I'll take your Bibles again,
turn me to Galatians chapter three. Galatians chapter three. Told you many times, I'm just
gonna keep plowing over this text and praying that God would
continually bless it to you and shore it up in your mind. It's
my hope and desire that when you open your Bibles to this
portion of Scripture and you start reading, you won't have
any problem understanding what's being said here. I think it's
very plain. The language here is very plain.
And so we've gone over since verse 10, we've talked about,
first of all, remember that the covenant of the law is a contractual
covenant. As many as are of the works of
the law are under the curse of the law, not the blessing because,
why? The scripture hath concluded
that all are under sin. Cursed is everyone that continueth
not in all things written in the book of the law to do them.
So then what is the conclusion? No man is justified in the sight
of God by the works of the law. So how then is a man justified? He's justified by Christ. Christ
hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse
for us. It was written, Cursed is everyone
that hangeth on a tree. For what? That the blessing of
Abraham, the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through
Jesus Christ, that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through
faith. And then in verse 15, he begins
to tell us of this covenant of promise. The covenant of promise
is not a contractual covenant. It is the last will and testament.
And he uses the last will and testament of a man. He says if
a man has a last will and testament, you can't add to it, you can't
take away from it. It wouldn't be just, it wouldn't
be right. And in verse 16 he tells us to whom this promise
was made. To Abraham and to his seed, which
was what? Christ. The promises of this
covenant were given to Christ as the mediator, as the testator
of this will. All the responsibility of the
covenant of promise rested on the seed, Christ. And he said, This I say, that
the covenant which was confirmed of God before before of God in
Christ, the law, which was 430 years after, cannot disannul,
that it should make the promise of none effect. For if the inheritance
be of the law, it is no more of promise, but God gave it to
Abraham. How? By promise. So we see the
distinction of these two covenants. And then he says, well, what's
the purpose of the law? Verse 19. Wherefore then serveth the
law. It was added because of transgression.
What's the purpose of the law? It is to magnify sin. That's
it. That's the purpose of the law.
All it can do is magnify sin and magnify the curse. It testifies
of the holiness of God, the justice of God, and the sinfulness of
man. But it can't save. It was never
intended to say. And he says this in verse 21,
is the law then against the promises of God? Can the law stop the
promises of God? Can the law somehow thwart the
covenant of promise? Did God put that law as a roadblock? Well, before the law, everything
was going well, and God gave the law. Now then, we can't get
in. That's not what it's for. It doesn't do that. He said,
God forbid, it doesn't stop the covenant of promise. It doesn't
have any effect on the covenant of promise whatsoever. For if there had been a law given,
which could have given life, verily, righteousness should
have been by the law, but the scripture hath concluded. The
scripture hath concluded. What's the first thing it concludes?
All men are under sin. That's the conclusion of the
Scripture. All men are under sin, by nature
guilty, children of wrath, even as others. Secondly, it concludes
this. It says, All under sin. It concludes
that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to
them that believe. The Scripture hath concluded
that God's eternal promise toward His elect people This covenant
of promise, which includes eternal life, righteousness, and forgiveness
of sins, should be given, should be accomplished by Jesus Christ,
and given to those who believe. I don't want you to take your
eye off the ball. The whole center of this is the
covenant of promise. This is what he's shining a light
on. The law doesn't have anything
to do with this. The law manifests, it has a purpose, but it doesn't
have anything to do with this covenant of promise. Listen to
what Paul says in Hebrews chapter 8 concerning this. He says, Behold,
the days come, saith the Lord, when I will make a new covenant
with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. Listen, not
according to the covenant I made with their fathers when I took
them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt. I'm
going to make another covenant. A totally separate and distinct
covenant. Why? Because they continue not
in my first covenant. That first covenant, they didn't
continue in it. And I regarded them not, saith the Lord, for
this is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after
those days, saith the Lord. I will put my laws in their mind
and write them in their hearts. And I will be to them a God and
they shall be to me a people. They shall not teach every man
his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord.
