As we have continued our study of Galatians, we have continually seen Paul’s defense of justification by faith apart from works of the law. He has defended the gospel from the assault of those who would have the Galatians keep the law’s command of circumcision. Paul’s argument seems to imply that the law is contrary to the gospel. As such one might assume that the law is of no use or purpose. However, in our passage for this week, we see that Paul comes to the opposite conclusion. The law has a purpose in the history of redemption. It has an abiding value for those who would seek to follow God. The law does not function to empower salvation or holiness but rather it serves as a contrast, a compliment, and a custodian to the gospel. To come prepared for the sermon take time this week to read and to meditate upon Galatians 3:19-25, Psalm 119, Romans 7:7-14, 2 Corinthians 3:7-11, and this article on the law.

This past week I found myself staying awake quite a bit later than normal to watch the NCAA tournament. I love to watch an underdog beat out a higher-ranked team. There is nothing as exciting as a game that comes down to the final seconds. Even those who only have a casual interest in college basketball can get hooked into watching with anticipation and excitement. And if you are lucky enough to watch your team hit a last-second three-point shot to win the game. What keeps me up way past my bedtime? I want to know how it ends. I want to know how the story finds completion. Will my team keep their lead? Will it go to overtime? Will Cinderella survive to dance another round? For a few hours, you enter into the lives of these young men. You feel the emotion, the anticipation, the disappointment, and the joy that all leads to the end. And when it is over? You can turn the T.V. off and go to bed. What happens though when the game doesn’t come to an end? What happens when you enter into a story that just keeps going? Like a Soap Opera, that promises resolution in each episode to come, but it never arrives. The drama never finds its end. The story never finds its completion. Several years back April and I watched the show Lost. It was filled with intriguing storylines, plot twists, and mystery. For six seasons we watched, yearning to know how it would end. There was a promise that it would all make sense in the end. But when we arrived at the final episode we still didn’t know what had happened. There was never the resolution for which we longed. In our passage for this Easter Sunday, we come to the question of resolution. The question of how it will end. We are all consumed with this question. Our heart yearns to see the end of the story. And what we will see is that the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ gives to us the true end, the true answer to all the unresolved stories in our own life. To come prepared for our Resurrection Day sermon take time this week to read and to meditate upon Romans 6:1-11, Luke 24:1-12, Revelation 22:13, and Westminster Confession of Faith 8.4.

Have you ever known someone who was hoping for an inheritance but when the time came realized they had received nothing? Maybe it was someone who failed to save for retirement believing that their rich uncle would provide all that they needed, only to find out that he was not as rich as they believed. Maybe it was a friend who cared for their aging parent, sacrificing much, with the belief they would be financially compensated by the estate, only to find out that their parent made no such provision in their will. Or maybe it was a spoiled individual who had greedily lived off of their parents’ generosity but was written out of the will. In 2007 the Wang family should have received an inheritance worth more than a billion dollars. However, Nina Wang the holder of this vast fortune changed her will. She voided her previous will which distributed her fortune to family and charities. Her new will designated Tony Chen, a feng shui master, as her sole heir. The reason? It is suggested that she left her fortune to this man in exchange for the guarantee of eternal life. In our passage for this coming Sunday Paul explains how every Christian might have great confidence in the inheritance that has been promised. The Lord made a promise to Abraham that his children would receive the land of Canaan as an inheritance. This land represented God’s grace to return his people to the blessing of Eden. This promise, though located in a particular geographic location, was to be understood as ultimately fulfilled in the renewed world. As Paul explains in Romans 4. “For the promise to Abraham and his offspring that he would be heir of the world did not come through the law but through the righteousness of faith.” (Romans 4:13 ESV) The inheritance given by God to the children of faith is the whole world. This is a promise that will come to pass when the Lord Jesus returns and brings his people into their promised inheritance. We are like children who are trusting in the inheritance promised. We are hoping that the Lord will give to his children life everlasting. And in Galatians 3:15-18 Paul explains how every Christian can have great confidence in this promised inheritance. To come prepared for the sermon take time this week to read and to meditate upon Galatians 3:15-18, Genesis 15:3-5, Psalm 47:7-9, Romans 4:1-15, and Hebrews 11:8-16.

