Have You Died?

Good Morning,

Today we will be finishing up Chapter 2 of Galatians. We are in Galatians 2 and we will be reading verses 19-21. Today I recommend throwing some sort of book mark in our passage, while this is our passage most of our time will be in other books to better understand what Paul is saying, since he is better at explaining himself than I am and scripture is the best interpreter of Scripture.

Pray 3+

So you may be looking at the title of today’s message asking yourself what on earth is he talking about? Of course not I am sitting here aren’t I? How could I have died?

This is the question we most ask ourselves as we study our passage today. Have we died? And hopefully we will see what it is to die by the end of this message and be able to answer this question.

If you could open your bibles with me to Galatians 2:19-21.

Galatians 2:19–21 “19 For through the law I died to the law, so that I might live to God. 20 I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. 21 I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness were through the law, then Christ died for no purpose.”

We see this expectation of death by the law, but why is that? Turn with me to Romans 7, starting in verse 7 Paul writes:

Romans 7:7–14 “7 What then shall we say? That the law is sin? By no means! Yet if it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin. For I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, “You shall not covet.” 8 But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness. For apart from the law, sin lies dead. 9 I was once alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin came alive and I died. 10 The very commandment that promised life proved to be death to me. 11 For sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it killed me. 12 So the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good. 13 Did that which is good, then, bring death to me? By no means! It was sin, producing death in me through what is good, in order that sin might be shown to be sin, and through the commandment might become sinful beyond measure. 14 For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin

Sin brought about death

We see here that it is sin that is bringing about death, if we look at Adam as an example. He had perfect union with God, sin was not yet alive in him. Yet God gave him one command and as long as it was followed Adam had life. But in Genesis 3 verse 6 what happened?

Genesis 3:6 ESV

6 So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate.

This law that was spiritual showed the weakness of their flesh and because of their flesh man was sold under sin. This is true of every type of law. We each have a moral law that we hold to and expect others to follow. We have all broken our own moral law in some way or another and we justify it to ourselves. The ten commandment are not the only form of Law that God has given. Romans 2:14 “14 For when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law.” But whether it is this internal law or the perfect law of God, through these laws sin comes to life and brings us condemnation and death. We living in the flesh apart from God have been sold under sin.

I love to blame Adam for his sin, saying you know if Adam hadn’t done that the world would be a great place. I know however that that is a lie, because I would do the very same thing he did. Back in Romans 7 Paul uses the command you shall not covet as an example. You cannot see if I am coveting nor can I see if you are coveting, but it is always sitting at the door waiting. Sin produces in me and if I were to guess in you all sorts of covetousness, and that is just one example. The law is supposed to help us realize that we are corrupt and sinful and that sin deserves death. But if we look back to Galatians,

Galatians 2:19–20 “19 For through the law I died to the law, so that I might live to God. 20 I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”

These two statements are very much connected. Paul says I have died, so that I might live to God and I have been crucified so I no longer live, at first these two statements seem to be contradictory. I might live but then I no longer live? Is Paul telling us we get to live or we don’t, but we have to remember that the way Paul writes there is this war within us. If we go back to Romans 7 we can see this in starting in verse 15.

Romans 7:17–25 “17 So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. 18 For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. 19 For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. 20 Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. 21 So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. 22 For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, 23 but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. 24 Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? 25 Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.”

We see this war with in us we both know the right thing to do and yet do what is evil. We know the evil thing and we don’t want to do it yet time and again we find ourselves doing the very thing we hate. His only response to this is Wretched man that I am! Who can deliver me from this body of death? The answer to the question, is the only one who ever could and thankfully did, Jesus Christ our Lord. Through Him we can be crucified with Him, but what does it mean to be crucified with Christ?

What is it to be crucified with Christ?

What exactly is Paul saying in our passage today when he writes both I died to the law and I have been crucified with Christ? I mean the question remains I am not dead, I did not hang on a cross. And Paul was not dead at this point in time either, so what does he mean? For the answer to this we have to look at a couple of different books. If you could first turn with me to Colossians chapter 2 starting in verse 11. Now remember that Paul sees no value in the circumcision that the Jews were pushing and this is a big part of why. But Colossians reads:

Colossians 2:11–14 “11 In him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ, 12 having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God, who raised him from the dead. 13 And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, 14 by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross.”

Here we see when our faith is in Jesus our life is intimately connected to his crucifixion, death and resurrection. In verse 14 here, we see all of the legal demands of our sin and debt are canceled because they have been nailed to the cross. We now stand free. We also see that when our faith is in Jesus we have been buried with Him in our spiritual baptism, and raised with Him through God who raised Jesus from the dead. As I said at the picnic service this is why the method of baptism I prefer is immersion, it best pictures this death and resurrection with Jesus. But before we leave here look at verse 11 with me and see what God does for us and this connects back to the verses we read in Romans 7 just a minute ago. In Him, we are circumcised from the flesh by the circumcision of Christ. He makes it so our flesh is no longer bound to us the same way it was before we knew him. Remember that in Romans 7 Paul said that nothing good dwells in him, that is his flesh, and here God circumcises us from it, that is not to say we won’t feel it’s effects, but it no longer has to be the driving force in our lives.

Ephesians makes it clear that this is something that we can choose to participate in or not. Ephesians 4:22–24 “22 to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, 23 and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, 24 and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.” We see here a command to put off this old self that Colossians tells us was circumcised from us and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, so putting on the new self is a call to become more like Jesus. It says this new self is created after the likeness of God and this is not to be like the pharisees who did things for show, but they are to be an action of the mind first. You must choose to put on the new self and choose to take off the old self and it must be done because you have turned to God.