For they all shall know me, from the least to the greatest. For
I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities
will I remember no more. If that's not a distinction between
these two covenants, I don't know what is. One only can give
you a curse. This one promises blessings.
One can only condemn you of sin, and one promises to forgive you
of your sins. One is a law written on tables
of stone, the other one is a law written on your heart. So the scripture has concluded
that all the promises of God are included in this covenant.
And thirdly, the scripture concludes that the promise of God must
be by the faith of Jesus Christ. That by the faithful obedience
of Jesus Christ, That he alone should merit the righteousness
of God for us. And that he by his death should
make an, by his death, he should make an offering for sin, that
he should make an end of sin. So the scripture concluded that
God saw the travail of his soul and justice was for the elect
perfectly satisfied. You feel guilty. You believers
in Christ, you feel guilty. Do you realize that that guilt
is what you feel is just that, it's a feeling, but the guilt
has been removed. The guilt has been removed. Christ
actually bore your guilt. And God said, I'm satisfied. I'm satisfied with His one offering.
He accomplished the salvation of His elect by His faithful
obedience and now He sits faithfully as the only mediator between
God and man. If you are ever going to be accepted
with God, it must only be through this mediator. This one who stands
between us and God, Jesus Christ. Fourthly, the scripture hath
concluded this, that the promise is given. Look at that, he said
the scripture concluded all under sin, that the promise by the
faith of Jesus Christ might be what? Given. This is how the
promise is going, you're going to get it. This is how you get
the inheritance. It has to be given. freely given. It's given by the grace of God,
simply by the grace of God. Remember, it was God that chose
his people in sovereign grace, and it's by the sovereign grace
of God that we all receive this through faith. It is by the grace
and power of God you receive this. You receive him, as many
as received him, to them gave you the right to become the sons
of God, which were born. How were you born? Not of blood,
nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of
God. You and I receive this by faith, according to the power
of God. And so now in the next verses,
the apostle then is going to apply all that he has taught. He's going to bring all of this
purpose together, his message. He prays to them that salvation
is not by law, but by grace, by covenant of promise. And he
declares his promise is not based on any physical inheritance or
outward obedience, but only by the merits of Jesus Christ. All who are saved by the grace
of God through faith in Christ are never separated by outward
classes and status. But the gospel declares our union. I want you to see now, he's going
to show you that the law divides. The law divides based on race. The law divides based on gender. The law divides based on obedience
or disobedience. But this covenant of promise
does not divide, it unifies. It unifies. The gospel of Jesus Christ declares
this, that we are in union with Jesus Christ. We are in union
with Jesus Christ. The law tells me that I'm not. What did God say? He said, your
sin has separated you from God. What does the gospel say? The
gospel tells us that we are reconciled to God. That we're not divided,
but in union, at peace with God. And the gospel declares this,
that we are in union with each other. We are in union with each
other. And because of this union, we
must of necessity be in union with one another. Now, let us
remember that these Jewish false teachers, this is what they came
in with, division. They came in with division. They
came in to the church causing division by saying this, that
the Gentiles must be circumcised to be saved. They must obey this
one precept of the law in order to be saved. We know this because
of Acts chapter 15. Exactly what they did in Antioch
is what they were doing in Galatia. Listen, he said, certain men
came down from Judea and taught the brethren, except you be circumcised,
after the manner of Moses you cannot be saved. But there rose up certain of
the sect of the Pharisees which believed, saying, that it was
needful, it was needful to circumcise them and to command them to keep
the law of Moses. So you had this rising up in
the church at this time, these Jews, they just would not let
the law go. Why? Because the law set them
apart from everyone else. The law separated them, and if
you were going to be part of them, you had to be circumcised. You had to set yourself apart
by this. This is always the way of false
religion. False religion, legalist doctrine, always seeks to divide
the church by groups and classes of people. It always causes members to set
themselves above others and look down on others. either because of their status
in the world, their status in the church, or because of their
education, or because of their zeal. This is why they always
need to hear the law repeated. What do they get out of this?
You hear somebody talking about works all the time. They say,
well, you need to be doing this. Why would they need to hear that?
