Introduction
Why celebrate the 16th century Reformation? Isn't it detrimental to the unity of the Christian Church? After all, we should let bygones be bygones! Well, the Protestant Reformation dealt with issues that are timeless. Issues that are common to sinful human nature. Theses issues of authority forgiveness, and how we become right with God are perennial issues in the history of humanity.
To celebrate the Reformation is to celebrate the power of God unto salvation. The Reformation, particularly the Lutheran Reformation, is often summarized by its view of the work of God in saving sinful people. The so-called solas of the Reformation are a description that God saves sinners.
· Sola Scriptura – the Scriptures alone tell us how God saves sinners.
· Solus Christus – Christ alone saves
· Sola Gratia – the grace of God alone is the reason for his saving sinners.
· Sola Fide – faith is the alone instrument that God uses to save sinners
· Soli Deo Gloria – Salvation is for the glory of God alone
We can see in this passage that we default away from salvation by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone. This passage also shows us that we must be constantly reminded that salvation is of the Lord. Right understanding if this view and right belief in this area will free us from the trap of performance and will allow us to actually rejoice in doing what God calls us to do.
I. The Pope Made a Mistake! 11-14
A. The Roman Catholic Church believes that Peter was the first pope
B. Since the First Vatican Council, the Roman Church also believes that the pope does not make mistakes when making pronouncements about doctrine.
C. Here Paul says that Peter is teaching by his actions that Gentiles should live like Jews, even though he taught otherwise with his words, 14.
1. Paul and Peter are in complete agreement concerning the doctrine of justification itself, 15-16, particularly knowingin v. 16.
2. But Paul does say that Peter was making a contradictory statement about the Gospel by the way that he was acting – blamed in v. 11 and not straightforward in v. 14.
D. There is more than just eating with Jews here.
1. Paul was willing to do some things that the leaders in Jerusalem asked him to do, like going to the temple with an offering, Acts 21.
2. But here he saw what Peter was doing as a threat to the very truth of the Gospel, 14.
a. It seems that Peter all of sudden allowed for the idea that it was the keeping of the law (dietary in particular) and circumcision that made a person acceptable to God.
b. Peter understood the Gospel, but in this particular instance he did not live out the Gospel.
c. We often do the same – more in a moment.
II. By the Works of the Law Nobody Is Declared Righteous in the Sight of God, 15-18
A. Here we have the crux of the Gospel – take this out and you don't have salvation anymore.
B. Paul says that even they who were Jews by nature understood that their standing before God had nothing to do with their obedience of the law, 15-16.
1. We who have had the idea that we must keep the law in order to be accepted by God drummed into us our whole life, have been able to believe that's not the case.
2. We who are not like the Gentiles, those sinners who grew up without the law, have been able to embrace Christ.
3. Ultimately, we who experienced the unbearable burden of the law and now have been freed from that burden through faith in Jesus Christ, why should we put that burden on the Gentiles? 14b.
C. You see, these false teachers who came from Jerusalem didn't deny that you needed to believe in Jesus, but they added something to him.
"…the false apostles did not reject Christ nor faith, but demanded that ceremonies should be joined to with them." John Calvin
D. The moment we add anything to faith in Christ, we turn the message of salvation into a message of damnation.
E. Notice what it is that both Paul and Peter knew, 16.
1. A person is not justified by the works of the law.
a. Notice how the Holy Spirit repeats himself three times in this one verse and how he finishes it with a very strong statement.
b. No one who has been born of a man and a woman is declared righteous before God because he/she was able to keep the law perfectly – declared righteous = accepted, you are ok.
1) Here the false teachers said, "Believe in Jesus, be circumcised, obey the dietary laws and you will be ok."
2) We may not think of circumcision and the keeping of dietary laws as what makes us acceptable to God, but we often think in terms of being good enough.
a) The problem is that no matter how we look at it we are not good enough.
Rom. 3:23 – …for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God…
b) We may even think in terms of the good we do out weighing the bad we do.
Jam. 2:10 – For whoever shall keep the whole law, and yet stumble in one point, he is guilty of all.
3) Or we may not think in terms of circumcision or becoming a Jew as what makes us acceptable to God, but we often come up with out own criteria for how God is going to be pleased with us.
a) How godly we are.
b) How clean our houses are.
c) How well we provide for our families.
d) How fit and healthy we are.
e) How skinny we are.
f) How well we play a sport/instrument.
g) How much we know.
h) How often we are in church.
i) How much we read the Bible.
j) How patriotic we are.
k) How many kids we have.
l) How much money we have.
m) How much we have suffered.
4) Yet none of this law keeping, biblical law or otherwise, we makes us acceptable to God because we just can't keep them perfectly.
c. No one who has been born of a man and a woman is declared righteous before God because he/she was able to keep the law perfectly, but there was one who did keep the law perfectly: the Lord Jesus Christ.
d. Therefore, it is only through him that one can be accepted by God.
2. A person is justified by faith in Jesus Christ.
a. Notice the exclusive nature of our standing before God: it is solely by faith in Christ that anyone is declared righteous in the sight of God apart from any work from any law.
b. There is a serious warning and great hope in this concept.
