Galatians 2:15-21 - Justification (Rick Graumlich)

Church, when I was um a young, when I was in high school, start with a story here, I went camping all the time with my friend John.

John and I went camping, not every weekend when it was warm, but we went camping a ton.

We camped so much that we ended up just leaving all of our stuff out of the campsite.

It was back in his woods, and we would just go back there, you know, the tent was always there, the sinking bag was there.

And there came a point where it's just all of our flashlights just died, right?

Because you we didn't bring batteries, you don't think ahead.

The only thing you think when you're going camping is I need to bring food, right?

As much food as your parents will allow.

And our battery just flashlights died, and we're like camping, and that's fine.

But then one time we heard just a bunch of noise like over this hill.

When we were camping, it was kind of down in this like valley, and over this hill we just heard a lot of noise, and we were we were terrified.

You know, we're like 16, 17, and we're all big and bad, and then all of a sudden we're just little boys again.

Right?

We're just we're freaked out, we don't know what's going on.

And the the woods was just really thick with undergrowth and the trees and the bushes, and so we couldn't really see anything.

The fire, you know, wasn't that big, and and we began to be like concerned, worried.

But what's what is over there?

We started thinking, man, if we just had a flashlight, if we just had a flashlight, we could literally just see what's out there.

And that would have been helpful, and that might have been good for us.

But the reality is, whatever was out there, the flashlight could not save us from what was out there.

That was probably just some deer or something, but the illumination of the flashlight only revealed more clearly the problem we were in.

It couldn't have saved us.

And so, likewise, the illumination that the law brings and brought to the Jews revealed more clearly the situation that they were in.

That they were sinners, that they needed a savior, but they could not save themselves.

The law revealed God's holy standard, and by that it revealed their wickedness and their sin.

But again, the light, it was enough to bring light to the path to show them where they were, but it did not provide salvation.

So, this is the situation that Paul is addressing in Galatians.

When Jesus Christ saved you, then you did you then have to keep living as a Jew and holding to the Levitical law or not?

So this was the controversy.

And it wasn't just a little bit of a controversy, this was everything.

It was so important that the church get this right, that the gospel is faith in Jesus Christ alone, nothing else.

You can't add anything else in there for salvation, or it is not the gospel.

Salvation by grace through faith alone.

This is so important to Paul that when he's writing to the churches, he says, if somebody brings to you a different gospel, if they add something to this message, let them be accursed.

And that language of accursed is eternally condemned, let them be accursed.

For the doctrine that we're dealing with is the doctrine of justification.

How are you, a sinner, rebellious toward God, then made right with God?

How are you, someone whose heart desires wicked things?

Even though sometimes good things we say, even the good things you want to do, if it's not unto the Lord, is wickedness and sinful because you're not doing the good things unto the Lord.

So how does someone like this, dead in sin, be made right with a holy and righteous God?

Justification.

It's that Jesus Christ came and paid the price for your sin.

Romans 6 says that the wages of sin is death.

So for every time there is a sin in your heart or you act out a sin, there is a wage that comes with that.

There's a charge that is given for that.

It's not as if it doesn't matter.

So when you think about just the last 24 hours of your life, most of you have been alive a lot longer than that.

How many times have you sinned?

What is that tab, if you will?

What's that record look like for you in the last 24 hours?

Now you just pick one of those sins.

Just pick one.

And against the holy and righteous God, that one sin is worth you being condemned to hell for eternity.

That's the weight of your one sin.

Eternity in hell.

So you begin to see the thing that you're up against.

How can you begin to deliver yourself out of this situation and pay the price for your sin?

You cannot.

But Jesus Christ can.

He came and lived a perfect life for you, on your behalf, paying the price then on the cross for your sin.

Not kind of a light trifle, glad that's over.

That was kind of an ordeal, kind of a weight.

The weight of the sins of the world on him.

Scripture says that he was crushed for our sin.

So don't take sin lightly.

