Galatians chapter 5. Now, back
in verse 31, chapter 4, that chapter ends like this. So then
brethren, we are not children of the bondwoman, which represented
the law, but of the free. And then Paul says this in Chapter
five, starting chapter five, of course you know it wasn't
written in chapters, it was just a flowing letter. He says, stand
fast, stand fast. That is a military term. Hold ground, hold your ground. I don't know if you've watched
the movie Gladiator. He says, hold the line. You know, he's
telling me, he said, hold the line. That's what Paul's saying,
hold the line, stand fast, don't you give, don't you give up ground,
don't you back down, you stand fast. You stand fast, you stand
firm. Therefore in the liberty, the
freedom, we're free this morning. I'm preaching to a free people,
truly free, truly free. Stand fast, therefore, in all
that has been said, all the way back to the chapter one, all
that's been said, therefore, in the liberty wherewith Christ
hath made us free. Christ made us free. We didn't
make ourselves free. Christ made us free. He set us
at liberty. Liberty from the curse of the
law, liberty from the power of Satan. Every one of us was under
the power of Satan at one time. We were under his power. We were
under the power of darkness. We were under the power of our
own ignorance. But now you're not. You've been
set at liberty through the Lord Jesus Christ. You know, freedom
is something we value highly. I tell you this, we better value
it highly or we'll lose it. It's something we value highly,
so highly we send men and women to the battlefield. You know,
I was thinking of this yesterday. The freedom we have in this country,
with what freedom we do have, and we do have more freedom in
this country even now, more than other countries. The freedom
we have in this country is dipped in blood. It is blood all over
it. I was thinking yesterday, and
I was thinking The freedom we have in this country, 18-year-olds,
19-year-olds, haven't even started their lives, gone out there on
the battlefield, and their blood was shed that you and I, you
and I can have some freedom in this country. It's of God, and
God used these young men and women, but it's dipped in blood.
If there's anything we can learn, freedom always comes at the price
of blood. Our spiritual freedom that we
have is at the price of blood, isn't it? It's the price of the
blood of the Son of God. That's the freedom we have. Don't
let that go. He says, stand fast to that.
You don't have freedom because of obedience, not yours. You
have freedom because of His obedience and the shedding of His blood.
We have freedom through His blood. It's through His blood. We have
blood-bought freedom. That's what we have in Christ. That's what we have. The freedom we have in Christ
is true freedom and it's eternal. It's eternal. We are free, listen,
from the curse of the law, which is a very real curse. Never lose
that, never lose that. That's a very real curse. There
are people in hell right now. In hell right now, under that
curse. And they'll never be free from
it. That's a, that's just a, I don't have a terrible thought.
I mean, it's just a horrifying thought to me, it is. And yet
here I stand and here you sit, You who believe the gospel, free. Free from that curse, that torment.
Free from it. Christ, it says, hath redeemed
us from the curse of the law. We are free from the power and
dominion of sin. At one time, sin reigned over
us. That sinful nature that you and I were born with at one time
was our master. It ruled over us. It did. But now the Scripture says, Sin
shall not have dominion over you, for ye are not under the
law, you're not under the curse of it, but you're under grace. Grace. Grace upon grace. Grace before grace, grace now,
and grace hereafter. Grace tomorrow. You're under
grace. You're free from the power of
darkness. You've been translated from the power of darkness It
says in Colossians 1.13, into the kingdom of God's dear Son.
You've been translated from that darkness you were born into,
into the kingdom of God's dear Son. You and I live in another
kingdom, don't we? We live in another kingdom. We are free
from Satan's power. The stronger man has come in
and taken over the house. He's taken it over. Free from
death. Free from the sting of death,
O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?"
The Lord took it away. He took the sting of it. He took
the sting of it, so I don't have to deal with it. The stinger has been taken out
of it. It was plunged into Him. And we are free to enjoy the
blessings we have in Jesus Christ. I would to God that you and I,
I do, this weighs on my mind more and more as I pastor here,
that you and I would grow in grace and in knowledge of Christ,
that we would really lay hold of what we have in Jesus Christ. You and I are so, we are so given
to feelings, aren't we? Which is what we feel at the
moment is whether we're up or down. But what we have in Christ,
we have it written in the Word of God. Sin shall not have dominion
over you. Do you feel that way? Do you
feel that you have the power over sin? Do you feel that sin
does not have dominion over you? No, I don't feel that way. I
feel like every time I turn around, I'm doing something or saying
something stupid, something wrong, something sinful. But you know
what? Based on God's Word, It does
not have dominion over me. It's not my master. And that's
what I want to grow in. I want to grow in faith in Christ. And to do that, to do that, I
and you must grow in faith in His Word. Take God at His Word. They go together. You can't know,
you cannot know Jesus Christ apart from the Word of God. That's
why we must make much of the Word of God. Because that's where
we learn of Him. Take my yoke upon you and learn
of me, He said. We're free now. Free to enjoy
the blessings we have in Christ and we need to become more and
more and more acquainted with those blessings. We're free to
come to the throne of grace. How much use do we make of that?
