As we begin this new series titled Fruit of the Spirit, and
we're going to be walking through Chapter 5, or rather
spend more time on chapter 5. So this morning I am in some way
doing an introduction to Chapter 5, and we'll walk through a few
verses in chapter 5. And then next week onwards,
we're going to look at the fruit of the Spirit.
So we titled this message this morning, Walk in the Spirit
Galatians, Chapter 5. We start reading from verse 13.
For you were called to freedom, brothers only do not use your
freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love
serve one another, for the whole law is fulfilled in one word.
You shall love your neighbor as yourself, but if you bite and
devour one another, watch out that you are not consumed by one
another. But I say, walk by the Spirit,
and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh.
For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the
desires of the Spirit are against the flesh.
For these are opposed to each other to keep you from doing the
things you want to do. But if you are led by the
Spirit, you are not under the law.
Now the works of the law are evident sexual immorality,
impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife,
jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions,
divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and other things like
these. I warn you as I warn you before,
that those who do such things will not inherit the Kingdom of
God, but the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience,
kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness,
self-control against such things that there is no law.
And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh
with its Persian passions and desires.
If you live by the Spirit, let us also keep in step with the
Spirit. Let us not become conceited,
provoking one another and envying one another.
Stick away to israelako lingua, israelako Lina mantra tetanati.
Go see it too. XNG.
Bless, O Lord, the preaching of Your Word this morning.
Help us to heed to its warning, but equally, oh God, help us to
be encouraged by it that in some ways we may be in step with the
Holy Spirit. We ask this in your name, Amen.
So I am aware of time this morning, so I'm going to try and
keep to the time that I have this morning.
As you would know, we worked through 2 stand alone sermons,
not one being the nature of the church.
And the second sermon was the parable of the talents.
And now we will begin this nine part series on the fruit of the
Holy Spirit, the book of Galatians.
It is indeed a fascinating book. The author of this book in
particular identifies himself as the Apostle Paul and he is
addressing serious matters in this church because indeed there
is a theological crisis that is taking place here.
It has heated the churches in Galatia and these churches of
course, were comprised of Jews and Gentiles alike.
And you get a sense of this as you walk through this book, as
you would see, as I'm going to show you later on.
And the Apostle Paul is making the point here that the this
Church of Galatia had had come through the proclamation of the
gospel all but also through the work of the Holy Spirit.
And it says that in Galatians 3 verse 1 to 15 and Galatians 413
to 15, he is encouraging these churches to hold firm to the
gospel. And what what begins to happen
in this gospel is that there are those who creep into this
context of these churches and the apostle Paul has got nothing
good to say about them. They started to really preach a
false gospel to say to these Gentile Christians that in order
for you to be truly saved, you ought to be circumcised.
You have to actually take on the Mosaic law.
In other words, circumcision is necessary for you to be accepted
by God. And so this church has been
infiltrated by such teaching. More specifically those Jewish
Christians who are bringing such teaching into this context.
Notice how the apostle Paul calls these people.
You would notice in Galatians one, verse 7 says those who
trouble you. In Galatians 512, he says those
who unsettle you. For these Christians, we're
calling the Gentile Christians to obey the law, to obey the
Torah. There's something big is at
stake here if these Christians are to take on the Mosaic law,
Was it at stake? Is massive.
Whenever we take on the law, it actually means that the Christ
sacrificial death on the cross is not sufficient.
What is at stake here is justification by faith alone
apart from the law. And so these Christians are
calling these gentle Christians to come take on this law, keep
in step with this law. And because of this, the apostle
Paul is harsh in how he's going to address that.
And you can see from chapter 1, the apostle Paul is not happy at
all. In fact, is quite harsh to these
people who are bringing to some extent this false teaching and
really causing division in the Church of God and reminding them
that we ought to keep in step with that which the apostle has
taught that the Church of God is never called to add to the
gospel nor take away from the gospel.
The gospel is sufficient as it is.
All the benefits of the believers come by grace through
faith. Apart from the Mosaic law, the
ultimate question here that the apostle Paul seems to be
addressing is how does then one become part of God's family?
His answer is not through circumcision but by faith alone.
It is quite interesting as I was thinking about this and thinking
about my own culture and my own context where circumcision is of
course practice, and someone asked me the other day, will
will your children go through that same process?
I then wrote a paper and I'm happy to send it to you to
respond if my children will ever do that within the African black
contest. But here the apostle Paul is
addressing something slightly different that whether it's
circumcision or not. What is important for you to
realize that circumcision in not in any way is able to save a
person. Rather it is through faith in
which a person is saved. And so the apostle Paul is
critical of his audience here. Notice what he said from verse
chapter one, verse 8. But even if an Angel from heaven
should preach a gospel other than the one we preach to you,
let them be under God's curse. And the Greek word today is
anathema. Let that person who proclaims a
different gospel, let them be under God's curse.
