 And we're getting near the end here of chapter three and the title of tonight's sermon airs of promise airs of promise Galatians 3 and it's verses 26 through 29 Galatians 3 verses 26 through 29 And let's read that together Galatians 3 26 through 29 And the Bible says for you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ There's neither June or Greek, there's neither slave nor free There's neither male nor female for you are all one in Christ Jesus And if you are Christ then you are Abraham's seed and airs according to the promise Let's pray Father in heaven we praise you Lord for the promise that we have in Christ Praise you and thank you God that you have fulfilled your promises in Christ And that Lord by faith we can inherit those promises that we can be Fellow airs with Christ I want a glorious truth that is So thank you Lord for this truth Thank you that you've given us that in Christ And we pray Lord that even now as we study this passage You'd help us to apply that reality to our Christian lives So we can live lives by faith Trusting in your promises God trusting in you And Lord that we look forward to one day inheriting the promise Being with you forever in heaven what a glorious time that will be So thank you Lord that you give us a great great hope in Christ And we thank you Lord we love you and praise you in Jesus name Amen Alright well we're studying through Galatians And now here chapter 3 the end of the passage the end of the chapter And we're looking at airs of promise Inheriting the promise through faith in Christ And it's interesting how Galatians here in this passage Is sort of dovetailing with what we've been studying on Sunday morning We get really similar teaching here Book of Galatians in the book of Acts especially in the area that we are in Acts And Acts 13 follows really closely with what we're looking here at Galatians 3 But so far in the book of Galatians Basically if you have to boil it down And you just want to sort of summarize what's going on so far Paul is basically setting up the point that either righteousness comes as a gift from God Or it man earns it by his own merit It's one of the two Either the righteousness that you need to be right before God That you need to be to have right standing with God That you need to inherit heaven That righteousness is either a gift of God Or it's earned through man's merit Earned through law keeping And this entire time he's setting up this contrast between law and faith The promises that we know of God are received through faith It is either going to be a view of works Or it's going to be a view of faith And that is the contrast that we see in world religion today Christianity is the only religion That views the promises of God Views salvation, right standing with God As being something that comes through faith and faith alone As a grace of God, as a gift of God Every other religion is through works By keeping the law, by being good so to speak And here it's exactly what the point is through the book of Galatians It's simply a contrast between either it is you gridding it out, you doing it Or it's God's grace And there is no in between and there's no mixing of the two You can't set this up as the Catholics do As being faith and works equal salvation It just simply doesn't work that way It's either faith alone or it isn't Faith alone means by default That it can have nothing to do with your works And hopefully through the book of Galatians That's becoming more and more clear That faith that simply can't be by works Now in this contrast between law and faith Paul uses the example basically of Abraham He tells Abraham before the cross Look I'm going to save you and I'm going to send you a redeemer I'm going to send you a savior And he says to Abraham do you believe me And Abraham says yes And God says you're righteous Right It sounds simple but that's it He sets up Abraham He tells Abraham this is what I'm going to do The Bible says Abraham believes him And God says you believe me Abraham says yes you're righteous Now that comes by a sovereign gift of Almighty God That biblical belief That understanding that Abraham had Came as a gift from God Faith and grace is a gift of God And it's given by gift And it's supernatural It's not a simple understanding of the gospel A natural understanding The Bible says the natural man does not receive the things of God Nor is he able because they're spiritually discerned But that's it Faith is Abraham believing Now by the flip side of that God to us said I have sent a savior Abraham looks forward to the cross Expecting the redeemer based on the promises of God We today we look back at the cross Understanding that God has sent the savior And so he says to you and I Do you believe Do you believe that I've sent a savior We biblically say yes You're righteous And if you're righteous If you biblically believe You exercise saving faith in Christ Then based on that belief God says that you're righteous That belief comes with repentance They're flip sides of the same coin You can't have biblical faith Without repenting of sin That belief comes with a heart and mind And soul supernatural understanding of the gospel That comes by gift of God But it is that He says I've sent a redeemer Do you believe me That you'll be saved Do you believe me that I'll save you Through the finished work of Christ Do you believe me that I'll save you Yes, Lord, we believe That belief results in trust Commitment following Christ And then in doing that God says you're righteous It is strictly by faith alone Nothing to do of works See if you see it that way Then you look back on the cross of Christ You look back at the finished work of Christ You look back at God's sacrifice You look back at God's provision Of a savior And God merely says Do you believe