I please Almighty God to be with
us this evening as we continue our meditation in the Epistle
of Paul to the Galatians and the third chapter and this evening
we'll read verses six to nine. The Epistle of Paul to the Galatians
chapter three and reading verses six to nine. Even as Abraham
believed God and it was accounted to him for righteousness, Know
ye 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 nations be
blessed. So then, they which be of faith
are blessed with faith for Abraham. as we've been considering in
this epistle to the Galatians, how the Apostle speaks much about
justification by faith, and also the great wonderful blessing
of God-given righteousness to those who indeed are justified
through the wonderful sinatonic death of the Lord Jesus Christ. And then here, the Apostle then
now comes back, as it were, to the case of Abraham, to establish
the truths he set in before of the great need to be possessors
of living faith. The Word of God tells us so clearly
that we walk by faith and not by sight. And we have therefore
this wonderful example of Abraham who, we're told, believed God. And we should not underestimate
the faith that was given. And we might say, well, that
was great faith. Well, we need a little faith. We all need faith to believe
the truth of the gospel. Abraham was blessed with faith
to believe God and His promise. And you know it was, you can
go back, can't we, to the time when he came out of his hometown
of Ur in the Chaldees. He'd been brought up there and
he spent his early years there. And now God had told him to go
forth and he didn't know where he was going. He didn't know
what was before him. but he had faith in his God. And that's a wonderful testimony
of the blessings which God has given to his people and does
give to his people. And then of course the Lord further
blessed Abraham with wonderful faith when he came to him in
that chapter we read in the book of Genesis, the 15th chapter,
where we read, And behold, the word of the Lord came unto him,
saying, This shall not be thine heir. That was, of course, his
Ishmael. But he that shall come forth
out of thine own bowels shall be thine heir. And he brought
him forth abroad, and said, Look now toward heaven, and tell the
stars if thou be able to number them. And he said unto him, So
shall thy seed be. and he believed God in the Lord
and he counted it to him for righteousness. So we see there
surely God's great goodness and God's great favour to Abraham
in giving him that living faith to believe something which was
really not tangible you might think. There was Abraham an old
man his wife, an old woman, passed the time of bearing and now God
had spoken to him and yet you see he believed. He believed. The line of the hymn is very
appropriate. Faith laughs at impossibilities and says it shall
be done. We do have a great God still
who still does great things and how It need for it is for us
today to be also given this like precious faith. We must all have
faith. We must all believe in God. And we cannot do that in and
of ourselves. It's only as the Lord gives us
faith to believe. And as the Lord gives us faith
to believe, then we respond with giving God the glory and thankfulness
for that faith which he's given to us, which we didn't receive
of our own ability, but it was all of his grace. And so, even
as Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness. What a blessing then for us today,
if the Lord comes and gives us faith to believe God. Believe God and his promises.
Believe God with regards to his words, with regards to the Lord
Jesus Christ, with regards to the great salvation, with regards
to the blessed expectation of the saints of God in glory. And
so may we be blessed with like precious faith. And if we may
wonder, well, I'm not sure if I have faith, remember All those
that we read of in the 11th chapter to the Hebrews, where they all
walked by faith. We read it now. We know the end. We know the result. We know how
they achieved that which the Lord had put before them. But
it was by faith. And so in our lives today, may
we ever be concerned to have the evidence that we do possess
God-given faith, which gives us that grace to believe God,
to believe God in all his truths, and believe God especially of
course with regard to our salvation, and our soul standing before
a holy God. So what a mercy it is then to
realise these things and think that the Lord God has imputed
to us this righteousness. We read in the Psalm, Psalm 32
about sin being imputed. Blessed is he whose transgression
is forgiven, whose sin is covered. And we might ask, well, how is
that covered by the atoning blood of the Lord Jesus Christ? When
the Holy Spirit convinces us of our sin and leads us to the
Saviour, the need we have is to be found washed in the blood
of the Lamb, covered, as it were, here in this Word. whose sin
is covered. Blessed is the man unto whom
the Lord imputeth not iniquity, and in whose spirit there is
no guile. Well, again, it's good if God
gives us faith to trust in him wholly, and not lean to our own
understanding, and to not look to some other way. but to come
committing all our way unto the Lord. And so Abraham's faith,
Abraham's benefits were indeed God-given. And the Gospel profits
no one without faith. Without faith it is impossible
to please God. Without faith it is impossible
to believe God. And therefore how Exceedingly
necessary it is and so the Apostle goes on when he says no you therefore
that they which are of faith Not their faith, but God-given
faith which becomes their faith the same are the children of
Abraham and the scripture foreseeing That God would justify the heathen
through faith by nature of course we were heathen and preached
before the gospel unto Abraham, saying, in thee shall all nations
be blessed. And we remember, we read also
the words of the Lord when he said, Abraham saw my day and
was glad. He looked forward to that great
and glorious time when the Messiah would come. And he would be born
in this world, and he would die to take away Abraham's sin. And so we're thankful that such
words are recorded in scripture to realize that way back, thousands
of years before, Abraham was blessed with this faith to look
forward to the day when the Savior would arise, when the Savior
would come into this world and he would be born into that humble
situation and live that perfect life and give his life ransom
price to pay for Abraham's sin. My friends, today, to have paid
for our sin. Now, these things, no doubt,
are familiar to us. We read them in the Word of God.
