Alright brethren, let's go to
Galatians chapter 5 again. Galatians 5. Verse 1. We read, Stand fast therefore
in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free. And be not
entangled again with the yoke of bondage. I want to remind
us again that this passage is dealing with the motive of the
heart. It's dealing with the motive of the heart, why we do
what we do. The outward work that they were
making a necessity was circumcision, outward circumcision, and coming
under the works of the old covenant. But what made it legalism was
the motive of the heart. The motive of the heart was for
justification and sanctification, and that made it legal. That
made it a yoke of bondage, rather than them believing Christ and
being constrained by the love of Christ in their heart. That's
the difference between newness of spirit and oldness of the
letter. Oldness of the letter was how these Judaizers were
worshiping and it's how they were trying to get the Galatian
believers to worship. They were looking at the outward
form of circumcision and looking at the outward works of the old
covenant. They were promoting salvation
by works. They were promoting justification
by works and holiness by works. Newness of spirit is to be made
to know that outward sign of circumcision. That was a token
reminder that God gave to Abraham to remind him and to show us
an example of what he'd done in his heart, in spirit. And
by that, rather than bringing us earthly circumcision, outwardly
brought you under the covenant of words. But inward circumcision
of the heart brings you into the everlasting covenant of grace. Trust in Christ alone. That's
the difference between newness of spirit and oldness of the
letter. Remember Paul in Romans 2.28, he said he's not a Jew
which is one outwardly. He's not outward in the form,
neither is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh.
He says he's a Jew which is one inwardly. Circumcision is that
of the heart, it's in the spirit. In the spirit, not in the letter,
not in the form, And the praise is not of men, the praise is
of God. Newness of spirit worships in
that new spirit given of God. The motive is what is new, and
it affects things we do in our body. But faith and love is in
the heart and spirit, and the motive is what makes the outward
accepted. The motive. And the same is true
of oldness of the letter. If the heart motive is legal
conviction, if the heart motive is trying to make oneself righteous
or holy or accepted or whatever, if the heart motive is that,
brethren, then the outward is nothing but sin. The act may
be good, but the motive makes it sin. And conversely, for one
God's given a new heart, the outward may fall short, and it
always does. But because the heart is constrained
by love, and Christ is the one on whom you cast in all your
care, it's accepted of God, in Christ, in the perfection of
Christ. So that's the difference between newness of spirit, oldness
of the letter. God looks on the heart. It's
hard for us to discern motive. It's hard to discern that. You
can't really discern that by outward deeds. You don't know
what's going on in the heart. Paul obviously had the Spirit
of God teach him here, and he heard what these Judaizers were
saying, so he knew what the motive of their heart was. They were
trying to exclude these brethren from Paul and make them follow
them. And they were wanting glory in
the flesh and glory in what they were constraining men to do.
That was their motive. And so the Galatians were beguiled,
and their motive now was they thought they needed to be justified
and sanctified to add to what Christ did. That made it legalism. That made it a yoke of bondage.
And here's the reason I say this, that Satan's a master deceiver,
and our flesh is a master deceiver. The heart's desperately wicked.
It's deceitful above all things. Who can know it? We can't know
it. It takes the Lord. So as easily,
and I just want to make this so clear that you could know
I'm not under the letter of the law for as a covenant of works
to make me righteous and holy. You can know that and believe
that. Believe you're under grace and
fall into legal conviction and come into entangled in a yoke
of bondage using Christ's gospel precepts. You can do that, and
it's just as much being entangled in bondage. Just as much. Now, what's the offense, or rather,
what's the danger of this? What's the danger? Well, the
Spirit gives here three fatal consequences of a legal heart.
Three fatal consequences of having this legal spirit. And we look
at the opposite of these now, and we're gonna see how Christ
profits His people and we're going to see how it's essential
for us to believe on Christ and rest in Him and do everything
from the motive of love that He's put in your heart. Christ
is the only one that can save from these fatal consequences.
He's the only one. But He does for His people. He
profits His people in this way. So I titled this, Liberty from
Fatal Consequences. Now here they are. There's three
fatal consequences of legalism. Number one, Christ becomes unprofitable
to us. He said here, behold, I, Paul,
say unto you that if you be circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing. And then, if in our heart, just
one law's a necessity that we gotta have for salvation or justification
or whatever, then we must keep the whole law. He says, I testify
again to every man that's circumcised, he's a debtor to do the whole
law. And if a man can trust his works
and he can go on entrusting his works, then Christ is not working
effectually in his heart. You could count that as a point
in itself, but I'm counting this as one point. If Christ is not
working in his heart, he didn't work that. The man has left grace
for works and proven he never was Christ at all. He says here,
Christ has become of no effect unto you, whosoever you have
justified by the law, You've left grace, fallen from grace. Now, first of all, to make one
work of necessity for salvation in the heart, to have this legal
notion in the heart, and the motive be, I'm trying to add
to Christ, or share something with Christ, or Christ is not
enough. Just this one legal motive of
the heart means Christ ceases to profit us. He said, there
behold, I, Paul, say unto you that if you be circumcised, Christ
shall profit you nothing. Now the opposite of this, and
this is true of everyone born of the Spirit of God, Christ
profits you, and he's gonna keep you from this fatal consequence.
