Transcript

Crucified and Alive-Part Two

Galatians 2:1-21
Sunday, May 27, 2012
Pastor Randy Smith

---

The great preacher, C.H. Spurgeon tells of an occasion when he was riding home one evening after a heavy day's work and feeling very wearied and depressed, until the verse, "My grace is sufficient for you" came to him. He immediately compared himself to a little fish in the Thames, apprehensive lest, drinking so many pints of water in the river each day, it might drink the Thames dry, and hearing Father Thames say to it, "Drink away, little fish, my stream is sufficient for you." Then he thought of a little mouse in the granaries of Joseph in Egypt, afraid lest it might - by daily consumption of the corn it needed - exhaust the supplies and starve to death; when Joseph came along and, sensing its fear, said, "Cheer up, little mouse, my granaries are sufficient for you." Or again, he thought of himself as a man climbing some high mountain to reach its lofty summit, and dreading lest he might exhaust all the oxygen in the atmosphere, when the Creator Himself said, "Breathe away, O man, and fill thy lungs ever; my atmosphere is sufficient for you."

He giveth more grace as our burdens grow greater,
He sendeth more strength as our labors increase;
To added afflictions He addeth His mercy,
To multiplied trials He multiplies peace.

When we have exhausted our store of endurance,
When our strength has failed ere the day is half done,
When we reach the end of our hoarded resources
Our Father's full giving is only begun.

His love has no limits, His grace has no measure,
His power no boundary known unto men;
For out of His infinite riches in Jesus
He giveth, and giveth, and giveth again.

Annie J. Flint

Our study-which began three weeks ago-in Galatians has all centered on God's free, unlimited, unconditional and unrivaled grace. It is the grace that only He can supply and it is the grace that He delights to lavish upon undeserving sinners simply when they ask for it in faith. The beauty of grace that forgave all our sins and reconciled us to God not based on anything we did but based on the sufficient and perfect work of Jesus Christ. Through His sacrifice on the cross, Jesus purchased our salvation entirely. Our sins have been put away and we are at peace with the Father. The personal guilt is gone. The need to earn His love is abolished. The fear has been cast aside. Grace that is sufficient to save and grace that is sufficient for our needs every day. We are His and He is ours for all eternity. That is the beauty of the biblical Gospel of free grace.

Paul had to write this letter we are studying to the churches in Galatia because this wonderful Gospel message of free grace that he proclaimed to them was being maligned by a sect of false teachers we commonly referred to as Judaizers. The Judaizers proclaimed that Jesus was good, but in order to be saved a person must also do good works, specifically back then it was the ceremonial laws of the Old Covenant, especially circumcision.

Paul knew that God had provided one message for salvation. We call it the Gospel. And if we choose to change this message, God is not obligated to comply with our alterations. Paul made the only way to receive salvation crystal clear in this letter. We covered one of the many verses last week: Galatians 2:16, "Nevertheless knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the Law but through faith in Christ Jesus, even we have believed in Christ Jesus, so that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the Law; since by the works of the Law no flesh will be justified."

Though man in his pride wants to contribute to his salvation, the Bible is clear that such an effort is an affront to the work of Christ. It is a claim that Christ's work on the cross is deficient; it is a losing proposition no matter how hard one may try because all of our work is contaminated with sin. We can never earn the favor of a holy God. That is why God did all the work for us through Christ. Grace stands available if we receive His love by faith. Will we accept His gift of salvation?

In today's passage we will learn how Paul received God's free grace at a point in time and then lived every day by grace in light of this new reality.

1. Crucified in Christ

First, it is only natural that something must die before it can experience a completely new life. I'm calling this first point, "Crucified in Christ."

We must understand that there are two and only two possible ways to be with God.

First, we can try to earn eternal life with God through our good deeds, morality and spiritual rituals. Every world religion and even many false sects of Christianity teach this. If you do enough, hopefully one day the scales will weigh out in your favor. But we all know that trying to earn God's approval will always result in confusion - wondering if you did enough, and guilt - knowing you fall short every day, and pride - thinking you are better than others. The core problem with this approach is that God is perfect and He will not lower His standards, nor does He grade on a curve. If you want to earn your way to God, it must be perfect compliance with His entire Law. The false teachers were persuading the Galatians to pursue this route through circumcision. In 5:3 Paul made it clear that if you want to earn salvation you can't stop with circumcision. "And I testify again to every man who receives circumcision, that he is under obligation to keep the whole Law." It's all or nothing.

