Galatians 5 - Freedom does not Mean Free For All

Good morning Journey I have been praying over this day for the last couple of weeks as I believe that it will be a day where many people are set free from the unnecessary weight and chains that come from trying to be religiously moral and trying to earn your way into the grace of God. It have to tell you church it is going to be a good day. But as we begin I want to thank you. Since the beginning of the year I have felt a shift in our church when it comes to our time of worship together and in our groups. Thank you for leaning into the spirit as we worship, thank you for bringing your bibles every week, thank you for leaning into the messages God has for you and for us and then actually doing what we were taught. We are seeing new families and new guests join us every week and they are being invited by you. This is just the start of what God is doing in North Peoria and through our church and it is not unrecognized. So lean in today as I have said before I believe God has something for all of us.

We are in part 4 of our series in the book of Galatians written by the Apostle Paul in the year 48-49 AD to the people in Galatia. This book is Paul’s 911 call to the church as the church during that time was being told and taught that in order to be saved from your sins you have to accept Jesus as lord and savior and repent of your sins, AND be circumcised. Why circumcision? Because that was the outward expression of the Jewish people to be set apart by God. But in making this a requirement to be considered a Chrsitian the Galatians were adding to the Gospel and in doing so preaching, teaching and practicing a false Gospel. The Gospel is this - The Lord Jesus is the Only Source of Salvation. That Jesus + Nothing = Salvation. It is the greatest news anyone can hear, and the greatest step anyone can take is believing in, devoting their life to following Jesus Christ. That you cannot add anything to the Gospel period. Paul even goes so far to say that even if an angel comes to you and tries to give you a different gospel, Paul wishes they go to hell.

Sound familiar, most cults, jehova’s witness, mormons, and other religions start with an angel came on God’s behalf and told me…Paul would say no, be cursed and be gone. I love the bible because it isn't just a book, it is a living breathing document written by God for us today. The same things people wrestled with 2000 years ago are the same issues we run into today. Today we are going to talk about how through the Gospel we are truly Free in Christ. Let’s pray before we jump in.

Pray

You know me by now, I like crowd participation and I am going to set you up with a teeball here so everyone can answer this one correctly and if you don't know the answer to this question the answer is yes. It's an open note test here we go. Does everybody know the significance of July 4th 1776? Great job church very proud of you. July 4th, 1776 is when our founding fathers of the United States of America signed the declaration of independence from Great Britain and the evil tyrant King George. It was the great patriot from Parks and Rec Ron Swanson who once said, “History Started on July 4th 1776. Everything else before that was a mistake.

Now I don't agree with that statement 100%, but July 4th was a significant event for multiple reasons but predominantly when our founding fathers wrote, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. And from this moment the most free and prosperous nation this world has ever seen was born. We have not always gotten it right, we have done a lot of wrong. Something to this magnitude was never attempted before. But do not be confused or misguided, even in our current political and social-economical standing, we are still the most free and most prosperous country on the face of the earth. America the land of the what? Free.

We call ourselves the most free people in the world, and to an extent we are. But let’s be honest, that term, freedom could be an illusion at times. Because here in our country we still have law and order.  I am free to do what I want as long as my freedoms do not hurt or hinder someone else's freedom’s. And if they do well guess what, I won’t actually be free for long. I have the freedom of speech, but I can’t yell fire in a crowded mall, I can’t say bomb at an airport. I am free to drive, but I can’t be reckless. I am free to own a gun, but I can’t take it on a plane. You get where I am going with this. We have freedom and we are free. But we have to understand that Freedom is Not a Free for All.

I wanted to lay this foundation and mindset before we jumped into Galatians 5 as the Apostle Paul writes these powerful words, so open up your bibles to Galatians 5 starting in verse 1 where he writes to the Galatians and to us, “It is for freedom that Christ has set us free.” Paul in these 10 words makes a profound statement. You are free to be free in Christ. But what did Jesus set us free from? The bondage and slavery to sin. You see Paul in Romans, and in other areas throughout the old and new testament makes this claim about the depravity of humanity. That every single person born is born a slave to sin. We are not free, we carry a weight and a burden that we cannot lift on our own. We live in a fallen world and dark world that Jesus says the prince of darkness rules, good thing Jesus is the light. Without Jesus we have the illusion of freedom, and without Christ we just have the freedom to choose which sin we want to be enslaved by.

And because we are fallen and enslaved to sin we tend to hold onto a moralistic and legalistic relationship with God. That my salvation or freedom from sin comes from my morality, my goodness or my character. As long as I am better than someone else, as long as my good out weighs my bad, as long as I am better than the person next to be or across from me I can earn my way. And that is how the Israelites lived when given the law of Moses, but the laws did something really good, they showed us exactly how broken and sinful up we actually are. How far we have to go, and it makes us realize that we cant lift, carry, or earn our freedom from the slavery of sin. We need someone to free us. And lets be honest here, if the law worked to give freedom and salvation, it would have worked already.

And this is why we need Jesus. He took the weight and the burden of sin and placed it on himself so that you may have freedom. Free from the shame of sin. Free from the guilt of sin, free from the punishment of sin, free from the judgment of sin and one day free from the presence of sin. Paul says that it is for freedom, the express purpose of God is that you would be freed from the slavery and bondage of sin and live in submission to Jesus. We are free to have a relationship with God that is no longer determined by our actions, but Christ’s action on the cross “It is for freedom that Christ has set us free.”