He's our prophet, priest, and king, and he's profitable to
us as our prophet, priest, and king. Now, when Christ is profitable
to us as our prophet, that means he's the counselor, that means
he's the teacher, he's the messenger of the covenant, he's the morning
star, he's the lamp who lightens our darkness, he's our teacher. He said in Isaiah 48, 17, thus
saith the Lord, thy Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel, I am
the Lord thy God, which teacheth thee to profit. which leadeth
thee by the way that thou should go. And Christ is profitable
to us as our prophet, as our teacher, because he reveals himself. Like we saw with the woman at
the well this morning, he speaks to us, he speaks affectionately
in us, he reveals himself in us, and revealing himself, he
makes us see that we have no reason to put any confidence
in our flesh. He said over in 2 Corinthians
3.15, Paul said, until this day, when
Moses is read, when the law is read, the veil's upon the carnal
man's heart. He said, but when that heart
shall be turned to the Lord, the veil's taken away. And he
said, now the Lord is that spirit. He's the one that turns us to
him. He gets the glory, doesn't he? And he said, and where the
spirit of the Lord is, where he's turned you to him, there's
liberty. Liberty to see him, liberty to
know him, liberty to worship him, liberty from that bondage. When you think of bondage, you
think about being entangled. I remember one time I was fishing
with an open face reel and I got a bird's nest in it and I began
to try to get the bird's nest out and was pulling the string
out and before long I got my whole hands tangled up in the
bird's nest. That's entangling. It just entangles
you. But He, when He comes in the
Spirit, He gives you freedom from it. He liberates you to
be able to worship Him. And He does it by teaching us.
He makes you see, He reminds you, things that you see are
temporal. Things you see in yourself, things
you see in your brother, things you see around you, this is all
temporal. It's the unseen that's everlasting. God is a Spirit. as we saw, they
that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth. He
makes you value the excellency of faith whereby you see things
invisible. You know, the natural realm,
in the natural realm, you don't know the mind of a man, you don't
know the spirit of a man, but spiritually speaking, when Christ
has made wisdom to us, he gives us the spirit to know him, to
know all the things freely given to us of God. Paul said we have
the mind of Christ. That's the only way we believe.
That's how he described it. He gives you the mind of Christ
so that you discern, so that he gives you to see that all
the wisdom and knowledge is in Christ. And he keeps you looking
to Christ alone. But now, the man who can turn
from Christ and continue looking to himself, looking to something
he's done, Christ profits him nothing. Christ profits him absolutely
nothing. And brethren, we know this by
experience. Because we still, at times, go
through seasons where we get to looking at our flesh. And
we get to looking at what we've done or what we haven't done.
Looking at our past life. And you end up being cast down. And Christ doesn't profit you.
Why? We're looking in the wrong direction.
We're looking to the wrong one. We need to look to Him. But because
you're His, He comes to you, and He turns you to Him, and
He makes you profit. Makes you behold Him, and He
profits you in every way. Now look at this second thing,
and this is how He makes us to see how He profits us as our
high priest. If we turn from Christ to just
one work, brethren, and go on, and can go on in that, we're
proven then, now we're a debtor to do the whole law ourselves.
He said in verse 3, I testify again to every man that circumcised
that he's a debtor to do the whole law. And you can put anything
in that place. If we had a legal motive, put
confidence that a man has to know certain level of doctrine,
are we not making doctrine a legal yoke? You get what I'm saying? We have to have a knowledge of
Christ, and He's going to give you a knowledge through knowing
Him, and He's going to teach you the doctrine through seeing
Him. When we start making anything to be necessary except Christ
and just faith in Christ alone, brethren, that becomes between
you and Christ, and that becomes the object of your salvation.
And when we do that, we're a debtor to do everything ourselves, the
whole law. The law requires obedience, not
only in the letter, but in the spirit. You know, it's not stealing
only if you do it outwardly. It's if you think about it, or
if you're covetous, a shiny car goes by, and you think, man,
I'd like to have that. Guilty, the whole law. everything. And it's sin, brethren. Sin is sin. Sin is to be guilty
before God. And that's how strict the law
is. Christ is our prophet, though, as our high priest. The high
priest profited his people by making satisfaction to the law.