me And if you believe with the faith of Abraham Then it is credited to you as righteousness You are righteous in God's eyes You're in Christ And he sees you that way And it is just that straightforward And if it's that Then it can't be of works Basically it comes down You've got to ask yourself a question What could you possibly add What would you possibly add If you're in Christ now You've repented of your sins You put your faith in Christ And you're trying to live the Christian life And you are trying to, as we've already discussed Rebuild that which has been torn down Trying to rebuild right standing with God Through works of the law Think about it for a second What would you add To the finished work of Christ In order to be saved There's nothing, right I mean the finished work of Christ is perfect If you're here maybe you're not converted You're not saved You want Christ You want heaven You want eternal life And you think to yourself Well man I just got to do this And I've got to do that I've got to study my Bible more I need to pray more fervently I need to evangelize more fervently I've got to be at church more fervently I mean what can you possibly add To the finished work of Christ So because it's of faith It simply cannot be Of your works Those two things are Mutually exclusive Now once you have Christ Once you've inherited the promise The title to the Sermon of the Night Is heirs of promise Once you have that promise And you've laid hold of that By faith in Christ Then what does that mean What does it look like And we're going to see that tonight Basically verses 26 through 29 Is what does a Christian look like What is a Christian We've already talked about The contrast between law and faith What it means to go back And look at law What it means to air In trying to establish right Standing with God by the law And what it means to be saved By faith Now that we know what it means To be genuinely saved Through faith in Christ What does that look like And we're going to see that In 26 through 29 In these verses You're going to see It's not under law You're in Christ You're not under law You're under grace You're not under bondage You've been set free You're free from condemnation You're free from judgment Free from the law Free from the penalty And power of sin You're free in Christ You're not any longer Under a tutor Or a paitagagas I don't know that we got there The last time we were looking At Galatians 3 But in the section just before this He's talking about the law It says in verse 24 Was our tutor That word there is paitagagas It's a master A disciplinarian When kids were kids Back at this time They were given a tutor Someone who basically ruled over them They taught them But they had the power of the rod And so when they got it aligned They beat them with the rod They were a tutor They were a disciplinarian That's the way Paul here Is describing the law They were under this disciplinarian The law And the law would smack you With the rod When you got it aligned But now you're no longer Under that tutor You're free from that tutor In Christ You're no longer under law Now you're in Christ Let me ask you a question And this is a question We've asked before We've talked about this before You've got to continuously Let this sink in Are you still trying to live Your Christian life Under the tutor? Are you still living Your Christian life in such a way That I mean if you're genuinely Christian There's a fine line here If you're genuinely saved by God Then this life that you live In the flesh is lived by faith In the Son of God Galatians 2.20 We talked about it this morning You live your life by faith In Christ And by faith in Christ You have the victory over sin And you'll see progress If you are sanctified You're being sanctified That's good assurance That you're genuinely saved If you're not being sanctified You can rest assured That you're not saved Sanctification comes With salvation But in this Christian life If you're a genuine disciple You can't go back and live your life Like you were under the tutor Where every time you step out of line You get the rod There is no faith, exercise In living the Christian life that way Victory is not going to come By gritting it out In your own power under the law Living as if you were under a tutor And every time you step out of line You're getting whacked with the rod Now that should not And cannot encourage you If you're falsely converted Or it cannot encourage you If you're not genuinely saved And you're just an external conformer You need to come to faith in Christ That message there That power of faith In the life of a Christian The work of the Holy Spirit In the life of a Christian That belongs to a Christian That doesn't belong to you If you're not a Christian So if you're living the Christian life You've repented of your sins You're following Christ Then that victory is going to come Through faith You can't live your Christian life Under the tutor any longer Now that doesn't mean that we throw The law of God out the window The moral law of God Still applies to the Christian We have to live according to that Moral law of God We're commanded to keep those commandments But that victory The keeping of those commandments Is by faith in Christ When you stand before God And now by faith in Christ You're doing good works You're living a life that is pleasing to God Because you're keeping his commandments in faith When you stand before God God doesn't look at you And say, wow, look at all the good things That you've done God looks at you And because of your union And identification with Christ He sees Christ And he sees the work of his spirit In your life And to the praise of the glory Of his grace You are right before him Nothing to do with you Nothing to do with you It's not your