Usually not until we get in trouble. What did David say in Psalm 118,
30? In my distress, I called upon
the Lord. Isn't that the way it is? The Lord, and this is so sad,
but it's who we are. He has to drive us to the throne
of grace. He has to drive us by distress
and by trials and afflictions. And then we call upon him. In
that Psalm, was it Psalm 107? They was always in trouble, they
get in trouble, they call upon the Lord and He delivers them.
And then what happened again? Then they get back in trouble.
Then they call upon, you know, if we call upon the Lord more
often before trouble, it was your, I think it would make a
big difference. It would make a difference. But
we are free to come to the throne of grace, free to worship God
in spirit and in truth. If the Son shall make you free,
you shall be free indeed. And that being so, Here, that
being so, that you have been made free in Christ, be not entangled
again with the yoke of bondage. Don't go back there. You know,
a yoke is something that in that day they would put on the neck
of an ox and they would plow with it. It was something that
was heavy, it represented servitude. Don't go back under that yoke,
that burden. The law was a burden. Christ
said to those Pharisees, you bind burdens on men too heavy
to be borne, and you won't even lift one of them with your little
finger. It's servitude. It's slavery. It's what it is.
Religion is bondage except for one. That's the one of grace. I'm not here this morning because
I have to be. I'm here because I want to be. I want to be here
this morning. I was glad when they said to
me, let us go into the house of the Lord. And he says here,
be not entangled. Boy, I tell you what, have you
ever seen an animal or a fish entangled in a net? And the more
it flips and flops, the more entangled it gets. And that's
what Paul was telling them. You're getting entangled in this
net. It's going to just, you're going to be so entangled in it,
it's going to totally mess you up or destroy you. It's hard to break free once
you are entangled in it, so don't get entangled in it. And here's
the issue, here's the issue. Behold, I, Paul, saying to you,
in verse 2, that if you be circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing.
Evidently, the Judaizers who came to them was pressing this
matter of circumcision upon them. And Paul is saying, if you are
circumcised as being part of salvation, Christ shall profit
you nothing. It's no good to you. He's no
good to you. He's no use to you, if that's
the reason you're doing this. You know, to the Jew, circumcision
was their induction into the covenant. You know what my induction
into the covenant is? God's electing grace. God chose
me in Christ. Don't ever get over that. Don't
ever get over that. God chose you in Christ. Many
He passed by. Jacob have I loved, Esau have
I hated. But they believed it was their
induction, it was their right to the covenant. Our right is
grace. Our right is Jesus Christ. Not
some fleshly mark or fleshly work. But now listen, here's
something. that we need to apply to ourselves.
You see, Paul said here that you be not circumcised, or if
you... I, Paul, say to you, if you're circumcised, Christ will
profit you nothing. This can be anything. Now listen,
this can be anything we might do to gain acceptance with God. Baptism. Baptism man said I heard
this been a few years ago someone y'all don't know but he was saying
to another So-called preacher He was saying to him he said
you know what he said, I'd like to be baptized someday You know
ways days. I want to be baptized and This
preacher was saying well. I could baptize you I There was
no mention of Christ. There was no mention of redemption.
There was no mention... There's nothing. It was just
being baptized. And to him, that was... To him, I knew the conversation. To him, that was salvation. If
he was baptized, he'd be saved. No, you won't. No, you won't. You see, this circumcision that
Paul's talking about, it can be baptism to someone else. It
can be prayer. You know, you see this Billy
Graham, repeat this prayer after me. That's no different than
what Paul is talking about here in this circumcision in order
to be saved. Or it could be fasting, or it
could be a decision. Whatever it is, it's not going
to work. It's not going to work. Our acceptance
with God is Jesus Christ and Christ alone. If you do this,
he's saying this here in verse 3, for I testify again to every
man that is circumcised that he is a debtor to do the whole
law. Now, if you do this, if you do
this, you're a debtor, you're in debt to keep the whole law
perfectly. You know, here's a problem. Here's
a problem. Men break down the law as ceremonial. Moral. They break it down as
civil. They break the law down. You
see, it's a moral, ceremonial, civil. But you know with God,
it's not broken down. It's one law. That's what they
don't understand. It's one law. Therefore, the least offense
offends the whole law. That's what he's saying. Christ,
He says in verse 4, has become of no effect to you, whosoever
of you are justified by the law, you've fallen from grace, you've
left the grace of God, because you can't have both. You cannot
have both, they don't work. Jesus Christ is of no use to
you, and this is what He's saying. He's of no use to you if you
want to go down that law road. If you want to go down that law
road, You have to obey every traffic sign. Don't you go one
mile over. Don't you go one-tenth of a mile
over. You see how strict God's law is, don't you go one-tenth
below it. I mean, if it says 55, it better
be stuck on 55 all the way. If you go one-tenth either way,
you broke it. As far as God's concerned now,
that's how strict God is with the law. And that's what Paul's
saying to them. He's saying to them, you don't
understand. You don't understand if you're
going to go down this road what you got to do. You don't understand
the obedience the law requires if you're going to go down this
road of law. And if you do, you left grace.