And that's what That's what Christ did. He profited us by making
satisfaction to the law of God. Now old high priests only did
it ceremonially. Christ has done it. He's done
it. He fulfilled all righteousness
for his people by his obedience. What does that mean? What just
in simple terms does that mean? He obeyed the law for his people.
He fully obeyed the law for his people. And not only that, the
law required that the soul that sinneth must die. Not only did
he obey the law for his people, he went to the cross and bore
our sin and satisfied the justice of God for us. Paul said, now
once in the end of the world has he appeared to put away sin
by the sacrifice of himself. And that's what he did. There's
one judgment for everybody. There's one judgment. We all
have to come before God in judgment. There's just one. And for that
reason, now once, one time in the end of the world, He appeared
and He bore the sins of many and unto them that looked for
Him to come again. He shall appear without sin. He put it away. He gonna bring
us to salvation. What he accomplished, he obeyed
the law perfectly for us. Justified us from all our sins.
Now if you want to see, and I think this is an excellent way to see
what the law demands. You want to see what the law
demands, look to Christ on the cross. That's what the law demands. The law demands perfect self-denying
love. And that's what you see on the
cross. Perfect self-denying love to God and to his people. And
the law demands that everybody that sinned have got to bear
the curse and Christ is the only one who is that righteous, the
only one. The law says that from the top
of our head to the sole of our foot were wounds and bruises
and putrefying sores. That's a grotesque picture, isn't
it? That's what we are. You look to the cross, what does
scripture say? wounded and broken. He was bruised for our iniquities. From the top of His head to the
sole of His foot, from the top of His head where they placed
the crown of thorns to the sole of His foot, nailed in the cross.
He was made to bear the curse, forsaken of God for His people.
And what does it say? And with His stripes, with His
wounding, all our wounds are healed. You believe that, brethren? What does it mean to have all
your wounds healed? What does it mean to have peace
with God? Paul said, number one, my body of sin's dead to God. God doesn't regard it. Number
two, the law is dead. I'm dead to the law. The law's
dead to me. And number three, because those
two are so, death is dead to the believer. You have eternal
life. That was accomplished by Christ.
And that's liberty, brethren. You can't serve God until you're
brought into that understanding and truly believe it's so by
Christ. Then we live under God. Not until
then. Not until then. So Christ is the
end of the law. But for the sinner that's moved
by legal motive, that thinks, well, now there's one thing I
got to do. Now my church membership now,
I got my name on the church roll. Got to do the whole law of God. 613 commandment. Got to do it
all. Without one sin and die under
it for sin. But for His people, Christ comes
as our high priest and He makes intercession for us. His blood
not only atone for our sin and put away our sin. He's a propitiation. He brings us into peace with
God. He's the mercy seat where we can come to and confess our
sin and find free forgiveness. Free forgiveness. And He makes
you do this from the heart. He comes to you. He knows the
feeling of your infirmities. He's been touched with everything
our sin causes. And He knows it when we're in
that place. And He's the only one, the only
one that can come. And He comes and He takes you
and He does this work in your heart and spirit and turns you
to Him and brings you to confess, I need mercy. I need mercy. And He gives it. He represents
you to God and he represents you to his people. Oh brethren,
do you know that that's how our high priest prophet says, why
would anybody turn from this high priest? Why would anybody
turn from the prophet and stop hearing him? And look to something in themselves. And we so easily get entangled
in this when we start hearing the gospel for others instead
of hearing it for ourselves. It has to be personal to each
of us that I'm the one. Start examining our own selves
and examining our own heart and realize I'm the sinner. And that's how he keeps us from
being puffed up and keeps us from justifying ourselves and
condemning others is he keeps you at his feet and it's a broken
and a contrite spirit. He doesn't despise it, he receives
it. and we should receive it. Now brethren, this is the last
thing I want to show you. If a person can put trust in
their works and they can keep going in trusting their works,
Christ is not speaking affectionately into their heart. They've left
grace and they're in the whole realm of works religion, salvation
by works. It's real simple, you know, Paul
said in Romans 11, If it's grace, then it's no more works. Because
grace wouldn't be grace. If it's grace, it's all grace.
It's no more work. If it's works, it's no more grace. Or works wouldn't be works. We
can't have a mixture of grace and works. And for God's child,
they're not going to mix. He's not going to let them be
mixed up. He's going to keep you looking
to Him and knowing it's by His grace. Because see, not only
is He our prophet, that prophet, that makes himself profitable
to us. He's also our high priest that
makes himself profitable to us, putting away our sin, interceding
with God. He's also our king. And his kingdom
is the kingdom of grace. His kingdom is the kingdom of
grace. The law of his kingdom is faith
and love. And so, you know, the king was
the judge in a kingdom In the Old Covenant, under the old Israel,
the king was the judge. Things were brought to him. Remember
how they brought the case before Solomon and he judged the matter?