good anything That secures right standing with God It is all of his grace All of Christ, all of faith And so with this It's not that as a disciple That you can grid it out In your own power Anything that is not done in faith is sin The life that you live Must be lived by faith In the Son of God Who gave himself for you This is all through faith Now adding any works To faith we've already seen In the book of Galatians is like the Judaizers What the Judaizers are doing here It's the sin of the Judaizers When you as a disciple Go back to live under the tutor You're committing the sin of the Judaizers You're trying to establish right standing With God based on your merit And you simply can't do it In their case they were adding circumcision Adding law keeping to faith That's what we've been going through here In the book of Galatians Think about that for your life What are you trying to add to faith In order to be right with God The answer to that should be nothing If you're a disciple You've got to get that out of your life Here in verses 26-29 We're going to see several These verses, several points of what a Christian looks like And how this life of faith applies If you're in Christ here Then we're going to see that you're sons You're baptized into Christ You're clothed with Him You're one in Him And you are heirs with Him Of the promise The main point here that Paul is going to set up In Galatians 3 These verses are that Disciples of Christ Are the offspring Of Abraham By default, by virtue Of their union with Christ through faith Who are the true sons Of Abraham True sons and daughters of Abraham Those of the faith of Abraham Are those that by virtue Of their union with Christ Have exercised genuine saving faith In Christ Those are the sons of Abraham Those are the ones that are going to inherit the promises And this is not, you have to understand Not just following Some man's teaching When the Bible talks about being in Christ Baptized in Christ Clothed with Christ Identified with Him In union with Him That's far different than just following some guy's teaching You don't hear Muslims Talk about being in Mohamed In Buddha It's not something you find in world religions This is only This is true This is the only truth The exclusive truth And this means in Christ Into Him, baptized into His death Baptized into His resurrection This is a glorious thing This is not just some other world religion This is the true faith Let's talk about this We're going to start off now with verse 26 The first point I want you to see from verse 26 Is that you are sons of God Through faith Look at verse 26 For you all, it's pretty clear here, right? For you are all Sons of God through faith In Christ Jesus Now, this does not mean What he's saying here is not That we are all children of God You've heard that before? We're all God's children And scripture is very clear about that Jesus said to the Jews in John 844 That they were of their father The devil Ephesians 2-3 Says of those that are sinners Outside of Christ that they are children of wrath Ephesians 5-6 Calls them sons of disobedience Romans 5-10 says That they are enemies of God 1 John 3-8 Says he who sins is of the devil For the devil has sinned from the beginning For this purpose the son of God Was manifested that he might destroy The works of the devil 1 John 3-10 Just a couple of verses later In this the children of God And the children of the devil Are manifest That this righteousness is not of God Nor is he who does not love His brother So we are not all children of God You are a child of God By faith in Christ You're a child of God By being the spiritual seed of Abraham The seed We've talked about that before That Paul sets up his argument For faith in Christ through the promise According to his seed singular That is Christ The inheritor Through the faith of Abraham The fulfillment of the promise Is Christ And if we are in Christ Then we're the spiritual seed of Abraham And so the seed there pertains to Christ We're not all sons of God All here simply refers to that believers Come from every tribe Every tongue, every nation There is no partiality There is no discrimination Every tribe, every tongue, every nation There are no examples of that in Scripture One is John 1.12 He came to his own His own received him not But to as many as received him To them he gave the right to become Children of God That's one example Let's look at another example Romans 8 And look down starting in verse 12 This is Romans 8.12 Speaking of sons of God This in and of itself is an awesome truth He entered a son of God A child of God As we get into some of these other verses In Galatians 4 We're going to talk about adoption There's a glorious doctrine in Scripture The doctrine of adoption We're going to be able to look at that over the next couple of weeks But here in John 8 starting in verse 12 I'm sorry Romans 8 verse 12 It says Now right off the bat If you're a son of God, a child of God You get the spirit of God And that is an awesome promise It is impossible To please him Impossible to live for him Impossible to be a Christian without the spirit of God It's a glorious blessing Verse 14 And you're led by the spirit You're walking according to the spirit Verse 15 Amen And I want to follow Christ That just charges you up That's your spirit witnessing with his spirit That you're a child of God My sheep hear my voice You're not going to sit in a Mormon Temple or a Jehovah's Witness Or some Catholic service And hear some wicked Catholic theology About work salvation And say amen You want to go out and work And grit and bear it and do more works If you're a son of God And if you are of Christ If you have the spirit of God Then your spirit witnesses with his spirit That you're a child of God And that happens by a