 Well, we want to get back started. We are going through the book of Galatians. And tonight, I want to do something a little different, but the title of the sermon tonight is justification by faith. And we're in Galatians chapter two. And we've been looking at the section that runs from verse 11 down through verse 21. And tonight, we're going to focus mainly on verses 15 to 21. We looked at 11 through 14 last week. And there is enough in here today. We're going to spend a month or two every day. But we don't have that time to do that. But this is something that's going to be ongoing. You know, this is going to tie in well with the Living Faith Conference that we're going to do at the end of July. And so we'll get a lot more information on this. There's just so much in here that's packed into these verses. And there's so much of it that is hotly debated in evangelicalism. But that is clear. And what I want to do, I want to talk through. I'm going to give you an introduction. And then we want to sort of expound on that introduction. And then we want to try to tie the introduction to the text and run through the verses, but then talk about a couple of words. All right. And so all of that, just basically tonight to get what hopefully will be a better understanding or a good understanding of what justification by faith looks like. So if you will in your Bibles, let's just get started. Galatians 2 and starting down in verse 11. Let's read the whole section together. Starting from verse 11. Right in Galatians 2, 11. Now, when Peter had come to Antioch, I withstood him to his face because he was to be blamed. For before certain men came from James, he would eat with the Gentiles. But when they came, he withdrew and separated himself, fearing those who were of the circumcision. And the rest of the Jews also played the hypocrite with him so that even Barnabas was carried away with their hypocrisy. But when I saw that they were not straightforward about the truth of the gospel, I said to Peter before them all, if you being a Jew live in the manner of Gentiles and not as the Jews, why do you compel Gentiles to live as Jews? We who are Jews by nature and not sinners of the Gentiles, knowing that a man is not justified by works of the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ. Even we have believed in Jesus Christ that we might be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law, for by the works of the law, no flesh shall be justified. But if while we seek to be justified by Christ, we ourselves also are found sinners, is Christ therefore a minister of sin? Certainly not. For if I build again those things which I destroyed, I make myself a transgressor, for I through the law died to the law that I might live to God. I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. 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 for me. I do not set aside the grace of God, for if righteousness comes through the law, then Christ died in vain. Father, God, we are so grateful to you, God, for justification by faith. We praise you, Lord, that it is not by works of the law that we are hopeless and destitute without Christ. And we attest, Lord, as your people here acknowledging tonight that by faith in Christ, by the cross of Christ, by the finished work of Christ, by a substitutionary atonement, that we are in Christ by faith and faith alone. We know that our works profit us nothing, and that if we feel as though, Lord, that somehow our salvation is merited through our works, then Christ died in vain. We certainly know with Paul, we say, certainly not. That's not what we believe, Lord. We trust in you, trust in you alone. Now, thank you for the infinite wisdom of your salvation, Lord, how you've designed this and how you've provided this salvation for us. It is glorious in our sight, God. Thank you so much for this teaching through Scripture, God, these words help us, Lord, to continuously apply these truths to our heart so that we can understand this, God, this is important, important teaching. So help us, Lord, to apply this to our lives. I want us to live for you by faith, and we love you, Lord, in Jesus' name. Amen. Justification by faith, it sounds easy, right? It sounds simple. Many of you can probably, if I ask you to define justification by faith, can rattle off a quick dictionary definition of that. No sweat, right? Just run down exactly what it is, and then that's it. But justification by faith is not simple in our understanding or in our living it out. This is something that's very challenging to stay on pace with, to understand, to apply. So challenging here that Peter, an apostle of Christ, one of the leaders of the early church, is found wandering away from it. Something in our flesh, something about how we think, how we operate, something about our nature just pulls us away from the simplicity that is in Christ, that is in the Gospel. Pulls us away from this idea of justification by faith. And so what I want to do tonight, through these verses, is just get a focus on it. Just to get a simple sort of 30,000 foot view, if you will, of what this is and how we are to apply this, how we are to understand it. And then now we're going to have to, on a regular basis, apply this understanding to our lives and live according to this understanding so that we don't slip into this same error that we see Peter here slipping into. Not simple. I was looking through the commentaries and I came across a quote from Luther in talking about this. Considering our flesh, this is not simple, not easy. This is said, Luther said, this is not something of which you will be master. You know, he made the comment that those that will say, okay, yeah, I understand justification by faith. I can give you a definition. I can tell you what it means. I can believe in it. Yeah, we're justified by faith, faith alone and Christ alone. And they'll say that, but he says, Luther says, if you find someone talking about justification by faith that way, like they understand that they've got it mastered, they've got it down. No problem, right? Easy, cheesy, light and breezy. They know exactly what that is. They don't know what they're talking about. Living according to an understanding of justification by faith, Luther says is hard. It's not something that you'll be master of. It's going to be something of which that you are always a pupil. As long as you're a Christian, you're going to be a pupil of justification by faith and how that applies to you. It will always be your master. He says that we as believers sense it as something like a great taste that we want to grasp or we want to fully comprehend, but we'll never completely get there. And it'll always be something that we hunger and thirst for. And Jesus Christ and Matthew 5-6 and the Beatitudes said that those who hunger and thirst for righteousness will