I'd like you to turn back with
me to Galatians chapter 2. My text in Galatians 2 is verses
19 through 21. And it may well be pictured in
the battle between David and Goliath. a giant among the heathens
standing in that valley between Israel and their enemies, and
defying them to send one down to represent the people and do
battle with him, and the loser willingly becoming the servants
of the victor. The giant I'm talking about is
legalism. Legalism. Legalism has always stood between
the enemies of God and his elect to intimidate and confound the
people of God. It's always been that way. And
it was that way in Galatia. The Judaizers had crept into
the churches at Galatia and gained enough foothold to begin to influence
the congregations there. Begin to get a foothold, begin
to get an ear. You know, people talk long enough,
after a while they get your ear. And you start to listen. And
you, well maybe this guy's got a point. And you start to listen
to him. You're listening to the wrong
one. But that's how they come in. They creep in unawares. And that's the way these Judaizers
had done. They creep into the churches
at Galatia and gained enough foothold to begin to influence
them. And so Paul sits down and writes
this epistle to them. And he draws a line in the sand.
He begins this Somebody writing about this book, I think it was
Brother Mahan, said this apostle was mad when he wrote this letter. He was. He was angry. He was mad. And he draws a line
in the sand. You've seen pictures of them
old westerns, you know. lay a piece of firewood down
there and spit over that piece of firewood, you know, and they're
gonna go at it or knock this chip off my shoulder. Paul draws a line in the sand and he said, though we or an
angel from heaven preach any other gospel unto you than that
which we preached unto you, let him be accursed. That is, you count that man accursed
of God. I don't care who he is. And Paul takes his place, as
David did, against the giant, and by the foolishness of preaching,
he slays the giant with a single stone. There's not a well-educated man
spitballing over a difference of opinion. It's not a devoted
man trying to promote himself and his ideas. This is a man
chosen of God, moved by the spirit of the living God to strike his
enemy to the ground. He means to put him down. He
don't mean to wound him. He means to put him down. He
said, I would that they were cut off who trouble you. That's how serious this thing
is. And Paul was once a Pharisee
of the Pharisees. He was trained by the best teacher
Israel ever produced. And he knew better than most
what they believed and wherein they trusted. And so he stands
before them as a man and he defends the name of God and the gospel
of God and the grace of God and the faith of God's elect. And
he means to splay this giant. And to do so, Paul only needs
one stone. One stone. And that stone is
the stone which the builders had rejected, but God had made
the head of the corner. Truly, that stone which is the
stone of stumbling and a rock of offense, the Lord Jesus Christ. The preaching of the cross is
to those who perish foolishness, Old Goliath looked at David.
He didn't even have armor on. Saul gave him his armor, but
Saul was so big David couldn't wear it. It was weighting him
down. He took it off, and there he stood. And Goliath had a spear
as big as a weaver's beam, and he had a sword, a gigantic sword
strapped to his belt. And he's a giant of a man and
he's standing there in the valley and he's looking down at this
little pitiful shepherd boy and all he has in his hand is a sling
and a few smooth stones. And little David looked up at
Goliath and he said, who is this uncircumcised heathen that he
should defy the armies of the living God? Preaching of the cross is to
those who are perishing is foolishness, but unto us which are saved,
it's the power of God. It's the wisdom of God. Let me give you several things
as we go through these verses. First of all, I want you to hear
their accusation. And their accusation was and
still is that the person and work of Jesus Christ is not sufficient. to save sinners. That's their
charge. They may not say it in those
words, but they say it in their preaching. These were telling
them, yes, yes, you can, you're saved by grace and all these
things, but you still have to be circumcised. You still have
to, I know that you're, that you're saved by grace, but you're
sanctified by works. Their accusation is that the
person and work of Jesus Christ is not sufficient to save sinners. In Galatians 3.3, he asked them
this. He said, are you so foolish? Having begun in the spirit, are
you now made perfect by the law, by the flesh? And there are thousands today
who profess to believe that they're saved by the blood of Christ
and then sanctified through the works of the law. They teach
salvation by grace and sanctification by works. The one looks to Christ,