And because Christ was crushed for your sin, you now stand justified before God.

You now stand there, your sin has been paid for.

Your wrongs have been paid for.

Christ has imputed, He's put his righteousness on you, and in you you're now righteous because of Christ.

So justification is being made right with God, receiving the verdict of not guilty.

Because the penalty of our sin was put on Christ.

It was paid by Christ.

Justification is not being made right with God through the blood of Christ and a little extra that you did.

Well, I was baptized.

Well, I took communion.

Well, I did something.

You cannot add to this.

Last week, Jimmy was working through the first part of chapter two, and he was saying how Paul's writing and part of his writing is to rebuke what Peter had done.

Here, Peter, the great apostle that he was, was still kind of working this out, and he had a fear of man.

And so when the Jews came around saying you need to submit to the law, Peter just kind of followed what they were doing.

Well, I guess this is what we're going to do, because the group is saying that.

And here Paul rebukes him for that, saying, You know the gospel.

You know that it is through Christ alone that you are saved.

He rebukes him sharply.

He knew better.

So this is where we're at when we begin to pick it up in verse 15.

But I want us to start reading in verse 14 of chapter 2.

So Galatians chapter 2, verse 14.

Galatians 2:14

But when I saw that their conduct was not in step with the truth of the gospel, this is Paul writing about Peter and some of the church leaders, I said to Cephas, who's Peter, before them all, if you, though a Jew, live like a Gentile and not like a Jew, how can you force the Gentiles to live like Jews?

We ourselves are Jews by birth and not Gentile sinners.

Yet we know that a person is not justified by works of the law, but through faith in Christ Jesus.

So we also have believed in Christ Jesus in order to be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the law.

Because by the works of the law no one will be justified.

But if in our endeavor to be justified in Christ we too were found to be sinners, is Christ then a servant of sin?

Certainly not.

For if I rebuild what I tore down, I prove myself to be a transgressor.

For through the law I died to the law, so that I might live to God.

I have been crucified with Christ.

It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.

And the life 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 nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness were through the law, then Christ died for no purpose.

This is the weight of what Paul's getting after here.

If you try to add anything to this message, then Christ died for nothing.

Either his blood was sufficient or it isn't.

Either it redeemed you or it didn't.

It made you right with God, justifying you or it did not.

So Paul's writing to encourage the church.

This is a rebuke in many ways, but a good rebuke from a loving brother and sister in Christ is a loving thing.

It's an encouraging thing.

So he begins in verse 15 just acknowledging.

Listen, we ourselves, Paul, Peter here, we're Jews.

And what he means by not Gentile sinners, they were Jews.

They were in the covenant family.

They had the law.

They weren't just pagans.

God had revealed the law to them.

But yet they had the knowledge of sin, but the inability to save themselves from it.

He's saying, if we who know the truth know what the law reveals.

And we know that a person is not justified by works of the law.

We know that Christ alone can save us and make us clean, not our works.

See, verse 16, there's kind of like a repetitive thing he's getting at here.

We know Christ alone can save us and make us clean, not our works, so we believe in Jesus Christ for justification.

Our faith is in him and not the law.

Because no one can be justified by the law.

And he's doubling down.

He wants to be so clear here, extremely clear.

We're not made right with God Almighty because we grew up in a good family.

Now, if you've been here for a few weeks as we've been going through Galatians, and we still have, well, willing more weeks to go, you just hear this on repeat from me and the other guys preaching and the other elders preaching through this.

Like, you're not justified by anything you do, baptism, family, all those things.

And you begin to like kind of check your mind, like, yeah, like I'm not trusting in those things.

I'm not trusting in my baptism, I'm not trusting in my family of origin or that I've grew up in the church, or that I give so much money to the church.

And that's good that you've worked that out in your soul.

But a question I have for you is, but are you trusting in Jesus Christ alone?

So you say you're not trusting in those other things.

Good, praise the Lord.

But are you trusting in Jesus Christ alone?

Is your faith in him?