Because they want to measure their spirituality. You preach a certain thing. Well,
do not commit fornication. And they look at their lives
and say, man, well, I've done that. Check. Well, don't steal. OK. Well,
check. What? Measuring up pretty good.
Then they find something that's a little bit rough, and they
say, well, you shouldn't covet somebody. They said, oh, I didn't
work on that. I'll work on that. I won't covet it. And pretty
soon they got that checked off. What are they doing? They're
just measuring their spirituality. And when they reach a certain
measurement, what are they going to do with you? When you stole something,
what are they going to do with you? Well, they're going to look
down on you. This is what religion does. It
sets people apart from one another based on their obedience. Well,
see whether they measure up. When we had kids, and our kids
were small, they'd always like to put a measurement on the wall,
you know, write a little pencil mark. They'd come back two or
three days later and try to see if they had gotten taller. That's how religion does. Religion
always wants to measure yourself, but who are you really measuring
against? Each other. If you were measuring against
God, like you should, you wouldn't be doing that. So here Paul sets it straight,
that those who would seek preeminence in the church above others, he declares this, that all believers
are the same in Christ. The gospel is the great leveler. It's the great leveler. It puts
us all on the same plane, on the same level. sinners saved
by grace. That's what it does. And so he's
going to declare this, that there is neither Jew nor Greek, bond
nor free, male or female. He's going to tell them all,
look, we're all one in Christ. We're in union here. Now in the
Old Testament, God did choose that one nation, that race of
people, and gave his law to them. God set this people apart. by
His deliverance of them from Pharaoh and giving them His law. And so Paul says this in verse
23, he says, Before faith came, what? We were kept under the
law. Shut up unto the faith, which
should afterwards be revealed. Before Christ, before He came
in His faithful obedience to accomplish The covenant of promise. God's people were shut up to
the law, which only pictured him in types and shadows. It only testified of his work
that was to come, but they couldn't clearly see it. Circumcision
was a part of that picture. And while there were many references
of Gentiles, there was only a few of them that believed. Only a
few of them. And he says in verse 24, wherefore
the law was our schoolmaster to bring us to Christ that we
might be justified by faith. I told you this, this last Lord's
day that this schoolmaster, he was a slave in the master's house. It was, this was a wealthy man
would take a slave that he trusted most and set his young children
under him. Until when? Until they came of
age. until they came of age. He would
teach them, he would discipline them, he would instruct them,
and that's what the law was to the Jews. But when it was no
longer needed, when Christ came, it was done away with. But the question in this modern
age is, how were the Jews saved? Those that were kept under the
law, how were they saved? Now some believe that the Jews
were saved differently than we are. That that law had some measure
of necessity in order for them to be saved. But we know this
is true. They were saved the same way
Abraham was. They're saved the same way we
are. You see the unity here? Salvation,
everyone who is saved before Christ and everyone who is saved
after Christ is saved the same way, by faith. He says in verse 24, wherefore
the law is our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ. that we
might be justified, how? By faith. The law was a schoolmaster,
it pointed them to Christ, and they were justified, how? By
believing in Christ before He came. And so what then is the difference
between the Jew and the Greek? Is the Jew better than the Greek?
Better than the Gentiles? Paul tells us this in Romans
3, he says, in no way. Romans 3 chapter 9, chapter 3
and verse 9, he says, what then, is a Jew better than the Greek?