And if you left it, you never had it. You never had it. Because
Paul says, I stand in doubt of you in one place. Listen, he said in verse 5, for
we through the Spirit, not we through the law, not we through
obedience to commands, not we through morality, we through
the Spirit of God wait for the hope of righteousness by faith. My hope of righteousness is not
that I did this, this, this, and this. Like that young man
said, from my youth up, I've kept all these commandments.
That's not my hope of righteousness. My hope of righteousness and
your hope of righteousness before God is a person, the Lord, our
righteousness, Jesus Christ. He's our righteousness. Through
the regenerating work of the Holy Spirit, His power at work
in us, we wait, expecting the fulfillment of the promise of
God of eternal life. We wait for Him. Through Christ
and His righteousness, we wait for Him. For in Jesus Christ
neither circumcision, that you are being pressed into. They're
trying to press them to do this. For in Jesus Christ neither circumcision
availeth anything nor uncircumcision. They don't have anything to do
with salvation. They don't have anything to do
with God. Not anything. But faith which
works by love. In Jesus Christ, whether you're
circumcised or not, it makes no difference. It makes no difference.
Here's what makes the difference. Faith, and not dead faith. It's faith that actually works
by love, which is evidence of the reality of that faith that
God has given you. It works. You know, faith that's
of God works, but it works by love. It works by love. Oh, he says here, You did run
well. You started this race well. Who did hinder you? Who stepped
in your path? Who stepped in your path that
you should not obey the truth? You believed the gospel. You
believed on the Lord Jesus Christ. He was all your hope. What happened? What happened? And what He's
doing, He's pointing out to them that these Judaizers are a hindrance. And I assure you, as you and
I make our journey toward heaven, there will be hindrances along
the way. Satan will throw something in
the way. He'll throw something in the way or somebody in the
way that will hinder you. Who did hinder you? You did run
well that you should not obey the truth. Here's the seriousness
of this matter, that you should not obey the truth. You're not
obeying the truth now. You've turned from the truth. Paul preached the truth to them.
He preached the truth about God, about Christ, about themselves,
about salvation, about how God could be a just God and a Savior,
and he said, you've turned from it. You've turned from it. This persuasion, this persuasion
did not come from God. This is not of God. Another gospel
is not of God. You say, well, you just, you
know, you believe some things that are a little different than
we do, but you know, we all believe the same thing. How can you believe
the same thing and are both different? You can't, that's, I mean, just
a statement of it tells you that it can't be so. It can't be so. Listen, you believe the gospel. You believed, you believed that
you were sinners. You came to Christ as sinners.
Now listen, stay that way. As sinners in need of mercy.
As sinners in need of a savior. Stay that way. Don't try to add
to that. Because if you do, I can assure you this, it's not of
God. God's not in it. God's not in a false gospel.
God, now let me say this. God does not save men and women
by another gospel, by a watered-down version of the gospel. God, listen. And this is so. God does not
save men and women under Catholicism, Arminianism, and then they learn
the Gospel. No. I'm not saying that you have
to learn all the doctrines of it, but I tell you this, you
have to learn the Christ of it. The right Christ. Now, you're
not going to have the true Jesus Christ of this Scripture preached
to you under a false doctrine. They don't go together. They
don't go together. You will hear from Him. You will
learn of Him and from Him. Now listen, from Him, you'll
learn right doctrine. Now you're not gonna learn wrong
doctrine under the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, Paul said, they'll
come preaching another Jesus. He said, they'll come preaching
another gospel. God's not gonna save by that.