But the great blessing is to receive faith, just like Abraham
did, to believe the Word of God. and what comfort there is and
it's all of God's grace and free gift to us and I believe when
the Holy Spirit gives us to understand what a blessing it is and how
humbling it is to think that the great God should have looked
upon us and not left us and to realize that this righteousness
is given and it's because we have been justified Because we've
been justified by the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ indeed
referring again to Romans which we've done a lot of course recently
and We read in the fifth chapter and the ninth and tenth verses
much more than being now justified by his blood We shall be saved
from wrath through him neither way of safety nor For if, when
we were sinners, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son,
much more being reconciled, we shall be saved by His life. And all of us, of course, need
that reconciliation. And all of us need that faith,
then, to be led to the Lord Jesus Christ. And the wonderful blessings,
which are, too, of the Church of God. Through faith, preach
before the Gospel unto Abraham, saying, in thee shall all nations
be blessed. So then, they which be of faith
are blessed, with faithful Abraham. That's a word to consider, isn't
it? We think of Abraham, don't we?
And we acknowledge that he was given that wonderful faith. And
yet here we have a very simple statement that has the same application
to us as it did to Abraham. So then they which are of faith
are blessed with faithful Abraham, united to Abraham through that
God-given faith which he gives to us. And what a mercy it is. And as the Apostle John said,
and this is the promise, that he has promised us even eternal
life. That's what he promised to Abraham.
That's what he's promised to all his people. He's promised
to all those who receive this God-given faith, the gift let's
not forget of eternal life and John it goes on in his epistle
and in the fifth chapter the last chapter we read in verses
11 to 13 and this is the record that God hath given us eternal
life and this life is in his son he then that hath the son
hath life And he that hath not the Son of God hath not life. That's very simple, isn't it?
To understand how vital that you and I do possess the life
of God, that our life is hid with God in Christ, and that
we are blessed with faith to believe the great and glorious
truth of the gospel. And he says then, these things
have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son
of God. You see, it's not those who possess
the evil heart of unbelief, but those who are granted this gift
to believe through faith. These things have I written unto
you first unto you that sorry these things are written unto
you that believe on the name of the son of god that ye may
know that you have eternal life and that ye may believe on the
name of the Son of God. We don't want to carry on in
our life without knowledge. We don't want to carry on without
recognizing that God has given us faith to believe. And if he's
given us that faith to believe, then we do possess life. Spiritual life. And then we are
united to the Lord Jesus Christ. And then to believe that through
that God-given faith there is that wonderful situation set
before us at the end of our life to enter in to that holy place
where sin no more defiles. Jesus shows his lovely face and
looks and loves and smiles. There is therefore a wonderful
inheritance to the people of God, but only to those who receive
like precious faith, how important it is to know that through that
God-given faith we are indeed justified. And as the Apostle
says when he wrote to the Corinthians, if we are justified then we shall
be glorified. Very humbling, very true. What
comfort it is to the true Church of God to be able to therefore
examine ourselves and to find therein the great work of grace
God's goodness toward us and to know therefore that we are
justified and that we are therefore made clean and we receive his
great and glorious robe of righteousness to cover our nakedness. Well,
may we thank God that the Apostle writes such things. Obviously
he was so concerned about the church at Galatia and therefore
he goes through it in great detail and as it might seem, repeat
himself sometimes, but sometimes we need things to be repeated. It's like knocking a nail in
with a hammer. You don't normally knock it in
with the first blow. It needs to be knocked again and again
to get the nail right home. And sometimes we need that in
the Word of God for the great truths to be hammered home into
our heart so that they do find a secure place there and we can
bless God for them. Well, may we thank God tonight
for the example of Abraham and to realise the great faith given
to him And may we therefore humbly be able to find our faith in
like manner as that great gift of God, and therefore the hope
of eternal life. Amen.