In no wise, for we have proved this, that all are sinners. See
the unity here? Unity is we're all sinners. We
all have the same father, don't we? Adam was our father. And if we are going to be saved,
we have to be saved the same way. Therefore, if any man is to be
justified before God, it must be by faith in the faithfulness
of Christ. Faith in the faithfulness of
Christ. This is how we are justified. By the grace of God that gives
it to everyone who believes the gospel, Jew nor Greek, so then
there is no difference as to how men are saved or justified
before God. I thought of this earlier, a
babe in Christ. If you have a babe in Christ,
you that have been, you that are spiritually mature, that
God has given the ability to grow in grace. When we first
believed, we were foolish. I'm telling you, I remember when
I first believed. I tell you, Martin Lloyd-Jones
says, you know, a believer needs two things. He needs light and
heat. He needs understanding and zeal. When I first believed, I had
no light but a bunch of zeal. I was gonna set the world on
fire, but I didn't have much light. I was pretty foolish running
around. I remember some of the things I said to my pastor, and
I don't know how he didn't call me stupid. I just don't know
how he kept his tongue. But that's how we are when we're
babes in Christ. We don't know much. God causes
us, He's going to cause us to grow in grace and we're going
to learn through trials and difficulties and pains and sorrows. He's going
to teach us. He's going to teach us and we're
going to grow up. And then you take a mature believer,
one who has been around and God has given them growth and they're
wise and zealous. But let me ask you this. Is there
any difference in their salvation? Is the mature believer any more
saved or is the babe any less saved? No. See the unity? See, because the
salvation of the mature believer and the salvation of the babe
are all dependent on Christ. Not on their maturity level. See, if we believed that, then
we would be preaching separation, wouldn't we? Joanne, you're more
saved than other people. That'd be horrible, but that's
what false religion preaches. And so the natural man, essentially,
in our day, you know, there's a lot of talk about equality. in this foolish idea of equality. But how do men make other men
equal? Well, they take one race and they lift it up and they
put down another. And they take one group that's been oppressed
and one group that's been the oppressor and then they reverse
it. Well, you oppressed me all those
years, now it's my turn to oppress you. Is that equal? Does that
make it level? No. They don't want equality. is give lip service to it. And
so it is with false religion, because false religion judges
men based on their outward deeds. And they legislate who is the
greatest in the church and who is the least by what they can
see. This causes division and not
unity. Division and not unity. Those
in Galatia, I want you to see it again, they were causing division.
There were those who were circumcised and there were those who were
not. So what do they think about the people who were circumcised?
They walked around with their chest out. They say, I'm at a
higher spiritual level than you. You know, this is what has been
going on among Calvinists and Armenians. A lot of the modern-day
Calvinists just believe Armenians are lesser Christians. Well,
they just don't understand as much as I do. See the division
they cause? Instead of telling the truth,
the Armenian gospel is heresy, friends. It's just heresy. It's
not a gospel at all. They're not lesser believers.
They're not believers. But because God has given me
the understanding of the doctrines of grace, does that elevate me
above any other believer? No. No, we don't make distinctions
like that. I thought of this parable. Remember
the parable of the penny? The parable of the penny. The
Lord says a man hired some servants early in the morning, and he
promised to pay them a penny for their work, and they agreed.
They went out there and they started working. And then noonday
came and the master said, I'm going to hire some more servants.
And he agreed with them for a penny. And then at the end of the day,
only about an hour or so left of the workday, and he goes out
and says, I'm going to hire some more servants for a penny. And
he says, I'll hire you for a penny. You go out there and work. And
now it comes time for payment. You see these guys only worked
an hour or two. They come up there. They're glad
to get that penny. They're so happy. And then you
take that noonday workers and they say, well, hmm, man, they
got a penny. Surely, I'm going to get a little more because
I've been out here for four hours. He gets up there and he gives
them a penny. They're kind of a little upset. They said, well,
at least they didn't work as much as those guys. And then
the last group comes up. And they said, well, those other
two groups, they didn't work very, I've been working all day
long. Surely he's gonna give me more
than them. And you know what he gave them? He gave them a penny. Now this
is very important because a penny in that day was a whole day's
meal. You work daily for your meal.
That's how you work. You didn't have salaries. Most
of them didn't have salaries or anything like that. Every
day they worked for that penny and that penny was, that penny
saved their life. It sustained them for a whole
day. This is a picture of salvation,
friends. Some of you have been laboring for a long time in faith. A lot of you have been laboring
since you were young. Some at midlife, then some even
at the end of life. You know what we all get? We
all get the same salvation. There are some then who would
preach that believers have different rewards in heaven based on what
they do here. This doctrine is not only false,
it's deadly. This doctrine, listen friends,
it divides. It divides. It doesn't generate
unity. This teaching only exalts the
pride of men, causes them to look down on others. And some
would preach the variance of different races. Some would preach
that one race is better than another. Some would preach this,
that God's blessings are Health, wealth, and prosperity are based
on the amount of faith that you have? All of these lies and heresies
are from the synagogue of Satan. This is not the gospel. Why?