We see this Idea of being buried with Him in baptism and again this is a spiritual baptism, this is the baptism spoken of in 1 Corinthians 12:12-13 where we are all baptised in to the body of Christ by the Holy Spirit. We see the truth that we are also raised to new life with Him and that our sin and the legal demands of it have been nailed to the cross. Now if you could turn with me to Romans 6 and we will continue to look at what it is to be crucified with Christ.

Romans 6:1–9 “1 What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? 2 By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it? 3 Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 4 We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. 5 For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. 6 We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. 7 For one who has died has been set free from sin. 8 Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. 9 We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him.”

Romans 6:10–14 “10 For the death he died he died to sin, once for all, but the life he lives he lives to God. 11 So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus. 12 Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, to make you obey its passions. 13 Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and your members to God as instruments for righteousness. 14 For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace.”

Here again we see if we have been baptized into Christ Jesus we have been baptized into his death. Here it expounds on this idea even more that it did in Colossians, we have not only been baptized into his death but also into his burial. All of this is so we can walk in the newness of life, but Paul clarifies this a little telling us that it was our old self, the part that was enslaved to sin that was crucified. This old self was the one who was subject to the law who looked to the law and could only see how wretched he or she is. Who was unable to keep it and therefore was destined to die. Through the Cross this part of us has in fact been put to death Paul writes.

When we put all of these together, we see Paul considers this a real death God considers this a real death. In these passages and in Galatians we see to be Crucified with Christ is to have our old self crucified or to consider it dead. We are to put it off sin because if we have died with Christ we have been set free from the law and sin. Remember that in Romans 7:8 Paul told us that apart from the law sin lies dead, Romans 6:14 tells us that we having died with Christ are no longer under the law but under grace therefore sin will no longer has dominion over us. I am not going to read the passage but Paul gives a wonderful illustration of this at the beginning of Romans 7 and he uses marriage to demonstrate this point. If you are married and your spouse passes away, you are then free to marry again. Before that point you are under the law of marriage and it would be considered adultery to marry someone else while your spouse is alive, but after they pass you are set free from that law. This is true of us and the law as well, when we place our faith in Jesus we are united with him in his death and we are set free from the Law. The law does not apply to those who are dead. So we must ask ourselves

Have we died?

Have we placed our faith in Jesus. If we have we have to look at our lives and ask another question. Keep your fingers in Romans 6 we are going to come back to it, but I am going to read part of our passage in Galatians again.

Galatians 2:19–20 ESV

19 For through the law I died to the law, so that I might live to God. 20 I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

I highlighted a couple of things in these verses. We see that this freedom, doesn’t come with the freedom to live however we want in sin and immorality as is frequently lived out and sometimes taught. Remember the I who died here is the flesh the very person who stood against God and under the law. If I have died with Christ, it is not supposed to be me living in me anymore, Paul writes here it is supposed to be Christ who lives in me and we are to live by faith in the Son of God.

Who are we presenting ourselves to?

If you go back to Romans 6, we see this choice and hopefully the slide selection will make more sense.

Romans 6:11–13 “11 So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus. 12 Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, to make you obey its passions. 13 Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and your members to God as instruments for righteousness.”

Romans 6:13 ESV

13 Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and your members to God as instruments for righteousness.

We can interpret this passage in a few different ways and they all have the same effect but we can look at it through a slave-owner relationship, a king-subject relationship, or a military relationship. All of these would have been easily understood by the readers at the time of this writing, but I lean toward the military interpretation due to the wording of the passage. The word here in the Greek for instruments more typically has this idea of weapons or instruments of war. It is used in Romans 13:12 and it is the word armour, it is also in 2 Corinthians both in chapter 6 and 10 translated weapons and in the Gospel of John in chapter 18 when the soldiers and pharisees come to arrest Jesus they come with torches and weapons. And this interpretation best lines up, when we consider what is going on in the world around us.

Ephesians 6:10–12 “10 Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might. 11 Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil. 12 For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.”

We are in a spiritual war, and we can either be weapons for sin or weapons of God for righteousness. There is never a middle ground in Scripture. We are never just neutral. We are to constantly be presenting ourselves to God. For a long time military boot camps, broke people down. This was to remove their me first mentality, to then build the unit up as a team. The idea being they act as a whole and the whole being only as strong as its weakest unit. God does the same thing with us, but we are no longer just as strong as our weakest unit. If we go back to our passage in Galatians, we are not even supposed to be the ones who are living, it is supposed to be Christ who lives in us and we are to live this life by faith, no longer by our own strength. We are no longer constrained to our weakness. Paul quotes Jesus in

2 Corinthians 12:9 “9 But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me.”

God shows himself in our weakness. If we are presenting ourselves to him, he is the one working, he is the one carrying us, he is the one living through us. He equips us, he cares for us, he strengthens us, and he comforts us. It is no longer us doing the work. If you have ever seen burden animals getting trained to pull heavy equipment, they always yoke a smaller young animal to an older bigger one. It is the bigger one who does all the work and the younger one just learns to be more like the big animal. We see this same idea with Jesus. We put his yoke upon us, he is doing the work we are just becoming more like him, learning from him.

Galatians chapter 2 closes with this line

Galatians 2:21 ESV

21 I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness were through the law, then Christ died for no purpose.

If everything Paul has said in this letter up to this point and righteousness were through the law, then the death of Christ was pointless. We could have done it ourselves. This life Paul now lives is by faith in the one who loved him who loved us and gave himself up for us and if we add anything more than that to our salvation we have nullified God’s grace. And Paul won’t do that, nor will I, nor should you.

Let us close with prayer.