Galatians Archives - Christ Church

Justice, Liberty, & Love (CCD)

Christ Church on September 11, 2022

THE TEXT

“For, brethren, ye have been called unto liberty; only use not liberty for an occasion to the flesh, but by love serve one another. For all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this; Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. But if ye bite and devour one another, take heed that ye be not consumed one of another. This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would. But if ye be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law. . .” (Galatians 5:13–23).

Justice, Liberty, & Love (King’s Cross)

Christ Church on September 11, 2022

INTRODUCTION

Justice, freedom, and love are the buzz words of our culture, but it is not at all clear that many of our neighbors know what these words mean. The Bible teaches that all three of these gifts originate in the Triune God and are only received and enjoyed through the Cross of Jesus.

THE TEXT

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

True liberty is the ability to love our neighbors, through serving them lawfully from the heart (Gal. 5:13-14). The opposite of liberty (slavery) destroys community, through biting and devouring, driven by lusts and envy (Gal. 5:15, cf. Js. 4:1-3). Those who walk in the Spirit are led by the Spirit and therefore free from the lust of the flesh (Gal. 5:16). There is a battle in true Christians, where they sometimes find themselves doing what they do not want to do (Gal. 5:17). But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the condemnation of the law (Gal. 5:18, cf. Rom. 8:1). You can tell you are under the condemnation of the law because you are enslaved to the works of the flesh (Gal. 5:19-21). The marks of true freedom are the fruit of the Spirit, against which the law can bring no charge (Gal. 5:22-23).

NEGATIVE V. POSITIVE JUSTICE

The Bible teaches that justice is primarily negative and punitive (Rom. 13:3). It is only positive in declaring innocence, affirming or praising the righteous (Rom. 13:3), but otherwise it condemns and punishes, executing God’s wrath (Rom. 13:4). Lady Justice is pictured in all the old paintings and statues as blind or blindfolded holding a set of scales in one hand and a sword in the other. Her job is simply to weigh out certain actions and demand equity – retribution and/or restitution that restores balance to the world, according to the law of God (cf. Ex. 22:1-15).

Related to the notion of justice is the notion of “rights,” and rights always imply obligations. If you have a right to life, everyone around you is obligated not to harm you. If you have a right to private property, everyone around you has an obligation not to take or damage what belongs to you. If you are a wife, you have a right to be provided for, and your husband is obligated to provide for you as himself (Eph. 5:29). Justice is called for when one of these obligations has been breached, defied, or severely neglected — eye for eye, tooth for tooth, life for life (Dt. 19:21). However, when someone claims they have a right to a job, education, health care, or welfare, the implication is that someone else is obligated to give it to them. But who? God has assigned the family government the ministry of health, welfare, and education. God has assigned the church government the ministry of worship in the word and sacraments. God has assigned the civil government the ministry of justice, punishing evil doers.

LOVE IS LIBERTY TO SERVE

The problem with coerced “love” from the state is like that demon-possessed guy in the tombs from the gospels – his name is Legion. First, the state is presuming to know how my resources are best used for the good of others. Second, the state is presuming to know how my neighbors will be best cared for and served. Third, the coercion of the state destroys the personalism of individuals freely giving and serving and receiving, reducing “love” to a merely material transaction or wealth transfer. Fourth, the automated provision of the state creates weak, irresponsible, immature, and ungrateful dependents. Fifth, the coercive automation of the state is massively inefficient. In all of these ways (and more), love and liberty are destroyed by the threatened violence of the state. True liberty is the room to exercise true wisdom and generosity with time and resources to care for the needs of your neighbors, and in particular, those entrusted to your care (Eph. 5:28-29, 6:4, 1 Tim. 5:8).

SINS & CRIMES

Many moderns confuse jurisdictions by conflating sins and crimes. Crimes are those acts that harm the person or property of others or are designated by God to corrupt society and therefore fall under the jurisdiction of the civil magistrates for punishment. Sins are those thoughts and acts that break fellowship with God and others, many of which fall under the jurisdiction of families and churches. True love, liberty, and justice occur when each jurisdiction submits to God’s assigned sphere. In a Christian civil order, all crimes would also be sins, but in most civil orders, there are a mix of crimes that may or may not be sins. So if the magistrate orders that meeting for worship is a crime, it would not be a sin to disobey that order (Dan. 3:18, Acts 5:29). But the other point is that not all sins are or should be crimes. So for example, covetousness is a sin and it may reveal itself in bad thoughts or words, but it isn’t a crime until it turns into overt theft or vandalism. The point is that Lady Justice deals with black and white actions, punishing evil doers upon the testimony of two or three witnesses, but she is not entrusted with matters of the heart, house rules, or matters of worship. When “justice” tries to meddle in those things assigned to the family or church, you don’t get love, liberty, or justice.

