New Birth Brings Freedom

February 12, 2017 Background Scripture: Galatians 4 Lesson Passage: Galatians 4:8 – 20 There are times when it seems impossible for some Christians to accept the extent to which grace abounds in working eternal salvation in us. We still want to do our part, i.e. work, in bringing about and sustaining our own salvation. Grace seems too easy from our perspective so we feel that we need to make up for the lack of a struggle or, in other words, we want to do something to earn our salvation or to at least show that we deserved it. In fact, to not have to do something is what causes some to label salvation by grace alone as a license to sin. We reason that if a person can be saved and not have to go to church or give a prescribed financial amount or openly live a certain way, then people will be tempted to accept salvation and then proceed to live their lives in any fashion they see fit. This kind of reasoning totally misses the point. Grace does not give us the license to sin but instead it gives us the license and desire to live holy. Because of grace we can drop all pretenses and live life as God calls us to. Within the Law, the Jews identified six hundred and thirteen statutes or rules to live by to exemplify holiness. They also discovered that it is impossible for a person to keep all of them because of sin in the flesh. So they further divided the statutes into those that were greater or lesser sins. The Law makes evident the sin that resides in our flesh but the Jews were attempting to minimize some sins and elevate others. Through the new birth, we have obtained the grace of God which frees us from trying to be holy by keeping the statutes in the Law. It is this freedom coupled with eternal salvation that causes angst in many. Some are so accustomed to the bondage of the Law that freedom is downright scary. Never mind that no one was keeping all of the statutes anyway. We were content to compare ourselves to each other—at least, what we know about each other. As long as we felt that we were as good as the next person, we lived as though God was going to grade us on a curve. Truthfully, we don’t really know what to do with religious freedom. Although we have received grace, we still have sin in our flesh. This sin is in constant rebellion against God and the Spirit of Christ in us. Grace has given us the desire to live holy and the Spirit gives us the power to do it. However, we are warned to not use our freedom such that it would cause a morally weaker Christian to stumble. We should exercise restraint for the benefit of others. On the other hand, we should not allow others to convince us of what they believe to be necessary for salvation aside from what God has shown us. The Law is a yoke of bondage but grace makes us free. This was the message Paul attempted to convey to the Galatians to refute the false teaching of the Jewish Christians. Their attempt to burden Christianity with the works of the Law was either unintentional error or a clear denial that the new birth brings freedom. Today, many Christians who have never been under the Law make the same error by not comprehending the unsearchable depths of grace. It is because of the grace of God that we are not constrained to obtain salvation by works and therefore, in Christ we have freedom. Robert C. Hudson January 5, 2017