Love Conquers All

HO Hum

I was kicked out of school. Sent home for wearing pants that were not appropriate for a person in a Christian school.

Legalism - term often used in this regard.

Tennessee Temple - Bible college in Chattanooga TN

Rules and regulations:

Women had to wear skirts

couples had to be 14 inches apart when they were together

etc . . .

WBTU

Some Christians are living a life of obligation rather than grace.

I wonder if the reason for the decline in churches in America isn’t a result of this sinful departure from its original mission.

Tennessee Temple is no longer in existence. Could it be because they confused obligation to the law with sanctification and obedience.

Are we a people who are spreading the gospel of grace or the gospel of slavery?

Our mission is to share the gospel of Jesus Christ, which is freedom from obligations.

Salvation is through faith in Jesus Christ, anything we add to that is an obligation not required by God.

Paul, addresses Galatians with a warning:

Galatians 5:1 ESV

1 For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.

Against the Circumcision party

obligation to keep the law

Covenant with Abraham

Paul warns them that when they depart from the gospel they actually depart from Christ. “severed from Christ.”

Damage occurs to the mission of the church, the spreading of the gospel, when we turn from it to the law

We become ineffective in our mission when:

FI

1Paul against the Circumcision party

Against the Circumcision party, men who believed it was a requirement for being a child of God

obligation to keep the law, an impossible task

Covenant with Abraham

This is what Paul has in mind in this passage, when he warns that leaning on the law, by making circumcision an obligation actually moves us away from our dependency on Christ for salvation.

“yoke of slavery” (1)

“Christ will be of no advantage to you” (2)

“You are severed from Christ.” (4) & “You have fallen away from grace.”

Legalism - term often used in this regard.

Tennessee Temple - Bible college in Chattanooga TN

Rules and regulations:

Women had to wear skirts

couples had to be 14 inches apart when they were together

etc . . .

I remember very little about our experience there, but I do remember the legalism.

I grew up in the church, and much of what I remember is not hearing about grace, but hearing about rights and wrongs, the law of God. How we should and should not act.

When this is the emphasis of the church we are not just missing the mark, we are actually anti-gospel. Paul plainly is speaking in this passage that we must not turn from the gospel of grace to the law of slavery.

Are we being legalistic in our speech and conduct?

2 Days of obligation in the Roman Catholic Church

This is why the reformers Martin Luther, John Calvin, John Knox, all stood against the RC church

In the teaching of the Catholic Church, an indulgence (Latin: indulgentia, from indulgeō, 'permit') is "a way to reduce the amount of punishment one has to undergo for sins". ... The recipient of an indulgence must perform an action to receive it.

Church Calendar

Know and Calvin taught that every Lord’s Day is a celebration of the resurrection

Saw little use for other days of obligation, believing it to be an addition that was unbiblical

On August 17, 1959 the Scottish Parliament voted to approve the Protestant confession calling Roman Catholicism an : “old system, rotten to the core”

3 Church attendance

Mother’s Day

Mom making sure I went to church - could be seen as good discipline or legalism

If I went to church only out of obligation and not because of the Holy Spirit then it would be no different

Wake of Covid- -19

Do we forgo worship and coming together as a people of God to appease the government?

Are we obeying God rather than man?

At the same time, are we loving our neighbor by gathering?

What other obligations are you adding to being a child of God?

So What?

What then is the Christian faith all about? If it is not about rules and regulations, what is it?

It is cleared up by Paul in verse 5 & 6

Galatians 5:5–6 ESV

5 For through the Spirit, by faith, we ourselves eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness. 6 For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love.

Christianity is about living in the Spirit (more on this starting next week) and living by faith

wait for the hope of righteousness, something not yet obtained

And

Faith working through love

Love of God for us, through Jesus Christ, as we see in God redeeming us through the death, burial, resurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ

Message

As Christians we need to get back to our mission as given by God. The spreading of the gospel, not the yoke of slavery by other obligations,

The message we have is that the gospel is about what Jesus did for us.

The love he showed for us.

And, then the love we extend to others.

1 Peter 4:8 ESV

8 Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins.

We need to be a people who lives in light of the love Jesus has shown us, accepting no other obligation

And, we need to be a people who lives by expressing this love to others so that they may come to faith in Christ

Let us be a people of faith, faith that the work of Jesus was sufficient for our salvation. That the love of God covers us, and the only requirement for salvation and being a member of the church of Jesus Christ, is faith working through love.

Paul’s exhortation is clear:

Galatians 5:1 ESV

1 For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.

When we rest completely on the love of Christ for us, we then can stand firm, not on our own undesrtanding, but on Him.

In 1959 John Knox was asked to come back to Scotland to preach the gospel in opposition to the extra obligations imposed by the RC church.

Visited St. John’s of Perth where he preaached

As the Queen regent, Mary Guise was persecuting and killing protestants, Knox would preach the gospel thousands would come to Christs, including fourteen priests of St. Andrews.

The gospel is God’s only means to bring men to faith. It is the message of God’s love through his son.

In the end, love, the love of Christ for his children conquers all. Let us rest in that today. AMEN