CONCLUSIONS

The greatest act of liberty ever performed was also the greatest act of love and justice: Jesus laid His life down freely as a ransom for sinners. No one took His life from Him, He laid it down freely (Jn. 10:18). And He had that freedom because it was obedience to His Father.

But the sinful heart of man always wants to get this backwards and upside down. The sinful, prideful heart of man wants to collapse and confuse justice, liberty, and love in order to remake the world according to its own wisdom, which always involves manipulation and coercion and demands that you must acquiesce to the demands of government thugs.

But justice only punishes or exonerates. That’s all it does. And that is what it did in the Cross. God’s perfect justice punished Jesus in our place, and then because our debts were fully paid, God’s justice exonerates all who trust in Him. That is a supreme manifestation of God’s love and liberty, but you cannot mix them up without confusing the gospel.

Those who receive this gospel really are set free, and the Spirit begins to lead them to love their neighbors freely and generously in imitation of Jesus in obedience. But slavery to the flesh is manifest and obvious. So which one are you? What characterizes your life? Is it the fruit of the Spirit or the works of the flesh? If it is the works of the flesh, then any demand for justice is only to have the law of God fall upon you with all of its fierce condemnation. But if it is the fruit of the Spirit, you are truly free, and you are a manifestation of the righteousness of God in Christ.

Christian Basis for Freedom

Christ Church on October 17, 2021

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INTRODUCTION

Freedom is a thoroughly Christian principle. The ancient pagan world knew nothing of true freedom, and despite secular humanism’s attempts at claiming it, there is no other liberty apart from the living God. Christian liberty is grounded in freedom to worship the Triune God, and when our hearts are turned to Him, we are set free from all bondage and set free to serve.

THE TEXTS

“It was for freedom that Christ set us free; therefore keep standing firm and do not be subject again to a yoke of slavery… For you were called to freedom brethren; only do not turn your freedom into an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another. For the whole law is fulfilled in one word, in the statement, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself’” (Gal. 5:1, 13-14).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

In context, Paul is warning the Galatians against Judaizing, that is, adding Jewish ceremonial laws to Christ perhaps as an attempt to feel more secure, perhaps as an attempt to avoid persecution from zealous Jews (Gal. 5:2-11, cf. Gal. 1:4-9). But every form of legalism is a crushing yoke of slavery, and to return to Egypt is to sin against Christ who set us free (Gal. 5:1). The mentality of slavery is simple: just do as you’re told, but true freedom brings responsibility (Gal. 5:13). This means that true liberty is directed by God’s law of love (Gal. 3:14).

FREEDOM FOR WORSHIP

In the Exodus story, one of the fundamental lessons we learn there that freedom is for worship: “Let My people go that they may celebrate a feast to Me in the wilderness” (Ex. 5:1, cf. 10:25). But Pharaoh instinctively knew that if Israel was set free to worship God, they would never be slaves again. True worship of the living God sets the captives free. This certainly begins as moral and spiritual freedom with regeneration (and hearts that can’t stop singing), but freedom from sin teaches men to think like free men. This begins with personal responsibility (confession of sin and forgiveness) and flows out to covenantal responsibility in the spheres of authority assigned to us by the Lord Jesus: family, church, and state.

When they are healthy, all three spheres mutually check and enforce one another, but throughout Scripture worship is the tip of the spear: Abraham built altars throughout the land of Canaan, the priests blew trumpets and carried the ark around Jericho, the choir went out in front of the army under Jehoshaphat, and Jesus sent us out into the world to preach and baptize and celebrate the Lord’s Supper as the vanguard of the Kingdom. Daniel shows us the centrality of free worship both in the refusal of the three friends to bow down to the statue (Dan. 3) and in Daniel’s resolute prayer despite the king’s decree (Dan. 6). Christians are free from every decree of man that would require idolatry or prohibit the worship of the living God. While there is freedom in some of the particulars of when and where worship is conducted, Christians must be zealous for freedom to worship because Christ is worthy and because all of our other freedoms flow from there. When you think about preserving freedom, first think about worshipping the King who grants all freedom.

