If you turn in your Bibles to
Galatians chapter 6, I just wanted to speak briefly to you before
we enter into that blessed ordinance of the Lord's Supper. We remember
Him. Remember Him. Remember His broken
body. We remember that shed blood. I'll read on a few verses further
in. I might go back to the beginning of the chapter and read down
a little bit so we have some context seeing as it's a while
since we've been here. O foolish Galatians, who has
bewitched you? that you should not obey the
truth, before whose eyes Jesus Christ has been evidently set
forth, crucified among you." That evidently set forth is to
be placarded, as if a banner was raised up in the streets
of those towns when Paul came there and an audience was gathered.
is what the Church is gathered for, isn't it? We want a placard,
Jesus Christ crucified. It is the power of God unto salvation. is evidently set forth crucified
among you. This only would I learn of you,
receive you the Spirit by the works of the law or by the hearing
of faith." The hearing of faith is a synonym for the Gospel,
isn't it? The hearing of the faithful activities
of our great God and Saviour, the Lord Jesus. Are you so full
as having begun in the Spirit, are you now made perfect by the
flesh? Have you suffered so many things
in vain, if it be yet in vain? He therefore that ministereth
to you the Spirit, He that supplies the Spirit, and supplies and
continues to supply the Spirit, and works miracles, works of
power among you, does He do it by the works of the law or by
the hearing of faith? Even as Abraham believed God,
and it was accounted to him for righteousness. Know you therefore
that they which are of faith, the same are the children of
Abraham. And the scripture, foreseeing
that God would justify the heathen through faith, preached before
the gospel unto Abraham, saying, In thee shall all the nations
be blessed. So then they which be of faith
are blessed with faithful Abraham. For as many as of the works of
the law are under the curse, for it is written, Cursed is
everyone that continueth not in all things which are written
in the book of the law to do them. The law is a package, in
fact the original language states there, to have done them all.
If you want to look to your works and to your law keeping of any
sort whatsoever, you must do them all, and you must do them
all. And one person has, and no other
person has. And all of God's children have
kept them perfectly in the Lord Jesus. We establish the law by
faith. As I said earlier and Simon pointed
out in Romans chapter 4 and throughout the scriptures, we have again
and again brought before us pictures of Abraham. We're told to look
unto Abraham your father. And unto Sarah that bear you
for I called him alone. It may have been that Abraham
was the only child of God. called in all of the world at
that time. It may be also the fact that
when God calls you, he calls you alone, he calls you personally,
he calls you individually, he calls you purposefully and powerfully
and effectively. called him alone and blessed
him and increased him. Abraham believed God. He had faith in the beginning. He had faith in the journey. And he had faith at the end. And it's reckoned to him for
righteousness. It's accounted to him for the
righteousness. It's credited to him for righteousness. Not his act of believing, but
the one he believed in. So often we need to be reminded,
isn't it, it's not the strength of our faith. or the power of
it, or what we might be able to boast about it, it is the
object of our faith. That's why Paul, the Holy Spirit
leads Paul to make that statement there, and that first word of
our verse in verse 6 is, even as, or just as, See, Paul declares
himself to be a pattern, which was why in Galatians and in Acts
twice and in many other places, Paul outlines his history. His history, like Abraham's history,
are the histories of all believers. All of us follow the pattern
of Abraham. All of us, like Paul, who are
believers, follow the pattern of Abraham. I love what great
verse 9 says, isn't it? So they which be of faith are
blessed with faithful Abraham. And verse 7 says it again, is
that know ye therefore that they which are of faith, the same
are the children of Abraham. They're both a pattern, a pattern
for all believers. God comes and God speaks. And in His speaking, He reveals
Himself. The Gospel is a declaration of
who the Lord Jesus is, but it's God. It's God's way of speaking
now, today, personally and individually to each and every one of His
people. The God of this world has blinded
the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious
Gospel, who is the image of God, should shine in them, for we
preach not ourselves. but Christ Jesus the Lord. We preach Christ Jesus God, the
sovereign God and Lord over this universe. I love what Peter says
in Acts in that amazing sermon on the day of Pentecost. God
has made this Jesus whom you crucified both Lord and Christ. He lost nothing of His divinity
and nothing of His Lordship by the crucifixion and by the wicked
activities of men. We preach not ourselves but Jesus
Christ the Lord and ourselves, your servants, for Jesus' sake,
for God, verse 6 of 2 Corinthians 4, for God who commanded the
