Galatians chapter 3 and we're
looking basically from verse 6 and we'll be looking throughout
the rest of this chapter to discuss What I have for us tonight The
title of the message tonight is the result of the Spirit the
result of the Spirit of God Now last week, we looked at the cause
of salvation by asking three questions. The importance of
the Spirit. And how it is that a person receives
the Spirit. And the third question, I refrained
from asking because I knew I wouldn't get to the end of it. So, I'm
going to take on the third question tonight. And that is, what is
the result of the Spirit? But last week we saw, what is
it to receive the Spirit of God? We saw that the receiving of
the Spirit of God is the new birth. It's the new creation
inside of a man's heart. The receiving of life from the
dead. It is receiving going from darkness
to light. It is receiving the truth as
opposed to before where we were receiving a lie. And it is a
new life that the Spirit of God gives us. And He descends upon
a person's life and gives them life and sets them free from
the enslavement of sin. and manifest salvation is found
only in the blood and righteousness of Christ." And that was our
experience. We knew that this was our experience when we received
the Spirit of God, that Christ was our only hope. And remember
the three things that the Spirit of God convinced us of. sin,
of righteousness, and of judgment. That we are sinners, that God
is righteous, and judgment is coming. We were convinced of
those things. But those very things that were
seemingly against us, when God the Spirit came and showed us
Christ, we saw that those things were for us. Christ had taken
our sin. He had made us the righteousness
of God, and the judgment of God has now passed. Those things
were glorious to us that received the Spirit. And the second question
we ask is, how did one receive the Spirit? And we saw this given
by divine grace and not obtained by merit. Remember, Paul asked
that question. He said, did you receive the
Spirit by the works of the law or by the hearing of faith? How
did you receive the Spirit? Well, we didn't receive it by
merit, but we received it by the hearing of the gospel and
receiving Him by faith, receiving Christ by faith. It's here that the theologians
that I've seen will distinguish between life and faith. You ever
heard that saying? Well, you got to have life before
you can have faith. Well, let me ask this question.
Have you ever seen anybody that's spiritually alive without faith?
I mean, that's impossible. A person can't be alive spiritually
without faith, but yet they must have faith to be alive. These
two are synonymous with each other. They come together when
the Spirit of God comes. We have both faith and life from
the Spirit. So then it is by faith in Christ
alone that life is manifest, and life within is manifest by
faith in Christ. But in no way did we receive
the Spirit of God by merit or law or works. And so this leads
me to the question that I have for us tonight. What is the result? What is this that has happened
to us? We talk in great terms and when I say what has happened
to someone who has received the Spirit, it is easily said salvation
has happened. But what Paul is getting at is
Paul is talking about justification in this. This is one aspect of
a larger equation. Salvation is justification, but
it's also redemption, ransom. There's a whole bunch of terms
that we can use to regard salvation. But the result of salvation according
to Paul in our text, if you'll look in verse 6, he'll tell us
this. Even as Abraham believed God,
it was accounted to him for righteousness." What is the result of the Spirit
of God then? Even as Abraham believed God,
how did we receive the Spirit of God? By believing, by trusting
in Christ. What then is the result? It is
accounted to him for righteousness." Imputed righteousness. That's
the result of the Spirit of God. The imputed righteousness of
Jesus Christ. Paul here is using the comparison
of Abraham and his faith with the comparison of our faith in
Jesus Christ with all of God's people. To all who have received
the Spirit of God, we did it the same way, by faith. Now this quote, this quote regarding
imputed righteousness, and before I go on, I want to explain that
word imputed. Very important and I think this
is one illustration and, you know, all illustrations break
down. But if you do this, I think it can give us a clear picture
of it. If you have a, you bought one of these houses in this financial
windfall and, you know, you bought a half million dollar house,
you know, a million dollar home and now then you get there and
you can't pay the debt. And the bank says, you owe us
one million dollars. And you have nothing to pay.
You got a bank account in that bank, but it's broke. There's
nothing in it. And there's nothing to pay. And
somebody comes along of his own free grace and gives you one
billion dollars. Puts it in your bank account.
