The Freedom to Boast

Big Idea of the Sermon: Freedom to Boast

The cross of Jesus Christ, properly understood, is the only way to finally be free to serve God and truly serve others sacrificially.

Fallen Condition Focus: At the core of humanity is the need to be recognized, the need to prove ourselves on our own merits.

Intro

In an NPR interview, David Brooks, author of The Road to Character, observes how differently we deal with promoting our own success. Brooks said:

The day after Japan surrendered in 1945 and World War II ended, singer Bing Crosby appeared on the radio program Command Performance. "Well it looks like this is it," he said. "What can you say at a time like this? You can't throw your skimmer in the air—that's for a run-of-the-mill holiday. I guess all anybody can do is thank God it's over."

I was really struck at this supreme moment of American triumph that they weren't beating their chests. They weren't super proud of themselves; they were deeply humble. And I found that so beautiful and so moving. And I thought there's really something to admire in that public culture.

Shortly after studying about what happened after World War II, Brooks watched a pro football game. He observed something very different:

A quarterback threw a short pass to a wide receiver, who was tackled almost immediately for a two-yard gain. The defensive player did what all professional athletes do these days in moments of personal accomplishment. He did a self-puffing victory dance, as the camera lingered. It occurred to me that I had just watched more self-celebration after a two-yard gain than I had heard after the United States won World War II.

It’s a problem isn’t it? Pride. Boasting. Ego. Being noticed for our accomplishments seems to be what makes us matter in today’s world. Our children are growing up with athletes as role models who blame others when they fail or who excessively celebrate every success.

Last week we looked at the flesh - the sarx - and the power it has on our lives. And this morning we see that there’s a kind of boasting that keeps us in bondage to it… and then there’s a kind of boasting that frees us from it’s power and transforms us. Today Paul shows us how we have the freedom to boast.

what Paul means by boasting

3 options for boasting

what “cross-boasting” leads to

1. What Paul means by boasting

Paul has had two primary concerns in the letter to this point - 1 is theological and 1 is situational… 1) doctrinal concern: Galatians were in danger of losing justification by faith alone; and 2) situational concern: because of that they were in danger of losing unity in the church. In danger of a church split.

But Paul has had two primary concerns in the letter to this point - 1 is theological and 1 is situational… 1) doctrinal concern: Galatians were in danger of losing justification by faith alone; and 2) situational concern: because of that they were in danger of losing unity in the church. In danger of a church split.

And so most of the letter has been Paul emphasizing the importance of justification by Faith in Christ, and now he concludes with how a proper understanding of the Gospel will seep out and provide the solution to the situational concern.

I wish I had time to preach on this entire chapter, but for the sake of time, we skipped over the first 10 verses. Because I want to get into the meat of what Paul leaves them with. And he says something in the last verse of chapter 5 that introduces and brings unity to this last section:

Galatians 5:26 ESV

Let us not become conceited, provoking one another, envying one another.

5:

Conceited - it is a word that literally translated means “empty of glory”. Old English: “vain-glory”. Paul is saying that when we become empty of glory, it leads to envy and provocation.

When someone is conceited, it means they have a sense of emptiness, a desperation for recognition, a desperation to prove themselves. Or as I said several weeks back, they are desperate for Triple A.

tells us that deep down all human beings know they were created to love, know and serve God. They were created for glory. And that means that every part of you craves God’s recognition. You crave his affirmation. You want to hear him say, “well done, good and faithful servant.”

That’s our deepest longing. But since we aren’t certain we have that from God, we seek it from others instead. And so as we go out into the world we are constantly comparing ourselves to others in order to feel good about ourselves. Or we see things in others that are better than us, and so we envy them. But the result of this constant comparison is that we are using them to either feel superior or to motivate us towards our own goals… rather than loving and serving them.

Teen movies where there’s a group of girls. Always that one girl who is really beautiful/talented and all the other girls who hang out with her want to be like her.

She’s constantly comparing herself to them and them to her. She’s somebody as long as she’s superior to them; and they’re somebody as long as she wants to be around them. As long as they can be in her popularity shadow.

But then what happens? Some new girl moves to town and starts going to the school who is better looking than her, or more talented than her, or nicer than her and this challenges not only her identity but everyone else’s as well.

Why is this important? Because in our passage, Paul uses the verb form of conceited “boast” several times. It’s the same Greek word.

And Paul says when we are empty of glory, we look for something about ourselves that we can boast in. Some source of confidence, something that we can point that proves we are somebody. That’s what it means to be conceited and in the church it leads to the very opposite of sacrificial love and service.

2. Three options for boasting

So what do you boast in. We all need to boast in something in order to feel like somebody. So what is it for you?

Paul says there are three options for boasting / or 3 things we can boast in. Verse 15 says that we can either boast in circumcision, uncircumcision, or new creation. The first two count for nothing… only the third counts for anything. What does Paul mean here?

He’s basically saying that some people take pride in their religion. Others take pride in their irreligion. And this is true as much in our culture today as it was back then. People still boast in one of these two things.

Helpful to think of parable Jesus told in about the two sons of the Father or the two brothers. The younger brother goes the way of irreligion and indulges in prostitutes, drinking and partying - he breaks all the rules; while the older brother goes the way of religion and keeps all the rules. But at certain points in the story, both are far from the Father.

Paul is saying that we are either like the older brother, if we boast in our religion by putting our confidence in our religious rituals, or our moral goodness, or by how committed we are to God. And remember how you are able to boast… by comparing yourself with others. That means we look around the church at people who appear to be less committed than we are and we boast, even if it’s just inwardly, about how we’re better Christians than they are.

