FREEDOM TO DO WHAT WE SHOULD (GAL 5:13-15)

SERIES: FREE AT LAST, PART 19

GCEFC: MARCH 14, 2010

INTRODUCTION

1. Freedom is a dangerous thing. Freedom is actually more dangerous than slavery. Because slavery has limitations, restrictions, and controls.

2. The reason slave rebellions were so feared, was because in such situations slaves seized freedoms they were normally denied.

3. No one could predict what might happen when people who were formerly enslaved had the opportunity to act freely and without restrictions.

4. The book of Galatians is a book about freedom. We said that it’s been called: The Charter of Christian Liberty. I’ve entitled this series: Free At Last.

5. Galatians describes the unspeakable gift of spiritual freedom. Freedom from the law’s demands. Freedom from the law’s curse. Freedom from God’s judgment. Freedom from sin’s condemnation.

6. We saw at the beginning of CH 5: It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. We’ve been set free so we can be free and remain free forever.

7. But freedom is dangerous. Dangerous because it creates an opportunity for abuse. A path by which we can do what we were never meant to do—but we’re free to do.

8. So after Paul goes to great lengths to say what a wonderful gift freedom is—he says that we must be very careful with this gift.

9. Because freedom can actually become our undoing. Freedom can undermine or even destroy the very thing that it was meant to produce.

A. FREEDOM SHOULD NOT BE ABUSED

1. GAL 5:13: You, my brothers (and sisters), were called to be free. There it is again. As if we were going to forget. You don’t forget news like that.

2. As believers, we’ve been set free from the most crippling, enslaving, condemning bondage there is—spiritual bondage. It doesn’t get any worse.

3. Paul was aware of freedom’s danger. So on the heals of his statement that we’re called to be free, he follows with: But do not use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature.

4. Literally it says don’t use your freedom as a base of operations or a springboard for a sinful life of self-indulgence.

5. You see, this was exactly what the false teachers were claiming would happen. This is what all legalists claim will happen.

6. You can’t give humans spiritual freedom—or they’ll catch the first train for Sinville.

7. People are sinful enough with laws. Laws that make unlawfulness painful. Sometimes very painful. Painful enough to deter people from doing what they would otherwise do.

8. The Bible says the heart of man is deceitful and desperately wicked—more than we even know—so the legalist says we cannot live godly lives without rules.

9. We cannot live lives pleasing to God without external restrictions on what we would otherwise freely choose to do.

10. You see human beings are prone to extremes.

a. That’s why we spend too much.

b. That’s why we eat too much.

c. That’s why we watch too much television.

11. We gravitate to extremes. Two common ones being legalism and license.

a. Legalism is the strict adherence to religious rules or laws in order to prove one’s righteousness and earn God’s favor.

b. License is the practice of excessive freedom and the lack of restraint, doing what one wishes to the point of unacceptable and even sinful behavior.

c. Legalism is too much restraint. License is not enough restraint. Both are extremes.

d. But Christian liberty is not about legalism or license. Christian liberty is about doing what I should because I’m free to do it by God’s grace and the Spirit’s power.

e. Christian liberty is not freedom to sin—it’s freedom not to sin.

12. Some have asked why we should even be concerned about rules and laws? We love to sin and God loves to forgive sin. Isn’t this a perfect arrangement?

13. Why not indulge our natural appetites to provide God more opportunities to display his grace! The thought has occurred before, and it’s addressed in ROM 5-6.

14. The law was added so that the trespass might increase. But where sin increased, grace increased all the more. What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? mh\ ge÷noito, says Paul—May it never be!

B. SERVE ONE ANOTHER INSTEAD

1. So legalism is not the answer for the Christian. We don’t grow spiritually by keeping rules. Even good rules. Keeping rules simply proves that I’m a good rules keeper.

2. Nor is license the answer. The unbridled fulfillment of our passions and desires and sinful lusts. Doing whatever I want because I’m free to do whatever I want.

3. So if neither of these is the answer—what is the answer? It’s in the same V13: But do not use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature—rather, serve one another in love.

4. The Christian life is not about keeping rules. It’s not about abandoning the rules. It’s about serving one another in love.

5. The Christian life is not a license to sin—it’s an opportunity to serve. It’s not freedom to do whatever I want—it’s freedom to do whatever I should.

