Untitled Sermon (4)

Freedom

Holman New Testament Commentary: Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians & Colossians I. Introduction: Cows in Prison

Cows in Prison

When I was a teenager growing up in the country, we had great fun letting the yearling calves out of the barn after a long winter. These calves had been born the summer before, so a pen in the barn was the only world they had known. They were kept there because of the severity of the northern Indiana winters. When spring came, we would open the gates that had separated the calves from the outside world. Then the calves were free to go into the field. However, the calves didn’t know what to do with their newfound freedom.

On a typical day they bucked and jumped and ran around inside the pen in excitement but wouldn’t leave it. Often they would run right up to where the gate used to be and slam on the brakes. From a full gallop they planted their front feet and dropped their noses to the floor as their rumps flew up in the air, stopping exactly where they would have had to stop if the gate had been there. Then they wheeled and sprinted, tail flying, for the other side of the barn.

Afterward, not having any more nerve for the bold approach, they changed strategies and inched cautiously up to the invisible barrier as if it were a snake. When they had exhausted their supply of nerve, they jerked back as though bitten. Then they ran around again on the inside of the pen like a merry-go-round run amok, bucking, jumping, and kicking the air. It would sometimes take hours for them to get up the nerve to leave, terrified of their sudden freedom, preferring the safety of their small enclosure to the unknown openness of the pasture outside.

I have often thought how these calves were like legalists, preferring the limitations and security of a set of dos and don’ts to the frightening world of walking by faith. Why would they want to stay in the barn when freedom, sunshine, and fresh air were theirs? That is the question Paul asks of the Galatian church. Having been freed from the slavery of the law, under Paul’s initial visit, why would they now want to lose their freedom and go back to the bondage of the law?

Paul answers this question in chapter 5 in three ways. First, he implores them to stand firm in their freedom in Christ (v. 1). Then, he lists six negative consequences of returning to the law (vv. 2–11). Finally, he introduces the Spirit-filled life as the power to overcome sin and evil (vv. 12–26).

"Gratitude Ethic." It says that God has done so much for me that I will devote my life to paying back my debt, even though I know I will never be able to completely. And even though most Christians who work out of this gratitude ethic would say that they are not trying to earn their salvation, nevertheless, when they start working for God because he has given them so much, it is very easy to begin to think of God's free gift as a loan to be repaid or as advance wages to be earned. So the gratitude ethic tends to put you in the position of a debtor instead of a son. And that is slavery. None of us feels completely free while we are burdened with a debt to be repaid. Christ does not want you to relate to him as a debtor who uses the law to make installment payments on an unending loan.

There are at least three reasons why this gratitude ethic is wrong.

First, true gratitude is, indeed, a sense of joyful indebtedness

The second reason the gratitude ethic is wrong is that it diminishes the cross of Christ.

The third reason why the gratitude ethic is wrong is that it tends to think of God's work for us as only in the past.

Everything good we do is from the Spirit, so even the gifts we give to God are from God.

How do we wait for the