That is serious. Any man who preaches a different
gospel, let that person be under God's curse.
Therefore, the apostle Paul from verse 13 to verse 26, I think he
gives us four things as in relation to experiential
sanctification. In other words, how the Holy
Spirit conforms us through the likeness of Christ.
I was encouraged this morning as we were in the at the prayer
meeting, these prayers around the Holy Spirit and this song
this morning we sing around the Holy Spirit and the works of the
Holy Spirit. That is indeed the Holy Spirit
sanctifies his church. Notice the first thing the
apostle Paul addresses from verse 13 to verse 14 and that I
titled that point to the freedom, the flesh and the law.
One of my favorite movies of all time is Braveheart.
I'm not sure how many of you have watched this movie is
Braveheart. And there's a particular scene
in that movie where William Wallace, played by Mel Gibson,
he shouts freedom, not you, Wallace.
The other ones, he shouts freedom.
Galatians can be summed up to mean freedom or liberty.
But this is not a political freedom and ideological freedom,
nor has to do with the gender rights and all of those things.
He presents a different kind of freedom that we have through the
Lord Jesus Christ. This is the kind of freedom that
we have through the substitutary death of Christ.
And the apostle Paul would encourage this just to walk in
freedom. The gospel does not bring
bondage, but rather the gospel brings about freedom.
And the apostle Paul would want these believers to know the kind
of freedom they have in Christ. And if they ought to keep the
Mosaic Law, they would not enjoy the freedom that Christ has
given them. Rather, they return to slavery
in the apostle process. Do not take the law.
Do not take this slavery upon yourself, as this false teachers
were telling them that evidently for you to be truly safe, take
on that law or the Mosaic Law. Christian is called to freedom,
but I want you to notice that word freedom.
The Christian is called. It has freedom from something
and to something. Let us deal first with freedom
from something. As you read the book of
Galatians, you have a sense in which the Christian is free, but
free from what? As you sit here this morning
singing songs about freedom, know this church number one, you
are freed from condemnation. Those who are in Christ Jesus
are no longer walking in condemnation.
They are walking in freedom that Christ has purchased on their
behalf #2 The Christian is free from guilt of fear.
He's he's free from the shame of this world.
He's free from eternal punishment.
The Christian is not worried about hell because it's been
freed with Christ, reconciled with Christ, and now wait for
the blessedness of Christ, because Christ has accomplished
all of this for us and our behalf.
So we are free from condemnation, we are free from
guilt, but also we are free from the fear of eternal punishment
#3 the Christian is free from the devil, from sin and death,
because Christ has defeated death, Christ has defeated sin,
and Christ has defeated the enemy.
And you can see that in Colossians chapter 3.
You have been freed from something.
Therefore, then do not take upon yourself the Mosaic Law.
The Christian is free from Satan, from sin, from death,
from guilt, from fear, from eternal punishment, from
condemnation. Praise be to God.
And I can simply stop the sermon right here because the Christian
is free. You are free this morning, but
also it does not only remind us that you are we have freedom
from something, but he also wants to remind us we are also
freed to something. That is the language the Apostle
Paul uses here. And therefore believers, be
careful to be free from something and still pitch a tent
outside of the prison gate. Leave as the one indeed who is
free. You are free to something, and
if you don't know that you are free to something, what will
happen is that you will try to justify yourself through the
works of the law, or through moral pursuit, or through
rituals and many other things, not just what the apostle post
says as he answers the question, what are you free to?
He says you are free to serve and love 1 another because the
Christian is already accepted on the basis of Christ, merit
believing and fully accepted in Christ.
Therefore, now you are free not just to do what you want, but
you are free to love and serve one another humbly.
But the apostle Paul goes further in answering that
question. We're not only freed from
something and freed to something.
He says there are two enemies of our freedom.
And we have to watch these two enemies of our freedom because
if we don't pay attention to these enemies of our freedom, we
will go back to slavery. We will go back to the Mosaic
law. And he mentions these enemies as
the flesh and the law #1 the flesh.
Doctor Michael Eaton writes the following.
That he defines the flesh as the aspect of our personality in
which we feel prompted to sin. I'll read it again.
That defines the flesh as the aspect of our personality in
which we feel prompted to sin. The flesh will always want to
what is contrary to the Spirit. The flesh will always whisper to
us. No one is watching.
