Good morning. Take your Bibles and let's go
to Galatians chapter 3. Galatians chapter 3, and I'd
like to close out this chapter in verses 26 through 29. Now, as we look at these verses,
I want you to remember that there's two truths that are undergirding,
strengthening the whole of what our Lord is declaring to us. And these two truths are of great
value and importance to us any time we go to the Word of God
to read it for ourselves, or we come to hear the Gospel, to
hear the Word of Christ preached, or any time that you are speaking
and declaring your hope in Christ to another sinner. There's two
truths, and these are, first, the justifying righteousness
of the Lord Jesus Christ for you, his people, the justifying
righteousness of Christ. And the other is the regenerating
grace of the Spirit. These truths undergird the whole
of our hope that Christ is our righteousness, that he has justified
us, and he has given us his Holy Spirit that has given us a new
birth by the grace of God, not according to our works, but according
to the grace and mercy of our God, given to us, shown to us
for the sake of Christ, who gave his life for us. And so these
two truths, Christ's justifying righteousness and the regeneration
of grace by the Spirit, these make up the good news, the good
word, the reason why we hope in our God. This is our ministry. This is the word which we preach
to sinners. This is why we declare this good
news to sinners. And these blessings have been
obtained for us by Christ, given to us in Christ, and these blessings
are for every child of God. every child of God comes into
the family of God being justified by the righteousness of Christ.
We don't enter with our own righteousness, and every child of God enters
the family of God by the regenerating grace of the Spirit given. That is, whether we're Jew or
Gentile, Whether we're slave or free, bond or free, or male
or female, we all come one way. I've titled this, All the Children
of God, which is taken from the 26th verse of our text. All the
Children of God. When reading this passage, I
was reminded, and thinking of these two undergirding truths,
I was reminded of the benefit I had as a child growing up in
that I was the youngest of three. I had an older brother and an
older sister. There were some drawbacks to
being the youngest, but to this point, there was a benefit because
of the fact they were so much older than me by a good seven
to eight and a half years. could benefit from seeing them
make the mistakes that all children make. And I could hear the conversations
of my parents with them and the discipline that they received. I was benefited by that. Now,
of course, I had to learn those same lessons. I had to go and
experience those same things. But the benefit being that I
could recall with a light bulb going on thinking, oh, now I
better understand. Now I see why my parents. said
to them what they said. And I could reflect on that perspective
when they themselves went through it. Well, that's sort of like
the benefit that we have here. The Apostle Paul is writing to
the church of Galatia. He's writing to a church made
up largely of Gentile believers and he's addressing them because
they've become entangled in the law. They've become entangled
in fleshly things and taken their eyes off of the Lord Jesus Christ
and look to things that cannot save or cleanse us from our sins. And it became a stumbling block
to them. And so we need to learn these
things, and we do. We that believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ, we come to an experiential knowledge of these things. We
go through these very same things looking to, hearing some new
thing, and being charmed by some new thing, but they're things
that cannot save, and they're things that take our eyes off
of the Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord gives us his word and
as we learn it we reflect on his word and we see the truth
of that word being revealed to us and the Lord helps us and
teaches us so that we see, Lord now I understand why you're saying
these things. Now I'm comforted and I understand
what you're teaching all your people in the Lord Jesus Christ. And what our Lord is showing
us repeatedly as we grow and walk by faith in the Lord Jesus
Christ is that this is a spiritual work. Salvation is not a thing
of the flesh in a combination of fleshly works or fleshly deeds
that we do, but it's a spiritual work of grace where the Lord
in fellowship with his people teaches us, brings us out of
darkness, shows us the wealth and the benefit and the riches
of Christ, whom we follow and trust and walk by faith in Him. And we see, we reflect back on
our times of folly when we've done things in the flesh or done
things thinking that it was an act or a deed that we did for
God and we see the glory of our Savior and the glory of our salvation
who does for us what we cannot do for ourselves. And we glory
and rejoice in the God of our salvation. And so Paul sums up
this grace saying in verse 26, for ye are all the children of God by faith
in Christ Jesus. You're all the children of God
by faith in Christ Jesus. And so we are brought to see
that every blessing that we have is for every believer, and that's
without exception. And I'm speaking of those two
undergirding truths, that Christ is our justifying righteousness,
that we've all been regenerated, born again by the seed of Christ
according to his spirit which is given unto us in grace. And this is true whether you
are a Jew or a Gentile. This is true whether you are
rich or poor, whether you're uneducated or educated, whether
you're a male or a female. Doesn't matter. We all come through
the blood. We are all justified by the blood
of the Lord Jesus Christ. And so we're all brought into
the family of God by divine adoption. None of us has a leg up on the
other one. We all are brought in to the
family of God by divine adoption. Look over at Ephesians chapter
one. Ephesians 1, let's look at verses
5 and 6. Paul says, Having predestinated
