent,
the body of Christ has been sacrificed, the precious ransom that God
required for the full payment of our sin has been made. And all those... You know, in
the Old Testament and even in the New Testament, in the days
of the Lord Jesus, there would have been armed guards at the
temple, keeping men out. And particularly
when the high priest went into the Holies of Holies, they would
have all had swords drawn and they would have been, stay away,
stay away, don't come near, stay away. Even the priest went into the
holies of holies with trepidation. If he didn't do it exactly as
God prescribed it, he would die in there. Now what did the Lord say? When he bowed his head on Calvary's
cross and he cried, it is finished. And the veil was rent from top
to bottom. And now, the messengers of God
don't say, stay away. No, they say, come, come. The way has been opened. Come,
see, rest. Christ was made flesh. John chapter one. Don't turn
there, the Word. In the beginning was the Word,
the Lord Jesus. And the Word was with God and
the Word was God and the Word became flesh and dwelt among
us. That word dwelt is the word tabernacled. The Word became flesh and he
tabernacled among us. And in Revelation chapter 21,
the scripture says the tabernacle
of God is with men. Now back in Exodus chapter 30,
that was the tent. That was the tabernacle that
moved around with the children of Israel in the wilderness.
And then by the time they came into, by the time of Solomon,
David's son, a temple was built. And it was a magnificent temple.
And both the tabernacle and the temple tell us something about
the Lord Jesus Christ. The tabernacle was made out of
badger skin. It was just a tent. And the Bible, the body is spoken
of as a tent. And so the humanity of Christ
is His being made flesh and dwelling among us, that's the tent, that's
the tabernacle. The temple, that's His deity,
that's His glory. And we see the fullness of Him
in both. But the Lord's saying to Peter,
and He's saying to us, let the strangers pay the temple tax,
let the strangers do what they think they need to do in order
to garner God's favor and earn salvation and prove that they're
of God. The children are free. You're
free. You're just free to believe,
you're free to love, you're free to rest, you're free to trust. What liberty there is. Turn with me to Galatians chapter
three, Galatians three. Verse 16. Now to Abraham and his seed,
singular, were the promises made. He said not, and to seeds as
of many, but as of one and to thy seed, which is Christ. So the promises that God made
to Abraham was to bring about the salvation
of his people through his seed. And the Lord tells us very plainly
here. He's not talking about Isaac
and Jacob and the children of Israel. No, he's talking about
the one seed, Christ. And this I say, that the covenant
that was confirmed before of God in Christ, the law, which
was 430 years after, cannot disannul that which was made by promise
and make it of none effect. What the Lord is saying is, God
made this covenant promise with Abraham and it wasn't until 430
years later that God gave the law, the 10 commandments to Moses. So why did God give the law? Is the promises of God received by the keeping of the
law? For if the inheritance be of
the law, verse 18, it is no more promise. But God gave it to Abraham
by promise, long before the law, 430 years, twice as long as America
has existed, almost. The promise was made. Salvation
is by the promise, not by the law. So now the Lord's gonna
tell us, well, why did he bring the law? What's the purpose of
the law then? Wherefore then serveth the law? It was added because of transgression
till the seed come to whom the promise was made and it was ordained
by angels in the hand of a mediator. God gave the law in order to
provide structure and limits and restrictions for
the children of Israel to keep them together. And that's what
the law did until the coming of the seed of Abraham, Christ. That's all law does. Law just,
it just restrains evil. That's what it does. And God said, because of the
transgression of my people, I had to give them a law. Had to give
them a law to restrain them. Now a mediator is not a mediator
of one, but God is one. Is the law then against the promises
of God? God forbid. For if there had
been a law given which could have given life, verily righteousness
should have been given by the law." If there was some law that
God could have given, if there was one law that God could have
given that we could have kept that would have provided life,
God would have made salvation by the law. What's the Lord telling
us? You can't keep one simple law.
I gave Adam One thing. Don't eat of that one tree. You
can have every other tree in the garden. You can do anything
else. You've got complete freedom and liberty. Enjoy it. Don't
eat of that one tree. One simple law, one simple rule,
he couldn't keep it. God's saying to me and you, if
there was one law I could give you and you'd be faithful to
keep it, you could be saved by it. You can't keep one. But the scripture has concluded
all understand that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might
be given to them that believe. Here's the seed. Here's the faithfulness
of Christ. He's the one who kept the law. But before faith came, we were
kept under the law, shut up unto the faith, which should afterwards
be revealed. We were restricted and limited.
And aren't you thankful that the law of God is written on
men's hearts? You know, the only difference
between one man and another man in this world is how much they
are being restrained in their behavior. That's the only difference. Restraining grace. And every
man comes into this world with the knowledge of right and wrong
and they're kept under the law. If there was no law, I mean,
you see pockets of it in the world and even in our country.
