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The Amish Voice 2
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Note two points:
1. When a person believes in Jesus Christ, he is freed from the law
and its enslaving power. He no longer has to worry if he is good
enough or if he has done enough good works or kept enough laws to
be acceptable to God. Why? Because Christ has fulfilled the law for
him. When Christ was on earth, He was sinless; He obeyed the law
perfectly, never violating it a single time. Therefore, He secured the
Ideal Righteousness and stood before God as the Perfect Man. But
Christ did something else much more wonderful. It was not enough
for the Ideal Righteousness to be secured for man. There was also the
problem of the penalty of the law; once the law had been broken, the
penalty had been enacted; it had to be paid. This is the glorious
message of the cross—what the death of Jesus Christ is all about.
Jesus Christ not only secured the ideal righteousness for us, He took
the penalty for our trespassing upon Himself and bore it. Jesus Christ
bore our judgment and punishment for having broken the law which
was death.
If righteousness has been secured for us and if the punishment for
our transgressions has been paid, then we stand before God perfect—
absolutely righteous and free from transgression—and acceptable to
Him. Does this mean everyone is accepted by God and covered by the
life and death of Jesus Christ? No! And the reason is easily seen: not
everyone accepts what Jesus Christ has done for him—not everyone
believes in Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ has set us free; we do stand in
liberty free from the bondage of sin and death wrought by the law—
but only if we believe it. Naturally—it is as obvious as can be—if we
do not believe and accept a gift freely given, then the Giver still
possesses it. We do not receive the gift; therefore, we do not have it.
The point is this: Christ has freed the believer from the bondage of the
law. Therefore, we must stand firm in the liberty He has provided for
us.
2. The Galatians were about to become entangled again with the
yoke of bondage. False teachers had arisen who were teaching that
the basic work of Christ was to live as a great example and to bring us
the great teachings of God. That is, they accepted Jesus Christ as the
Son of God, but they did not accept the message of salvation by grace
(the righteousness and death of Jesus Christ). They taught that Jesus
Christ had not come to give us a new approach to God; He came to
add new teachings to the law.
Therefore, a person was still to approach God. . .
by undergoing the basic ritual of Jewish religion (circumcision,
baptism, church membership, etc.).
by committing himself to the law.
by observing all the rituals and ceremonies of Jewish religion.
All of this of course sounds familiar to every generation, for if we
simply omit the word
Jewish
, the three stipulations are seen to be
present in so many teachings, religions, and churches of society.
Again, the exhortation is that a person must not become entangled
with approaching God by law or works, for no person can ever do
enough good to become perfect before God. Our perfection and
acceptance before God has already been secured for us—in Christ
Jesus our Lord. Therefore, we must stand firm in the liberty that
Christ has given us. For the only person who will ever be acceptable
to God is the person who stands before God free of sin and
condemnation, a person who has been set free by God’s very own
Son.
“For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath
made me free from the law of sin and death. For what the
law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God
sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for
sin, condemned sin in the flesh” (Ro. 8:2-3).
ILLUSTRATION:
Christ has freed the Christian believer from the power of the law.
With that truth stated, keep yourself free. In
Who Will Deliver Us?
,
Paul F.M. Zahl writes:
A duck hunter was with a friend in the wide-open land of
southeastern Georgia. Far away on the horizon he noticed a cloud of
smoke. Soon he could hear cracking as the wind shifted. He realized
the terrible truth: a brushfire was advancing, so fast they couldn’t
outrun it.
Rifling through his pockets, he soon found what he was looking
for—a book of matches. He lit a small fire around the two of them.
Soon they were standing in a circle of blackened earth, waiting for
the fire to come.
They didn’t have to wait long. They covered their mouths with
handkerchiefs and braced themselves. The fire came near—and swept
over them. But they were completely unhurt, untouched. Fire would
not pass where fire had already passed.
The law is like a brushfire. I cannot escape it. But if I stand in the
burned-over place, not a hair of my head will be singed. Christ’s
death is the burned-over place. There I huddle, hardly believing yet
relieved. The law is powerful, yet powerless: Christ’s death has
disarmed it.
QUESTIONS:
1. What things could become potential entanglements of
bondage to you? What protective barriers have you put in
place in order to stay free?
2. What is Christ’s relationship with the law?
3. Can rituals sometimes become yokes of bondage? What can
you do to keep rituals from enslaving you, from becoming the
focus of attention instead of Christ Himself?