the other looks to itself and the law. But this violates the very principles
of the grace of God. He tells us, if it be of grace,
now listen, then is it no more of works. Otherwise, grace is
no more grace. The minute that works enter into
this thing of your salvation, grace goes out the window. It
will not mix. It will not mix. And to mix the
salvation of God's elect with anything a man can produce on
his own is to deny, to absolutely deny the grace of God and the
salvation of God's elect. When they come to this point,
they can go no further. One must defeat the other. Somebody
has to follow. There's no compromise here. They
cannot both exist together, no common ground, no compromise,
no reconciliation. And I mean, I'm talking about
if it's a ceremony. We keep the Sabbath. Christ is
our Sabbath. Isn't it? Be it ceremony, be it dietary, rules to live by, Works and grace
cannot live together. All right, secondly, that's their
accusation. Christ is not sufficient. Here's
the declaration. Paul said, for I, through the
law, am dead to the law. There's only one, now hear what
I'm telling you. There's only one saving relationship
between the believer and the law of God, death. That's it, death. There's no such thing as a law-abiding
Christian. He's dead to the law. David said,
the wicked are strained from the womb. They go astray as soon
as they be born, speaking lies. Behold, he said, I was shaping
an iniquity and in sin my mother did conceive me. My sin is ever
before me. Paul said, oh, wretched man that
I am. Huh? Does that sound law-abiding
to you? My sin is ever before me. A fallen man cannot keep the
law. He can only dishonor it with
his hypocritical attempts. That's all he can do. I used
to, in fact, it's been a while since I gave this to you, maybe
some of you haven't heard it before, but Kathy and I went
up to Washington, D.C. to see my son and we went in
that big art gallery up there. I'm not an art critic, I don't
know anything about art, but it was fascinating once I got
inside and looked at these and they had this room, they called
them the Dutch Masters. And their paintings, they were
bigger than that cutout that I have there on the wall, and
there was benches back away from them, and you could sit and look
at these, or sketch them, or whatever you wanted to do. But
there was a, everybody here know who Mr. Clean is? You've seen
the picture on the bottom? There's this big guy, he weighed
about 260, and there wasn't an ounce of fat on him, and he was
standing like this, looking around the room. You know what his job
was? If you grabbed your little pencil
you were sketching with and went over there to touch up that painting
on the wall, he's gonna take you down and put you out. This is what I'm trying to tell
you. Our sufficiency in Christ is complete, and he's not gonna
let you touch it up with your works. Your works is no more
than a hypocritical effort to honor the law of God. Jesus Christ
has made that law honorable. He's exalted it as high as it
can go. And you cannot honor the law
more than you do when you look to Christ. That's honoring the
law. He fulfilled the law. All in man cannot keep the law,
just dishonor it. And there's no other word that
accurately describes our relationship to the law except death. A dead
man's finished with his prior obligations, isn't he? He done
with it. His old existence terminated. And if he's dead, he's dead totally,
isn't he? That's the only way you can be
dead. totally, finally, eternally. Now if you're ill, there can
be levels of illness. I've been a little bit sick,
and I've been a whole lot sick. There's levels of illness, and
if you're crippled, you may have degrees of disability, but if
you're dead, you're dead. And you're dead all the way. And then secondly, notice how
Paul words this. I, through the law, am dead to
the law. The only way to satisfy the law
and the justice of God is to die. Is that right? That's the only way you can satisfy
it. The soul that sinneth shall surely die. I will by no means
clear the guilt. The only thing a sinner can do
is die. That's all he can do. The law demands death. He said,
by one man, sin entered into the world, and death by sin,
and so death passed upon all men, for the law of sin. Now
he says this about the law. If there had been a law given,
which could have given life, rarely righteousness should have
been by the law. But the scripture hath concluded
all under sin, that the promise of the faith, that the promise
by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe. The law demands death, not obedience
unto life. You hear what I say? The law demands death, not obedience
unto life. Our Lord did not become obedient
unto life, he'd become obedient unto death, even the death of
the cross. Isn't that what it said? The
argument of his obedience unto life is never used in the scripture.