Because the gospel is one of unity. It's one that unifies. First of all, the gospel message
testifies of our union with Christ. Look at verse 26. For you are all the children
of God by faith in Jesus Christ. If you are a believer in Jesus
Christ, you are saved by the grace of God alone through the
faith and faithfulness of Jesus Christ. And it doesn't matter
how rich or poor you are. It doesn't matter if you are
black or white. It doesn't matter where you came
from. If you are a believer in Christ,
you are a son of God. You are. Who? All of us who believe. All of us who believe. are a
son of God. Believer, let us men by faith
see the only reason that we are believers in Christ is because
of this. We were forever in union with
Christ. We were forever before the foundation
of the world in union with him. Look at 2nd Timothy. 2nd Timothy chapter one. 2 Timothy chapter 1, look at verse
8. He said, Be not thou therefore ashamed of the testimony of our
Lord, nor of me as prisoner. Be thou partaker of the afflictions
of the gospel according to the power of God. That's a very important
phrase, the power of God, because no one's saved apart from the
power of God. Look at that very first thing. Who hath saved us? What's the second thing? And
called us. Which is first? He saved us. Then what did he
do? He called us. How did he call
us? With what kind of calling? Was
he asking us? Did he make an invitation? Did he leave it to our will?
No. It's a holy calling. A perfect
calling. holy calling not according to
our works but according to his own purpose
and grace why in the world are you saved
why were you called according to your works No, he
says, not according to your works, but according to the purpose
of God and the grace of God, which was given us, where? In
Christ. In Christ. Remember, I told you
that Christ is the center of this covenant, the center of
this covenant of promise. He is responsible for the outcome
of this covenant, and therefore all of its beneficiaries are
put into union with Him. When were we put in Christ? Before
the world began. So then when Christ came into
the world to honor God's law, when He merited the righteousness
of God, you that are saved, I want you to see this, you were in
Him. I know. Trying to wrap your mind
around this is hard. You can only see it by faith.
That's what the importance of this is. You have to see it by
faith. Because you're not going to feel it. You're not going
to wrap your mind around it. You must embrace it as God said. You were in Adam. Did you feel
that? No? physically there. But you were
in Him, and when He died, you died. So even so Christ, we were
in Christ, so when Christ obeyed God, I obeyed God. When Christ
died upon the cross, bearing our sins in His own body, I died. I died in my substitute, in Christ. I suffered the justice of God
in Him. We were one with Him. You know
in Jeremiah 23 in verse 6 it calls the Lord, he says, in his
days Judah shall be saved and Israel shall dwell safely and
this is the name whereby he shall be called, the Lord our righteousness. Isn't Christ our righteousness?
Now how much righteousness is Christ? Is he partial or is he
all our righteousness? What do we call him? We call
him the Lord Our righteousness. He's all my righteousness. Why? That's his name. That's
his name. But in Jeremiah 33, listen to
what it says. In those days, Judah shall be
saved and Jerusalem shall dwell safely. And this is the name
whereby she shall be called. Listen, what your name is. The
Lord, our righteousness. We are given the same name He
has. Can you get much more in union
than that? He is all our righteousness,
and when the Lord died, we died in union with Him. Paul said
in chapter 2 of our text, I am crucified with Christ. Nevertheless,
I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me. And the life that
I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God.