Have you ever said outwardly or in your head, “I sure wish more people at All Souls cared more about ____.” children’s ministry. cleaning up. bringing food to a potluck. setting up on Sunday. mercy ministry like helping me move. missions. giving financially.

We’re comparing ourselves aren’t we. Because we need to feed our pride and ego.

But we can also be like the younger brother… who boast in the fact that they don’t care about the rules. They come across as indifferent to the rules altogether. There’s even an illusion of freedom - the rules don’t control me! Other people don’t control me. In a sort of James Dean rebel sort of way - they are sticking it to the “man” and are free to live how they want. But they are chained to the rules as much as the elder brother - just in the other direction.

And ironically younger brothers are typically comparing themselves with elder brothers and elder brothers are comparing themselves to younger brothers. And each one is putting their confidence - their boasting is in the fact that they are better than the other.

We could put all sorts of categories in here instead of circumcision and uncircumcision or religious and irreligious: Republican and Democrat. Liberal and Conservative. Whatever our lines of demarcation, it is always simply a reason for our own boasting in the flesh.

Or we could say Republicans and Democrats here.

These lines we draw, these comparisons we make, they don’t count for anything, says Paul. What counts is new creation.

The gospel of Jesus Christ does something deep inside of us that completely transforms our source of boasting. It doesn’t say that the gospel eliminates boasting. It says that the gospel provides a third option for boasting. A third option that only exists through the power of the Holy Spirit: The cross of Jesus Christ - v. 14.

When you make the cross your boast, Paul says you become a whole new person. If you’ve learned to put all your confidence in the cross, you no longer operate according to the world’s system of boasting… of using others in order to make your particular boast. You are free of their opinions, free of what they think of you. You are finally free to fully and wholly serve and love God. You are free to love and serve others as well.

3. What “cross-boasting” leads to

P says “cross boasting” leads to at least 3 things in a person’s life:

New Creation -

New Creation - the way we live as a new creation and die to our flesh is by learning to constantly boast in the cross.

Boasting in warfare - how do you get soldiers to charge into battle into almost certain death? boasting - general/commander says: “we are stronger than they are…” and all the men go “yeah!” “We have better weapons than they do...” “YEAH!” The get all worked up, and then they charge the battlefield.

William Wallace - played by Mel Gibson in Braveheart - remember that scene? Wallace addresses the soldiers before the epic battle that they will surely lose: “Fight and you may die. Run and you’ll live—at least a while. And dying in your beds many years from now, would you be willing to trade all the days from this day to that for one chance, just one chance to come back here and tell our enemies that they may take our lives, but they’ll never take our freedom!!!” And then they all yell with one voice “Alba gu bra!” which means “Scotland forever.”

Paul takes this battle metaphor and weaves it into his argument in order to show us that if you want to be truly free…if you want to die to yourself, then you need to boast. You can’t help but boast. But what are you boasting in? That is the question. Is it the cross of Christ?

Persecution - He says, in v. 12 that his opponents, the false teachers in Galatia were afraid of being persecuted for the cross of Christ. They were afraid of being rejected by their friends and by society, they were afraid of suffering for it, and therefore avoided boasting in the cross.

Boasting in the Cross will lead to persecution. Jesus himself said, in : “A servant is not greater than his master. If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you.”

John 15:20 ESV

Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours.

Matthew 15:20 CSB

These are the things that defile a person; but eating with unwashed hands does not defile a person.”

John 15:20–21 CSB

Remember the word I spoke to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours. But they will do all these things to you on account of my name, because they don’t know the one who sent me.

“If they persecute me, they will persecute you. But they are not actually persecuting you, but me.”

“If they persecute me, they will persecute you. But they are not actually persecuting you, but me.”

“If they persecute me, they will persecute you. But they are not actually persecuting you, but me.”

What about us? Are we afraid of persecution? Paul shows us here that by nature the cross is offensive. People find it insulting to be told that they are too weak and sinful to do anything to contribute to their salvation. The gospel is offensive to liberal-minded people, because it claims that the cross is the only way to be saved. But it is also offensive to conservative-minded people, because it states that, without the cross, “good” people are in as much trouble as “bad” people. if you boast in the cross you will offend somebody.

Paul certainly did and he bore the marks of it on his body. What about us? Are we boasting in the cross? Are we bearing the marks of Christ? Or are we afraid to be offensive?

Are we afraid to be offensive to our culture?

Humility - Boasting in the cross of Jesus Christ, surprisingly leads to humility rather than pride. C.S. Lewis makes a brilliant observation about gospel-humility in Mere Christianity. He says that if we were to meet a truly humble person, we would never come away from meeting them thinking they were humble.

They would not be always telling us they were a nobody (because a person who keeps saying they are a nobody is actually a self-obsessed person). The thing we would remember from meeting a truly gospel-humble person is how much they seemed to be totally interested in us. Because the essence of gospel-humility is not thinking more of myself or thinking less of myself, it is thinking of myself less.

Boasting in the cross of Jesus Christ leads to gospel humility because it frees us from needing to think about ourselves. It frees us from the need to connect things with myself, or make things about me. It is an end to such thoughts as, “I’m in this room with these people, does that make me look good? Do I want to be here?”

True humility means I stop connecting every conversation and every experience with myself. In fact I stop thinking about myself.

Can you imagine what our church would be like if we all boasted in the cross? If we all had that kind of humility? It can be. If we repent of our boasting in the flesh - whichever side of it we tend to lean. And instead look to the cross, make it our confidence, get our identity from it. Boast in it. The cross of Jesus Christ is what has the power to transform our lives… our church… our city… our world. The cross of Jesus Christ is the only way we can truly be free. Will you commit with me to boast in it!

The Lord’s Supper is a way that we boast in the cross.