There is a spiritual war happening inside every believer, but thankfully, The Spirit empowers us to resist the flesh, The Spirit produces fruit in our lives, and The Spirit helps us to see others as God sees and thus love as He loves.

If you make the law your identity and you succeed, it will go to your head. If you make the law your identity and you fail, it will crush your heart. Thankfully, we are no longer slaves to the law but are now free to walk in the Spirit.

A human work will only get human results, thus leaving us in bondage. However, we can be confident in God's promises and rejoice that His saving grace is sufficient for our journey.

We are living out a spiritual war against the devil in a fight to believe truth over lies. We need to live solely in the person of Jesus (who is The Truth) and as children of freedom, so that God may produce the life of Christ in us.

The Gospel of freedom promises adoption into God's family. In Christ we are welcomed into God's family of Grace, and our identity as God's child is a springboard into this new life with God's family.

Legalism is self-reliance, which is slavery because we will never be able to do enough to justify ourselves. Obedience to God comes as a result of faith, not as a means of salvation. We must transfer our hope from ourselves to the finished work of Jesus Christ.

The law declares we are guilty, but Christ declares we are free.  Righteousness begins and ends with taking our place as a sinner, utterly in need of God's justifying grace, and our common need for this justifying grace can humbly unite us. The true meaning of freedom is to live the life Christ created us for, free from sin and shame.

As we begin our study in Galatians, we see that Christ alone offers true spiritual freedom and empowers us to live as messengers of freedom in a world that desperately needs hope and redemption.

In our individualistic society, Church membership is often quickly dismissed as unnecessary or an obstacle for people to experience God’s love. As we understand what God has called us to be as a church, we will quickly realize that Scripture lays out clear examples of a committed God welcoming believers into a committed family. A temple has bricks. A flock has sheep. A vine has branches. And a body has members. Church membership is not simply a record of a box we once checked or a sentimental feeling. It should reflect a living commitment.