Paul tells us that he was punished five times by the Jews for preaching the gospel, and each time he received forty lashes minus one for his crime (2 Corinthians 11:24). Tradition holds that when a prisoner was being whipped, he was required to read out the twelve curses of breaking God’s law recorded in Deuteronomy 27. This reading acted as a sign that the prisoner was cursed by God. As the last lash was given Paul would have repeated the last curse, Cursed be anyone who does not confirm the words of this law by doing them. (Deuteronomy 27:26 ESV) A curse is upon all who do not obey the law perfectly. This truth is central in his defense of the gospel. All those who would seek the blessing of the Lord through obedience to the law will inevitably fail and in their failure come under the righteous curse of God. While Paul’s punishment was unjust, it was a reminder of the suffering that flows from the laws condemnation of human sin. How then might one be freed from the curse of the law? What we will see in our text is that Christ took on the curse of the law to free all those who trust in him for salvation. He was crushed for our iniquities and by his stripes we are healed. Our sin turns the blessing of the law into a curse but Christ by his grace has taken upon our curse that all who trust in him might be blessed. To come prepared for the sermon take time this week to read and to meditate upon Galatians 3:10-14, Genesis 12:3, Leviticus 18:5, Deuteronomy 21:23; 27:11-26, Isaiah 44:3, Habakkuk 2:4, and this article on the curse of the law.

How do you know that you are a true member of the family? Growing up with two adopted brothers meant that I was faced with the meaning of belonging to a family. There was a time when my brothers were not members of our family. They were born with different parents. They lived in a different house. However, by God’s providence, these two boys were welcomed into our home first as guests (foster care) and eventually as family members (adoption). When they were legally adopted, they were given all the rights and privileges of any natural-born child. They were given our family name. They were put under the protection of my parents. They were included in the life and traditions of our family. Yet it has not always come easy for them to feel as though they are true members of the family. There is a continual voice that says they are different that they do not belong. The Gentile Christians in Galatia may have been feeling the same tension. They had been accepted into the family of God by grace. They had received the Spirit as a seal of their acceptance into the family. However, they wanted something more to prove that they truly belonged, and circumcision seemed to be the right path. For was not circumcision the family symbol? Was not circumcision the sign that you belonged to the family of God? In our passage for this Sunday Paul combats this line of thinking by demonstrating from Scripture that the true mark of the family was not circumcision but faith. And if we would have confidence in our acceptance into the family of God, we too must believe that we are not received by works of the law but rather through faith in Jesus Christ. To come prepared for the sermon take time this week to read and to meditate upon Galatians 3:6-9, Genesis 12:3;15:6; 18:18, Romans 4, Hebrews 11:8-12, James 2:14-26, and WCF 11.6.

In Galatians chapter three Paul begins by asking the Galatians, “Who has bewitched you?” Paul has spent the first two chapters defending his Apostleship against the attacks of the false teachers but now in chapter three, he turns his attention to defending the theological foundation of the gospel. He had preached the pure gospel of faith in Jesus Christ, but this message has been undermined by those who claim works of the law are necessary for acceptance and growth. How could the Galatians believe such lies? Paul rhetorically asks if they have been bewitched. To be bewitched means that you have been placed under a magical spell that blinds you to the truth. Paul was not truly concerned that a witch had cast a spell over them. Rather he is pointing out that to turn from faith in the gospel to works of the law takes such a leap of inconsistency that the only explanation is bewitchment. How could they believe that works of the law would bring them into the family of God when they had already received the Spirit? There are many falsehoods that confuse and bewitch Christians. Yet the word of God teaches us that it is by the work of the Spirit that we are accepted into the family of God, it is by the work of the Spirit that we grow in our relationship with God, and it is by the work of the Spirit that we endure to the end with God. To come prepared for the sermon take time this week to read and to meditate upon Galatians 3:1-5, Numbers 11:29, Acts 15:6-11, Romans 8:9-11, 1 Corinthians 2:12, and WCF 11.4, 13.1,17.2.

God has designed human beings as aiming creatures. Aim is built into our physical and spiritual framework. The Lord has given us eyes that are designed to look forward and focus on a target. He has given us minds that can imagine a future target and aim our actions toward achieving that goal. As a result of this design, we are enthralled by such activities and find deep meaning and pleasure in hitting a target. How many of our sports are designed around aiming and hitting a target? Basketball, football, baseball, soccer, volleyball, lacrosse are all designed to reward those teams and individuals who can take aim and hit the target. And when someone does this well, we rejoice and celebrate how wonderfully they have hit that for which they aimed. We jump up and down, we hug complete strangers, we dance and sing, all because someone hit what they were aiming for. Why has God created this way? Why do we love to aim? I believe that God has created us this way so that we would learn how to aim our lives toward the ultimate target. The Lord has designed us so that we could point ourselves toward a goal and live in a manner to achieve that goal. The word of God is clear that the ultimate purpose for man’s creation is the glory of God. We were designed to aim our lives at this purpose and when we achieve this goal we experience the highest sense of meaning and fulfillment. We are meant to aim our lives toward God. In our passage for this Sunday Paul continues to outline the power of the gospel to transform lives. In particular, in verse 19 he explains how we might live to God. That is to say, Paul explains how Christians are to aim their lives toward the glory of God through faith in Jesus Christ. To come prepared for the sermon take time this week to read and to meditate upon Galatians 2:17-21, Romans 7:4-6, Ephesians 4:22-24, and WCF 13.1.