be blessed. It's something that we're always going to be grasping, always going to be reaching for. And so let's start our conversation with this. The first thing I want to talk about is a man has a dilemma. We have a dilemma. We've got to set the context for this. Our dilemma is that we are wickedly sinful, totally depraved from our natures. Every part of us is corrupt. It doesn't mean that we're as wicked as we could be. We're not all running around like a bunch of Hitler's, right? But every aspect of our lives is completely depraved. Our thinking is depraved. Our reasoning is depraved. Our emotions are depraved. Desires depraved. Our understanding is darkened. Every piece of us is wicked down to the core. And so it's that total sinfulness of man that has separated us or put us at enmity with a holy God. And so the question becomes in Job. Job asked the question, how can a man be just with God? How can a man be just with God? Look at us. Look at our state. Look at our condition. How can we be right with God? Habakkuk answers that question and says that the just will live by their faith. It's by faith that we're right with God. And here we have the introduction to this subject of justification by faith. This is something that's easily taken for granted, all right? And the idea, the propensity in our flesh is to constantly rail against that free gift of righteousness in Christ, to rail against that free gift in Christ, and to try to gain or achieve righteousness on our own, in our own works, according to what we do. And it's really dangerous, really simple to slip into that way of thinking, but we can't do that. And that's something that you've got to be aware of, you've got to be able to identify. We need to be able to spot that and we need to be able to avoid it. But why is it, is it that justification or being right with God, and this is what we need to understand, is not simply a matter of what you do. And we're going to look at this from two different angles. The first part is this. Justification, or our dilemma, our problem with our hostility towards God, our rebellion against God, our separation from God, is not simply about what we do, it's about our heart. If it were strictly just actions, will you stop those actions and now you're right with God? No, it's a matter of man's heart. It's like it goes back to this understanding of the passage of Scripture where Jesus says, okay, if you want to be right with God, then cut off your hand, gouge out your eye. If cutting off your hand or gouging out your eye would get you to heaven, it's only a pretty good deal, okay? There's one swift motion of the ax, we'll take care of that, done deal. Right now, if you believe that sin is merely something that you do with your eye or do with your hand, then just pluck out your eye and cut off your hand, right? But sin isn't simply a matter of what you do with your hand, what you see with your eye. Sin is a matter of the heart, and it's out of the heart of man that sin comes. Evil, murder, slander, divisiveness, all of that malice comes out of man's heart. So you have to understand, first of all, our condition and our need for justification is not simply what you do. It's the heart of man that puts us at enmity with God. It's who we are by nature, okay? Now the reverse of this is also true, we're going to have to look at this in a moment, is when you're considering whether or not you are justified by faith in Christ, and you start looking at your performance, evidences in your life for saving graces, right? Evidences in your life for the demonstrations of genuine saving faith, which are the works that you do, your performance. Again, it's not a matter of what you do that makes you right with God, it's a matter of the heart, it's a matter of who you are by nature. We're going to need to understand that, all right? The basic root, though, the basic root of this problem is in our heart, not in our actions. It's what we are, all right? No matter what you do, no matter what you do, you cannot change your nature. So settle it in your mind. When we're talking about justification by faith alone in Christ alone, there is nothing that you can do. There's no law keeping, no obedience. There's nothing that you can do to change your nature. You are by nature a sinner, separated from God and without hope, apart from Christ. You're a sinner. There's nothing that you can do. There's no amount of law keeping, all right? Go to Romans 3, and I want to give you some context for this. Romans 3. And look down first, Romans 3 at verse 21. Romans chapter 3, verse 21. But now the righteousness of God, apart from the laws revealed being witnessed by the law and the prophets, even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ to all and on all who believe, for there is no difference. For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. I've heard it said this way, that you are a sinner, therefore you sin. It's not that you sin and are therefore a sinner. You are a sinner by nature and therefore you act in accordance with your nature and you sin. It's not a matter of what we do necessarily. It's a matter of who we are. It's a matter of the heart and out of the heart leads the sin. For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Verse 24. Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God set forth as a propitiation by his blood through faith to demonstrate his righteousness because in his forbearance God had passed over the sins that were previously committed to demonstrate at present time his righteousness that he might be the just, might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Christ. Now God's solution to our dilemma here is faith in Christ. The solution to your and my problem of being at enmity with God because of who we are, God's solution for that is Christ. Christ provides a solution. The vehicle through which we have that solution is faith. This is by faith. This is not mere intellectual ascent. It's not just agreeing with a set of facts. You can't understand a dictionary definition of faith and agree with a historical facts about Christ and be saved. It's not intellectual ascent. It's personal trust in his death. It's identification with Christ in his death, in his burial, in his resurrection, understanding that he died, that he was raised from the dead, that he was God in the flesh, and then it's total commitment to submit to him as Lord. It's living in that kind of trust. When we say that we've got faith in Christ, we live completely and fully, totally trusting in the Lord. It's a committed living out of our trust, our faith in Christ, not merely intellectual ascent. Now, I want to give you a background. Go back to Galatians 2. Let's look at how Paul, the important thing I want to get for you tonight is this argument. The train of thought that Paul is going through here, I