Is the way that you live, the way that you steward what God has given you.

Does it show me my life is anchored to one thing, and that is Jesus Christ alone.

I'm not banking on figuring it out in ten years.

I'm not banking on waiting and kind of once I have kids, we'll kind of figure this out.

I'm not banking on just what happened to me 10 years ago, what was in my faith.

But I am tethered, I am walking, I am pursuing Jesus Christ and him alone.

So Paul's revealing this just by saying it again and again.

We know the law reveals sin.

We believe that Christ is the only one who justifies.

It's not by works, it's only through him.

And to kind of further explain this, look in verse 17 and 18.

But if in our endeavor to be justified in Christ we too were found to be sinners, is Christ then a servant of sin?

Certainly not.

For if I rebuild what I tore down, I prove myself to be a transgressor.

See, in pursuing being justified in Christ, that's going to reveal something.

When you open the scriptures and you say, okay, how can I be saved?

How can I follow God?

What's it look like to do those things?

As you pursue Him, it's going to become very apparent that you're lost and that you're sinful and that you need a Savior.

And for even those of us who are Christians, as we continue to pursue Christ in our faith, it's going to reveal to us how sinful our own hearts are.

Now, because that revelation has happened, does that make God or Christ a servant of sin?

Certainly not.

It's a gracious thing for Him to reveal that to us.

Again, to bring illumination to the condition of our heart.

And if we return to the pathway of darkness after going on the pathway of illumination, we prove ourselves to be guilty about going back to the dark path.

We've seen the illumination.

We know the way.

No longer are we just kind of blind or dead.

So to return back to that way is to tear down what has already been revealed to us.

To proclaim Jesus Christ as our salvation alone, and then to add circumcision or parts of the law to that is to destroy the message of the gospel.

And to say, well, you should be saved.

You need to be reconciled with God.

Only He can save you.

And then say, now that you are going to call on Christ in order to truly be saved, you need to do all these things.

That's not the message.

English Puritan William Perkins wrote of this verse believers in Christ are great offenders when reformed religion and unreformed life are joined together as they often are.

For then unreformed life builds the kingdom of sin that Christ has destroyed.

Cannot submit to God's rule and reign in our life.

While at the same time leaving areas of our conscience unsubmitted to him.

We cannot declare, I'm a follower of Jesus Christ.

And the way of salvation is through him, by grace alone, through faith alone.

And then begin to add something to that.

Subtly.

We cannot, we must not do that.

Paul begins to reveal what happens because of this.

See, in the false gospel, what happens is you get saved, and then guess what?

You need to follow these rules and be made right officially with God.

But what happens, what Paul lays out, what happens for him is he begins to be united with Christ because of the true gospel.

There's now union with Christ.

In this union, it brings justification and it brings sanctification, being made right before God.

It brings a new way of living.

Look with me in verse 19.

For though, for through the law I died to the law, so that I might live to God.

I have been crucified with Christ.

It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.

And the life 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 nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness were through the law, then Christ died for no purpose.

So it's through this revelation of this standard, the law, that Paul's inability to keep it, or our inability to keep it, and to keep God's standard, we realize that God's ability to keep it.

It's because the law was given that we now see the magnitude of the grace that God has shown us.

And because Christ has redeemed us completely, he didn't leave any more work for us to do to earn our justification.

We're dead to the law.

It's revealed our need for a Savior.

The Savior has come, He's redeemed us completely.

We're dead to the law so that we might now live to God.

We're not dead to the law, so that we may now live to the law again, as he says in the verse previous.

That would tear down the message.

We've been redeemed.

We're now dead to the law so that we might live to God.

His standard.

Paul's not saying that he ceases to exist in verse 20.

There's not this idea that he just kind of ceases, or his personality is gone, or there's nothing left of him.

But rather that the old man, the sinful man, has died.

He's been crucified.

It's done with.

Again, that's not possible if you're adding to the gospel.