us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to Himself, according
to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of
His grace, wherein He hath made us accepted in the Beloved. And so this adoption that we
have into the family of God is revealed to us by faith. God reveals this hope in us by
faith. So that we are made to understand
that this fellowship that we now have with God, wherein we
are made partakers of the eternal inheritance of the saints of
God, it's entirely by grace. It's all of grace. And it's not
because of anything that we are in this flesh. It's not because
we're a physical Jew or a physical Gentile. It doesn't add anything
or take anything away. It's not because we come from
a particular class of society, whether we're rich or poor. whether
we are a bond slave or we're a free man. It doesn't matter
what our gender is, whether we are male or female, that's of
no consequence in the family of God. And so the spirit of
adoption bears witness to us, not because of anything in this
flesh, but he bears witness to us that we are the children of
God by manifesting faith in us. Ye all are children of God, the
children of God by faith in Christ Jesus. Okay. Now, faith, when
God gives us faith, that faith doesn't remain alone. It's not the whole or the end
of our experience in the Lord. Faith doesn't remain alone, but
there's an obedience of our faith. There's an obedience to the manifestation
of grace in us whereby we follow the Lord. Writes of this in 2
Peter 1, when he says, add to your faith virtue, and to virtue,
knowledge, and to knowledge, temperance, and to temperance,
patience, and to patience, godliness, and to godliness, brotherly kindness,
and to brotherly kindness, charity, love. We grow. We grow in the
grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. And
what Paul speaks of here in our text, after he says, you're all
the children of God by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, he
declares that we obey and are baptized. We are baptized believing
on the Lord. He says in verse 27, for as many
of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ. And so first comes faith, then
comes baptism. a public profession of our faith
in the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, I used to wonder, why does
the Lord give us baptism? I wondered why does the Lord
give us baptism? We see how that we're not saved with fleshly
things. We see how this is a spiritual
salvation of grace. And we rejoice in that our God
saves us apart from any works. So why does the Lord give us
something that we do in the flesh in such a manner? Why did the Lord give us baptism? Why do we have this ordinance? It not only brings a public awareness
that we are the Lord's and that we believe in him and trust him,
that we have faith revealed in us. It not only is a public declaration
of the hope that we have in Christ, but it testifies to the grace
that we've been given in the Lord Jesus Christ. And it speaks
to the fact that we are all one body. None of us gets a pass. None of us jumps ahead and says,
well, I don't need that. You needed that, but I don't
need this baptism. I'm a Jew. You're a Gentile.
Yeah, you should be baptized. No. Jew or Gentile is baptized. Male or female, all are baptized. Rich or poor, doesn't matter.
All are baptized. All are one, and they're all
baptized into Christ. And we see here that the graces
that we received in Christ, this baptism is an outward testimony
of what the Lord has done in our hearts and the hope that
he's given us in the Lord Jesus Christ. It's an outward profession
of an inward manifestation. and what the Spirit's done in
our hearts, for us, in the new man. We believe Christ by faith,
and we want to be baptized in obedience to our Lord. You know
that Christ himself was baptized, and none of us would dare think
that we're better or different than the Lord Jesus Christ. And
so faith is wrought in our hearts, and we say, Lord, you've been
baptized. And you say to be baptized, Lord,
I want to be baptized. I want to be baptized. And so
we believe Him and we are baptized as He is baptized. Now, on one
hand, our baptism pictures our death, the death of this flesh
and the life that we now have in the Lord Jesus Christ. Let's
turn over to Romans 6. I'm going to speak first on some
things that we know. I know you know these things.
Romans 6, verses 1 through 4. It's good for us to see them.
and to be reminded, especially we that have been baptized, as
we remember what our Lord has done for us and why we've been
baptized in the Lord. Romans 6, 1-4 says, what shall
we say then? Shall we continue in sin that
grace may abound? God forbid. How shall we that
are dead to sin live any longer therein? So there is a work of
grace done in the heart. This is speaking of the children
of God here. There's a work of grace done
in us. And he says, know ye not that so many of us as were baptized
into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death? Therefore, we
are buried with him by baptism into death. That like as Christ
was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even
so we also should walk in newness of life. And so, Our God, what
he does is he performs the operation of grace in his people. We're
not saved by outward things. We're not saved by something
we do in the flesh. This is just a reflection of
the operation of God that he works in each and every one of
his children. And so our baptism is a picture. Described here, it's a picture
that we have been crucified with Christ. We died with him. When he went to the cross, I
was in him. He carried me in his bosom. And when he died, I died. When
He was justified in the Spirit and raising Him from the dead,
I was justified by God, by the Lord Jesus Christ and what He
did. And so we're dead with Christ
and we're in Christ and our life is hid with Christ in God. And we do now count ourselves
dead to the lusts of the flesh, not wanting to go on living according
to the dictates and desires of the flesh. There's a war that
rages in us. I can tell you there's a war.