6. When you remove love from liberty, you get a freedom to indulge your own impulses and feed your own desires to the neglect of others.

7. When you combine liberty with love, you get a freedom to serve others in love.

8. Which is why the second component of our mission is: Growing together in community.

9. If we aren’t interested in growing together—we don’t need community. When your desire is to serve yourself—the community just gets in the way.

C. LOVING YOUR NEIGHBOR SUMS UP THE LAW

1. Look at V14: The entire law is summed up in a single command: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’

2. I hope this reminds us of the conversation in MT 22. When the Pharisees got together and tried to stump Jesus by asking him a hard question. The question: Teacher, what is the greatest commandment in the Law?

3. Pharisees they had dedicated their lives to the Law and all its nuances and intricacies.

4. And you can bet that as soon as Jesus gave them the one commandment he considered greatest—they were primed to say NUH-UH.

5. But Jesus’ answer is profound in its simplicity. He said: Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.

6. Of course, when Jesus said this commandment was first, he meant it was primary in rank—not that it was first in the list of commandments.

7. Like when we say the Obama’s are the “first family.” We don’t mean they’re the first family that came into existence. We mean they’re the primary American family because they’re the family of the Chief Executive.

8. Jesus wanted the Pharisees to understand that the entire Law of God can be condensed to just 2 basic commands: Love God and love other people. Everything else is detail.

9. God’s supreme desire is that we love him and serve him. And that we love the people he created and serve them. We can make it a lot more complicated than that.

10. But usually when we take something simple and make it complicated, it’s because we aren’t all that comfortable with the simple version.

11. So how does loving our neighbor sum up the entire law?

a. If you love your neighbor—you won’t murder him.

b. If you love your neighbor—you won’t commit adultery with their spouse.

c. If you love your neighbor—you won’t steal from him.

d. If you love your neighbor—you won’t say what is not true about him.

e. If you love your neighbor—you won’t envy what he has.

12. When my children were growing up, we had to impose some rules on them. The rules were for their own good and benefit.

a. You see, my kids didn’t have a natural, built-in desire to always do what was right. Or safe. Or wise.

b. So we had to do 2 things. We had to make sure they understood what the rule was. Nice if they appreciated the wisdom of the rule—but that wasn’t necessary.

c. Second, we needed to be sure that violating the rule was appropriately unpleasant for them. Unpleasant enough that it would deter a repeat performance.

d. Now it didn’t always work perfectly. But the approach was sound. And it eventually produced some valuable results.

e. Now my kids are grown. We don’t impose rules on them anymore. Why not? First because they aren’t with us so we can’t enforce them.

f. We could give them rules. But they know we have no way of monitoring their compliance.

g. Second, because it’s time for them to impose their own rules on themselves. We trust their rules are grounded in biblical truth. But unless they break civil laws and are caught—no one is going to serve as their rules monitor. It’s now up to them to do so.

h. That’s what being an adult means. Taking responsibility for your own life. We have a word for this. It’s called discipline.

13. When we were outside the Christian faith. When were lost and dead in our transgressions and sins. Without hope for this life or the next. All we had were rules.

14. Keeping them would keep us out of trouble. But keeping them did not save us or commend us to God. That required God’s grace through our faith in Christ.

15. When we trusted Christ we were set free. Liberated from the law of sin and death.

16. Now we’re no longer spiritually enslaved. We’ve been set free. Set free from something and set free to something.

17. Set free FROM the penalty of sin and eternal condemnation. Set free TO serve one another in love. Not because our salvation depends on it.

18. Not because we have to. Not so God will be nice to us and give us goodies. But because we want to as an expression of our relationship to God and as a recipient of his grace.

19. God saved us. And now he tells us what he wants from us. He wants us to love and serve him. And he wants us to love and serve others.

a. I read a story about a woman who was married to a domineering and very demanding husband who required her to follow a list of very specific duties. He actually had a written list she was expected to follow.

b. His demands were relentless and the marriage was nothing more than a daily drudgery for the woman.

c. Eventually her husband died and the woman later remarried. Her new marriage was based on love rather than on law.

d. It was nothing like her previous marriage which was a burdensome list of do’s and don’ts with consequences.

e. One day, after being married to her second husband for several years, she came across the old list written by her first husband. She read through the list of all his demands.

f. And she was shocked to realize she was doing everything on the list her previous husband had demanded—but that she had resented doing.

g. Now she was doing all of these things willingly and voluntarily—even joyfully! This is how serving one another in love works.

h. We don’t serve because we have to. But because we want to. And because we’re able to because of our freedom in Christ and the indwelling Spirit of God.