light to shine out of darkness. has shined in our hearts to give
the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face
of Jesus Christ." See, God creates. It's a reference, isn't it, to
Genesis. His first creative activity is let there be light. Light
be and light was, He just creates by speaking a word. And God who commanded the light
to shine out of the darkness has shined in our hearts. It is God who shines in the hearts
of God's children through the Gospel. God is illuminated. God illuminates himself in our
hearts to give. There's a purpose in
God shining that light in the hearts of people. Where was God
revealed when he met Paul? What was Paul's conversion? When
it pleased God, when it pleased the sovereign God who separated
me from my mother's womb and called me by His grace to reveal
His Son where? To reveal His Son in. that I might preach Him among
the heathen, to give the light of the knowledge
of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. And we, like
Abraham, have this treasure. That's the treasure, isn't it? It's Christ in you, the hope
of glory. That's the treasure. We have
this treasure in earthen vessels, and there's a purpose for that
in this time, that the excellency of the power may be of God and
not of us. All the glory, all the honour,
all the praise rebounds to our great God. You see, God saves
people. He saves sinners the way he does. so that he receives all the glory
due his name. He saves sinners the way he does
so that his blessed son, his precious darling son would be
esteemed as heaven esteemed him before the foundation of the
world and as heaven esteemed him now. God saves the way he
does so that the blessed Holy Spirit enlightens and shines
the Lord Jesus on us through the Gospel. And salvation, that's
why salvation, that's why faith, this walking of faith and being
in the faith and being blessed with faithful Abraham and being
of faith is such a big deal in all of the scriptures because
faith alone honours the character of God. It honours Him for what
He says about Himself. It honours Him for what He says
about His dear and precious Son. It gives Him great glory to be
honoured as one who is faithful when He speaks. And that's why
the word of the Lord came to Abraham. The beginning of Abraham's
faith is the word of the Lord came to Abraham. The word of
the Lord comes to Saul. The word of the Lord comes to
us in the preaching and the proclamation of the gospel. And without the
gospel, Without the declaration, the spiritual and scriptural
declaration of Jesus Christ being crucified, there is no word from
God. Faith simply says, you have spoken. You have spoken reality. Your words are now my reality. Faith honours God. So Paul is a pattern. Abraham is a pattern, isn't he? God spoke, and in his speaking
he revealed himself. In his speaking, I love Ezekiel
16, go and read it. It's a great declaration of your
history. It's a great declaration of your
history, of what you were as a child of Adam and what you
are as a child of Adam. And I love how God walked by
and just said a word. to this baby that was cast out,
uncared for, left." He says a word, doesn't he? He says, And she was just adorned with
all the beauty, all the glory of God adorned her. And she, like us, turned and
treats so much in our flesh We treat so much of the glory of
God as if it's something to be traded and treated with contempt. And I love the way the chapter
finishes, Ezekiel 16, read it through to the end and be astounded,
brothers and sisters. at the covenant love of our God
to his children. Those he loves, he loves to the
very end. God spoke to Abraham and he said,
He's the great God, isn't He? He says, get you out of your
country. He says, I am. He says, I am,
the great I am said, I will. And He makes these promises,
they're unconditional promises of the eternal covenant. I will
make you a great nation. I will bless you. I will make
your name great. You shall be a blessing. I will
bless them that bless you, and I will curse him that curses
you. And in thee, all the families
of the earth shall be blessed. Abraham met God. Abraham, as we read in Romans
4, Abraham had met God in the gospel preached to him. What a remarkable, remarkable
thing it is that in this world God is still doing exactly the
same things as he did to Abraham and to Saul. get you out of your
country. Abraham departed from people,
from family, from place and religion. And so that's why in Galatians
he's such a powerful picture, because Paul had to do the same
thing. He had his name changed like
Abraham, he had to leave his religion, he had to turn from
all of what it meant for him to be a Hebrew of the Hebrews,
all of what he thought, and all of what the religious world thought
was of high esteem in those days. He was made in a meeting with
the Lord Jesus to see that it was done, all of it. In Galatians Paul clearly sets
out that his journey from unbelief to faith is like Abraham's. And this Galatian letter, like
the Roman letter and the other letters of the New Testament,
is a warning and an encouragement, isn't it? It's an encouragement
to us about how our God preserves and protects his people in the
midst of their failings, Paul's failings and Abraham's failings.