That's the source of my life. is the faith of the Son of God
who loved me and gave himself for me. I was crucified with
Christ. And so when Jesus Christ died
under the justice of God, I died in Him. And when He rose from the dead,
you listen, when He rose from the dead, I rose from the dead
in Him. When God set him on the throne
of God, he set me on the throne of God in him. Union with Christ. And I'll tell you this, we have
not yet experienced the fullness of this union. I'm telling you
about something that I can't fully understand. I believe it
with all my heart, that's my hope, is I'm in union with Him. That's it. It's all my hope. One day we will fully experience
this union. Paul says in Romans 8, For whom
He did foreknow, He also did predestinate to be conformed
to the image of His Son. that he might be the firstborn
among many brethren. Moreover, whom he did predestinate,
them he also called, and whom he called he also justified,
and to whom he justified he also glorified." Do you know those
all are past tense? Paul wrote that a long time before
I was born. And yet it's as though he says,
you've already been called. You've already been justified.
You've already been glorified. You feel glorified? Do you feel
justified? Oftentimes we doubt if we were
ever called. Well, see, that's good. It don't have anything to do
with my feelings, does it? So all this, even before we ever
received it by faith, therefore, the believer must never exalt
our faith in Christ above others, must never exalt ourselves, because
this is true of all of us. This is true of all of us. If
we are faithful witnesses of the gospel, we must never boast
in ourselves, our station, our status, our family, our religion. We must and should always give
thanks. Do you realize you can't murmur
and give thanks at the same time? If you're murmuring and giving
thanks, you're really not giving thanks. You're just murmuring. But let our boast then always
be in Jesus Christ. It is always the heart of the
believer to brag on Christ. Why? Because he's our savior.
He's my righteousness. He's my justification. He's my
sanctification. He's my wisdom. He's my redemption. We boast of Christ. If we have
believed, it is only then by the grace of God because we were
put into union with him. And only those who are born again
by the power of God can claim this union. I'll go through this next part
real quickly. Union of the church. union with the Church of Christ.
Now look at this again. You are all the children of God
by faith in Jesus Christ. There should be no contention or boasting or strife
among the people of God. Because all believers in Christ
are in union with Christ, all of us are children of God. There's
not one that can exalt himself above another. You're just as
much a child of God as I am. Do I have any? I'm preaching
the gospel. Does that give me any room to
boast? Does that have anything to do with me being a child of
God? Nothing. Nothing. I have no room to boast. We are all the children of God.
It was all by the will of God. To conform us to the image of
his son. You know, it makes me cringe
when people tell me that we're all children of God. Well, we're
all children of God. No, we're not. We're not. Jesus told those Pharisees, you
are your father, the devil. Were they children of God? No. No. So who are everyone who believes
in Jesus Christ? But if anyone believes in Christ
plus their merits, plus their obedience, plus the power of
their will, these are not the children of God. The word of
God then is plain. Paul says, if you be circumcised.
In this same chapter, look at your text real quickly. What
happens if someone adds something of their own works to distinguish
themselves? What does Paul say about this
matter of circumcision? Look at chapter 5 and verse 2. He says, Behold, I, Paul, say
unto you, if you be circumcised, Christ shall profit you what?
Nothing. Why? Because they believed that
adding their circumcision to his work made them more profitable. They were higher spiritually,
than everyone else. Paul says this, if you add anything
to Christ, he's not going to profit you anything. He says,
I testify again to every man that is circumcised, that he
is a debtor to the whole law. Christ has become of no effect
in you, whosoever you are justified by the law, you're fallen from
grace. To all whose salvation as any
part depended upon themselves. These are not the children of
God. But if by the grace of God you
have been born of the Spirit through the preaching of the
gospel of Jesus Christ, we know and have assurance that we are
the children of God. How? Because we believe on Christ
alone. This is the unity of every believer. All of us. Now, there are different
churches who have different manners in worship. They do things a
little differently. It doesn't amount to anything. But we all know this, if you
are a child of God, that all our hope is on Jesus Christ,
all of it. Paul says in Ephesians 4, therefore,
the prisoner of the Lord, I beseech you that you walk worthy of vocation
wherewith you are called. How we walk, Paul, with lowliness
and meekness, with long-suffering, forbearing one another in love.