Nowhere. Listen to the scriptures, Romans
8, 34. Who is he that condemneth? It's Christ that died. Paul said our gospel is Christ
died for our sins, according to the scriptures. I through
the law, that is according to its strict demands and holy judgments,
I through the law am dead to the law. And being dead to the
law, I'm not obligated to it in any form or fashion. In one
place, Paul gives us the picture of a man and wife, and the wife
is, she's in a bad marriage. and her husband abuses her and
so on, but she can't do anything about it because she's obligated
to it. She's obligated to it. But if
he dies, she's free to marry another. We did to the law that we might
marry another, the Lord Jesus Christ. Being dead to the law, I'm not
obligated to it, not in any form or fashion. Actually, the Bible
states quite clearly that it was not made for a righteous
man. The law, the purpose of the law
has nothing to do with a righteous man, nothing. He said it was
added, now listen to this, I'm gonna read every bit of it to
you. It was added for the lawless and disobedient. for ungodly
and sinners, for unholy and profane, for murderers of fathers and
mothers, manslayers, whoremongers, them that defile themselves with
mankind, slave traders, liars, perjured persons, and anything
else that's contrary to sound doctrine. That's what the law
is made for. We're sinners, and to sinners,
the law offers no love, no grace, no hope, no kindness, No righteousness,
only condemnation and guilt. What the law saith, it saith
to all them who are under the law, to what end? That every mouth be stopped and
the whole world become guilty before God. Still though, being dead through
the law, to the law, offers me no peace, no hope, and no justification. Which brings us to the how and
the why. Why must the believer be dead
to the law? Why is Paul so insistent on this? Well, he tells us in verse 19,
Galatians 2. For I through the law am dead to the law that I
might live unto God. There's no way I can live before
God by the law. You follow what I'm saying? God
won't tolerate me a half a second outside that law. There can be no life unto God
without death to the law. And death is necessary because
God is just and holy and righteous. It's necessary. And God's not
going to save any man or woman at the expense of his justice
and righteousness. He'll be just and justifier or
he won't be anything at all. And here's the how. Galatians
2.20, he says, I'm crucified with Christ. The very heart and soul of the
gospel is the death of Christ, isn't it? In Romans 3, 24, having stated
that all have sinned and come short of the glory of God, he
now says being justified freely by his grace, through the redemption
that's in Christ Jesus, whom God has set forth to be a propitiation
through faith in his blood. Why would he do that? To declare his righteousness
for the remission of sins. That's why. Jesus Christ came into this world
and was made of a woman and made under the law to redeem them
that were under the law. How did he redeem them? By his
death. By his death. He came into this
world as a representative man to die in our place, to take
our place before God. I'm crucified, Paul said, with
Christ. And God chose us in Christ before
the foundation of the world that we should be holy and without
blame. That is his character. should not be compromised in
our salvation, but be without flaw, and that His justice be
satisfied perfectly, and that we might be preserved before
Him, always being loved. When our Lord hung in agony and
shame and torment on that cross, He was bearing our sins in His
own body on the tree, and the law and justice of God extracted
from Him. everything that was demanded
of us. And as he hung there in his final
seconds, he said, it is finished. It's finished. But that's not all yet. He said,
I'm crucified with Christ. Nevertheless, I live. I live. Yet not I. Not I, but Christ liveth in me. And the life which I now live
in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God who loved me
and gave himself for me. Now here's my life, and here's
how I'm to live it. Christ liveth in me. Salvation is in a person. Old
Simeon, you remember, it was revealed to him that he wasn't
gonna die till he saw the Lord's Christ. And old Simeon was standing
there at the temple and they brought in this young baby to
be circumcised after the law and they brought him in and Simeon
looked at him and picked him up out of his mother's arms and
said, Lord, I've seen thy salvation. Now let me depart. Well, he was
just holding a person in his arm, wasn't he? That's what I'm
saying, salvation's in that person, isn't it? Salvation's not in a creed or
a catechism, it's in the glorious person of God our Savior. And
while it's true that he sat before men in doctrine, specifically
called in the scriptures the doctrine of Christ, yet we're