spirit through his word Look at the end of that Chapter And if children verse 17 Then heirs Heirs of God And joint heirs with Christ If indeed we suffer with him That we may also be glorified together You're going to suffer with him But if you suffer with him You'll also be glorified with him That's an awesome thought too One day glorified in heaven forever with Christ Another example of this is in Hebrews 2 This is awesome too I love this passage of scripture Hebrews 2 Same kind of concept here Hebrews 2 And look at this Hebrews 2 verse 10 For it was fitting for him To whom are all things And by whom are all things In bringing many sons to glory It was fitting for him to make the captain Of their salvation Perfect through sufferings For both he who sanctifies And those who are being sanctified Are all of one For which reason he Is not ashamed to call them brethren That's an awesome thought Saying verse 12 I'll declare your name to my brethren In the midst of the assembly I'll sing praise to you And again I'll put my trust in him And again here I am in the children Whom God has given me Verse 14 In as much then as the children Have partaken of flesh and blood He himself likewise shared in the same That through death He might destroy him who had the power Of death that is the devil And release those who through fear Of death were all their lifetime No longer in bondage or in Christ Amen? For indeed he does not give aid to angels But he does give aid to the seed of Abraham Therefore in all things he had to be made Like his brethren That he might be a merciful and faithful High priest in things pertaining to God To make propitiation for the sins of the people That propitiation there is a wrath Satisfying sacrifice It satisfies the wrath Penalty of God For in that he himself has suffered He is able to aid those who are tempted Not ashamed to call us brethren When you're in Christ your son of God A child of God We have Christ and Christ is not ashamed To call us brethren So that's verse 26 but now look at verse Back in Galatians 3 Look at verse 27 And the next point on your notes here Is that you are in Christ Through faith Point 1 your sons of God through faith Point 2 you're in Christ through faith For as many of you as were baptized Into Christ Have put on Christ Now before you were Baptized into Christ You were clothed in old Adam right And you know the difference if you've been Genuinely converted you were once Clothed in Adam When you come to Christ you're clothed In Christ I mean when the Bible says Examine yourself whether you're in the faith That shouldn't take you a long time You're either going to be clothed in Adam Or you're clothed in Christ And there is a big difference Unless you have just completely Deceived yourself You've got yourself so caught up that Yes I'm in Christ and your life Just simply doesn't match up and you don't see it Otherwise it's very clear When you come to Christ You're putting on the new man You start looking like Christ Your life starts to become Identified with Christ We'll see that in a moment. Now here In verse 27 what he's not talking about Is he's not talking about water baptism Okay especially In the letter to the Galatians He's not saying that water baptism is necessary For salvation he's not talking about that And if you think about it here's a good Example or a way to think about it Especially if you're talking to someone That's coming out of the church of Christ Movement or something like that Someone that teaches baptismal regeneration Catholicism again We've got the Judaizers Who are trying to add works of the law to salvation They're trying to add circumcision to salvation Now we've got two covenants At play here that are sort of in transition The Old Covenant and the New Covenant What was the sign of the Old Covenant? Circumcision Right, circumcision was the Sign of the Old Covenant Here Paul is saying That if you try to add The sign Of the Old Covenant To salvation which has been the same From eternity past to eternity future All through faith in Christ If you try to add the sign Of the Old Covenant to salvation You're to be accursed If anyone comes to you preaching any other gospel Even if we or an angel from heaven Preaches another gospel to you Which is really not another That person's to be accursed, right But now what is the sign or symbol Of the New Covenant? Baptism Certainly if you can't add The sign of the Old Covenant To salvation Well the last place you're going to teach That you're going to add the new sign Of the Covenant, the new symbol of the New Covenant To salvation is going to be the book of Galatians In the same way that you're anathema For adding circumcision To salvation, the sign of the Old Covenant You are anathema for adding The symbol or sign of the New Covenant To salvation It is always and only by faith alone In Christ alone And so here it's certainly not talking about Water baptism, it cannot be Faith appropriates Your faith in Christ appropriates What baptism symbolizes Baptism symbolizes Your death and burial with Christ Rising to walk in newness of life These are simply just initiation Rights and they're important Baptism is so important that often times In scripture you see it closely associated With conversion Because it's something that God says you're going to do If you're genuinely saved Repent and be converted that your sins may be blotted out Repent and be baptized All of you for the remission of your sins He's not saying be baptized so that you can have your sins forgiven Baptism is a closely related symbol Of an inward reality Here it's not teaching salvation By water baptism, we want to make that clear And you'll get folks that will use this Passage of scripture to argue for that Here what it's referring to Is identification with Christ And