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Hi and welcome back to “Abounding Grace”. In the last two postings we discussed the three adversaries to our freedom in Christ and they were: doctrinal heresy; ecclesiastical harassment and personal hypocrisy. To-day let us look at four strong defences we have to overcome come these subtle adversaries. Don’t ever forget that you are free. Don’t live your life behind a fence of false feelings and don’t let your relationship with Jesus be regulated by a rigid set of religious rules, become everything God created you to be, not poured into someone else’s mould.

• Keep standing firm in your freedom. If the group your in is giving you grief because you don’t live up to their expectations, leave the group.

• Stop seeking the favour of others, seek the favour of God alone, don’t look to other people for approval no matter how spiritual they may seem.

• Refuse to submit to bondage, there is no system of slavery as devastating as legalism; it enslaves your attitude as well as your actions. It closes up your feelings for Jesus instead of freeing them.

• Continue being straightforward about the truth, live honestly and when you fall admit it. No matter how big a slip you make people will usually forget it if you’re honest about it and don’t try to cover it up.

Always remember you are free.

Gal.5:1. (Amp) In [this] freedom Christ has made us free [and completely liberated us]; stand fast then, and do not be hampered and held ensnared and submit again to a yoke of slavery [which you have once put off].

(Mess) Christ has set us free to live a free life. So take your stand! Never again let anyone put a harness of slavery on you.

The letter to the Galatians is a proclamation of freedom. It is God’s official document that proclaims that we who are in Christ are free; anyone trying to live by the law will find that it impedes their relationship with Jesus. What we are free from is the Old Testament law.

Gal.2:16, 21. (Mess) We know very well that we are not set right with God by rule keeping but only through personal faith in Jesus Christ. How do we know? We tried it, and we had the best system of rules the world has ever seen! Convinced that no human being can please God by self-improvement, we believed in Jesus as the Messiah so that we might be set right before God by trusting in the Messiah, not by trying to be good. I am not going to go back on that. Is it not clear to you that to go back to that old rule-keeping, peer-pleasing religion would be an abandonment of everything personal and free in my relationship with God? I refuse to do that, to repudiate God’s grace. If a living relationship with God could come by rule-keeping, then Christ died unnecessarily.

Gal.3:2, 10, 12 – 13, 15 – 19, 21 – 25. (Mess) Let me put this question to you: How did your new life begin? Was it by working your heads off to please God? Or was it by responding to God’s Message to you? And that means that anyone who tries to live by his own effort, independent of God, is doomed to failure. Scripture backs this up: “Utterly cursed is every person who fails to carry out every detail written in the Book of the law.” Rule-keeping does not naturally evolve into living by faith, but only perpetuates itself in more and more rule-keeping, a fact observed in Scripture: “The one who does these things [rule-keeping] continues to live by them.” Christ redeemed us from that self -defeating, cursed life by absorbing it completely into himself. Do you remember the Scripture that says, “Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree”? That is what happened when Jesus was nailed to the Cross: He became a curse, and at the same time dissolved the curse. Friends, let me give you an example from everyday affairs of the free life I am talking about. Once a person’s will has been ratified, no one else can annul it or add to it. Now, the promises were made to Abraham and to his descendant. You will observe that Scripture, in the careful language of a legal document, does not say “to descendants,” referring to everybody in general, but “to your descendant” (the noun, note, is singular), referring to Christ. This is the way I interpret this: A will, earlier ratified by God, is not annulled by an addendum attached 430 years later, thereby negating the promise of the will. No, this addendum, with its instructions and regulations, has nothing to do with the promised inheritance in the will. What is the point, then, of the law, the attached addendum? It was a thoughtful addition to the original covenant promises made to Abraham. The purpose of the law was to keep a sinful people in the way of salvation until Christ (the descendant) came, inheriting the promises and distributing them to us. Obviously this law was not a firsthand encounter with God. It was arranged by angelic messengers through a middleman, Moses. If such is the case, is the law, then, an anti – promise, a negation of God’s will for us? Not at all, its purpose was to make obvious to everyone that we are, in ourselves, out of right relationship with God, and therefore to show us the futility of devising some religious system for getting by our own efforts what we can only get by waiting in faith for God to complete his promise. For if any kind of rule-keeping had power to create life in us, we would certainly have gotten it by this time. Until the time when we were mature enough to respond freely in faith to the living God, we were carefully surrounded and protected by the Mosaic law. The law was like those Greek tutors, with which you are familiar, who escort children to school and protect them from danger or distraction, making sure the children will really get to the place they set out for. But now you have arrived at your destination:

Gal.5:4, 18. (Amp) If you seek to be justified and declared righteous and to be given a right standing with God through the Law, you are brought to nothing and so separated (severed) from Christ. You have fallen away from grace (from God’s gracious favour and unmerited blessing). But if you are guided (led) by the [Holy] Spirit, you are not subject to the Law.

(Mess) I suspect you would never intend this, but this is what happens. When you attempt to live by your own religious plans and projects, you are cut off from Christ, you fall out of grace. Why don’t you choose to be led by the Spirit and so escape the erratic compulsions of a law-dominated existence?

Thank you for joining me to-day and I trust that you have been blessed thus far, Paul’s question to the Galatians was “who are you trying to please, men of God?” and that question is still a valid one to-day, to please men you will have to squeeze yourself into their mould, but if your aim is to please God then you will have to give the Word of God first place in your life, it is that simple. Have a blessed day and don’t forget to share the Word and spread the love all around.

If you have never made Jesus the Lord of your life then to-day would be a good day to consider Jesus, and know this, Jesus came to seek that which was lost, the will of God for all men is that they would come to the knowledge of Christ and be saved, if you hear the Spirit beckoning do not harden your heart, just pray the following prayer by faith and receive the promise of eternal life that God is offering you to-day:

“Father, it is written in Your Word that if I confess with my mouth Jesus as Lord and believe in my heart that You have raised Him from dead, I shall be saved. Therefore, Father, I confess that Jesus is my Lord. I make Him Lord of my life right now. I believe in my heart that You raised Jesus from the dead. I renounce my past life with Satan. “I thank You for forgiving me of all my sin. Jesus is now my Lord, and I am a new creation. Old things have passed away. Now all things become new in Jesus’ name. Amen.”

For further words of Cheer click on the link: http://theinvisablechurch.wordpress.com/