Go ahead and do it. The flesh will always whisper to
us. No one is perfect anyway.
Go ahead and do it. Here is the reason.
The flesh is always hungry. The flesh demands more and never
have its feel. And may I say to us, Weinberg,
Oh dear ones this morning, don't indulge the flesh.
And the apostle Paul gives us the anecdote in terms of what we
ought to do. He says crucify it, crucify the
flesh. Do not feed the flesh, rather
crucify the flesh. Let the flesh hang on the cross,
and for some of us, while the flesh is hung on the cross, we
go back and take the flesh down from the cross.
This morning we ought not to do that.
We ought to hang the flesh, crucify the flesh, because the
fruit of the fruit that the Lord will produce in US is an
evidence of the Spirit's work in us to triumph over the flesh,
not just what it says in Galatians 524 And those who
belong to Christ have crucified the flesh with his passions and
his desires. Therefore I ask you 2 questions
this morning. Oh dear ones, one, are you
feeding your flesh? What are you feeding your flesh
and what is it costing you? Oh, are you walking this morning
in joy and in freedom? I think as I was reading this
text and, and, and reading and reading this text, and when you
get to verse 19 and verse 21, you can't help but pause.
I pray that if you read verse 19 to 21 at home, you will just
pause in reading that. There's so much in those verses
to just wait as we look at those works of the flesh and say on
that list, look at it, pause, process, reflect, ponder.
Think about verse 19 and verse 21.
He says this is not only flesh, but it is also the law.
In the book of Galatians, the law appears 32 times.
And the Apostle Paul is making a point here that no one becomes a
Christian by observing the law or observing rules.
If one believes that salvation is by keeping the law, therefore
you must keep the whole law, which is impossible for anyone
to do. Furthermore, if salvation is to
the law, that everyone must be circumcised, so the Gentiles
must now be circumcised and be like the Jewish believers here.
And the point is, no one can keep the entire law.
Whenever we talk about the Mosaic Law, it is often split
into three parts. One, it is what we call the
moral law. It is the law that reflects the
very nature, the very character of God, the moral law.
Really we can sum it up in the 10 commandments.
That is the moral law do not, do not.
But also God gives Israel civic laws that we are regulating the
lives of the Hebrew people, things around divorce, things
around how they were they were they were they were what we do
in regarding to disputes among them things that had to do with
marriage and property rights and all of those things.
They were civil laws that. The Israel had to adhere to #3
there were also ceremonial laws which related to how people of
God ought to worship God, the sacrifices, the, the rituals,
the celebrations. And so the apostle was saying,
if you want to keep the law, you keep all of it, not just part of
it. The civil law, the ceremonial
law, you, you, you keep that as well.
And you keep the, the, the, the, the moral laws as well, which is
impossible to do. The point Apostle Paul is making
that the law cannot do what Christ have done, that believers
come to Christ by placing their faith in Christ and therefore
their status changes completely. They do not need to observe laws
in order to be part of God's household.
Praise be to God, it is difficult to keep such laws.
Just may I remind you, we break such laws every day, every
single day. And so Paul says to them in a
very harsh way. Paul is not kind here in a very
harsh way. He says, oh, you foolish
Galatians, Oh, who bewitched you?
Who bewitched you Galatians? It was before your eyes that
Jesus Christ publicly portraying the sacrifice.
Let me ask you only this Did you receive the Spirit by works of
the law or by hearing by faith? Are you so foolish?
Heaven begun by the Spirit? Are you now being perfected by
the flesh? When you live by grace, you
depend on the power of the Spirit.
But if you live under the law, you must depend on your own
performance and power daily. Can I say to depend on your own
power daily? You will fail.
We are not sustained by what we do.
We are sustained by the grace of God each day.
The law to the Jews says You are righteous by keeping the law.
Grace says I'm not righteous. My righteousness is accredited
to me through the death and the sacrificial death of Christ
Jesus. I can't make myself righteous.
Christ's righteousness has been accredited to me.
If hypothetically, we would be asked at the doors of heaven,
why are you here, the answer would not be because I'm just a
Christian or I was a good person.
Let me in because of Christ. That's the answer.
Because His righteousness has been accredited to me.
I don't deserve to go in because of what I've done.
I deserve to go in because of what He has done.
It's because of Him we don't depend on ourselves.
Paul argues to this Christian that the law was simply your
guardian until Christ has come. Now that Christ has come, now
that you have received Christ, you no longer need a guardian to
gain the righteousness of Christ.
And so I ask you this morning, are you free?