want to understand that. I want to give you a set up first from the verses we looked at last week. In verse 11, Peter had come to Antioch with Sodom to his face because he was to be blamed. He's to be blamed for perverting or straying away from the gospel of Jesus Christ. He's compromised the gospel. Now, how did he do that? Verse 12, For before certain men came from James, and these we found out last week were Jews that had come from Jerusalem, he would eat with the Gentiles. But when they came, he withdrew and separated himself fearing those who were of the circumcision. Now, he was having full and complete fellowship with Gentiles, eating with them. Disregarding, if you will, the dietary laws that had been in place, now he's eating freely, fellowshiping freely with Gentiles. Now, verse 13, what was the result of that? As a result of Peter's behavior, the rest of the Jews also played the hypocrite. They pretended. They joined him in his pretense, joined him in his hypocrisy, even Barnabas was carried away with their hypocrisy. Verse 14, But when I saw that they were not straightforward about the truth of the gospel, they weren't walking rightly, as the Bible says. They were by their conduct perverting or corrupting the gospel. I said to Peter before them all, if you being a Jew, live in the manner of the Gentiles and not as the Jews. Now, Peter had been living freely, fellowshiping with Gentiles, not keeping the dietary laws himself, not obeying the ceremonial laws at all. He was living like a Gentile. So if he was living like a Gentile and not as the Jews, then Peter, why do you compel Gentiles to live as Jews? Now, what we found out was that in Peter shrinking away from the Gentiles and now only having fellowship with the Jews that came from James, what Peter was in effect saying was that if you wanted to belong to the people of God here, you've got to keep the laws. You've got to keep the dietary laws. You need to, in essence, be circumcised. You've got to keep the Mosaic law in order to be among or belong to the people of God. That's what in effect he was saying with his behavior, with his conduct. And he did that out of fear of persecution. We talked about that last week. And that brings us to verse 15. In verse 15 here, Paul has already made the claim that Peter has corrupted the Gospel by retreating from fellowship with Gentiles. He's already corrupted the Gospel, but now he's going to prove his case. He's going to state his claim. And in verse 15, we, Paul says, who are Jews by nature and not sinners of the Gentiles, mainly saying that they're just Jews. They were born into Judaism, raised in Judaism. They were circumcised. They're living under the covenant promises of God as Jews. And they weren't sinners of the Gentiles. It's not that Paul is saying here that they're not sinners. Paul would be the first to admit that he's a sinner. But he's not sinners of the Gentiles, meaning that he's not. They weren't outside the covenant. They're Jews. They've been circumcised. They've been keeping the law. They're a part of the promises of God. And so he's saying in effect, listen, Peter, you and I, we've been a part of these covenant promises. We grew up in Judaism. If anyone's kept the law, we have, right? And he's saying if we are in the covenants of God and Jews by nature and not sinners of the Gentiles, look at verse 16, knowing, now we know, Peter, you know, I know that a man is not justified, not made right by the works of the law, but by faith in Christ. Even if we have believed in Christ Jesus, that we might be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the law for by the works of the law, no flesh will be justified. Now let's break that down a little bit. Something in this passage of scripture, there's a lot in here and just sometimes breaking it down a little bit at a time just helps you to get the total picture a little easier, understand it a little bit easier. Knowing that a man is not justified by works of the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ. That's what we're talking about here. That's the claim. Listen, Peter, you've started compelling by your behavior, these Gentiles that live like Jews, what you're communicating to them is that in order to be right with God, to belong to the people of God, to be among the people of God, you've got to keep the law. Now, Peter, that's not being straightforward about the gospel. There is no law keeping that is going to make you right with God. You need to do what's right here. Even if we, even we have believed, Paul says, in Christ Jesus, that we might be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law. Now he's saying here, Peter, even you and I, you and I, Peter, have believed in Christ for our justification. We've believed in Christ for our justification because we know, Peter, you and I, even though that we grew up in Judaism, even though we've been under the covenants, we know that's not how anyone gets saved. You and I have believed on Christ in order to be right with God, that we might be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law. And then he makes a summary statement for by the works of the law, no flesh shall be justified. There's no amount of law keeping that can be done here for us to be right with God. That's simply not how the gospel goes out. That's not how the gospel, that's not how people get saved. Now in this, Peter, because of his conduct, has compromised this truth. He's compromised the gospel. The gospel here, the reason that Paul is making this claim is because the gospel stands in authority over Peter, stands in authority over Paul, stands in authority over you and I. It's the gospel that has that authority, not Peter, to do anything to change that. And this is the truth here that simply by justification, by faith alone, or a right standing with God comes strictly by faith alone and Christ alone. And that's the only way to be right with God, okay? That Peter is compelling Gentiles to observe the mosaic law, to belong to the people of God by his behavior, and doing what the law commands will never be the justification for salvation, justification by faith. It's simply going to be all faith. No one is justified by works because all fail to keep the law, alright? So now he's defined the issue. We're talking about justification by faith. He's defined the problem. He's defined what Peter is doing. He's made that clear. He's going to give now his argument to set, to argue that. He's going to give his argument to go against what Peter is doing. Look at verse 17. We'll go through this sort of quickly. But if while we seek to be justified by Christ, we ourselves also are found sinners, is Christ therefore a minister of sin? Certainly not, alright? Now this question that he's asking, he's literally saying, listen, if you, Peter, and I, Paul, if we seek to be