Many of you might be familiar with Evangelism Explosion (E.E.). It is an evangelism program that was developed by Presbyterian Minister D. James Kennedy. This program utilized two diagnostic questions that help Christians begin an evangelistic conversation with a nonbeliever. “Have you come to the place in your life where you know that if you died, you would go to heaven?” “If you were to stand before God and he were to ask you, ‘Why should I let you into my heaven?’, what would you say?” These may be the two most important questions to have answered. Why should God allow you to enter into his heaven? What right do you have to claim his eternal peace and rest? We are all on an unstoppable track toward eternity. There is no escaping the reality that one day you will meet your maker. And when you do, what will be your ground for claiming his reward? This is the question that Galatians 2:15-16 answers. And this is why Paul is so insistent that a different gospel is no gospel at all. For, if we get this question wrong, we will not only miss the reward of eternity we will enter into eternal punishment. However, by God’s grace, we have great assurance through Jesus that we will surely be welcomed into his heaven. To come prepared for the sermon take time this week to read and to meditate upon Galatians 2:15-16, Genesis 18:25, Psalm 130:3;143:2, Proverbs 17:15, Romans 3:9-26; 8:33-34, 2 Corinthians 5:19-21, James 2:10, and WCF 11.

This past summer Ronnie Long was released from prison after the state of North Carolina vacated his convictions. In 1976 Long was found guilty of a crime that he did not commit. He was sentenced to 80 years in prison and remained there for the past 44 years. He maintained his innocence, but it was not until this summer that he was found to be not guilty. I bring this case forward to explain a key term which we must understand to fully grasp our text for this Sunday. The word is justification. To justify is to legally declare that someone is innocent. The opposite of justify is condemn. In the case of Ronnie Long, he was condemned in 1976 even though he was innocent. That is to say, a judge declared him guilty before the law, even though he was innocent in reality. Then in August of 2020, he was justified, declared innocent. To properly understand the meaning of justification you must understand that it is a legal (forensic) term. An innocent person may be condemned, and a guilty person may be justified. It is a legal declaration. In a perfect world, we would hope that a judge would always condemn the guilty and justify the innocent (Proverbs 17:15). However, a judge’s decision to condemn or justify is not always in line with reality. The question that is posed in our verse for this Sunday is: How is a sinful person to be justified by God? If God is the judge of all the earth how might anyone be given a not guilty verdict? What we will see is that no one will be found innocent according to the law but only by faith in Jesus Christ. To come prepared for the sermon take time this week to read and to meditate upon Galatians 2:15-16, Genesis 18:25, Psalm 143:2, Proverbs 17:15, Romans 8:33-34, 2 Corinthians 5:19-21, and WCF 11.

Standing up to your friends is often more difficult than standing up to your enemies. We call it peer-pressure and it is a powerful force in our lives. Who cannot think of a story of giving in to do something stupid or even illogical because a friend pressured you? Your first drink; your first cigarette; your first act of vandalism. These were probably not done alone after a day of contemplation. No, you were most likely with a friend whose approval you were seeking. On a humorous note, when I was in middle school, I had a friend who thought “grunge” fashion was cool. So, to impress him I showed up at the mall wearing a flannel, baggy jean shorts, long thermal underwear, and Doc Martins. I think Eddie Vedder (Pearl Jam) wore that once. My friend wore something similarly grunge. And we walked around the mall looking like fools. At least we looked like fools together. In our passage for this Sunday, we have a case of peer pressure causing Peter and other church leaders to make foolish decisions. They have felt the pressure to stop meal fellowship with Gentile Christians. Instead of standing up to this pressure, Peter gives in along with many other church leaders including Barnabas. However, Paul has the courage to stand up to this peer-pressure for the sake of the gospel. In our own lives, we will be pressured to live in ways that are contrary to our beliefs. In those times how will we stand for the gospel? To come prepared for the sermon take time this week to read and to meditate upon Galatians 2:11-14, Mark 14:66-72, Leviticus 11, 1 Corinthians 15:3-11, 2 Peter 3:15-18, and WCF 17.3