The only other possible road to God is through grace. This option, the biblical option says you can never do enough. This option says God knows this and that is why in His love and mercy He sent Jesus Christ to be our substitute. Where we failed, Jesus succeeded. And because He succeeded in fulfilling God's law perfectly He qualified to be our representative on the cross. He stood in our place and bore our penalty. Justice was accomplished completely. Forgiveness is available entirely.

This is why Paul says in verse 19 that he himself "died to the Law." He died to the attempts of trying to use God's Law or any other man-invented ethical code of conduct as a means to secure God's favor. He knew this road was a losing proposition 100% of the time. He knew the Law's intentions were never to be used as a means of salvation. He knew the Law only revealed his sin, a "tutor" as he calls it in 3:24 "to lead [him]to Christ."

Paul puts his death even more violently in verse 20: "I have been crucified with Christ." Crucifixion was an awful tool in the ancient world. It brought tremendous agony and humiliation. And it always guaranteed to bring something else as well: death. Once nailed to that cross a crucified man didn't walk away.

Paul uses this illustration to graphically describe his death. The old man in him was fighting to stay alive and do self-righteous deeds to secure its salvation. Paul had no other option but to crucify him as an enemy, as a traitor to the free grace of God. Paul knew the death that His Master faced on the cross. Paul knew how the cross was an open display of his own hellish condition. Christ's crucifixion proved the depravity of man and the extent of God's love to rescue us for our sin. Paul knew that his self-reliance and self-exaltation could not exist with Christ at Calvary. The crucifixion of Jesus on the old wooden cross was a picture that the old Paul needed to die as well. As one author put it, "On that Cross He was crucified for me, and on that Cross I am crucified with Him" (John Gregory Mantle). For all Christians, coming to Christ is a death to self. Paul put it this way in verse 20, "It is no longer I who live." Dead people can't try to obtain God's favor. It is "resting in peace (RIP)," relying every day on God's grace and not rituals and rules to secure His love.

2. Alive in Christ

Second point, Paul in a sense died to his old ways of thinking and doing things, but that death brought for him (as it does us) a blessed life! It made him alive!

In verse 19 he says he "died to the Law so that [he] might live to God." There was a deliberate purpose in his death. He died in trying to obtain God's favor through his deeds. And the result? Only now is he able to live to God. Simple conclusion? When we try to work our way to God we are dead to God. But when we trust the sufficiency of His work for us, only then will we experience true life. Did you notice the irony? The more we try to attain God's favor with our ability, the more God is offended. The more we rest in His grace and our inability, the more God is honored. The first one brings our death. The latter brings our life.

So the old Paul was dead. He was crucified with Christ, but there was no doubt that Paul as a person was still alive. Half way through verse 20 he refers to that when he says, "The life which I now live in the flesh." So in a sense the old Paul was dead. But the new Paul was alive, and that new Paul is identified in verse 20 as Christ living in him or as he puts it, "Christ lives in me."

My friends, this is the heart of the Christian faith. When I was a school teacher I'd always cringe when the teachers assigned their yearly project, "All about me." Self is in the center on a poster board surrounded by bubbles depicting our greatest interests in life. Almost always, God never made the poster. Occasionally a child would put church or religion in a bubble sharing equal space with cell phones, a sport and a favorite TV show.

I really believe this is how most professing Christians think about their faith. At best it becomes Jesus tacked on to an already overcrowded life. That is not the biblical message, and I'd be hard-pressed to even consider that a saving message. When we come to Christ, Jesus becomes our life. We die and He now lives His life through us. That doesn't mean we lose our unique personality or interests. It only means that we use them as He guides us, and we use them for His glory. Where do You want me to go? What do You want me to say? How do You want me to act? Our lordship has been changed from self to Christ. This is the greatest evidence of salvation because this is evidence that one has been made alive by grace to God and that grace is now showing itself by producing not a reformed life, but rather a transformed life as if you are a new person. Can you say as Paul said, "I am dead and the live that I now live is Christ in me."