Endeavoring to keep the unity of the spirit and the bond of
peace. Why? There is one body and one spirit,
even we are called in one hope of your calling. One Lord, one
faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, above all and
through all and in you all. And to every one of us is given
the grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ. Every
one of us is given the grace. Every one of us. But according
to the measure he gives us. You may not have the same measure
of faith. But if you have more, who gives
it? If you have more measure of love, who gives that? That's
a gift of God, too. It's true of every child of God
that we must and shall believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. So
with all lowliness and meekness of mind, how do we act? We act
in love toward one another. And we do not promote ourselves. Look what he says back in your
text, real quick, and I'll close. He says this. You're all the
children of God, how? By faith in Jesus Christ. For
as many of you as are baptized into Christ have put on Christ. Because baptism in Christ is
spiritual. Physical baptism, and I'll probably
deal with this more on Sunday. Physical baptism is a symbolic
picture of a spiritual event. But what he means by baptism
is this, we are all baptized into Christ and Christ is our
Deliverer. You that are saved, you've all
been delivered by Jesus Christ. You that are saved, you have
all been washed by the blood of Jesus Christ. You all that
have been saved have been given life, spiritual life, by Jesus
Christ. And you that have faith, you
have been given faith by Christ, and He keeps giving you faith. If you have faith, it's going
to endure because He keeps. And then what do we do? We put
on Christ by faith. We that have been delivered by
Christ, put on Christ. You put on Christ simply this,
like that high priest. He would take off his common
garments when he was getting ready to go into that sanctuary
to do his work. He would put off his common garments
and put on the priestly robes. And this is what we do is we
put on the righteousness of Christ. I think the best illustration
of that was that wedding garment. You remember the king who had
a feast for his son, a wedding feast? He made the garment and
he gave it to everyone who came to the feast. And the only one
who was cast out was what? The person had his own garment. And so we that have been baptized
into Christ, into union with Christ, look, is there anything
else you want to put on? Is there any other righteousness
you want to put on but His? I'd say even more than that.
He didn't say just put on the righteousness, put on Christ.
I think of the scheme that Jacob had. Remember, he put on the
skin of that animal so that when his father Isaac
felt him, he felt his son. And so it is, we're so put into
union with Christ that when God sees us, he sees his son. This is the glorious truth of
the covenant. This is all the promise of God,
the covenant of promise. And the unifying part is this,
we are all baptized. So then what does he say? There's
neither Jew nor Greek. There's neither bond or free.
There's neither male nor female, for you're all one. Where? In Christ. No distinctions. No distinctions. Have you ever
thought about this? When these Jews were coming in,
they said, well, you've got to be circumcised. What about the
women? You can't be saved unless you're
circumcised. That made a distinction, didn't
it? What does it say here? There's no such distinctions.
No such distinctions. No bond, no free, no male, no
female. Now there are distinctions. We
don't say that Christ does. If you were a slave, when you
believed in Christ, you didn't automatically can tell your master,
I'm free! Get out. No, that's not what
he means. There's no distinctions in salvation. And I hope to get to this soon.
There will be distinctions in our responsibilities in this
body. You have different parts of your body. It's all one body,
isn't it? Your hands aren't your mouth. Your feet aren't your
hands. They do different things, but
they're all one body. And listen, Christ is the head
of this body. Every time my hand moves, you
know why? It's because my head, my mind is telling it to move.
My hand is living because my head is. And so it is with all
of us. all of our hope is in Christ and I'll tell you this, we all
who are in Christ don't want to be anywhere but in Christ
is there any other place you'd rather be? Oh that I might be found in Him
The unity of the church is found in Christ. Not having mine own
righteousness, which is of love, but the righteousness which is
by the faith of Jesus Christ. That's the righteousness. That's the righteousness I need. So how then does this exalt me? It doesn't. It exalts Christ. And that's the covenant of promise
that unifies us. All one in Christ, all saved
by Christ. No distinctions. My preaching
adds absolutely nothing to my righteousness. Not one bit. Your
sitting there does not add one bit to your righteousness. Your
believing this does not add one bit to your righteousness. Why?
Christ is all my righteousness. And he's all your righteousness,
if you believe. I pray God will bless this to
you. Let's stand and be dismissed
in prayer.