Living Free

10/29/11

Scripture:

We will continue the Getting Our Gospel Right sermon series this morning with a sermon that I've entitled “Living Free.”  Our text this morning is from Paul’s letter to the Galatians, chapter 4, verses 8-31, a rather long passage that I’ll be reading from the New Living Translation of the Bible.  In this text Paul writes about the freedom we have in Christ that leads to a joyful and a grateful spirit as opposed to living by the law which leads to spiritual slavery and religious oppression.  And so hear these words from Galatians chapter 4:

⁸ Before you Gentiles knew God, you were slaves to so-called gods that do not even exist.  ⁹ So now that you know God (or should I say, now that God knows you), why do you want to go back again and become slaves once more to the weak and useless spiritual principles of this world?  ¹⁰ You are trying to earn favor with God by observing certain days or months or seasons or years.  ¹¹ I fear for you. Perhaps all my hard work with you was for nothing.  ¹² Dear brothers and sisters, I plead with you to live as I do in freedom from these things, for I have become like you Gentiles—free from those laws. You did not mistreat me when I first preached to you.  ¹³ Surely you remember that I was sick when I first brought you the Good News.  ¹⁴ But even though my condition tempted you to reject me, you did not despise me or turn me away.  No, you took me in and cared for me as though I were an angel from God or even Christ Jesus himself.  ¹⁵ Where is that joyful and grateful spirit you felt then? I am sure you would have taken out your own eyes and given them to me if it had been possible.  ¹⁶ Have I now become your enemy because I am telling you the truth?  ¹⁷ Those false teachers are so eager to win your favor but their intentions are not good.  They are trying to shut you off from me so that you will pay attention only to them.  ¹⁸ If someone is eager to do good things for you, that’s all right; but let them do it all the time, not just when I'm with you.  ¹⁹ Oh, my dear children! I feel as if I am going through labor pains for you again, and they will continue until Christ is fully developed in your lives.  ²⁰ I wish I were with you right now, so I could change my tone. But at this distance I don't know how else to help you.  ²¹ Tell me, you who want to live under the law. Do you know what the law actually says?  ²² The Scriptures say that Abraham had two sons, one from his slave wife, one from his freeborn wife.  ²³ The son, Ishmael, of the slave wife, Hagar, was born in a human attempt to bring about the fulfillment of God's promise. But the son, Isaac, of the freeborn wife, Sarah, was born as God's own fulfillment of his promise.  ²⁴ These two women serve as an illustration of God's two covenants. The first woman, Hagar, represents Mount Sinai where people received the law that enslaved them.  ²⁵ And now Jerusalem is just like Mount Sinai in Arabia, because she and her children live in slavery to the law.  ²⁶ But the other woman, Sarah, represents the heavenly Jerusalem. She is the free woman and she is our mother.  ²⁷ As Isaiah said, "Rejoice, O childless woman, you who have never given birth! Break into a joyful shout, you who have never been in labor. For the desolate woman now has more children than the woman who lives with her husband!"  ²⁸ And you, dear brothers and sisters, are children of the promise, just like Isaac.  ²⁹ But you are now being persecuted by those who want you to keep the law, just as Ishmael, the child born by human effort persecuted Isaac, the child born by the power of the Spirit.  ³⁰ But what do the Scriptures say about that? "Get rid of the slave and her son, for the son of the slave woman will not share the inheritance with the free woman's son."   ³¹ And so, dear brothers and sisters, we are not children of the slave woman, we are children of the free woman.

This ends the reading of God's word.  May the Lord bless us as we listen with spiritual ears, as we hear His word in our hearts, and as we apply it to our lives.  I want you to know how thankful that I am to be one of the pastors at Eden Church and that I love you and I pray for you, and I long for you to grow in Christ.  Let us pray.

Father, we call upon your Holy Spirit to enable us to understand your word.  May your Spirit open our eyes and our hearts to see how your word to the people of the Galatian churches affects the way we live our lives today.  God, I pray for you to show us the eternal life-changing truths in your word.  May our lives be changed this morning.  Conform us to the image of Jesus Christ by your grace at work in our lives.  In Jesus’ name, amen. 

The text that I read is a very complicated text.  It would take hours really to do an exposition of all that is in there and really, in order to understand it, we would need to go back to Genesis and read two or three chapters in Genesis about the story of Isaac and his birth.  But what I want you to understand and to see this morning is the passion and the love of Paul for the people in Galatia.  Martin Luther said of this passage, “It just breathes Paul’s tears all over these verses.”  Imagine Paul writing with tears and with the great compassion that he had for these people.  Paul addresses the Galatians with a heart of passion and love.  And so what are the things that Paul is so passionate about? 

Paul has a passion for the God who knows us.  He says in verse 9, “So now that you know God (or should I say now that God knows you).”  Are you known by anyone really important?  Imagine being known by...let’s just say Albert Pujols.  You’re standing on Market Street and you’re waiting for the parade to begin this afternoon.  It’s going from Union Station back to the stadium.  I believe it’s up Market Street.  You’re standing there and the lead vehicle begins to come and as it gets to you Albert calls out and he says, “Andy, Andy...hey look its Andy!  Hey, stop the car!”  And Albert gets out of the car and he runs over to Andy and he shakes his hand real big, and he says, “Andy, it’s so good to see you!  Man, I didn’t know you were going to be here...c’mon, ride in the car with me.”  And so Andy goes and he gets up and he rides in the car with Albert and the other Cardinals stars.  Imagine how that would make you feel. 