But Paul has a warning for all of us, Stand firm,then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery. This word stand firm means to preserve, don’t move, don’t compromise. Isn't it interesting that we are saved by Grace through faith in Jesus. But we constantly fall back into our moralistic and law following views of God. We think that because we still sin that we fall out of grace, but friends I want to tell you in Christ we don't fall out of grace when we sin, we constantly fall deeper into it. So just like the gentiles and jews in this passage, we see that they fall back to the old way of living according to the law. And Paul says in the next several verses if you revert back to your old way of living  trying to be justified by the law, Christ means nothing to you. That when you embrace the law you are rejecting Jesus. That when you put the chains of slavery back on you you diminish the finsished worked of Jesus. Basically you say without even knowing it, Jesus what you did didn't matter. So Paul urges them, if you are going to follow one part of the law you have to follow the whole thing. You can’t pick and choose what areas you will and won’t follow.

In fact he makes one of the more graphic and dark jokes we see in the bible. I wonder if he said it a little more tongue in cheek, but as we’ve talked every week they were being taught that to have salvation you believe in Jesus and get cirucmcised. Paul simply says, hey if you are going to allow yourself to fall back to your old way of living, don’t just stop at the circumcision, cut the whole thing off and be done with it! (laugh)

You know we are not too different than the Galatians. We believe in Jesus and start living in the freedom he has given us, but we tend to revert back to our old way of living. Sure a few major sin issues may no longer hinder you, but just the same, your back and your life may not look any different than it was before Jesus. You are free in Christ but you still hold onto and obey your sinful master. Our moralistic standards of justification and righteousness are the same. We have what people call the prisoner mindset. That when a prisoner has been jailed for so long, when they get out they can't assimilate back into society, so they commit a crime to go right back in. When we are free in Christ the chains are gone, but oftentimes, we place them back on ourselves. It is for freedom that Christ set you free. So what does freedom in Christ look like, how do we move forward in this freedom? I’m glad you asked.

Paul writes this at the end of our passage for today, “You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love. For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Here is my main point: if you missed anything from today, don't miss this, “You are free in Christ to be like Christ.” You are free in Christ to be like Christ. This is a profound statement beucase before you follow Jesus you are a slave to sin, and once you are free you can be more like the one who set you free. You receive the Holy Spirit, you are a new creation, the old is gone and the new is here and you have the opportunity to submit yourself to Jesus in order that you might be more like Jesus. This is what we talked about last week, it is the process of Sanctification.

A lot of people view Jesus as a get out of hell free card, they profess him as Lord and Savior so when they leave this earth they won’t go to hell, but then they live like hell on this earth, they abuse the freedom that Chrsit has given them. Ultimately they abuse the Grace of God. There is an old world war 2 German Pastor by the name of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and in his book entitled “The Cost of Discipleship” he lays out two different views when it comes to the Grace of God.

He says we either view grace as Cheap Grace, we abuse it, use it, that grace is what sets us free and therefore no matter what I do or how I live, I can continue on in my sinful lifestyle and ways with no regard because after all I have the grace of God to forgive me. Cheap grace is preaching forgiveness and freedom without repentance of sin. Thats cheap grace, and then he lays out the view of Costly Grace. This view of Grace is costly, because we understand and know the price that was paid in order for us to receive it. It is costly because it means that we fight against our flesh and desires, its costly because we no longer desire to live in the old way of life, it is costly grace because it demands that we be fully devoted followers of Jesus and in the pursuit of life we desire nothing more than to be a disciple of Jesus. It is costly because you die to yourself, it is no longer I who live but Christ to lives in me. I know the price that was paid to set me free so I am going to cherish it, I am going to hold fast, I am not going to move from it.

We must view our freedom as costly, and in doing so we are free to be christlike. Paul says, exactly what Bonhoffer said, do not use your new freedoms to indulge the flesh, don't view it as cheap, but rather live and be like Jesus. Loving and serving one another. It is a call to a higher way of living, a higher standard and higher calling. You are Free in Christ to be Christlike, but like I said before, Freedom does not mean free for all. We hold fast to the teachings of Jesus. There are still standards and expectations as one who follows Jesus. The difference is we are not trying to earn our way back to God, rather we are living in the freedom that Chrsit has given us to live in his grace and live like him and for him. We are going to look at how we can do that more practically next week.

But as I close I wanted to give you an illustration to drive this point home. We are Free in Christ to be like Christ. And that that Freedom is not a free for all. Imagine with me for you moment that being free in Christ is like playing the drums. Wouldn't you know it I have drums right here. So there are many different parts that make up the drums. You have your basics, bass drum, snare drum, hi hats, crash symbols, floor tom, you know the basics. Here I sit, and I have all the freedom in the world do play what I want, the problem is I don't know how to play the drums. Some people sit in their new freedoms and they don’t know how to be free in Christ. So what do they do, they revert back, they don't try to learn or move forward, but they are still expected to to play something so (play the drums) there is no rhyme, there is no rhythm, there is no reason where is only Chaos. And that is what alot of us live in these days, daily chaos, spiritually, emotionally, physically. Without submitting ourselves to Jesus, without moving forward in our faith, without order there is chaos. I’m not actually playing the drums, I am not making music, I am making noise and calling it freedom. Without order there is Chaos. I don’t know how to play.

But my main main Carson over here does. Give it up for Carson will you! This dude right here faithfully serves in our worship team. I want to show you what living in freedom looks like by having Carson play. You see it takes hard work, it takes discipline, it takes practice, it takes time of continually messing up but never giving up in order to learn to play an instrument and dare I say it’s the same in living in the freedom Jesus gives us. But Carson has the same freedom I did, he can hit whatever he wants however he wants the difference is, Carson is living within the confines of order and what we find out is living within order grants freedom to produce music. Go ahead and give us something great Carson. Carson is free to play as he likes, but to be able to have great music you must live within the realm of rhythm. I was talking with carson this past week, he was more nervous about trying to play bad than playing good, why…because once you know true freedom does not mean free for all, once you know order, you can’t go back.

So church, let me ask you…are you free?