Galatians 3:1-14

It’s hard to quit. It’s not in us to give up. There’s something that makes up our character, our core, that tells us there has to be a way. We may not have found it yet, but we’ll keep trying to get the job done, to fix the problem, to gain the goal.

Because to quit is to fail, and we just can’t accept failure. Failure is not an option, we say. We are do-it-ourselfers. We are competent. We are skilled. We are hard workers who can get the job done. We put our noses to the grindstone and we use our elbow grease and we accomplish what we set out to do. We cannot fail.

But guess what, folks. We’ve failed. We had a job to do, and we couldn’t do it. And we couldn’t hire anyone else to get the job done. We are out of resources, we are out of time, there are no other options. We are incompetent. We could not get the job done. We...have...failed.

We were in a contract, and we couldn’t keep up our end of the contract. The contract stated that God would take care of us, provide for us, give us the food we need and the air we breathe and the protection from our enemies that allows us to survive. In return, we would obey. We would have no other gods besides this one true God. We would honor our fathers and our mothers and all other authorities. We would love human beings. We would honor our marriages. We would love God with all of our hearts and souls and minds and strength, and we would love each other as much as we love ourselves.

We didn’t do it. God did. He kept His part of the bargain. But we didn’t. We couldn’t. We maybe loved God with some of our heart, parts of our souls, a little of our mind and a certain part of our strength. And we love the people who loved us. The people that were mean to us, the people that were different from us, well, they were harder to love. We failed. We could not keep up our end of the contract.

This does not set well. I know that we all know that we are sinners, needing to be saved by grace. When we hear this, we agree to it. But there’s two parts to salvation. There’s justification, when God declares us perfect, like we’d never sinned. Bu then there’s sanctification, the part where we’re living our everyday lives, and we’re supposed to be living them in a holy way. We don’t have a problem with being justified by grace through faith. We have that down.

But the sanctification part causes us more problems. We think it’s up to us to get the work done, to do the obedience, to create the holiness. And then look at how we live our lives. We try so hard to do the right thing, and then when we mess up. And that makes us nervous. Have we stepped over the line? Is God finished with us now? The doubts start to grip us. The fear paralyzes us. And sometimes, the guilt is enough to make us quit. We realize that there is no way to live up to all of these expectations, there is no way to get the job done, so then why even try?

And God agrees. Why try? In fact, don’t try. Because if you’re trying, you’ll fail and you’ll miss the real way, the true way, the grace way of salvation. Paul writes, in verse 1:

We know the gospel, right? I think you’ve probably heard this statement a couple of thousand times, as often as you’ve heard a sermon. Jesus died for you and rose again for you so that you can live eternally. The first Bible verse many of us ever knew was:

And nowhere in there, not once did you hear anything about what you’ve done, your contribution to salvation. And Paul would like to know something. Verse 2:

You were given the Holy Spirit, He came into you and gave you life. How exactly did that happen? Did you offer certain sacrifices and talk God into it? Did you pay Him off, bribe Him into giving you eternal life? Did you say the right words and convince Him? This sounds silly, and it’s supposed to be silly.

Which makes how we live our lives right now downright silly. Verse 3:

We know God’s grace saves us from hell. We got that. Why do we still act like we have to earn it? Why are we scared that, if we do something wrong, something sinful, that bad things will happen to us?

We sin. That’s nothing new. Each one of us has sinned today, a number of times. If God was going to get us because we sinned today, none of us would be here. We wouldn’t have made it to dinner time this noon without receive the punishment we deserve. We sin. Of course we sin. The fact that we sin isn’t surprising. That we DIDN’T sin, that’s what would be shocking. The fact that we did anything holy, anything pure, that’s what’s surprising.

You know this verse, from Psalm 103:

God is good to us, in spite of us. God is good to us, because of His Son. Verse 5:

Is our life going well because we’ve done good things? Are we healthy because we’ve obeyed? Now, flip it around. Does our life stink because we’ve sinned? Is our body, our mind unhealthy because we’ve disobeyed? That’s not how this works. God does not give His Spirit and work miracles because we’ve been good people or good churches. God gives out of His grace. God heals out of His grace. God blesses out of His grace. No other reason.