How would you like to live in one of those lawless countries
or lawless neighborhoods. How would you like to live in
the Wild West when everybody did what they wanted to do and
killed one another and no one could restrain them? You see,
that's why God gave the law, to restrain men. But now, you don't need the law
to restrain you. You don't need someone to say
thou shalt not murder, keep holy the Sabbath. You don't need someone
to, you don't need a law that demands that you show up at church
on Sunday in order to worship God. You don't need a law that
requires you to be faithful to your spouse. You don't need a
law for that. Why? Because we have the law
of liberty, James called it. We have the law of grace, the
law of the spirit, the law of love. And it's so much better. Love is the fulfillment of the
law. Now, I want you to notice something
in verse 24. Wherefore, the law was our schoolmaster. And I want
you to notice in your Bibles, to bring us is in italics, it's
not in the text. The translators put it there
because they, well, they, they, A lot of the men that translated
our King James Bible were lawmongers. I mean, they were right out of
that Puritanism and they thought, you know, we got to preach the
law because it's the law that convicts men of their sin and
it's not until they're put under the law that they're going to
a plea to Christ. To bring us is not in the text. We were under the law as our
schoolmaster. A schoolmaster was a servant in a wealthy home
that would be responsible for the children. And the children
were instructed by their father to obey the schoolmaster. Whatever
schoolmaster tells you, you do it. But then there came a time
when that child became of age. And now that schoolmaster has
no authority over that child. That schoolmaster is now that
child's servant. It wasn't the schoolmaster that
brought him to Christ. It's not the law that brings
us to Christ. It's Christ that brings us to
Christ. It's the gospel that brings us to Christ. It's the love of Christ that
constraineth us and it's the goodness of God that leads us
to repentance. It's hearing about who the Lord
Jesus is and what he did. You can be put under the law
all you want and all you're gonna do is try to do penance and try
to wallow in your shame and try to compete with your peers to
see if you're less lawless than another. That's what these reformed
guys are. It was all about being under
the bondage of that. I'm so encouraged with these
men that I've talked to just recently as they remind me They're
all three, all three of these men are the same age I was 30
years ago, 28 years ago. Let's read verse 24 without those
words. Wherefore, the law was our schoolmaster. We were under its authority unto
Christ. Until Christ, until Christ came, that we might be justified by
faith. But after the faith has come,
we're no longer under a schoolmaster. We don't need the law to monitor
you, to motivate you, to measure your salvation. You don't need
to look inside. We don't need to compete with
one another. These reformed people, they're
so self-righteous and they're so... I listened to one guy and
I just thought, A lot of things he's saying is true, but he's
not preaching as a sinner to sinners. He's so condescending. He's so proud and self-righteous.
And I didn't feel at all like he was relating to me at all. And that's the way they do. And
the bondage that comes as a result of that. And everybody starts
pretending that there's something that they're not. What liberty we have, brethren.
I believe in myself to be in need of grace more than you.
I know my sin better than I know anybody's sin and I know my need
for Christ more than... Every child of God says with
the Apostle Paul, This is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptation,
Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am
chief. You believe yourself to be the
chief of sinners, don't you? So we don't have to pretend. Verse 27, for you are all the
children of God by faith in Christ Jesus. Children are free, Peter. Children are free. And there, let me just close
with it, because the Lord does go ahead and pay the tax. He
says that we not offend them. He wasn't going to be put under
the law but we're free in that we take into consideration the
gospel and its influence and we're willing, the Lord The Lord
is putting aside his legal right. He had the legal right to say,
I don't want to pay our tax. Peter, you don't have to pay
our tax. That's not a law. But for the sake of the gospel,
he said, go ahead and pay it. We're going to put aside our
rights. There's so much freedom in that to be able to say, You
know, I don't have to demand anything
from somebody. I can put aside my own personal
preferences and my own personal rights for the sake of the gospel
and esteem someone else more highly than myself. Lord, give
me the grace to do that. I want to be that way. That's
freedom. That's just freedom. It's just
bondage and always demanding your rights, isn't it? Our Heavenly Father, thank you for making your children
free. Lord, we pray that you would direct our steps and cause us,
Lord, to find our hope and our happiness, our joy, our comfort,
our peace, and our rest in thy dear son. For it's in his name
we pray, amen. 45, let's stand together, number
45. in the Spiral Hymnal, 45. How vast, how full, how free,
the mercy of our God. Proclaim the blessed news around
and spread it all abroad. How full it does remove the stain
of every sin, And makes our souls as white and pure as though no
sin had been. O guilty sinner, come! Christ stands to comfort thee. Come, cast thyself upon His love,
so vast, so full, so free. I'm glad salvation's free. I'm glad salvation's free. Salvation's free for you and
me. I'm glad salvation's free.