The king was the judge. In Christ, our king is the judge. All judgment has been committed
to him. Scripture says. Now he's not only the judge,
he's the high priest, he's the sacrifice, he's the lamb, he's
all to us. You think the king who has all
power is going to allow anybody to bring a charge against one
that he himself has made righteous by his grace? No. He has the power, brethren, to
subdue all our enemies. Just like what Brother Ravi read.
She was saying that about herself because that's what God had done
for her. That's what he does for each of his people. He kills
our flesh and he renews the inward man. He brings down our flesh
and he brings up the inward man. He takes us from the dung heap
and sets us among princes. Our Lord Jesus Christ shed his
precious blood. He laid down his life on Calvary's
cross. Our king suffered that we might
reign with him as kings. And he did it by grace, free
and sovereign grace. He was denied access into heaven
while he hung up on that cross so that you and I might have
access right into his throne. And he's gonna keep us coming
to that throne. When Satan stands by and would
accuse, he'll intercede for us and he'll silence his objections.
And when any enemy accuses, he's gonna silence their objections.
Oh, Joshua, the high priest, Joshua was guilty. He was guilty. He married a woman the Lord forbid
him to marry. He was guilty. You know what the Lord said to
him, said to Satan? He's a bran plucked out of the
fire. He's covered in soot. So are we, brethren. He said,
take those garments off of him. Put the king's garments on him.
Set a miter on his head. I made him a king. That's what
he does. That's what we ought to do. Concerning
ourselves. You know what we tend to do is
we tend to be easy on ourselves and harder on others. We need
to remember concerning ourselves. This thing is a thing of grace.
He saved us by grace, grace, grace. Grace greater than our
sin. And he keeps you knowing he's
everything. He's all. And he won't let our
flesh be the accuser. He won't. We get to accusing
ourselves. We get to thinking, you can't
be a child of God. And Satan feeds on it. You can't
be a child of God. How are you going to be safe
from that? If you left there, you know what
you'd do? You'd turn right to your works and think, as soon
as you did something to amend your ways, then the flesh and
the devil will say, now you're righteous because you did that.
Who's going to save us from that bondage? Our King has the power
to send this word, and as our prophets speak it, and as our
high priests make intercession and bring us to rest in his grace.
You remember Solomon? He'd come on that deadline, and
he ate honey out of that deadline. Our Lord Jesus Christ keeps us
beholding him slain in our room instead. He keeps us knowing
that He is all our prophet. He keeps us knowing He's the
end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believes. He
keeps us knowing this by effectually working in our heart and keeping
us thankful for His grace alone. All in His crucifixion on Calvary's
cross. And you know what He does? He
makes you eat the honey. And he brings you to say this,
how sweet are thy words unto my taste, sweeter than honey
to my mouth. That's where he keeps you. That's
where he keeps you. Why does he let us slip? Why
does he let you come under this bondage and become entangled
in it? We wouldn't need this exhortation if it wasn't so.
Every exhortation he gives us, why do we need it? Because we
fall into it. Why does he let us? to show us we have no reason
to trust ourselves. See she from man whose breath
is in his nostrils. In proportion to how much you're
looking to a man, that's how much you're gonna be disappointed
by the man. But if you're looking to Christ, you won't ever be
disappointed. I promise you that. And I pray that. I pray he keep
us looking to him only. It's the key to everything. Salvation. Salvation. Our Father, we thank you for
this word. We thank you that you, oh Lord, you keep us in
liberty. Thank you for being all our prophet.
Lord, be with our brethren that aren't here. Be with Brother
Rob as he's sick and hurting and give him some comfort and
Brother Jeff and be with those, Lord, that are trying to make
hard decisions Help them always to have the discernment to know
this gospel is more needful than bread. Help us, Lord, to stay
under it and to hear it and united with your people. Lord,
we pray for our brethren everywhere, pray for our young people here,
any Lord that not be entangled in bondage or any that don't
know you yet. We pray, Lord, you'd work this
work of grace in their heart. We thank you, Father. What a
blessed, blessed gospel we have. What a blessed Redeemer. Lord,
please forgive us for looking to ourselves and looking to our
works and trying to entangle ourselves and others. Lord, keep
us free, keep us worshiping you, living unto you by your grace
in heart and spirit from a right motive. It's in the name of our precious
holy prophet, priest, and king that we ask these things. Amen.