justified in Christ, alright? If we've sought justification or right standing with God through faith in Christ, alright? And if we're then found to be sinners, and I want you to get the context for this, we've looked to Christ in faith to be saved. Which means that we are no longer keeping the law to be saved. We no longer have our faith in the law or the works of the law to be saved. So now if in abandoning the law and putting our faith alone in Christ for salvation, if in that we're found to be sinners because we're not keeping the law, well then Christ then would be responsible for our sin, wouldn't he? And Paul says absolutely not. Now imagine, Peter has stopped keeping the dietary laws. Jesus Christ did away with the dietary laws in Mark 7, right? Did away with them. We saw God do away with the dietary laws with the sheet falling in Acts 10 when Peter got his vision. I said, I'll put yourself in the situation of what Paul's saying here. Listen Peter, we're coming to Christ by faith to be saved. Which means we're not keeping that law anymore. So now if we're not keeping that law anymore, and we're following Christ according to the teachings of Christ, then if we're sinners, we're saying Christ is responsible for our sin. And Paul is saying absolutely not. Christ is not responsible for our sin. May it never be, right? So here he, that's the first statement in his argument. Christ is not responsible for the sin. The teaching of Christ about justification by faith is right. And we're doing right by abandoning that law and living by faith in Christ, right? But then look at verse 18. For if I build again those things which I destroyed, I make myself a transgressor. Transgressor, right? And what Paul's saying here is on the contrary. If I try to restore my right relationship with God by keeping the law, I'm in sin. And I want you to see, we'll talk about this more in a minute, but the application to you for this. If you've come to Christ for a right standing with God on the basis of faith in Christ, then you fall into sin, right? Or you have some difficulty, you question your salvation, maybe you've got difficulties with assurance, and you attempt to restore a right standing with God, or to have an understanding of a right standing with God on the basis of keeping the law, on the basis of doing good works, on the basis of how you live. If you do that, you're in sin. So now think about that for a minute, and we're going to talk about it more. But you come to Christ and you come to Christ by faith. You realize I am a wicked sinner. I'm depraved. I need a savior. And you look to Christ and you look to his work on the cross and his substitution on your behalf. And you think, boy, I have nothing to offer God. I am empty-handed here. I am spiritually bankrupt. I am without hope apart from Christ. And if I died right now, I'd go to hell. And you think to yourself, man, Jesus Christ did that? And he did that for me. And I believe it. And I'm going to live by faith in Christ. I want Christ and Christ alone. There is nothing good in me. There's nothing that I can do that will merit myself before God. Nothing that I can do on the basis of faith. You turn from your sin and you turn to Christ and you begin living for him. And you go just like these believers in Galatians, just like Peter. You go and you run. You run hard. You run well. You're on a mountaintop. You've been saved, praise God. And you go for a while and then things get tough. And you start questioning. You start having difficulty. And you start thinking to yourself, I'm struggling with this sin over here. I'm still having a hard time with my life. Am I really a Christian? I mean, look at what I'm doing here. I'm not as committed to my daily devotions as I should be. I'm not fully through that whole lust issue I've been having or that whole anger issue I've been having or whatever it is. And I just haven't conquered that. And I just fell into that sin again. Or I've got this issue with pride or apathy or whatever it is. And you look at your performance and you think to yourself, you're not where you want to be. And you start looking at your performance. Looking at your life. Looking at your obedience to the commands of Christ. Apart from faith in Christ. And you start looking at what you do. You begin in the flesh to attempt to restore a right relationship with God on the basis of your works. On the basis of keeping the laws of God on the basis of obeying His commands. Now you're no longer trying to establish a right relationship with God based on faith. All of a sudden now you found yourself in the ditch of trying to establish a right relationship with God based on obedience to His commands. And that makes you a transgressor of what we're talking about here. You're in sin for doing that. Now that's really really really easy trap for genuine believers to fall into. Right? And it creates a circumstance that Martin Lloyd-Jones called morbidity. Where you without faith in Christ completely focused on your own performance slip into this despair that comes by trying to justify yourself based on works of the law. And that's not faith in Christ. You pulled away. Paul would say why are you leaving so soon? Who's bewitched you? Why are you departing the gospel of God, the gospel of grace? Why are you departing justification by faith alone and going back to trying to justify yourself by works of the law? So if you try to restore that relationship with God based on your works then you're going to fall into that sin. And it is sin. Look at verse 19. For I through the law died to the law that I might live to God. Right? Now all believers I want you to follow the train of thought here all believers have died to the law so that they might live to God. You'll hear this excuse. It's a beautiful passage of Scripture used as an excuse all the time. We're no longer under law, but we're under grace. Now what that simply means is this and it's the argument that Paul is making here. Justification is not, being right with God is not through keeping the law. So you're not under the mosaic law anymore in the sense that you keep that law in order to be saved. You're not under law anymore. You're under salvation by faith alone and Christ alone. You're under salvation by grace. You're under grace. It does not mean that you just toss out the window all obedience to Christ. It doesn't mean you can get away with disobedience. You can live however you want to live. It's not what it means. As a system of salvation as a way, as a means to be right with God you're not under law anymore. You're under grace. But here all believers died to the law so that they might live to God. And that live to God is another way of saying live by faith. It's by faith. We'll talk about that in a minute. Verse 20 I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live but Christ lives