But especially it's a warning, isn't it? Warning to these Galatians,
and it's a warning to us, to go back to the law for anything. It's like Paul going back to
the Jews' religion, or Abraham going back to the idolatry of
Iraq. No difference between the two.
There's no difference between a legalist and an idolater. Both of them are turned from
God in Christ Jesus and turned to weak and biggly elements. Abraham believed God. So Abraham is a pattern here. He believed God. And there is
this contrast, isn't it, throughout Galatians. There's a contrast
between works, law, righteousness, trusting what God has said. We see in these verses around
here that law righteousness leads people to a place where they
are not justified. They are no longer dead to the
law. They are alive to the law, which
means that they are alive to its curses. And to be alive to
the law means that they are not alive to God. Read verse 19. For I through the law am dead
to the law that I might live unto God. If they're alive to
the law, They are not alive to God. And this is why Abraham, of course,
is such a powerful example. Abraham, these people were wanting
these Galatians to be circumcised and then as a circumcision was
a road into law keeping. Abraham was counted righteous
by God, by faith. Years, 20 years before he was
circumcised, Abraham was a friend of God's. 430 years before the law was
given. Abraham was perfectly righteous
with God without one single work of law. He's alive to God. He's dead
to the law. He lives like Paul did in Galatians
2.20. He lives by the faithfulness
of Christ. He doesn't frustrate like the
law keepers and the works people. They frustrate the grace of God
and shockingly They make Christ's death to be as nothing, as nothing. They want to get to heaven and
bypass the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ. God will not let
any into heaven. unless they come through His
Son. He is the Way, He is the Truth and He is the Light. In chapter 3 we see that He outlines
the history of what had happened to the Galatians. They had received
the Spirit. And now they've been turned back
to a place where they think they're going to be made perfect by the
flesh. And all of their suffering, all of what they suffered as
the Gospel came and persecution came with it and rejection and
being ostracised and cast aside from the religion and from families
and from this world, all that is in vain. And they're no longer a child
of Abraham. That was the great boast of the
Jews, wasn't it? That we are Abraham's children. We are Abraham's children. If you read John Chapter 8, you'll
see how the Lord Jesus spoke so strongly and powerfully to
those Jews who thought that being Abraham's physical descendants
meant anything at all in this world. It's Abraham's children
are faith children of Abraham. He did have two children that
are mentioned significantly in the scriptures, and one is Ishmael
and the other is Isaac, and we'll see more about them as we get
through the rest of Galatians, Lord willing. Abraham believed
God. believed God and it was accounted
to him for righteousness. It was accounted to him, as I
said earlier, before circumcision, before the law. The great work
of God's salvation is in the declaration of the Gospel, isn't
it? Is Christ evidently set forth, crucified among you, and then
you receive the Spirit, And you receive it by the hearing of
faith, and those who have received the Spirit have the Spirit supplied,