not saved trusting in a doctrine. A doctrine was not appointed
as our purity. A doctrine didn't die as our
substitute. And a doctrine's not sitting
at the right hand of God making intercession for us. Christ is. We trust Him. We see Him coming
into the flesh. We see Him coming into a holy
union with us, dying for us, living for us, ascending for
us, governing for us. and coming again to receive us
unto himself. Christ liveth in me. Now watch
this, Galatians 2.20, right down in the middle of the verse. In
the life I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith, that's talking
about the faithfulness of the Son of God, who loved me and
gave himself for me. Now turn with me to Romans chapter
seven and I'll see if I can show you this in the scriptures and
I'll wind this thing up. Romans chapter seven. We're talking about the life
that we now live in the flesh. How do we live every day? What's
my hope every day? How do I think and move and live
in this world? Romans 7, beginning with verse
18. Again, this is Paul. He said,
for I know that in me, that is in this flesh, dwelleth no good
thing. Do you know that? You that are
sitting here today, do you know that? In you dwelleth no good
thing. Quit looking for it, it ain't
there. Quit striving for it, it's not
there. He said, I know that in me, that
is in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing. And this is talking about a converted
man. This ain't talking about somebody
who don't know Christ. This is talking about an apostle. For the will is present with
me, I wanna honor every statute of
God, don't you? I wanna honor his word, I wanna
honor his son, his gospel. To will is present with me. But now watch this. But how to perform that which
is good, I find not. For the good that I would, I
do not. The evil which I would not, that
I do. Now if I do that, I would not,
it's no more either do it, but sin dwelleth in me. I find then
a law, a fixed principle, that when I would do good, evil is
present with me. For I delight in the law of God,
after the inward man, But I see another law, another principle,
another authority in my members, warring against the law of my
mind, bringing me into captivity to the law of sin, which is in
my members. Now, if you can't do that, that
you know is right, and you always do that which you know is wrong, boy, you're in a hole, ain't
you? So listen to what Paul says next, verse 24. Oh, wretched
man that I am! Who shall deliver me from the
body of this death? Huh? How am I gonna be saved? Holiness in my mind, yet sin
in my flesh. I thank God through Jesus Christ
our Lord. So then, with the mind, that
is the mind of Christ, knowing, understanding, leaning on the
faithfulness of Christ, with the mind of Christ, I serve the
law of God. That's how I look at it. That's
how I live. I live by his faithfulness to
it, because I'm dead to it. Romans 8, 1. There is therefore
now no condemnation, no judgment to them which are in Christ Jesus,
who walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit. For the
law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free
from the law of sin and death. Huh? Ain't that clear? That just clears the bell to
me. The revelation of the Spirit,
which is Christ honoring and exalting the law by dying for
us, satisfying the holy demand of a righteous God. And we live
out our days looking to Christ. He's my righteousness. He's my
righteousness. Listen to the scriptures, looking
unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith. And then fifthly,
Paul sums up his declaration with an accusation. I gave you the accusation of
the unbelievers and false religion. Here's Paul's accusation back
toward them. He said, I do not frustrate the
grace of God For if righteousness come by the law, then Christ
is dead and vain. If you would strive for a righteousness
by obeying the commandments of God, you've made the death of
Christ a vain thing. If you could be righteous by
your obedience, then God poured out his wrath on his son and
caused his son to suffer all this humiliation and pain and
grief for nothing. Is that right? That's exactly
what Paul's saying. Nothing could be more hideous
to God than to make his eternal purpose of grace in Christ to
be a vain show. Not that anybody could actually
do that. but they do try to declare it
and teach it and support it and glory in it. God forbid that
we should do such a thing. Salvation in Christ and salvation
100% by the grace of God. When you look to Him, when you
look to Him, you're complete in Him. You're resting in Him. God rested in him. He rested
everything he had, everything he purposed. He rested in the
sun. He was the only one worthy to come and take that book out
of his hand. Why do we find it so hard to
trust our little bit of stuff in his hands, huh? We find that
so difficult, don't we? So my soul, may God open our
eyes to see it. Thank you.