Credits it to you. Now my friend, that debt was
yours. That debt was real and it was your debt. But when that money was transferred
into your account, it was yours. It was charged to your account. It was credited to you and it
is fully yours. To be imputed, the righteousness
of Christ to be imputed to us, it is real and it is ours. Now, where did he get this quote
from? Look at Genesis chapter 15. Just real quick, Genesis
chapter 15 and verse 4 through 6. Genesis 15, 4 through 6. And if we remember the context
of this chapter, remember that Moses had just come back from
the battle of the kings. And the Lord, here speaking to
him, if I get the right text, I went over to the wrong place.
There it is. Genesis 15, verse 4, and he said,
Behold, the word of the Lord came unto him, saying, This shall
not be thine heir, But he that shall come forth out of thine
own bowels, the same be thine heir. And he brought him forth
abroad, and said, Look now toward the 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 in the Lord,
and he counted it to him for righteousness." Notice the context
of what he's talking about. He is talking about the heir. He is talking about the seed. And God gave him the promise
of the seed, and Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him
for righteousness. It was the promise that he believed. It was the Word of God, Jesus
Christ, that Abraham believed. Now Abraham, it was this time
without an heir, and God had promised him to make him the
father of many nations, to have a seed to whom His promises were
given. And this seed is Christ. This is the one that Abraham
looked to. This is the object of Abraham's
faith. When I say Abraham believed God,
I'm not saying that because of his faith it was counted to him
for righteousness, but rather because of the object of his
faith. The object of our faith is where
the righteousness is imputed from, not our faith. We don't
have faith in our faith. Our faith is meaningless without
the object. Many people believe in many things,
but that doesn't make them have the righteousness of God. What
we're talking about is imputed righteousness through the object.
Jesus said of Abraham, remember he said, Abraham rejoiced to
see my day and saw it and was glad. Where is that found? Well, that's on down in Genesis
17, 17. It says, then Abraham fell upon
his face and laughed. He rejoiced when he heard again
about the seed. about Christ. He rejoiced to
see the day of Christ, the Redeemer, the seed of the woman that should
bruise the head of the serpent. And Paul saying, even so, our
faith, just as Abraham believed God, so we believe God. Even
so, our faith is directed to the object, even Jesus Christ.
See, now that the faith of Abraham, it says he believed God. My friend, there's altogether
a difference from believing in God or believing in a God and
believing God. Altogether a great difference.
Ask anyone on the street if they believe in God and you'll find
many that do. And many of them do not know
Christ. To believe God is to be reconciled unto God. To believe God is the same as
to be reconciled to God. God said to Abraham, in thy seed
shall all the nations of the earth be blessed. And Abraham,
not considering his own body, not considering the deadness
of Sarah's womb, not considering any of the earthly hindrances
to God's Word, not considering any of the outward circumstances
that surrounded him, he did not consider any of that. He believed
God. And it was counted to him for
righteousness. He didn't believe in his feelings
or emotions. He believed God's Word. And this
is always the result of the Spirit that is being received. It is
to believe God concerning Christ and concerning ourselves. It
is to see that God is holy and we are sin, and yet God, yet
against all objections, all earthly wisdom, We believe God that Jesus
Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law. Against all
our feelings, how many times have you felt lost? How many times have you felt
as though there is no way God could love me? There is no way
God could accept me. But against all feelings, we
believe God instead. We rest on God's Word. We take
comfort in it. We find assurance in it. And
we find rest in God's Word. We find joy. We find peace. Paul says, the result of the law. Remember, Christ
redeemed us from the curse of the law. Christ has redeemed
us, that's verse 13, Christ has redeemed us from the curse of
the law being made a curse for us. So we are clearly to see
that we have not walked in the law. We've not walked in any
merits of the law. We've not strived in anything. And if any man strive in the
law, the Scriptures are clear that he is under the curse of
the law. This is why Paul asks in verse
4, have you suffered so many things in vain? If so, be it
in vain. My friend, we've not suffered
anything compared to what these Galatians have suffered. These
Galatians have suffered many things. Many things. They've
suffered many persecutions. concerning their faith. And Paul
said, yet if you believe that you have begun in the Spirit
and you are made perfect in the flesh, then your faith is vain.
That's a pretty serious charge. That is a very serious charge.