another parallel passage of this is Roman 6 Look at Roman 6 for a second It's just identification With Christ In Roman 6 And look at verse 3 The key word here is ace into It's into Roman 6 3 Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized Into Christ Jesus Immersed into Christ Were baptized Into his death Therefore we were buried with him through baptism Into death For if we have been united together That's identification with Christ In the likeness of his death Certainly we also shall be in the likeness Of his resurrection So that's one place Look at Colossians 2 Colossians 2 What he's referring to here in Galatians 3 Is just identification with Christ In Colossians 2 Look down at verse 11 This is interesting This parallel with circumcision here Colossians 2 verse 11 In him you were also circumcised With the circumcision made without hands It's not flesh circumcision That's the circumcision made without hands Circumcision of your heart By putting off the body of the sins of flesh By the circumcision of Christ Buried with him in baptism In which you also were raised With him through faith In the working of God Who raised him from the dead And you being dead in your trespasses In the uncircumcision of your flesh He is made alive together with him Having forgiven Forgiven you all trespasses That's awesome Having wiped out the handwriting of requirements That was against us Which was contrary to us And he has taken it out of the way Having nailed it to the cross Now, I heard that said multiple times Used multiple times To say, listen, you don't have to keep The moral law of God You don't even have to try He has taken that thing out of the way And nailed it to the cross That is a misunderstanding in this passage of scripture You are no longer under law As a system for salvation any longer You are under grace It's not that you're going to In Adam, strive to keep the law And have to keep the law perfectly In order to be right with God You can't do it In the uncircumcision of law Now you're over here under grace By grace you've been saved through faith And so that's not saying That you can just abandon Obedience to God's commands If you're going to be saved If you're going to be a disciple of Christ Then you have been closed in Christ You've been baptized into Christ Now you're identified with him And in your identification with Christ You are dead to sin And you can sin no longer We who have died to sin live any longer In it, Paul asks And so you're going to start looking Like Jesus Christ You're going to be sanctified You're going to have your sin You're going to have victory over sin This closed with Christ This baptism in Christ This is the way this works Identification with Christ When God sees the sinful Believer He sees his sinless son He sees you so closely associated With Christ He doesn't see the sin Of the believer in that sense He sees his sinless son And you identified with him You become closed with Christ But then closed with Christ You start putting on the new man Romans 13-14 says But put on the Lord Jesus Christ You see that comparison there That analogy to being closed in Christ Put on the Lord Jesus Christ And make no provision For the flesh To fulfill its lust In other words, you cannot Be closed with Christ And make provision For the flesh to fulfill its lust When you put on Christ You put on the new man You're closed in Christ Baptized into Christ You don't make provision for the flesh to fulfill its lust You strive to get rid of that thing You strive to get rid of sin And Jesus says Do all things without complaining And disputing That you may become blameless And harmless Children of God without fault In the midst of a crooked and perverse generation Among whom you shine As lights in the world Here's another part of being closed with Christ Verse 16 says Holding fast the word of life So that I may rejoice in the day of Christ That I have not run in vain So once you are Clothed in Christ You're never gonna be naked again Once you're clothed in Christ You hold fast the word of life You persevere in the faith Once clothed in Christ, there's no turning back You are now Transferred into the kingdom of his dear son A son of God Adopted into his family And there simply is no going back And you wouldn't want to, right? There's no going back And you wouldn't want to take it again But now go back to Galatians 3 And point 3 I want you to see from this Is that You are one in Christ now Through faith So back in Galatians 3 And look at verse 28 Verse 28 Now verse 26 you're all sons of God through faith Verse 27 You were baptized into Christ You've put on Christ You were in Christ through faith There is neither slave nor free There is neither male nor female For you are all one In Christ Jesus So you're all one in Christ through faith Now Here it's interesting to see He's not calling them To be all one He's not saying You are to be all one He says you are all one In Ephesians 4 when he commands Christians to labor To maintain unity of the spirit and the bond of peace You're to maintain what's already true You're to maintain what's already been given If you're in Christ You're all one In Christ because he says that we are But there's always something And this is a constant problem There's always something in our flesh That prompts us to want To be superior to someone else There's something wicked in our flesh In our members that strives for that You have to fight against it Here what he's saying is that there's no Ethnicity There's no social class There's no gender Discrimination at all Those three things Ethnicity, social class, and gender Are completely irrelevant In determining who is and who isn't A child of God Who is or isn't a true son or daughter Of Abraham There's simply irrelevant There's to be no discrimination