in me 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 for me. In verse 20 initially you're identified with Christ. You're identified in his death, identified in his resurrection. If you're a genuine disciple of Christ when God looks at you he doesn't look at your works any longer in that sense. He's looking at Christ and the finished work of Christ on the cross. He sees you identified in Christ in his death and in his resurrection. When Christ died it's as if you died with him. When Christ was raised it's as if you are being raised with Christ. It's identification with Christ but then now after that truth based on that truth the next part of the statement is the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me that now your life the Christian life is lived out by faith in Christ. When you live as you're living as you're coming across temptation in situations where you've got a choice to make you're living your life based on faith in Christ every decision every action it's all based on faith in Christ what would the Lord have me do out of the overflow of a new nature you start making decisions for Christ and against you for Christ and against your sin it's life lived by faith in Christ. Now look at verse 21 I do not set aside the grace of God for if righteousness comes through the law then Christ died in vain okay therefore it follows if anyone requires law if you require law keeping for yourself you're rejecting the grace of God you're rejecting the grace of God and in returning to the law going back to the point we made a minute ago if you attempt by your works, by your performance by what you're doing to restore a right relationship with God then what you are in effect doing is you're rejecting the grace of God and you're saying the cross of Christ is of no effect and that Christ died in vain that's why it's sin okay so if you're attempting by your works to be right with God if you're looking at your accountability if you're looking at your performance you've got your eyes on that and you're judging yourself based on that if I do good I am good if I don't do good I'm not good and it's a lot more subtle than that right when you're trying to and you can't fall into that trap if you're looking at those measures if you're looking at your performance apart from faith in Christ then you're establishing a righteousness of your own and a righteousness of your own will not save and you in your actions render the cross of Christ of no effect Christ died in vain if that's the case that's why it's sin go to 1st John 3 we want to tie in how this works 1st John 3 this is really important and it's just something that you are going to have to grapple with any good vibrant healthy church is a church that preaches hard against sin a church that preaches hard for holy living you've got genuine disciples in there that their foremost desire is just to live pleasing to God and I want to live for Christ I want Christ to be pleased he's my lord he's my master he's saved me the desire of your heart with everything you are is to live for him but now in that environment the natural byproduct that is a struggle with what we're talking about it's going to be difficult in your flesh sometimes to understand where the line is and we in our flesh just like Peter is doing here can easily cross over that line and we can cross over that line and find ourselves in territory we don't need to be because it's sinful territory that will throw us into a death spiral and will get your mind tangled up you've got to be vigilant against that and the point of being vigilant against it is understanding and we'll try to give that more to you but in 1 John 3 look down at verse 4 and if you're like me this passage has given you trouble before related to what we're talking about this passage has given us difficulty whoever commits sin also commits lawlessness and sin is lawlessness and you know that he was manifested to take away our sins and in him there is no sin we know from looking at this before what we're talking about here is a pattern of sin a lifestyle of sin being characterized by sin verse 6 whoever abides in him does not practice sin whoever sins has neither seen him nor known him little children let no one deceive you he who practices righteousness is righteous just as he is righteous he who sins is of the devil sin from the beginning for this purpose the Son of God was manifested that he might destroy the works of the devil whoever has been born of God does not sin for his seed remains in him and he cannot sin because he has been born of God in this the children of God and the children of the devil are manifest whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God nor is he who does not love his brother now back in Galatians 2 that passage alright has it's a tough passage and it's a good passage it's a helpful passage in the sense that if you've been genuinely saved and you've been justified made right with God on the basis of faith alone and Christ alone you've turned from your sin and are following Christ then the Bible says you're not going to live in a pattern of sin now how does that relate with living by faith in Christ if you look at 1st John 3 and you hold that passage of Scripture up as a standard by which you judge yourself examine yourself whether or not you're in the faith and you do that apart from faith in Christ you're going to be living a pattern of sin there's no hope of recovery from alright that passage is to be viewed by the Bible through the filter through the lens of living a life of faith in Christ if you have your eyes on Christ trusting him trusting him alone to save you if you have your mind focused on Christ living for him if when you fall into sin when you're battling sin and you're repenting of sin and you've got your eyes on Christ and you're living by faith in Christ then that there isn't a pattern of sin if you are in Christ by faith then you live by faith in the Son of God and whatever is done in faith is not sin if I can make that clear it's whatever is done not in faith is sin if you're not living by faith you're in sin if you have faith in Christ and you're living by faith then those patterns in your life are going to be patterns generally of righteousness you're going to struggle with the sin and you're going to have difficulty with what you perceive as patterns in your life but living by faith in the Son of God gives us victory over that and you'll see progress but it's by faith if you are living looking at your own performance holding your own performance up against 1 John 3 and you're not looking at it by faith you're going to be sorely disappointed you're going to see that you don't have victory that sin you in essence are looking at 1 John 3 attempting to restore a right relationship with God based on your works that's a difficult fine line to understand