If men think that they have begun in the Spirit and yet are made
perfect, that their righteousness comes by what they do, then my
friend, they are lost. and they don't know Christ, their
faith is vain, Paul says. Because it is evident that no
flesh shall be justified by the works of the law in the sight
of God. That's evident. That's clear. That's clear. But the result of the Spirit,
the result of the Spirit is not a partial righteousness, is it?
When God comes and imputes our righteousness to us, it is not
a partial righteousness. It's not to be filled in. It's
not like He began the righteousness, and as you go along, you fill
it in. That's not the way it works.
You see, this idea of progressive sanctification is a false idea
because what they're trying to do is they're filling in the
righteousness as they go. They say, we are holy, but we
can be holier. We are righteous, but we can
be even more righteous by what we do. It's not a righteousness, this
imputed righteousness is not a righteousness started by God
and finished by us, no way. But all who have received the
Spirit of God and believe God, just as the righteousness was
credited, counted, charged, imputed to Abraham, so it is credited,
charged, and imputed to you. Just as much as Abraham was righteous
before God, so are we. if we believe in Christ alone. My friend, when I'm talking about
the righteousness, I'm not talking about just a righteousness. I
am talking about the righteousness of God. This is not a pretend
righteousness, is it? It's real. It is the righteousness
of God. Look at that in Romans chapter
3. Flip over Romans chapter 3. Romans chapter 3 and verse 21,
you know this. He says, "...therefore..." I'm sorry, I went in two, flipped
over more. "...but now the righteousness
of God without the law is manifest, being witnessed by the law and
the prophets," here it is, "...even the righteousness of God." even
the righteousness of God. Now, when I say the righteousness
of God, of course, I am not saying the essential righteousness of
God. In other words, God has an essential
righteousness that is all His own, that was by His by nature,
that God always had with Him. God always had a righteousness. We didn't always have a righteousness,
did we? There was a time in our life
when we walked according to the course of this world, according
to the Prince and the power of the air, and were children of
wrath even as others. We walked in disobedience. We
didn't have a righteousness. But yet God, one day, when we
came and believed Him, He imputed the righteousness, His own righteousness
that was made by the faithfulness of Jesus Christ. He gave us His
own righteousness that He made. Let me ask you this. Is this righteousness less than
the essential righteousness of God? Is the righteousness imputed
to you? Is it less? My friend, if it's less, then
it's not righteousness at all. It is either righteous or it's
not. It is either holy or it's not. It's an all or none principle
on this one. There's not lesser degrees of
righteousness. God has given us His righteousness. His which was by essential nature
and worked through by Christ, who is the God-man, earned, merited
the righteousness of God and gave it to you. Gave it to you
of His own sovereign free will. Imputed it to your charge. And
it is not lesser. There's no such thing as a lesser
righteousness. It is either righteous or it
isn't. Yet because this righteousness is not ours essentially, we deserve no praise for it. You see, because God is essentially
righteous all in Himself, He is worthy of praise for being
righteous. But we are not worthy of praise
for righteousness, but we express praise because we received righteousness. You see, it's not ours essentially,
but it is imputed to us. It's charged to us. And this
is the result of everyone that has the Spirit of God. This is
the result. It is why we praise. And so therefore,
there is no boasting, Paul says. There's no boasting in us. Did
we do anything to earn this righteousness? Absolutely not. So therefore,
where's boasting? It's excluded. It's done away
with. We don't boast because of it.
We just praise God for it. We praise God for it. Now, Paul
shows us in 2 Corinthians 5 this righteousness, how it was obtained,
how it was merited, how it was given. And in the context regarding
this, it is speaking about the imputation of Christ. Here it
is. Go to 2 Corinthians 5. 2 Corinthians
5. And let's look at verse 19 down
to verse 21. It said, to wit, that God was
in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself. Here's the context. Not imputing their trespasses
unto them, and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation. Now then, we are ambassadors
for Christ as though God did beseech you by us. We pray you
in Christ's stead, be you reconciled to God. For He hath made Him
to be sin for us who knew no sin, that we might be made the
righteousness of God in Him." And the context of this verse
is the same as the context in Galatians chapter 3, where we're
at, and also in Romans chapter 4. If you read that later, you'll
see the same thing, the imputation of righteousness. God reconciled
us to Himself by Jesus Christ. Now remember, to reconcile is
to change our attitude, to change our thoughts, to change our hearts. We once were enemies of God,
and now He has reconciled us to His way of thinking. Hasn't
He? He's changed our minds completely. That's what it is to be reconciled
to God. In other words, just like He
says in Galatians, He believed God. He was reconciled to God. He was reconciled to God. It is to bring us who were enemies
and to take God's side against ourselves. I readily do that. Oh, I love doing that. Taking God's side against myself.