FREED TO SERVE

This freedom that Christ gives is for serving one another in love, and that love is measured by the second greatest commandment: love your neighbor as yourself (Gal. 5:13-14). But Christians must not be simplistic or naïve in this. Remember first of all the gospel: “In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another” (1 Jn. 4:10-11). God did not love us in the way that we thought He should; He loved us in the way that we actually needed. And we must love one another like that. This is truly serving one another in love: doing what is needed for long term physical and spiritual health, blessing, and success.

How does Scripture teach us to love like Christ? It says husbands are to love their wives as their own bodies, like Christ has loved the church and gave Himself up for her, providing for them and protecting them (Eph. 5:22-33), and fathers are to provide for and raise their children in the nurture and admonition of Jesus (Eph. 6:1-4). This includes the duty to care for the health, safety, medical decisions, welfare, and education of all in the family. Failure to do so is functional apostasy and worse than a run of the mill pagan (1 Tim. 5:8). This spiritual and religious duty to care for your family is why Christ set you free. This is what your Christian freedom is for. And you are under orders not to relinquish this freedom. Wise men will need to consider various tactical courses to protect this freedom but protect it we must.

CONCLUSIONS

One of the ways our freedom is under attack is through well-meaning appeals from other Christians that we need to be willing to lay our freedoms down for the sake of the gospel. Don’t be selfish! This is one of those half-truths that can sound more godly than it actually is. The half truth is: do not use your freedom for the flesh, to serve yourself, to serve your lusts, to bite and devour one another (Gal. 5:13-15). Don’t use your freedom to act like Egyptians. But keep the image of the Exodus firmly in mind. Christian liberty is fundamentally freedom from Egypt (sin, death, the Devil) and freedom to love our people in obedience to Christ. Therefore, no Christian is free to go back to Egypt. Lay our freedom down? That’s like saying lay your obedience down, lay your duty down, lay your family down. God forbid. Christ has set us free.

For another example, when drag queen story hour first burst on the scene in all of its lugubrious shame, some of our most prominent conservative, even “Reformed” leaders told us that this was merely the price of “freedom” in a country like ours. If we want to continue to have the freedom of speech, the freedom to express our religious convictions then we have to make room for gaudy perverts. Notice the hidden unbiblical assumption here is that “freedom” is merely power of choice. But that is like saying that in order to be a truly free country you must allow for the option of slavery. Not hardly. True freedom is walking in the light of Christ, walking in the relief of forgiveness of all our sins. No, the price of freedom was paid by Jesus on the cross, and He died to set us free from all that darkness. And loving your neighbor means doing all in your power to share that freedom with them.

A Covenant Primer (Further Up #9)

Christ Church on August 15, 2021

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INTRODUCTION

As we consider our moment in history, it is important that we not lose sight of the way God has always dealt with His people over the course of history: through covenant. Covenant is the name of the relationship God has determined to have with His people and ultimately the whole world. But because of who God is, the dominant theme is death and resurrection – which means that God will always keep His promises. We keep covenant in history by believing that.

THE TEXT

“Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made. He saith not, and to seeds, as of many; but as of one, And to thy seed, which is Christ. And this I say, that the covenant, that was confirmed before of God in Christ, the law, which was four hundred and thirty years after, cannot disannul, that it should ^omake the promise of none effect. For if the inheritance be of the law, it is no more of promise: but God gave it to Abraham by promise. Wherefore then serveth the law? It was added because of transgressions, till the seed should come to whom the promise was made; and it was ordained by angels in the hand of a mediator. Now a mediator is not a mediator of one, but God is one. Is the law then against the promises of God? God forbid: for if there had been a law given which could have given life, verily righteousness should have been by the law. But the scripture hath concluded all under sin, that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe. But before faith came, we were kept under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed. Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith” (Gal. 3:16-24).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

Paul has been explaining covenant history to the Galatians who have been “bewitched” into going backwards, covenantally speaking (Gal. 3:1, 2:18). Specifically, they have succumbed to the Judaizing heresy that wanted to accept Christ as Messiah but continue under the Old Covenant, making distinctions between Jews and Gentiles, circumcised and uncircumcised (Gal. 2:12). Paul’s argument is that God does not forget or annul any of His promises (Gal. 3:16-18). What God was doing in the time of the law has to be understood in terms of what God began to do with Abraham. The law is not opposed to the promises of God, but it was a schoolmaster to bring us to maturity in Christ (Gal. 3:19-24).