About this through the book of Acts And we saw that example of Peter with Cornelius And he says, after the vision I can truly see there is no partiality With God, right? There's to be no discrimination Those discriminations, that wall Has been broken down completely We see that with the leaders in Acts 13 Just a couple of weeks ago When we look at the diversity of the leadership In the church in Antioch And just the class The social status, the ethnicity Those were all things that were completely out of the way There's simply no more No more partiality No more discrimination there A good example of this is Philemon And Philemon and his slave, Anesimus And how he was to be treated And how Paul wrote to him It's just a good example of this in Scripture Turn to James 2 and let's look at this a little more closely James 2 Hebrews James And look at James 2 starting in verse 1 James 2 1 And he says My brethren, do not hold the faith Of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory With partiality For if there should come into your assembly A man with gold rings and fine apparel And there should also come in a poor man In filthy clothes And you pay attention to the one wearing the fine clothes And say to him, you sit here in a good place And say to the poor man, you stand there Or sit here at my footstool Have you not shown partiality among yourselves And become judges with evil thoughts Right off the bat Show partiality You become a judge with evil thoughts Even in making the distinction Which is in generating The partiality Making that distinction makes you a judge With evil thoughts That's wickedness Listen, my beloved brethren Has God not chosen The poor of this world To be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom Which he promised to those who love him The poor man Do not the rich oppress you And drag you into the courts Do they not blaspheme that noble name By which you are called If you really fulfill the royal law According to the scripture You shall love your neighbor as yourself You do well But if you show partiality You commit sin And are convicted by the law As transgressors There simply is to be no partiality Why is this important? And what's the point here? Ephesians 4, looking verse 1 I, therefore, the prisoner of the Lord Beseech you to walk worthy of the calling With which you are called With all lowliness and gentleness With long suffering Bearing with one another in love Endevering to keep the unity Of the spirit in the bond of peace You see that? We need to keep the unity of the spirit In the bond of peace In one body and one spirit Just as you were called In one hope of your calling One Lord, one faith, one baptism One God and Father of all Who is above all and through all And in you all We are all one body This is important, there can be no partiality Now, there is no discrimination But scripture holds up Distinctions That's in the trinity itself There's equality in the trinity But there is functional subordination There are differences in roles The same thing holds true for your marriage You and your spouse Are functionally equal In God's eyes Spiritually equal, functionally distinct In your roles God gives you different roles to fulfill Now in our society We have a problem with that That strips gears in people's heads How can you be equal But different Listen, you as a believer As a disciple in Christ can't let Worldly reasoning Infect your thought process here This is what scripture teaches You are equal, and you are different God says there's to be no discrimination No partiality, but he upholds Distinctions In many ways One, the roles you perform in your marriage That's a good example Husbands are to be the head of the wife Wives are to submit to their husbands That in the marriage God establishes authority God establishes functional differences According to role And we just have to get used to that You can't let worldly reasoning Infect that You have to submit In those kinds of things to what scripture says Rather than limiting scripture To your own understanding of it You just have to accept what scripture says But that's what it says We're equal, but different There are role Distinctions that are set up here Now this also I want to make clear Is not advocating some social agenda This is not teaching Evangelical Women's lib People will use this passage of scripture To support that This is not what this is teaching There are many that think that This passage completely opens it up So there can be women pastors Women leaders in the church That's what it teaches Evangelical women's lib This is not teaching liberation Theology The poor and oppressed It's simply not teaching that authority That theology But a lot of folks twist it to mean that It simply means that we are equal Spiritually in Christ We're one body, one faith, one baptism One spirit, we're all of one You're one in Christ Jesus Through faith Partiality This is exemplified well in the New Testament Through fellowship When we were looking through acts And studying through those sections of scripture Where as soon as that wall of separation came down They started fellowshiping together They started eating together They were in a Gentiles house Eating Gentile food Fellowshiping with Gentiles That's what that means There's to be unity Warm Christian fellowship Being bred together There's to be that kind of fellowship That kind of love John 13, 34 and 35 The Bible says a new commandment I give to you That you love one another Is I have loved you That you also love one another By this all will know That you are my disciples If you have love one for another If you're showing partiality If you're discriminating and praise the Lord We don't see that in this church This church is a diverse Loving body of believers And I'm so grateful