Because if you're adding to the gospel, obviously there's the gospel, then there's something that you need to do to add on to it to be saved.

That's not possible to be crucified with Christ and yet hold on to the old man in order to be somehow atoned for part of what you contribute.

It is all or nothing.

Paul's saying, I have been crucified with Christ.

It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.

His focus, his desires are for Christ.

Return with me back to the book of Romans.

So, not too far back, passage 2nd and 1 Corinthians into the book of Romans.

We're gonna go to Romans chapter 8.

Romans 8 · chapter mention

Sorry, chapter 6.

Romans 6, if I can get there.

This is verse 11 or 6.

Romans 6.

Verse 6 is 6 through 11.

We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin.

For one who has died has been set free from sin.

Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him.

We know that Christ being raised from the dead will never die again.

Death no longer has dominion over him.

For the death he died, he died to sin once and for all.

But the life he lives, he lives to God.

So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.

So, in a false understanding of the gospel, it's believe the gospel, then start.

Start to work to keep your faith or to earn your faith, your justification.

But under the true gospel, the gospel of Jesus Christ, what he's saying is Christ is atoned for your sin.

Now walk in that.

Speaking of the doctrine of justification, John Calvin calls this a double grace of the gospel.

It makes us right with God, justification, and again, it makes us right with him in our sanctification, in how we can live with him.

It's a new record in heaven and a new heart on earth.

He begins to change us.

So the call before to leave the sin, to walk away from those things, before it was impossible.

Before, until you're justified and made right with God, you can spin your wheels, you can put all your effort you want into doing the right thing and overcoming sin and being a good person.

But you will fail 100% of the time.

One, because you don't have the strength of Christ in you.

The Holy Spirit's not dwelling in you to give you strength to overcome, to pursue this holy life that Christ has purchased for you.

And secondly, and I mentioned this before, whatever good you think you're doing, you're still doing it from the wrong heart.

You're doing it from a heart of wanting to kind of better yourself or please others, but it's not out of a heart to worship God.

So we talk about God making us right with Him, justification.

It not only has purchased for us right standing with God, it's purchased for us a new heart, new desires, new affections.

And to add anything to that outside of what Christ has done is to say that Christ died for no reason.

So verse 21, he just finishes with this in Galatians 2, 21.

To add to this is to add to the gospel.

To say that Christ died for no reason.

I just want us to kind of work through a few questions as we seek to apply this.

You've heard me say this, and I'm going to say it again.

Are you seeking to be justified by your own works?

And whatever those works are, I keep mentioning the typical ones, baptism, communion, church membership, giving money.

And even the ones that aren't common, that you're kind of making up in your own head.

Do you think that you have the wisdom on your own to figure that out and to declare yourself justified?

If you are adding something to the gospel message, well, I think the pastor's right that it's through God's love, but I think you also need to.

If that's where you're at, do you think that you are that smart, that wise, that holy to figure this out on your own?

Paul's not writing to an individual person.

He's writing to the churches.

Our doctrine is walked out among the church and with brothers and sisters to teach us and to correct us, to tell us where we're right and where we're wrong.

That's why we have robust church membership here at Proclamation Church.

The church members are responsible for the doctrine of this church.

If you're a member, you're responsible for that.

This letter isn't just to the elders or to the guy who gets the paycheck from the church.

It's to the churches.

So whatever you're adding to that, I just want to be clear.

You're making a very, very bold statement that I can figure this out.

It's not God's design to be doing this by myself, but I can figure this out by myself.

Are we seeking to be justified by something of our own works?

Faith in Christ is critical for this whole thing to work, right?

It's our faith in Christ.

What does faith in Christ look like?

We're justified, we're made right by grace through grace by faith in Christ.

Well, what is faith?

Do you have this faith?

Do you desire this faith?

Trusting in Jesus, believing him to be who he says he is.

That his word is what it says it is.

God's word revealed for us.

We're putting our hope and our trust in that.

We're walking in obedience to God.