Well, you know, you are known by the God of the universe.  The God of the universe says, “Hey Andy, how you doing buddy?  I love you!  I care about you!”  And, you know, that word ‘known’ in the scripture is the intimate sense of knowing.  It’s like a husband and wife of many years and the way that they know each other, that intimacy they’ve shared in so many different areas of their lives.  God knows us in that way.  Do we have a passion for that God who knows us? 

Paul has a passion for people to live in the freedom of God's grace.  He asks in verse 9, “Why do you want to go back again and become slaves once more to the weak and useless spiritual principles of this world?”  And in verse 12 he says, “Dear brothers and sisters, I plead with you.  Live as I do in freedom from these things, for I have become like you Gentiles, free from those laws.”  Do you hear the deep affection of Paul for these people as he pleads for them to live in God's freedom, to live in a daily relationship with God through Jesus Christ?  That’s the passion that he has and that should be our passion.  Not that we’re just doing our religious duty, not that we’re just obeying the rules, so to speak, of what we’re supposed to do as Christians, but that we have a passion for the one who dwells in us, for the one that we love and that we know loves us. 

Paul has a passion for the word of God.  God help us to know and to trust your word.  In verse 21 Paul writes, “Do you know what the law actually says?”  And in verse 20 he asks them, “What do the scriptures say about that?”  Let me ask you, do you know the scriptures?  Do you know what they say?  Paul wants them to search the scriptures to know the mind of God and to learn of God's freedom and grace.  If we take God's word by grace through faith in Christ and we obey it, not just the parts we like, not just the parts that seem most appropriate for our culture, but if we really obey God's word, it will transform us.  Do you have a passion for God’s word to know it?

Paul also has a passion for people to become mature in Christ.  He writes in verse 19 again with great love, “Oh, my dear children.  I feel as if I'm going through labor pains for you again, and they will continue until Christ is fully developed in your lives.”  Another translation says “until Christ is formed in you.”  The Greek word there is morphos.  It means a transformation from the inside out.  It’s like the metamorphosis of a creepy crawly caterpillar that spins its cocoon and then emerges as a beautiful butterfly.  He says, “My dear children for whom I am again in the pains of childbirth until Christ is formed in you.”  What a powerful image, like a mother urgently wanting, needing to give birth to a child whose term has come.  In the pains of childbirth for Christ to be formed in you, the metamorphosis is the same as Galatians 2:20, which says, “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live.  Christ lives in me.”  And 2 Corinthians 4:10, “The life of Jesus will be manifested in your bodies that Christ would be formed in you.”  Oh God, help us to trust in your word because this is the work God's word does for us.

This is why we study the Bible at Eden Church, because this word that we’re studying has the power from the Spirit of God to conform our hearts and our minds into the image of Jesus Christ.  This is why the mid hour, the 9:15 hour, is going to be for Eden Church a time of Christian study, of Bible study, of Christian formation.  That’s why we study the Bible, because we know that when this book by the power of the Holy Spirit comes alive in our hearts and minds, God will transform us into the image of Christ.  Verses 28 and 29 say, “And you, dear brothers and sisters, are children of the promise, born by the power of the Spirit.”  Do we have that passion first for ourselves and then for others to be conformed to the image of Christ?  What would happen at Eden Church if we all had that passion, like a mother giving birth, to see people born into God's kingdom and becoming mature in Christ?  Let us pray that God would give us that kind of zeal.  Let us pray that we would care enough about each other that we would want to live so that others watching our lives would also want to be transformed in Christ. 

And finally, Paul also has a passion for people to be full of the joy of the Lord.  He asks in verse 15, “Where is that joyful and grateful spirit you felt then?”  Our faith is to be characterized by joy in the Lord.  Did you see the joyful...or perhaps you were there and experienced the joyful exuberance of the Cardinals team and fans at the end of game 6 or the end of game 7 of the World Series?  We can be joyful because Christ will fulfill his purpose in us as Paul writes in verse 23.  The Cardinals had a purpose, which was to win as many games as they could in the regular season and in the postseason, and when they fulfilled that purpose there was great joy for the team and for Cardinals fans.  Friends, God has a far greater purpose for our lives for each and every one of us, which he will fulfill as Christ is fully developed, as he is fully formed in our lives, a purpose which will fill us with the joy of the Lord.  Would you bow with me as we pray?

Oh God, the glorious Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, give us spiritual wisdom and understanding so that we might grow in our knowledge of God.  I pray that our hearts will be flooded with your light so that we can understand the wonderful future you have promised to those you called.  May we all realize what a rich and glorious inheritance God has given to His people.  I pray that we will begin to understand the incredible greatness of your power for us who believe in the name of Jesus Christ.  Amen.