God does not save by another Jesus. He doesn't save by another
gospel. It's the gospel of the Lord Jesus
Christ that's revealed in the pages of this book, the sovereign
Christ. No man knoweth a father save
the son and he to whomsoever he will reveal him. It's the
sovereign Christ. It's the reigning Christ. It's the redeeming Christ. God saves men by the gospel. That's why Paul in the very first
chapter of this book said that they've come preaching another
gospel. I'm marveled you turned to another gospel, which is not
another. It's a lie. It's a lie. Here's
the problem. Here's the problem in verse 9.
A little leaven leaveneth the whole lot. It's either a little
leaven in you or a little leaven in your midst. Someone among
you has turned this up. But a little leaven leavens the
whole lump. You know, it's kind of like this.
Paul, why get so upset? We're not trying to reestablish
the whole ceremonial law, just circumcision. That's all. That's all. Just a little poison poisons
the whole thing. A little poison poisons the whole
thing. If I put just a little drop of
arsenic in a water, in a thing of water here, will you drink
it? If I put a little, I mean just a little eye drop, if I
give it to you, would you drink it? Not a person in this room
would drink it. You'd say, I'm not touching that
water, it's contaminated. It's contaminated. If I probably
just stuck my finger in it, you wouldn't drink it. If I just
stuck my finger in it and I say, here, now drink it, you say,
I'm not going to do that. Well, how much more the gospel
when somebody puts a little twist on it and he wants me to drink
it? I don't think so. A little leaven, leavens, it
becomes a big problem. You see, Adam, the whole human
race fell by Adam's many transgressions. It doesn't say that. It doesn't
say that at all. But if you didn't know the word
of God, you wouldn't know the difference, would you? I could
say that and you'd think, well, that's right. No, it's not right
because it doesn't say that by one transgression, by one. And that one transgression, listen,
leavened the whole lump, leavened the whole human race. The whole
human race is the mess it's in because of that one act of transgression. That's how important it is that
we keep the gospel the gospel. The gospel is not my opinion.
It's the truth. It's the truth of God. And then he says here, Paul says
here, but I have confidence, verse 10, I have confidence in
you through the Lord. I don't have confidence in you.
Paul says, you're better than anybody else. I know you're just
like me. But my confidence in you is through the Lord, through
his work in you. I've witnessed it. I've witnessed,
is what he said, I've witnessed the work of God among you. I
preached the gospel. I saw the work of God. You know,
Paul could recognize it. He recognized the work of grace.
He said, I have confidence in you through the Lord that you
will be none otherwise minded. You'll straighten out. You'll
get this right. You'll turn about. You'll give attention to what
I've written to you. You won't just forget it when
you leave the building, but you'll do something about it. You'll
do something about it. I have confidence in you through
the Lord that you'll be none otherwise minded, but he that
troubles you shall bear his judgment, whosoever he be." Whoever this
troublemaker is, God will judge him. God will judge him. And I, brethren, if I yet preach
circumcision, because, you know, there had to be somebody, there's
always somebody that's got a, you know, they're going to stick
a knife in. Paul had Timothy circumcised. And they're saying,
Paul said, if I preach circumcision, if that's the reason why I had
Timothy circumcised, if I yet preach circumcision, why do I
yet suffer persecution? If that's my message, why are
those Judaizers persecuting me? Why are they against me? Why
do they hate me if that's what I'm preaching? You see, Paul,
listen, Paul had Timothy circumcised so that it would not be a hindrance
to those whom he preached to. It was not an issue. It was not
an issue. Someone wrote to me, this had
been years ago when we had the split there at 13th Street. Someone
wrote to me and they said, Henry did not make the new birth an
issue. I wrote back and said, it was not an issue. That's why
he didn't make it an issue. It was never an issue. Now, if
it becomes an issue, like here with Paul, circumcision has now
become an issue. Now that it's an issue, as far
as salvation goes, Paul said, it's not going to happen. But
when he did it with Timothy, it was not an issue. It was something
Paul did to just avoid a hindrance to him preaching the gospel.
You see, there's a world of difference. There's a whole world of difference
in the motive. And I, brethren, if I yet preach
circumcision, why do I yet suffer persecution? Then is the offense
of the gospel ceased. They wouldn't have any reason.
If I was preaching circumcision, the Judaizers wouldn't have any
reason to be offended. We would be one. We'd be together.
But the gospel is offensive because it cuts off all human merit.
It cuts off all human merit, and it shuts us up to Jesus Christ
only in salvation. It shuts us up to grace alone,
Christ alone. Stand fast. Stand fast. You think you wouldn't. You think,
well, I'm confident I wouldn't leave. Well. Stand fast. James sent me a tape
I sent out to about five or six of you this morning. You'd be
surprised how many would leave. You'd be surprised. That's why Paul says to the Galatians,
stand fast in the liberty, the freedom, wherewith Christ hath
made you free.