it's something we can easily get our mind tangled up over if you're living by faith you turn from your sin that sin doesn't have dominion over you in the sense that you were enslaved to it any longer you've died to that sin we still struggle we still struggle in our sin but if you're living by faith you're continuously looking to Christ you're going to see out of the the outflow of your new nature in Christ is going to be victory over that is going to be progress over that is going to be a breaking of those patterns of sin in your life and that's done by faith in Christ you're looking and working and gritting your teeth to get rid of it working in your own power to try to break those patterns in your life it doesn't come that way it comes by faith in Christ if you're living by faith as a disciple of Christ then just by the nature of living by faith you break patterns in your life of sin you're not in sin in that sense any longer you've been delivered from that as a disciple of Christ so it's a fine line when you look at your own performance the Bible says to examine yourself whether or not you're in the faith and you are looking at yourself examining yourself whether you're in the faith that's not a process that should take you months and months to figure out have I a new nature in Christ has God changed me this is all about nature and affections remember it's not what you do it's who you are and who you are produces what you do if you're living by faith in Christ who you are has been changed and now what you do begins to be transformed but it comes back to the issue of nature have you been changed by God have you been saved and do you see now progress toward Christ toward godliness is the primary motivation for what you do affection or love for Christ is the primary motivation for what you do is the nature from which you do those things is that nature a nature that hungers and thirsts for righteousness is it a nature that loves holiness and hates that sin is it a nature that wants to please Christ that desires to live for him that finds him infinitely appealing and valuable and precious is that the nature that you have now is it a nature that loves God's word that loves righteousness that hungers and thirsts for it that hates the sin is that the nature that you have if you have that nature you've been saved by God this is the faith alone in Christ alone you've been transformed by him you have a new heart in Christ now listen, if you've been transformed that's your nature if God has changed you that way then those patterns that we see in 1 John 3 are broken those patterns they don't apply to you in that way any longer and you look at them based on faith in Christ not based on your own works not based on your own righteousness as believers and just like we see the Galatians doing here and Peter doing here believers in Christ can fall from or stray from that understanding and start living back according to works they look at a passage like 1 John 3 and say, you know, I've got this sin and I've got this sin and I've got this sin and I'm not doing this and I'm not doing that and I'm not doing the other thing and you know what, I only do this much here and I only do this much and I'd rather I think a Christian would do a lot more and again, then you start trying to establish a right relationship with God based on your works based on keeping the law based on obedience and not on faith but if you look like okay, yes, if you look at yourself long enough I've got this and I've got this and I've got this you repent of that you trust Christ to deliver you from it and you live by faith your eyesight needs to be on Christ that is a reality right, and you're going to find sin in your life from now until the day you die until you're finally and fully glorified you find that sin and you gouge it out of your life and how do you do that do you do it by looking at passages like 1 John 3 and agonize over your own performance and try to do that in your own power or is that done through faith in Christ do you try to establish a right relationship with God based on obedience to those commands or are you living by faith if you live by faith that's where the victory is Christ I'm trusting you Christ I want free from this I want to please you, I want to live for you Christ please help me I need victory over this sin I want to live for you Christ it's faith in Christ that does that alright, so it's just a fine line and it's something we've got to be constantly aware of but that's the way that works and that's here in Galatians 2 in a way demonstrated by the conduct of Peter what we see happening in this chapter and it's what we fall into all the time but I want to see, I want you to see next a couple of definitions here give you a couple of definitions the first in verses 15 and 16 the first word that we need to look at is the word justification in exactly what justification means justification decaiutai it's a there's a word justification based on a verb and there's justification based on a noun noun is decaiusune literally it's the word it can be translated justification or it can be translated righteousness so when the Bible is talking about righteousness or about justification this is what we're dealing with here we're dealing with the righteousness that is required for us to be right with God we need righteousness and we have none of our own, alright so justification justification is a legal declaration of your right standing with God it is God in his courtroom dropping the gavel and pronouncing you not guilty that's what you need to be right with God now this is a decree but it's also imputation it's also crediting to you the righteousness that you need we need righteousness in order to be right with God we need a legal declaration of not guilty and we need to be made right it's the giving you of Christ's righteousness crediting that to your account and pronouncing you not guilty now a judge who declares the guilty righteous is a judge who's violated standards of justice we all understand how that works the Bible says he who justifies the ungodly is an abomination to God but that's exactly what's going on here if you blanket pronounce someone justified that's what's being talked about there that's justifying the ungodly which is an abomination to God here this justification is a legal declaration based upon the finished work of Christ alone so it's not just a blanket legal declaration it's got teeth to it you're under a curse because you cannot keep the law everyone who cannot keep the law is under a curse Jesus Christ if you're a disciple of Christ Jesus Christ took that curse for you and in Christ because he took the curse for you you can be made legally declared righteous legally declared justified on the basis of Christ and you get the righteousness of Christ Romans 833 says who will bring a