to God for that It's just an awesome blessing It's a great blessing, it's a rare thing these days Even now, can you believe it? Even now, that's a rare thing As far as we think we've come In church, they call church the most segregated Time of the week, Sunday morning It's ridiculous, there's not to be that And when you show partiality That sin, we are To demonstrate our love for one another By not doing that If you show partiality, you're not loving You're hating your brother There's to be no partiality By this, all will know that you're my disciples If you have love for one another Somebody comes in here, that's often said It's a common statement that Wow, this looks like a genuine Bible believing church Because look at the diversity in this place That's an awesome blessing And we love our brothers, we love our sisters This is important Because God has established Authority, and so it's important To make that distinction We are equal in Christ, but functionally Different in roles, and we have to maintain That, but that also doesn't eliminate Giftedness, that's seen In the gifts that God gives Some men are gifted, some ladies Are gifted in one way, other men Other ladies are gifted in another way God distributes gifts to each As the body has need Some are a hand, some are a foot Right, some are a belly button Some are a right ear, some are a left ear God gives gifts Based on the needs of the body And that should give us great Joy to Implement our gifts according to The need of the body, right? If God gives you a gift That's God's gift to you You should cherish That, you should implement That in service to God's body In service to the church For the benefit of your brother Be soul saved For the furtherance of his kingdom That should give you great joy God gifted you in that way But to, again, going back to this issue Of showing partiality, if you are jealous Or envious of your brother For a gift your brother has Again, that's showing partiality That's discriminating, that's not Loving your brother, that's not The spirit that we should have That's sin, we're not to be that way God grants gifts God, who is the gift giver It's God that is the originator and the source Of the gift, and so one person gifted In one way, another person gifted in another way Praise be to God And there's just no partiality It's just no partiality It all comes from God The person that has that gift If they're in Christ, in no way Should be boastful about that Is it 1 Corinthians 4 that says You act as if though you've received nothing But everything you have You've received, so why do you boast? Why would you boast in that? That is the grace of God It's the mercy of God, and as soon as God Gives it, God can take it away And turn your pride On your head You can't be that way, but now The truth of the matter is that God Establishes giftedness in the church And so you're to Establish and use your gifts And those that are serving in the church Should serve according to their giftedness And not overreach that Serve according to your giftedness And that's what's important But now, point 3 on your notes, back in Galatians Point 3 In verse 29 We are heirs of the promise through faith Now we've seen we are sons Through faith We're in Christ through faith We're all one in Christ through faith But here in point 3 We're heirs of promise through faith And that's in verse 29 Then you are Abraham's seed And heirs according to the promise Now this is a glorious truth We praise God for it Romans 8.17 says And if children, then heirs If you're a child of God, a son of God Then you are an heir An heir of God and joint heirs with Christ If indeed We suffer with him that we may also Be glorified together Look at Romans 4 Romans 4, and let's take another look at this And look down beginning in verse 13 Romans 4 Down in 13 Now this promise Is awesome We talked about it this morning That you are, you inherit the promise You are heirs of the promise Through faith in Christ And look at Romans 4 down in verse 13 For the promise that he would be an heir of the world Was not to Abraham or to his seed Through the law But through the righteousness of faith The righteousness Of Christ Imputed to you, given to you Credited to you Through faith, through genuine saving faith Verse 14 For those who are of the law or heirs Faith is made void and the promise made of no effect Because the law brings about Wrath For where there is no law, there is no transgression Therefore, verse 16 It is of faith That it might be according to grace That the promise might be sure And we look at this morning That in order for the promise to be steadfast, sure It had to be based in God In Christ alone Otherwise if it's based in you, it's not sure But it had to be of faith That it might be according to grace So that the promise might be sure to all the seed Not only to those who are of the law But also to those who are of the faith of Abraham Who is the father of us all As it is written I have made you a father of many nations To God who gives life to the dead And calls those things Which do not exist as though they did Who contrary to hope In hope believed So that he Became the father of many nations According to what was spoken So shall your descendants be Now that according to what was spoken That's the promise of God God promises Abraham That he would be the father of many nations And in hope Abraham believed God and it was Credited to him as righteousness And in his Faith became an air Of the promise God makes the promise Abraham Exercises faith in God Because of the promise And as a result of that, he inherits The promise, he gets the promise And that's true of you It's true of me today That's the promise He says there's salvation And there's salvation in no other There's only one name By which you must be