Absolutely. To reconcile is to believe God. It is to be brought in. And remember
when He said, Come now, let us reason together, though your
sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as wool. You remember
that? That's reconcile. God came to
us and He reconciled us. He drew us by the cords of a
man. He drew us by bands of love.
And He brought us to Himself. And what did He do when He reconciled
us in Christ? He said in verse 19, "...not
imputing our trespasses to us." Oh, that's good. That's good. Not imputing, not charging, not
crediting my sins to me. Although we know that God could
not sweep them out. God could not do anything like
that. He could not justly slide them
under the rug. So how then could He not impute
my sins unto me and impute His righteousness to me? Verse 21,
He hath made Him to be sin for us who knew no sin. You see,
He imputed my sins to Christ. He imputed my transgressions
to Christ. And by this word, imputation,
just as I made it clear at the very beginning, our sin debt
was real. We really deserved God's wrath. We really did. This word, imputation,
does not mean pasted on or pretended. God did not pretend. our sins on Christ when He imputed
them to Him, He personally became responsible for our sins. He personally bore our sins in
His own body on the tree. And when they were imputed to
Him, so much so that He said, My soul is exceedingly sorrowful
even unto death. No doubt this was a real transaction
that Christ would say, as in Psalm chapter 40 and verse 12,
for innumerable evils have encompassed me about. My iniquities have
taken hold on me so that I am unable to look up. This was real. So then he was made sin by God
Himself, taking our sins and charging them to Christ. And
so then, we in the same way are made the righteousness of God
in Him. The same way. The same way He
imputed our righteousness not unto us, but unto Christ, He
imputed Christ's righteousness unto us. And that righteousness,
my friend, is very real. It is very much real. It is very
much ours. He has given it to us and charged
it to our account. Oh, the joy and greatness of
our God. When He says this in verse 9
of our text, He says, So then, they which be of faith are blessed. How are we blessed? by the righteousness
of God, charged to us with faithful Abraham." You are blessed with
faithful Abraham. Blessed. Blessed. Number two,
what is the result of the Spirit? Second point, the result of the
Spirit is freedom from the law. Freedom from the law. Because we were blessed, because
we had the righteousness of God imputed to us, and not by law,
for Christ hath redeemed us from its curse, being made a curse
for us, that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through
faith." My believer friends, we are right now, at this moment,
justified from all the curse of the law. Every point. Find it in the Word. Find the
Law. And tell me which point we are
not redeemed from. Which point we are not free from. Because God hath imputed His
righteousness to us. Now, no doubt when Paul mentioned
Abraham, these Judaizers got a little tickled. You can imagine,
oh, he's going to talk about Abraham. Now we got him! Because
Abraham was highly exalted about these people. They thought, hey,
circumcision was the way. You ain't circumcised, you can't
be saved. So they knew that Abraham was
the father of circumcision. So when Paul mentioned him, I'm
sure that they got tickled. But they didn't get so tickled
after Paul finished with Abraham, I'm sure. I'm sure they weren't.