charge against God's elect it is God who justifies when God justifies on the basis of Christ there is no one who can bring a charge against you it has been nailed to the cross it's done with there's no one that can bring a charge God justifies then righteousness justification is given by faith as a free gift not to those who work but to those who have faith in Christ Romans 4 talks about this if you work a full week at the end of the week you get a paycheck if you work for God if you're going to be right with God it's almost as if you're saying you owe me and God doesn't know you anything so justification doesn't come on the basis of works it comes on the basis of faith alone in Christ alone it's a free gift and that's the legal declaration that you're right with God not guilty and it's also the imputation or the crediting the giving by a free gift of Christ's righteousness righteousness to you that's different than forgiveness you can go out and sin again alright that record may be cleared you can go out and sin again it's different than pardon pardon your record may be cleared but you can go out and sin again now this is legally declared righteous and when you're declared righteous by God you are righteous in Christ that's the way God views you alright but then next in verse 15 it talks about or in 16 it says the works of the law you're justified may right with God made righteous by Christ righteousness by the works of the law it says there works of the law is keeping of the mosaic commandments now there's one aspect of this which is legalistic that's simply saying that those who rely on keeping commands to merit right standing with God that's legalism if you rely on the law to gain merit before God that's legalism and if you're being a legalist you're under a curse you're under the curse still right or and also here works of the law there's a summary for works provided or prescribed by the mosaic law works of the law are strictly in obedience to the mosaic law human obedience to commandments cannot function as the basis for which you are right with God human obedience to commands cannot be your basis for your right standing with God or not for right relationship with God it's got to be on the basis of faith let's look at faith got justification talks about works of the law we know that justification does not come by obedience to commands does not come by our obedience to the works of the keeping the mosaic law comes on the basis of fight on the basis of faith Christ is our righteousness if the righteousness you need for a right standing with God is in Christ and through Christ then everything you're about is Christ you keep your focus on Christ you live for Christ you think through what Christ would have you do you live according to his principles you live according to his teaching according to his word you live for him your his property you put all of your trust all of your commitment in Christ Christ is your righteousness make sense if he's your righteousness and you need that righteousness to be saved it's your total commitment to Christ it's commitment and trust in his work in his righteousness alone to save you it's Christ that is our righteousness there's no righteousness in our own and so we trust in Christ crucified God sees nothing in you sees nothing in me that impresses him you thought about that? there's nothing in you that God sees that impresses him can't do anything outside of Christ to please God your righteousness comes through Christ alone should you see anything in yourself that impresses you so what are you doing looking at your own works if you've fallen into this trap and you're trying to establish a right relationship with God by keeping works of the law by obeying commands I mean where does that end take that out to its logical conclusion are you ever gonna do enough are you ever gonna have the right motives are you ever gonna completely have the right heart in what you do because you're contending with this flesh stop looking at works that way if you look at works that way you're trying to establish righteousness again based on keeping the commandments and you're in sin you're a transgressor because you're rendering the cross of Christ of no effect Christ died in vain so what this means here is that you can't look at your works and think that anything commends you to God so when you're examining yourself look at the nature look at what God has done in you do I have a new heart in Christ have I been transformed by God am I a new creation and then out of that new creation you look and you say the way I'm living victory over the sin progress in the sin my understanding of the Christian walk am I making progress am I living for Christ by faith in Christ is that the outflow of my new nature do I have affection for Christ is that the motivating factor behind my actions you walk into a room you sit in a chair nothing happens by accident you do that for a reason maybe you saw somebody you wanted to sit by maybe that chair was not around anybody and you didn't want to be around anybody maybe that chair is just everything you do you base on a decision there's a reason for it alright is what you're doing on the basis of a love for Christ out of a desire to obey him out of a desire a hunger and a thirst for righteousness is it based out of the new nature is it based out of a new creation or are you merely trying to establish righteousness with God on the basis of your own works on the basis of your own power questions for yourself this is not a works righteousness this is a salvation that results in works but you've got to determine am I a new creature in Christ have I been saved by God and are the things that I'm doing is this performance that I'm looking at is it based on a new creation based on a new heart based on a new nature if you start looking again at strictly what you're doing you're going to get it and white knuckling it to get it done apart from faith in Christ you're in sin God doesn't see anything that impresses us that leads us back to where we started that this is not simple this is something that genuine believers fall into all the time conversations after conversation after conversation maybe you've counseled people that have had difficulty with that they look at their lives and they say you know what it's right and you're not going to the thing about I remember hearing I didn't understand I remember hearing a new believer just get converted and you think about guys like John MacArthur somebody that's been saved a really long time you think to yourself wow what's it like to be saved for 30 years you must be really holy and you ask them does it get any easier like well no the longer you live in Christ the longer you live for Christ by sanctification and by his spirit the more sensitive you become to sin in the very beginning there were just big