There's desires and lusts and all kinds of things in this flesh. But in the new man, which believes
Christ and loves Him, I don't want to walk in that sin. I don't
want to do those things. I want to know my Lord and continue
in that sweet fellowship. I don't want to bring fear and
doubts and worries upon me in doing those things. Peter describes
them as warring against the soul, and they do. They make war against
the soul and fill our minds and hearts with doubt and fears and
worry. And so we live, brethren, in
faith, believe in Christ. We walk by faith in Him. Now
let's finish Romans 6, verse 5 and 6. And then that'll be
it for this passage. He says, for if we have been
planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also
in the likeness of his resurrection. knowing this, that our old man
is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed,
that henceforth we should not serve sin. That power and control
that was over us, that sin had over us and that death, that's
all we knew in the flesh. That we were just moved about
with various passions of the flesh. But that's been broken
and canceled so that now we see Christ. And we believe Christ,
and we trust Him, and we follow Him, and we cry out to Him, Lord,
keep me. Lord, preserve me. Lord, help
me to walk in You by faith, in obedience to You. I don't want
to live according to the flesh and the dictates of the flesh.
You've delivered me from that. I don't want to continue in that.
Lord, I want to serve You, and I want to love my brethren and
serve them as well. Now, I realize that we're all
familiar with these truths. We know these things. We've read
these truths in the Bible. We understand it's not a washing
away of the sins of the flesh by being baptized. Christ did
that. We understand those things. We
understand it's a symbol, a picture of that. But the child of God,
when they're baptized, we're baptized in hope. according to
these undergirding truths, that Christ is my righteousness, that
I'm justified by Him, that I've been regenerated by the Spirit
of God who reveals faith in me and put my hope, my eyes, upon
the Lord Jesus Christ, that in Him I am saved. In Him I am forgiven
of all my sins. And God has brought me into His
family and made me his own revealing these truths. to me. And he says, verse 27 again,
for as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put
on Christ. And so the physical act of baptism
does not save the people of God. It doesn't wash away the sins
of the people of God. Baptism doesn't do that. Christ
did that. Christ is the one who washes
away the sins of his people. Now, some are baptized for a
religious act. Meaning some are baptized because
they do think that it is a means whereby God will say, well done. Here's a little grace for you.
Here's a little extra something special to help you in the day
of judgment in earning my favor. Some people think it gives them
grace. And that's a lie. That's not
true. That's having confidence in the
flesh and the works of the flesh. We're not bettered by our baptism. We are only bettered, we are
only helped, we are only saved by the Lord Jesus Christ himself. And so the children of God are
baptized, believing, this is our hope. And that doesn't mean
that every single one of these is going through your mind as
you're being baptized. But what you're professing, what
you're declaring, my hope is, is that Christ has cleansed my
soul. from death. Christ has put away
my sin. In him I am washed clean by the
blood of my Savior. He's purged me of my sins and
he's delivered me from the punishment that I deserve for my transgressions
and my trespasses and my sins and iniquities against the living
God. We are confessing that Christ
has justified me by his righteousness, and that I am delivered once
and for all from the wrath of God. And that second death hath
no more power over me. I believe that I have been raised
again by the Lord Jesus Christ, so that in that day of judgment,
my name shall be found written in the Lamb's book of life, that
I will not be judged according to those works in the books,
but according to Christ. according to my Savior. And He's
revealed this hope in us by the regenerating grace of His Holy
Spirit. Those truths undergird us and
support us and hold us up. I'm justified by Christ. I'm
regenerated by His grace through the Spirit, which He's given
to me according to His own love and mercy for Christ's sake,
which is shown to me. Why, Lord? Thank you, Lord. Thank
you. And so that's why we're baptized. All his people are baptized believing
Christ did this for me, an undeserving, filthy, wretched sinner. And so you that believe in him,
if you haven't been baptized, come, be baptized, trusting your
Lord who did this work for you. Not because this saves you. That's
not your confidence and your hope. But because your confidence
and your hope is that Christ has saved you, his people. And so the apostle says, such
have put on Christ. They've put on Christ. The picture
is that I come laying aside. the confidences of this flesh,
self-righteous confidences. The old man, these filthy rag
righteousness that I once trusted him, I laid aside and am washed
by Christ and come up in the garment, clothed in the garment
of Christ's righteousness alone. That's what it means there. That's
the picture that's given to us. This righteousness is the wedding
garment. whereby we will enter into heaven
by the righteousness of Christ and we'll take our place seated
at that table, made partakers of that great feast in Christ. And without such righteousness,
no man, no woman, no one, Jew or Gentile, rich or poor, male
or female, none shall be able to take their place at that seat
without the righteous garment of Christ. And that's why our
Lord gave us that parable when he said, friend, how camest thou
in hither, seeing as you have no wedding garment? And he was
speechless. so that he was unable to say
anything that could deliver him from the wrath of God. We have
one hope, one confession, the Lord Jesus Christ. He's our deliverance
from the wrath of God. He's our deliverance from sin.