That's what our faith reveals.

We can say what we want all day long about our faith.

We should be saying things all day long about our faith.

We should be walking it out.

Because if you're walking it out, and I'm not saying you need to be perfect.

I'm saying you have to be walking out your faith.

Striving to be obedient, striving to fight sin, to belong to the church, to love one another well, to be in the word, to be shaped by God's Spirit and His Word.

We know that faith in and of itself is also a gift from God.

We don't bring that to the table.

We don't show up and say, Well, I have the faith.

God, what do you have?

What can you offer me?

Well, here's justification and eternal life.

He gives us faith.

It's a gift from him.

So we talk about this idea of justification.

And Paul's laboring to write to these churches saying, listen, it's only through Jesus Christ.

I want you to think about this before I pray.

About Jesus' words, what Jesus said in Matthew 11, 28.

Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.

For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.

The call of Christ is a call to come and to serve and to labor and to work.

But the means of getting to Christ are not labor and serving and working.

So when you begin to add something to the gospel, and Jesus says, Come to me, you who labor heavy laden, I will give you rest.

How can you rest when you know that part of your salvation is up to you?

How is there peace in Jesus Christ?

How is there rest for your soul if part of your salvation is up to you?

How can you sleep at night and think, well, I think I got it figured out?

There is no rest apart from Jesus Christ paying the price for your sins alone.

Everything else is labor, everything else is toil and burden and anxiety.

It's only through the gospel that you can truly have peace.

Because if you have to keep maintaining something, keep showing up for something to earn it, good luck.

You've missed the gospel, and you have missed Jesus Christ.

Christ has secured peace for us and rest for us.

The work, brother and sister, is done.

We need to walk in what He has purchased for us.

Let's pray.

God, you you are so good to us.

We're so quick, Lord, even though we believe these things.

How good it is to be a part of your family, that we don't toil and labor for salvation.

What a joy that is to us.

That our obedience to you isn't for merit or for credit.

It's because you have loved us.

And out of that love we love others.

And out of that love we pursue you.

What a blessing it is to be loved by you, God.

Pray for those this morning who do not know your love.

That they would see their need for a savior.

See how good it is to be under you, Jesus, to have you as our Lord and our Master and our Savior.

May they today repent, put their faith in you.

Give us strength as a church, Lord, to guard our doctrine well.

And that starts by guarding our hearts well.

Guard our hearts against looking to other things to give us affirmation.

To the things of the world to give us joy or comfort or meaning.

Lord, may we rest in you.

May we be honest with ourselves and with one another about where we're at with you.

Not trying to put on a facade or act in a way that isn't true.

May we humbly come to you, knowing that you have redeemed, you love us, you've called us.

Pray this in your holy and precious name, Lord.

Amen.

Church, we're gonna have a time of communion this morning.

And the way that we practice communion at Proclamation Church, you can come up and get a piece of the bread and a cup and return to your seat.

We'll partake together.

Communion and Scripture instructs us is for baptized believers.

Those who are baptized, declared to be a follower of Jesus Christ by a church.

And for those who are walking out their faith.

What I mean by that is they're not withholding forgiveness to others.

Scripture is clear that we cannot come and remember what Christ has done for us, forgiving us of our sin while holding unforgiveness toward others.

And similarly, we are not to come and partake and remember what Christ has done, redeeming us, freeing us from sin, while also clinging to unrepentant sin.

So we're to come with our hearts fully confessed to the Lord, not holding on with holding forgiveness and not holding on to unrepentant sin.

We're to come and remember that we are broken, that Christ Jesus is the perfect one, and he has atoned for our sin.

Him alone.

So I'm gonna pray for us.

And then the table is open.

Come and take.

We can remember what you have done for us.

We can walk, knowing that your blood and your body was broken and poured out for us.

Lord, again, another time of confession.

May we examine our hearts.

We thank you, Lord, that you have redeemed your church and marked your church off from the world.

Encourage us to pray.

Amen.