A young man approached an older Christian with this question: "What does it mean as far as this life is concerned to be 'crucified with Christ'?" The believer replied, "It means three things: One, a man on a cross is facing in only one direction; two, he is not going back; and three, he has no further plans of his own." Commenting on this, T. S. Rendall wrote, "Too many Christians are trying to face in two directions at the same time. They are divided in heart. They want Heaven, but they also love the world. They are like Lot's wife: running one way, but facing another. Remember, a crucified man is not coming back. The cross spells "finished" for him; he is not going to return to his old life. Also, a crucified man has no plans of this own. He is through with the vainglory of this life. Its chains are broken and its charms are gone" (Our Daily Bread, Saturday, November 28).

3. Faith in Christ

Let's move to the third point, "Faith in Christ." Jumping back into the context, Paul's primary point is that he began his relationship with God solely on the basis of grace (to obtain God's favor) and that he still lives by that grace every day (and not his own merit to maintain God's favor). Or we could say, Paul began by faith in Christ's work, and he lives every day by faith in Christ's work. Halfway through verse 20 he said, "And the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me."

It's a shame that the NIV translators left out that word, "now." It is in the original Greek and I believe for a good reason. Why? Because Paul is talking about how he lives "now" in light of the grace he first received at salvation. He makes it crystal-clear throughout Galatians that we come to God solely on the basis of grace. But what happens after that point? What happens when I realize I still struggle with sin? What happens when I repeatedly let God down? What happens when I am still burdened by past sins Satan brings to my attention? What happens when I am tempted to start doing things to earn God's favor? The answer is here in verse 20. We still live every day in God's all-sufficient grace. We live every day by faith in the Son of God! We live every day knowing that how He loved me when I came to Him is how He loves me today and will tomorrow as well. And we live every day reminding ourselves that He proved His love for me by giving Himself up for me on the cross. Let those words ring in your head, Christian! "[He] loved me and gave Himself up for me." It's personal!

We live in a performance oriented culture. At work, school, athletics, even dysfunctional families your standing is achieved based upon what you do. God does not work this way, and even if He did our best days as a Christian would fail to receive His approval. That is why we begin with grace and live by grace every day. Because of what Jesus accomplished, we remember that we are forever loved and forever accepted. Die to self-righteousness! Be free! And as Paul has repeatedly said, this is true life! And apart from all of us living this way, we will never have a church on fire for Christ!

Is there any part of you that needs to die to self? The great man of God, George Mueller, when questioned about his spiritual power, simply responded, "One day George Mueller died." Evangelist Christmas Evans, putting down on paper his surrender to Christ, began it by writing: "I give my soul and body to Jesus." It was, in a very real sense, a death to self. Do you need to go conduct your own funeral so you can really start to experience life? Think about that! Have you ever told God, "I am completely Yours without reservation?" There is no other hope. There is no other alternative. There is no other Gospel.

4. Righteousness in Christ

And Paul makes that clear as we move to our final point, "Righteousness in Christ."

I hope by now you have come to this conclusion yourself. I hope by now you realize that trying to earn God's favor is an offense to Him as if you and I as fallen sinners can meet His holy standards. I hope you by now realize that anything you attempt to do to earn His favor implies that Jesus Christ and His work on the cross was deficient. I hope by now you realize the sheer impossibility of earning or even contributing to your salvation and the personal agony of living in doubt, confusion and condemnation. The Gospel message from God is clear. Salvation is available by grace through faith in Christ. Grace alone. Faith alone. Christ alone. Period!

But if you still have any doubts, Paul adds the final nail to the coffin in verse 21. "I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness comes through the Law, then Christ died needlessly."

I love that verse! His point? If there be any other way to achieve God's favor perhaps it's by good works or religion or your own invention (which is in vogue today), then why in the world did the Father send His Son to die on the cross? What a waste that would have been! So anything that does away with Jesus or seeks to complement His work dishonors Christ and makes the Father look outright foolish. Though his opponents accused Paul of diminishing grace, the pure Gospel and that Gospel alone lifts grace to its highest and most exalted place.