He's our deliverance from our enemies. And so, we do walk in
Christ, not according to the dictates of a corrupt nature,
but of a new man created in Christ Jesus unto good works. And we
live upon the hope of His grace. Romans 13.14 is a like passage
and it says, But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not
provision for the flesh, to fulfill the lusts thereof. And so by
the work of grace for us in Christ, his justifying righteousness,
the regenerating grace of the spirit, we walk. That new man
formed in us. And we're given a picture of
this in the Old Testament. You know, the priests, when they
would come to minister to the people, what did they have to
do? They took off their street clothes and they dipped themselves
in the pool. They were baptized in the pool
and washed themselves and then put on those priestly garments
whereby they ministered to the people. And that's what it is
to put on Christ. We lay aside the hope that we
had in this flesh. and we trust in Christ alone.
We're watching him. And the baptism is just a picture
of what Christ has done for us. And so this brings us to what
we all have in Christ. The baptism, this baptism is
for all believers regardless of what we are in the flesh.
Verse 28, there is neither Jew nor Greek There is neither bond
nor free, there is neither male nor female, for ye are all one
in Christ Jesus. You know, under the Old Testament,
only men could be priests, but now you're all priests of the
living God. Only males were circumcised,
but now male and female are baptized in Christ. Only Jews could enter
the temple, And now we all are the temple of our God. And Christ
dwells in our hearts by faith. Look at Ephesians 2. We see how
Christ put this away. Ephesians 2 verse 13 through
16. But now in Christ Jesus, ye who
sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ.
For he is our peace, who hath made both one and hath broken
down the middle wall of partition between us, having abolished
in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained
in ordinances, for to make in himself of two one new man, so
making peace, so that there's nothing now that separates believers
in Christ. We're all one. We all come through. the same way, through that blood,
and there's nothing different about any of us. None of us is
excused from believing the Lord and trusting Him and being clothed
in His righteousness and regenerated by His Spirit. Verse 16, and
that He might reconcile both unto God and one body by the
cross, having slain the enmity thereby. And so all our Christs
all came that one way through the redeeming blood of Christ.
And he says, verse 29, and if ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's
seed and heirs according to the promise. We are all Christ's,
not by some work that we've done for ourselves to earn this. We're
Christ's because he justified us by his righteousness. and
he's given us his spirit to regenerate us according to the grace of
God shown to us richly and abundantly in the Lord Jesus Christ. And so he's made known our adoption
in this family of God by grace and made us heirs according to
promise. And so I pray the Lord bless
that word to your hearts and encourage you and comfort you
in Christ. Amen. All right, let's close in prayer,
and then we'll have 15 minutes. And we'll come back in the book
of Judges, Judges 3. Our gracious Lord, we thank you,
Father, for your mercy. We thank you, Lord, for your
grace, your power. Lord, we thank you that you have
made us all one in Christ, that none of us can exalt ourselves
or glory over another. But we've all been laid low.
All our works have been cast aside as dung, as no righteousness,
no help, nothing for us to glory in, in the works of the flesh,
but you've given us Christ. You've given us His justifying
righteousness, and you've given us His Spirit of grace regenerating
us, and making us to know this glory, this salvation in Christ
our Savior. Lord, thank you. We know and
confess that we are undeserving sinners, but we thank you for
bringing us into the family of God, for adopting us by grace
through Christ and making this known to us. Help us, Lord, to
walk in faith. Help us, Lord. Don't leave faith
alone, but grow us in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and
Savior, Jesus Christ. And help us, Lord, to walk obediently
in all things. It's for Christ's sake that we
pray this and give thanks. Amen. Before I forget, too, I'm going
to try on these to save just the message, and that way if
there's ever a message that you're blessed by or like in particular,
I'm going to try and boost it. And I'm just going to boost it.
I have to parse it down right here. And then we'll boost that
message out. And you can target it going to
the immediate vicinity, right here, so many miles out. And
you can pick how many people it does, whether you pay $10
or $20. And we're doing the newspaper. And that's out now. I don't know
if you've seen it, but we have a color ad, which by the grace
of God, they erred on some things, and they gave us an extra week
for free, already ran, and it's out in color, and they give us
that color for free. And so they're pushing it out,
and so it would be nice to maybe do a few other things, and just
pray that the Lord bless it, and bring in his lost sheep,
who need to be fed, and hear this glorious good news in Christ.