abundantly supplied to them. The Spirit takes the things of
the Lord Jesus and reveals them to us. And we do it again and
again by the hearing of faith. It starts with the hearing of
faith and it continues on with the hearing of faith. So the
faith children walk in the steps of our father Abraham. They walk in the steps of that
faith of our father Abraham. He was an idolater. An idolater
in Iraq, in Ur of the Chaldees. And when God called and revealed
himself to Abraham and made known to him sovereign grace and covenant
mercy, and all of them perfectly and fitly and purposefully were
supplied in the Lord Jesus, so there was nothing in Abraham's
conduct to deserve or earn God's love. What single work did Abraham
have? that would have enticed God to
go to him and anyone else. Nothing. It's altogether free. Salvation and grace necessary
is altogether free, totally unmerited, not looked for, not sought by
Abraham. God came and revealed himself. Christ Jesus came and revealed
himself. That's the word, isn't it? The
word of the Lord came to Abraham. The word of the Lord is an audible
word, but as John 1 tells us, the word of the Lord is Jesus
Christ. Came to Abraham and spoke to
Abraham. And when God, in sovereign grace
and sovereign mercy, comes and speaks into the hearts of idolaters
like Abraham, there is the most remarkable transformation. Abraham
had no problem getting up and leaving. Abraham had no problem
walking away from the idolatry and the entanglements of this
world. Abraham, like any of us who meet the Lord Jesus, when
you have met Him, everything changes. The whole world changes. Is that not the case for you,
brothers and sisters? All of the world changes. This
physical world changes, this religious world changes, and
it's all transformed in a single simple meeting with Him. He believed God. He believed God
and he believed the Word of God and he believed the promises
of God. And he's told, isn't he, as we
are, to leave our father's house, to leave our country, to leave
our kindred. They're all pictures of Adam's
nature in exercise. How entangling is our flesh mixed
with this world and mixed with sin. We are prone to wander and so
prone to unbelief in our flesh does nothing but disbelieve God. It's the Spirit that gives life,
life from the dead. And in His seed all the families
of the earth shall be blessed. He was given the promise of the
Gospel and the promise of the success of the Lord Jesus throughout
this world. I love what we read in Genesis
15.50 last week. He says, I am thy shield and
thy exceeding great reward. What a great description. What
great titles. of our Lord Jesus Christ. We
need both, don't we? We need a shield. We need Him
to hold us and protect us and to care for us, to watch over
us. And mercifully He does. We need
Him, like a hen gathers its chickens under her wings, to gather them
together. We need Him to be our shield
and we need for Him to make us our exceeding great reward. The word came to Abraham, who's
going forth, I love what Micah says about the Lord Jesus Christ,
who's going forth have been from of old and from everlasting. Our patriarchs that are held
up before us in the scriptures have real meetings with the real
God. I know there is an ongoing, continuing
revelation in detail in the Scriptures, but these patriarchs knew God
and walked with God and saw Him. What does the Lord Jesus say?
Abraham saw my day and rejoiced and was glad. And I'll just finish
briefly by looking at some of the aspects of Abraham's faith.