No doubt that they highly esteemed him. But when this happened,
when this text, remember what we just read in verse 6, when
Abraham believed God and accounted for righteousness, was that before
or after circumcision? It was before. He was counted
righteous before circumcision. It was before the law of circumcision. And if they say, what about the
law of Moses? Paul says, it was 430 years before
the law of Moses. So what does that mean? That
He was saved without the law. He was saved without it. He was
justified by believing in God. Paul said the law, which was
430 years, cannot disannul this. In verse 17 and 18, he said,
This I say, that the covenant that was confirmed before of
God in Christ, the law which was four hundred and thirty 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 promised. But how did God give it to Abraham? By promise. By promise and not
by law. My friend, the law does not disannul
our righteousness. but our righteousness that is
given to us rather honors and confirms the law." It does. You see, because the righteousness
of Christ is imputed to us, the law can do nothing but bless
us and set us free. That's all it can do. It cannot
curse. It cannot curse. So then Paul asks the question
that naturally arises, wherefore serveth the law? Why did God
give it? Verse 19, wherefore then serveth
the law? Here it is. It was added because
of the transgression, till the seed should come to whom the
promise was made, and it was ordained by angels in the hand
of a mediator. Paul said it was added because
of sin. And you can read this in Romans
chapter 7. Paul said that sin, the law was there that sin might
be seen exceedingly sinful. In other words, the law was nothing
more than a magnifying glass on our sin. That's all it was.
It was to magnify our sin. To clarify our sin. To show us
our sin. And that's all it could do. Paul
said if salvation came by the law, then, you know, if that's
the way God intended it, then there should have been a law
that we could follow. But that's not the way God intended
it. The law was only there to magnify and manifest sin. And that's all it does now today.
Doesn't do anything else for us, does it? Thou shalt not lie. What does that say? Guilty. That's
all it says. That's all it says. It doesn't
guide me anywhere. It just condemns. That's all
it does. The law does nothing for us.
Paul says that it was added because of our sin. It magnifies our
sin. And then down in verse 23 and 24, he calls it a schoolmaster. A schoolmaster. Let's look at
that. Wherefore, the law is our schoolmaster to bring us to Christ.
Now, I looked up this word. Very interesting. It does mean
teacher. But what it is, it's not an education
teacher. Not like we think of an education
teacher. But it is more of a disciplinarian.
In other words, when a wealthy homeowner or some wealthy person
had children, he would put this person in charge of the discipline
and moral upbringing of the child. In other words, he had no interest
in teaching this child math or reading or science. He just had
one purpose, to make sure that child was obedient. That was
it. Take care of the spanking. Take care of all of that heavy
stuff. And he was not meant to be someone that was loving. He
took care of the well-being of the child. And that was it. He's a schoolmaster. So the law,
you see, the law doesn't teach us how to be saved, does it?
It doesn't teach us anything at all concerning that. It just
says, don't do that. I sound like that with my children
all the time. Don't do that. Don't do this.
Don't do that. That's all we do many times it
sounds like. But this was the job of this
person. So the dad didn't have to do
it. That sounds kind of neat. I might want to get one of those. Might want to get one of those.
But that schoolmaster, what does he do for us? What does Christ,
what does this law do? It drives us. It drives us to
Christ. That's all it does. It drove
us to Christ. We see Christ as its fulfillment
and the result of faith in Christ is the result of the Spirit of
God revealing Christ to us that we have no need of a schoolmaster.
We are in Christ, and we no longer need that schoolmaster. You see,
there was a certain time, a certain age, that a boy would come into
the heirship of his father, and he would no longer be under tutors
and governors or that schoolmaster anymore. There was an appointed
time when God had come to us, and He said, that schoolmaster's
enough. That's enough. He's an heir, and he's over you.
He was over him. And that's what it is for us
when we come to faith in Christ. This is the result. We are free
from the law. Free. What then can we conclude
from this? Here's the conclusion. The Spirit
of God has done a great work. A great work on us. And my friend,
He is still performing a great work on us. The Spirit of God has done a
great thing. He's given us life and faith. And He has blessed
us with faithful Abraham in that we have been charged with the
righteousness of God. When you stand before God's judgment
bar, He will swing the gavel and He will say, Righteous are
you! Come, you blessed of my Father. Come, inherit the kingdom prepared
for you from before the foundation of the world. Why? You have my
righteousness. Come on. That's a blessing. That's a blessing. And number
two, while we walk through this world, my friends, we are free
from the law. You know what this thing is in
my head and in your head? It's a law factory. How many
times do we still strive to be put under something? We put ourselves
under so much bondage. My friends, Christ, if He has
made you free, you are free indeed. You are free indeed. That is a blessing. That is the
result of everyone who has had the Spirit of God come to them
in a saving way. I pray that God blesses to us.
Let's be dismissed in prayer. Let's stand. We'll be dismissed
in prayer.