20. The love of God within us is more powerful and more transformational than any rules or laws. We’re now called to fulfill not the letter of the law, but the spirit of the law. And when we fulfill the spirit of the law—we’ve fulfilled both.

D. WE MUST GET ALONG

1. In the last verse of the section, we get a glimpse of a battle going on in Galatia. It was a battle between the legalists and the libertines.

2. You see, laws cannot force people to get along—even Christians. We still have sinful, self-centered, self-serving tendencies. All of us.

3. Rules don’t guarantee or produce true spirituality. Only the Spirit of God can do that in the context of community.

4. Spiritual growth occurs when we invest ourselves in God’s Word, prayer, and in the community of believers. This is the environment in which growth takes place.

5. The very things that sometimes annoy us about each other are the very things that spur our growth.

6. PRO 27:17 says that as iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another. If you’ve ever sharpened anything, you know that sharpening occurs when pieces of metal are removed.

7. If the metal being sharpened could talk, you know what it would say? But it’s the removing of the metal that creates the sharp edge.

8. As we rub shoulders with each other. As we commit to one another in loving service within a caring community—we grow. Just as iron gets sharper—so will we.

9. We weren’t saved and granted liberty to ignore, neglect, or abuse others. We were saved and granted liberty to love and serve others.

10. Other people aren’t objects to serve us. We’re agents to serve them. It’s a huge part of what it means to be a biblical Christian.

11. Our freedom is not for indulging the flesh. Our freedom is not for exploiting our neighbor. Our freedom is for serving our neighbor.

12. Paul uses a word picture here when he says that the Galatians were biting and devouring each other. It was a term used of wild animals and snakes—not people.

13. It’s the image of two snakes grabbing each other’s tails and swallowing each other. So when you finish swallowing the other snake—you’ve been swallowed yourself!

14. In fact, Paul goes on to say that if we keep on biting each other, and hurting each other, and abusing each other—in the end both of us will be destroyed.

15. But when we serve one another in love—both of us grow and develop as God intended us to do. We both love, we both serve, we both grow, and we both win.

CONCLUSION

1. Freedom is often misunderstood. We tend to think that freedom and slavery are mutually exclusive. That you’re either free or you’re a slave.

2. But slavery to the right thing is liberty. And liberty in the wrong thing is slavery.

3. Just ask a drug addict, or a sex addict, or an alcoholic, or a gambling addict.

4. There was a time when they were totally free. Free to indulge this particular thought, or that particular behavior. So they indulged. They chose freely.

5. But over time it became painfully apparent that their freedom had become a form of slavery. They were no longer free. Their addiction was now in charge.

6. Freedom without restraints just becomes a different kind of slavery. As Bob Dylan said back in 1979 in his last hit record: You’re gonna have to serve somebody…

7. You’re either going to serve the law as a legalist. Or you’re going to reject the law and serve your own sinful passions and desires.

8. Or you’re going to serve the living God. And serve one another in love.

9. You’re not getting away with serving nobody. It’s only a matter of whom you serve.

10. Many people think that freedom is being able to do what you want. But freedom is the ability to do what you ought.

a. Think of a fish swimming out in the ocean. A picture of freedom. The fish can go anywhere he wants any time he wants. Oh really?

b. There are all kinds of objects the fish must swim around. And types of water that must be avoided.

c. The fish can’t enter fresh water or it will die. The fish must swim on guard lest it become another fish’s meal. Or end up on a fisherman’s hook or in his net.

d. And suppose the fish decides one day it’s tired of the water and wants to spend some time on land. How’s that going to work? That’s the end of the fish.

11. Even freedom must be lived within boundaries. As believers we’re most free when we enlist as slaves to God. When we willingly and freely choose to serve one another in love.

12. We all must choose. Let’s choose wisely. Let’s choose true freedom.