saved That's the man Christ Jesus If you have faith in Christ Jesus If you turn from your sin Put your faith in Christ Then you can have The righteousness That is the requirement Of my justice The righteousness that you need And being right with God Means eternal life Forgiveness of sins It means Christ in heaven forever It's the promise that God has given And that's all done through Faith God gives the promise You savingly believe The promise And you can't add anything to that When you savingly believe the promise You inherit the promise You become an air of Christ A child of God A joint air with Christ Inheriting the promise It's just a really simple formula The way that works God makes the promise You savingly believe the promise You inherit the promise And that's all through Repentant faith in Christ And it's important to understand That faith, we've talked about this last week At the Living Faith Conference It's not just simple belief Counting something as true Holding something to be true This is God gifted Saving faith That God applies the understanding Of the scripture to your mind Works that into your heart Activates your will And you become savingly Believing in the promise You become someone who lives for Christ Committed to Christ You become a new creation A new nature Only comes through faith in Christ I saw this quote It was interesting and it sort of sums up What's going on here in the book of Galatians And the quote goes like this We cannot come to Christ To be justified That means made right with God We cannot come to Christ to be justified Until we have first been To Moses to be condemned But once we have gone To Moses And acknowledged our sin Guilt and condemnation We must not Stay there We must let Moses Send us to Christ That's the issue You can't be justified Until you go to Moses To get condemned And when you're condemned By Moses and you acknowledge Your sin, guilt and condemnation You can't stay there If you're a disciple of Christ To the promises of God by faith And you're clinging to hope In Christ for victory over sin To live the Christian life You're clinging to Christ for hope Of eternal salvation A clear conscience, forgiveness And you're doing all that by faith in God You can't stay with Moses Moses has to You can't stay there You can't live the Christian life there You can't walk in the spirit there You can't be there Let Moses send you to Christ And you abandon that To live wholeheartedly for Christ And in Christ Faith has the victory over sin You have God's spirit in dwelling you To give you the power To live the Christian life It only comes through faith in Christ When you come to faith In Christ that way You inherit the promise of God And it's an awesome inheritance It only happens by faith This passage here Is Setting up that contrast It's a summary to what has gone on before And now finally At the end of chapter 3 We see what a genuine Christian Now looks like This contrast of law and faith And now here what does a Christian look like You are all sons of God You're all one in Christ You're in Christ And you're heirs of the promise Through faith And now in chapter 4 If you're an heir and you're a child Then we're going to look at adoption And what it means to be In the family of God What it means to have God as your father The access that you have To the father by faith Is an awesome and glorious thing in the Christian life It's that access To the father by faith in Christ That gives you the power to live the Christian life And we're going to talk about that more next week Father in heaven, Lord God Thank you for this great salvation Just constantly, Lord, in awe of it Just constantly Lord seeing just how Multifaceted it is And how awesome it is, Lord And how gracious and merciful You are In providing this for us Through your son Through his work on the cross, Lord And just thank you, Lord For this and I pray God, as we continue to work through the book of Galatians Lord, this letter That you would help us to see Just the utter futility Of the law To inherit the promise The law to do anything to please you Lord, but that it must be done through faith in Christ And Lord, help us to understand That faith, Lord To grasp it In all its depth and all its richness Apply that to our hearts So that we can live victoriously Through faith in Christ Overcomes sin We know, Lord, God, that we are Even as Christians, Lord Even as disciples of Christ That we want to obey your law We want to live by your commandments We want to live wholeheartedly for you And you've said in your word He who says, I know him But does not keep his commandments as a liar And the truth is not in him And we know that, Lord We know that obedience to your commands That comes through faith in Christ And how important it is, Lord That we walk according to faith Walk according to your spirit Live according to your spirit Putting to death the deeds of the body Help us to do that, Lord We just see in this letter Great promise, great hope, great strength Lord, in the faith that you have provided Through Christ, so help us to live that life Lord, we want to be pleasing to you You are our Lord, our God And we are so thankful, Lord The sons of God by faith in Christ Heirs of the promise Just what an awesome thought So thank you, Lord, we love you And just take great joy in seeing you Exalted, seeing Christ Magnified Seeing your gifted grace And faith being Lifted up, Lord It's just a glorious thing in our sight So thank you, Lord Thank you for these brothers and sisters And thank you for our fellowship together The kindness that you have given us Lord, this unity, this peace It is a wonderful thing And we just thank you for that blessing All these things we pray in the blessed name Of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ Amen