Abraham's faith is a saving faith. It's God revealing himself to
man in the Gospel. It's God giving it, and it's
given in a covenant of grace. Abraham's faith, and these aren't
in any particular order of importance, but Abraham's faith was a growing
faith. as John the Baptist said, he
must increase and I must decrease. The flesh is put down and Christ
Jesus is exalted. Abraham's faith was a persevering
and an enduring faith. Abraham's faith was a faith that
led him to be protected. Those who came under the care
of Abraham were protected. Abraham's faith was a knowledgeable
faith. Abraham knew the character of
God. Simon outlined it in Romans 4. He knew that God creates life
out of nothing. He knew that God calls things Those things which are not as
though they were in the eternal covenant of God, those things
which are not, those things which seem not to exist, exist perfectly
and completely in the mind of God and in His purposes. He had a knowledgeable faith,
a knowledge of the purposes of God, a knowledge of the character
of God, a knowledge of the revelation of God. in Jesus Christ. And he had a faith which was
based on the Word of God, on the promises of God, on the covenant
of God, on the revelation of God. He had a faith that was
based not on things that were seen. He was given a vast nation. And he looked around that nation
and he says, as he says in Hebrews 11, there is no foundation here. There's not even a place, a hole
in the dirt here to build something on. He was looking for a city
whose foundations are of God, aren't they? Whose builder and
maker is God. He wasn't looking at things that
were seen. He had a personal faith. Abraham not only knew
the Gospel, but he knew the Gospel personally, didn't he? He knew
he was personally loved by God, personally redeemed, personally
reconciled, personally accepted and forgiven. He had a faith
that was exercised. And God exercises the faith of
His children to grow them more and more aware of His faithfulness
to His promises and His character. Abraham's faith was a law-free
faith. Abraham's faith was a grace-exalting
faith. It was a spirit receiving faith. It was a faith that was rewarded. The great reward of believers
is walking with God in this world, knowing the Lord Jesus. It had
a singular faith. Abraham had a singular faith.
It had one object. There was just one object in
Abraham's faith, and that was the word of God himself, the
Lord Jesus Christ. Abraham is set before us as a
pattern. A pattern of those who believe
God and are accounted by God, reckoned by God. And I reckon
what God reckons is right reckoning. Believe God. There's one activity
that I'll just leave you with. Abraham, you can read it again
in Genesis 15. was given another sign of the
covenant, and in Genesis 15 he's asked to cut the animals in half,
and it was a covenant cutting, keeping ceremony. And the idea
was that both parties would walk through the cut animals and say,
if I break the covenant, let this, what's happened to these
animals, happen to me. Abraham didn't walk through God,
walk through alone. Abraham was in a deep sleep.
But Abraham did one thing before he fell into that deep sleep.
The vultures, the birds, come down on the sacrifice and Abraham
shooed them off. May God grant us the grace and
the faith to shoo away the birds of unbelief, to shoo away the
birds of compromise of the Gospel away from the sacrifice. The
sacrifice obviously represents the Lord Jesus Christ whom he
crucified. His perfect, completed, finished
work. Him declaring Everything that we meet with
in this world, outside of the Word of God and the gathering
of God's people, will lead us in many ways, like
the birds do, to spoil the sacrifice. May God keep it pure in your
eyes and in your hearts. May He continue to show us the
depths and wonders and the glory of His dear and precious Son
and what He did on Calvary Street. Let's pray. Our Heavenly Father,
we thank You again for gathering us together. We thank You again
for your word of promise, Heavenly Father. We thank you again for
the remarkable grace that you show to your people, and you
come to them personally and individually, and you speak to them, and you
create life, and you create faith, and you give to your people.
a sight of Your Son as we had never ever possibly imagined
Him to be before. Heavenly Father, we thank You
for Your Word of Truth. We thank You that You are a God
who cannot lie. And we praise You, Heavenly Father,
for that perfect and finished work of Your dear and precious
Son. pray you'd keep the vultures away from that sacrifice in our
sight, Heavenly Father, that you would protect us and care
for us as you did. Our Father Abraham, and that
you might, by your grace, help us to walk in his steps and see
that the paths of your people in the scriptures are the paths
of your people in this world, our Heavenly Father. We thank
you. for redeeming love, for saving
grace. We thank you most of all for
the gift of faith by which we honour Him who is both faithful
and true in all things. Heavenly Father, as we take these
emblems that remind us of his broken body and his shed blood,
we pray, Heavenly Father, that you would cause us to eat and
to drink worthily, recognising, Heavenly Father, by your grace,
who he is and what he has done and what he is doing right now. We pray your blessing upon us,
Heavenly Father. In Jesus' precious name, Amen.