1) The warning is that if you are hoping to be accepted by God because of you, that is, on the basis of whom you are or what you have done, you will stand before God without any justification and hell will be your reward.
2) The great hope is that it really does not depend on you!
a) We set up all these systems to evaluate whether God loves us or not.
b) If we succeed in them we think that God loves us and when we fail, we think God doesn't love us. For example:
i. If we are good spouses and parents God will love me, we are not, then God doesn't love me.
ii. If we are successful at work God will love us.
iii. If people like me then God will love me.
c) If we think of our standing before God as based on our performance, we will be setting ourselves for a very bumpy and discouraging ride.
i. On the days that we are able to perform like we think we should, we will be excited because we think that God loves us.
ii. But on the days we can't, which is often most days, we will be depressed because now God won't love us.
iii. And we will live our lives based on a daisy philosophy: he loves me, he loves me not.
c. Yet, it is faith in Christ that justifies regardless of what we do.
1) If read you Bible or not.
2) If you come to church or not.
3) If you pray or not.
4) If you obey the law or not.
"A Christian is not someone who has no sin or feels no sin; he is someone to whom, because of his faith, God does not impute his sin." Martin Luther
Heidelberg 60 – How are you righteous before God? Only by true faith in Jesus Christ. Although my conscience accuses me that I have grievously sinned against all God's commandments, have never kept any of them, and am still inclined to all evil, yet God, without any merit of my own, out of mere grace, imputes to me the perfect satisfaction, righteousness, and holiness of Christ. He grants these to me as if I had never had nor committed any sin, and as if I myself had accomplished all the obedience which Christ has rendered for me, if only I accept this gift with a believing heart.
F. So, let's just sin! 17-18
1. To that Paul says, "Certainly not!" – God forbid (KJV), may it never be so.
2. Paul anticipated that this glorious and freeing teaching regarding the justifying grace of God in Jesus Christ was going to be used by some as a justification for sinning.
3. Also, being freed from the works of the law is not a sin, 18
a. Here Paul is using the false teachers' idea that being sinner is being a Gentile.
b. So, he says that this is the very concept he is trying to rebut.
G. Paradoxically, it is this very concept that our standing with God is based solely on our faith in Christ apart from any obedience or disobedience that drives us to joyful obedience.
III. The Law Kills, 19.
A. We read what Paul says in verses 14-16 and we tend to think that the law is bad.
B. But the law is good!
Ps. 19:7a – The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul…
C. The law does exactly what God designed it to do.
1. It shows us our sinfulness.
2. It shows us how incapable of pleasing God on our own we are.
3. It condemns and humbles us.
4. And it pierces us through the heart killing us to any notion self-worth before God.
Rom. 7:8-12 – But sin, taking opportunity by the commandment, produced in me all manner of evil desire. For apart from the law sin was dead. I was alive once without the law, but when the commandment came, sin revived and I died. And the commandment, which was to bringlife, I found to bring death. For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it killed me. Therefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy and just and good.
D. It is at that point, when the law does its work of killing us that we are ready to be brought up to a life of joyful obedience.
IV. Death to the Law Means Life in Christ, 20-21
A. The law brings us to the end of ourselves so that you can place our faith in another.
B. When we place our faith in Christ we are united to him.
1. His life becomes our life.
2. His crucifixion becomes our crucifixion.
3. His resurrection becomes our resurrection.
4. The life we now live becomes his living in us.
C. Christian, Christ is present with you and living in you.
1. The Spirit confirms that you.
2. He gives you victory over sin.
3. And he enables you to obey him joyfully, not as a means to guarantee your standing before God, but out of gratitude for his immeasurable grace in your life.
4. When we fail, the result is not despair, but repentance and thankfulness that God's love for us is not based on what we do, but on Christ's work on our behalf.
D. Here is the crux of the matter, 21.
1. Machen thought that this verse expresses the central idea of the epistles.
"Christ will do everything or nothing" for your salvation. Machen
2. There is no middle ground, either Christ has done all that needs to be done for us, or he has done nothing.
3. There is no synergy, there is not working together on this one.
4. Christ is either the reason and the ground on which you stand before God, or he has nothing to do with it and you stand on your own.
Conclusion
In speaking to the Corinthians the apostle Paul, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, says the following:
2 Cor. 2:14-17 – Now thanks be to God who always leads us in triumph in Christ, and through us diffuses the fragrance of His knowledge in every place. For we are to God the fragrance of Christ among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing. To the one we are the aroma of death leadingto death, and to the other the aroma of life leading to life. And who issufficient for these things? For we are not, as so many, peddling the word of God; but as of sincerity, but as from God, we speak in the sight of God in Christ.
If you continue to try to stand before God on your own, apart from Christ, then this message becomes to you the aroma of death leading to eternal death. And as far as you are concerned Christ died in vain.
If you trust in Jesus Christ as the only way in which we can be accepted by God, then this message to you is life leading to life. You are free from condemnation and you are free to obey joyfully knowing that God loves you as much as he loves Christ.
Rom. 8:1 – There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.
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