All we do is believe. Verse 6. Here’s a good example:

Abraham was not righteous. Abraham was a sinner. Abraham sinned just like you and just like me. He just got credit for being righteous. And the way he got credit for being righteous is that he believed.

But don’t think that it was his incredible faith that earned him God’s favor. God didn’t look at Abraham and think, "Wow, that guy’s got faith! I’m impressed. I’m going to make life really good for him." No, the righteousness that was placed on Abraham’s account was given out of God’s grace. Abraham believed that God was doing this, and so Abraham could enjoy the life God was offering. God was giving, and Abraham believed it.

And that’s where we are, now, too. Believing. Verse 7:

Believe that God has saved you, and that’s it. Nothing more needs to be done. Believe that God has declared you righteous, perfect, absolutely without sin, and nothing can ever change that. This is what we say, right, at the Lord’s Supper, that Jesus gave His body and blood for the complete, the complete forgiveness of all of our sins.

So why do we have such a hard time believing this? Why do we carry this burden on our shoulders that we have to get the work done, that we have to prove ourselves to God, that we have to try to be holy. We ARE holy. We believe.

If we are combining our belief with our own efforts, then we’re not really believing. We can’t believe God, but at the same time have our responsibilities. If we think that there’s something we have to do yet in order to be saved, if we have the list of do’s and don’ts that we somehow have to figure out how to get done, then we’re not really believing that God has saved us, are we? We can’t have it both ways. Either our salvation is up to us, in which case we better kick it into gear and really start working on it, or salvation is up to God and His mercy, His grace. Verse 10:

Hear that? We have to do EVERYTHING that is written in the book of the law. We can’t miss one, if we’re going to go that way.

Oh, we can get some work done, if we’re really trying. We’ll produce some holiness, some righteousness. But not near as much as if we step back, believe that God has saved us and is changing us, and watch what God does in us and through us.

We get confused when we read Scripture. We see God’s commands, and we try to get them done. We work hard at getting them done. That was the old covenant, the old way of doing things, and it didn’t work. It’s true, the Bible tells us what to do, but it also tells us how to do it. And the answer is not to work harder. The Bible tell us what to do, and it tells us that the Holy Spirit is going to get us to do that. The Bible is the description of the life that the Spirit is creating in us, if we believe that He is doing that. If we wouldn’t try so hard, and instead listened to the Holy Spirit, we would end up doing amazing things.

On our own, in our own efforts, we could probably get ourselves to the point where we’re giving 10 percent of everything we earn. Not bad. But with the Spirit, when we’ve given up and let Him work in us, we can give our whole lives, not just 10 percent. On our own, we can probably live nice lives in the eyes of our neighbors, you know, be nice people. But with the Spirit, we can actually talk to them about Jesus and about salvation through God’s grace. On our own, we can have a pretty decent church that gets some things done, we’ll have our ministries. But with the Spirit, we could change this community. Verse 14:

We don’t change in order to be redeemed, we’re changed by the Spirit BECAUSE we’ve been redeemed. We don’t do good things so that we’re saved. We do good things BECAUSE we’ve been saved. The Spirit will make the changes. Later in Galatians, we learn what the Spirit will turn us into...into loving, joyful, peaceful, patient, kind, good, faithful, gentle, self-controlled people. That’s the Spirit’s work. We just have to agree.

This was the Reformation, getting back to the gospel, quitting, realizing our failure and trusting in God. Luther, Calvin, Zwingli, they had had it. They were tired of trying so hard, so they quit. And they found redemption. And God changed the world through them.

So, take a breath. Rest. Be at peace. None of this is up to us. Your salvation is clinched because Jesus died. You believe that right? Then it’s true. And God is making sure you grow in your holiness. You believe that, too, right? Then it’s happening. And the weight and burden and fear is off your shoulders.

You are saved by grace through faith. You’ll still be saved by grace through faith tomorrow, no matter what you do tonight. Believe it, own it, breathe it, be thankful for it...live it.