things I wanted God to sort of lock them off and over time he did he locks off the big things but when you really understand your sinfulness and you really start looking at who you are in the flesh and there is nothing there to be impressed with there is nothing there you are going to be pleased with you look at that there is going to be just discussed right it's like Paul and Roman 7 saying wretched man that I am that's the apostle Paul so you continue to look at yourself that way that's what you are going to get so now as a result of that do you then go back and attempt to make sure that you are right with God that you are doing better or is you doing better the only hope you have for that based on faith in Christ yes you want to do better there is sin in your life sin in my life that we want to gouge out of our life if you look at that sin and you say I am going to do better here I am determined I am going to do this I am going to get that sin out of my life I am going to be disgusted by it I don't want to do that anymore and you start working on it and maybe you stumble maybe you have difficult time you think to yourself would a Christian really have this much difficulty with this I am not a slave to sin any longer I shouldn't be having this kind of trouble so I need to try harder then try harder maybe you pray God please help me I am going to do better in my life and you are thinking to yourself if I can get past this sin if I can have victory over this sin what that is demonstrating to me is that God has saved me that I am right with God maybe you have an understanding of doctrines of grace and you think to yourself how do I know God has saved me if I can get rid of this sin I am going to get rid of this sin and prove that I am right with God and you do that and you are looking at yourself and you are running and running and running and failing and failing and failing but then you say that is trying to establish a right standing with God based on your own performance you have to switch that around all of that for the genuine disciple is based on faith in Christ you look at yourself you are going to be and you should be disgusted I am saying the closer you get to Christ the more disgusted with yourself you should be the more mature you are as a believer the worse you should feel about yourself right? so you either let that send you into a downward spiral of depression morbidity as Martin Lloyd Jones calls it introspection or you keep your eyes focused on Christ you know what? I look at myself I see no good but I love Christ and I want to live for him I want to acknowledge this sin out of my life I want to be holy and pleasing to him I want to obey him and you get up in the morning and you say okay by faith in Christ I am going to live this life by faith in Christ God please help me and you obey him when you are faced with sin you don't do the sin you obey Christ now sometimes you will sin but you continue by faith in Christ to win victory over that by faith in Christ looking at your performance you know is what is happening in my life evidence that God has saved me evidence that he has worked on me evidence of faith is it evidence of Christ and you walk that way you live by faith and if you do that living by faith is what gives the victory and I have an older believer it's been around for a long time been in the Lord for a long time you do you have progressive a person that's not being sanctified is not saved if you're being sanctified that's a good indication that you are genuinely converted so these guys you're in Christ you get sanctified you make progress sometimes that progress isn't as evident as you'd like it to be sometimes you just have your eyes focused on Christ just trusting Christ out of your own it's like you put yourself on an autopsy table you got yourself cut wide open you got the microscope down there and all the dirt you got to get your eyes out of the microscope and on Christ and if you live that way by faith in Christ you make progress but what we got to be careful of and what legalism is is you get your eyes back on your own works and trying to be right with God based on your works and listen it's something that we've got to be cognizant of because any church that preaches the word of God any genuine disciple has a sensitive conscience and in that you can fall into this trap we see Peter doing it here I've done it myself before it's not a pleasant place to be you got to live by faith in Christ that's where a great joy comes when you fall into that trap of trying to establish right standing with God on the basis of your works on the basis of your performance one of the first things that happens is your Christian joy gets sucked right out you become joy less you become despairing you don't have any hope in Christ any longer you're not joy that's like David saying Lord, please restore to me the joy of my salvation he's pleading for that that's the first thing that goes also what goes is assurance of your salvation you no longer have faith living by faith in Christ you're not believing Christ taking man as word assurance goes out the window and you believe yourself to be lost now there are some that when your assurance wanes it's because you're not converted but there are others that are genuine disciples in Christ they believe themselves in this trap and the first thing that goes out the door is assurance of their salvation they believe themselves to be lost because they're not walking by faith in Christ so it goes back to that issue of live according to faith in Christ live by faith walk by faith if by the spirit you put to death the deeds of the body you'll live so don't find yourself in that downward spiral if you get in that position put your eyes back on Christ victory in the Christian life comes from that's where joy in the Christian life comes from alright let's pray Father in Heaven God help us to grasp the truth God that you've laid out in scripture just the cornerstone of our faith this idea of justification by faith alone and Christ alone God help us to grasp that help us to live in that truth God to understand it to apply it to our hearts God please protect us Lord from our fleshly tendency to try to establish right standing with you based on our works based on obedience there's just nothing in us God that can commend ourselves to you there's nothing in us that is righteous we need Christ's righteousness in order to be right with you we know that comes by faith Lord help us to live by faith in you to turn from our sin to the holy trust you be holy committed to you to follow you with our whole heart help us to live that way for your glory God we want to be saved we want to live for you we want to be in heaven with you we want to be Christ people as we were talking about this morning Lord help us to do that Lord for your glory in Jesus name Amen