THE COVENANT SCHOOLHOUSE

Paul uses the term “law” somewhat interchangeably with the Mosaic law and the Old Covenant. Clearly he’s talking about Moses in Gal. 3:17, but as he goes on, he seems to be talking about the entire Old Covenant leading up to Christ (Gal. 4:21-22), the era of “tutors and governors” (Gal. 4:2). This image underlines the fact that God’s covenants do not expire and become obsolete and therefore maturity means understanding how they were preparation for growing up into our inheritance in Christ (Gal. 4:7).

The first covenant was made with Adam, and it is called the Covenant of Creation (or sometimes the Covenant of Life or Covenant of Works). While Genesis 2 doesn’t use the word “covenant” all the elements are there, and Hosea says, “But they like men/Adam have transgressed the covenant…” (6:7). A covenant is an agreement between two or more persons, sovereignly administered, with attendant blessings and curses. We can add to this basic definition the common practice of giving covenant signs and seals. In the Covenant of Creation with Adam, the agreement was that Adam would live forever under God’s blessing as he was perfectly obedient to the commands of God, but if he ate of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, he would surely die. The Tree of Life functioned as the sign and seal of the covenant.

THE COVENANT OF GRACE

The Covenant of Grace is what we call the overarching covenant that God made with Christ after Adam sinned. The promise is that the seed of the woman will one day crush the seed of the serpent (Gen. 3:15), and the requirement is that Adam believe. The sign of God’s covenant promise is the skins God clothed them with (Gen. 3:21). Within this one, overarching Covenant of Grace are the Old and New Covenants, and within the Old Covenant are a number of covenant renewals that function as those schoolmasters and tutors: covenants with Noah, Abraham, Moses, David, and Ezra. In each covenant era, the previous covenant is not annulled, but each one functions as a teacher to bring us to Christ. Think of it as one overarching story, or like a math course where the lessons are cumulative.

What God taught us in the Noahic Covenant is still true: the death penalty is still applicable for murder, and God will never destroy the world again with a flood. But God came and expanded that covenant to include particular promises to Abraham and his seed for the blessing of all the nations of the earth. Likewise, God remembered that covenant with Abraham and brought Israel out of Egypt and gave them the law and the tabernacle. And then God gave them kings and the temple, and after exile, He renewed covenant once again under the leadership of Ezra, teaching His people how to be faithful in an era of pagan empires. All of these covenants are talking about Christ. He is the seed of the woman, the ark of the gospel, the seed of Abraham/the heir of the world, the Word made flesh who “tabernacled” among us, the Son of David, the true Temple, and our teacher (cf. Lk. 24:27).

COVENANT & SALVATION

Two additional points emerge from reading the Bible this way: First, faith has always been the way of salvation. The Old Covenant saints were saved by believing God’s promises to send the Seed who would crush the head of the serpent, and in the New Covenant we are saved by believing that Jesus is the Seed that has crushed the serpent on the cross. Second, the New Covenant is not made out of stainless steel. It is a new and better covenant, the final covenant, that is far more potent and glorious (Jer. 31) that will fill the whole world, and our election is absolutely sure (e.g. Rom. 8:35), but the Bible teaches that we stand in this certainty by faith alone. New Covenant members can fall away just like in old Israel (1 Cor. 10, Jn. 15, Heb. 10).

CONCLUSION: THE FAITH THAT OVERCOMES THE WORLD

Fundamentally, saving faith is faith in the God of resurrection: “He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief; but was strong in faith, giving glory to God; and being fully persuaded that, what he had promised, he was able to perform” (Rom. 4:19-21). The same faith was on display when God commanded him to sacrifice Isaac (Heb. 11:19). This was the faith that overcame the world through obedient deliverance and suffering (Heb. 11:34-37). It is the same with covenant history: God takes His people (and the world) into graves and out again.