Are you depending on your own performance perhaps, Or do you
feel you must do certain things for you to be truly accepted in
Christ Jesus? I want to say this morning to
you, let go of that. Let go of that was Christ has
done it all. It is finished #2 freedom to
serve in love and not bite. He uses a very interesting
language here. But if you bite and devour one
another, watch out. You are not consumed by one
another. The the language of biting seems
to convey an idea of a snake bite or a behaviour that is
common to wild animals. The term devours him to convey
the idea of eating parts of another.
So the apostle Porter is using a wonderful imagery to address the
issue of relations among the believers.
And so he says, there are those among you who are legalistic
expecting you to be circumcised or to keep the Mosaic Law.
And you're saying to them, I want you to watch out as a
family and as the churches don't be legalistic to one another.
If you do that, you're going to bite one another and devour one
another. Because when you are a legalist,
often what happens, you become quarrelsome because you want to
observe the law and you are very critical of others winning
arguments than loving other people.
If you read the book of Galatians, it is only at this
point where you see the Apostle Paul.
He's not saying they are doing this, He's not saying they're
guilty of this, but he is warning them that do avoid this.
Do not bite one another. Instead, love one another.
I don't need to even give you examples of how we can bite one
another, but I think the wisdom of Michael Eaton, again, he is
quite helpful. He is saying this is an
interesting thing about the law. It is meant to promote love, but
typically unlegalistic people are more loving than legalistic
people. Love is not criticizing others,
but ministering to others. It moves out to touch everyone,
but begins with one another. This is the encouragement of the
apostle. That is the This is not
something that happens externally, but this is
something the Holy Spirit produces in us to love one
another. So I ask you again, are you
biting? Are you quarrelsome?
Are you more concerned about rules?
Are you concerned about the love #3?
Ryan, you'll just say this and then I'll stop.
Ryan, you need to give me an education.
The flesh and the spirit #3 The flesh and the spirit from verse
16 to verse 17. But I say to you, by the Spirit,
and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh, for the
desires of the flesh against the spirit and the desires of the
spirit are against the flesh, for they're opposed to each
other to keep you from doing the things you want to do.
Constable defines it this way. To walk by the Spirit means
living moment by moment, submissively trusting in the
Holy Spirit rather than itself. And so the apostle Paul is
encouraging the church here. Walk by the Spirit.
Let your Spirit direct you. Let your Holy Spirit be in
control. Keep on working.
That's the that's the root language here of walking by the
Spirit. The root language is keep
walking by the Holy Spirit. And for some of you may say this
morning, Eric, you simply do not understand.
When I'm tempted, I cannot help it.
I just can't get enough. Eric, you don't understand.
I really struggle with slander and gossip.
You do not understand. I don't like those people very
much. They're not likeable anyway.
You just don't understand which the Apostle Paul would respond.
It is because you are not walking in the Spirit.
Instead you are indulging the flesh.
And because we saw earlier on that we are called to something,
free to something. The Christian is led by the Holy
Spirit, not only led by the Holy Spirit.
The the believer is sealed by the Holy Spirit as they
guarantee, as they deposit of the future inheritance, so the
believer has the Holy Spirit. Our freedom is not a license to
sin habitually. Our freedom is not for us to
walk in disobedience. Just let me remind you that in
this world the fight will go on in the believer's life it will
go on until we die. Why?
Because our of our sinful nature.
The flesh once what is contrary to the spirit the flesh will say
Eric come on have an affair. The flesh, once that is put, no
self-control will we fight every day.
That's what the apostle forces walk in the Spirit, because the
flesh wants what is contrary to the Spirit.
Paul in Colossians puts it this way, put to death.
Therefore, what is earthly in your sexual immorality,
impurity, passion, evil desires, which is idolatry?
Church. The apostle Paul does not call
us to manage our flesh. He calls us to put it to death,
for flesh cannot be managed. Put it to death.
Crucify it. Let the flesh die.
Do you know when that? Do you know when that happens?
Every single day. I was reminded as I was
preparing this of Solomon, that part of Solomon's mess did not
really. Most of it actually happened
when he was just young. Solomon actually moved away from
God in his old age. It's quite interesting, quite
interesting to me, that a man in his old age would actually go
and serve other gods. Because the flesh knows nothing
about age. Absolutely nothing.
It fights the young, it fights the old.
That's why we fight every single day.
One of my favorite theologians, Doctor Mark Jones, he writes the
following. Christians commit certain sins
in the presence of God that they would never dream of doing in
the presence of others. Walk by the Spirit.
Each day we say, Holy Spirit, help us to say yes to you.
Temptations will come from different directions.
Holy Spirit, help us this morning, this day, to say yes to
you. Help us.
We can't do this in our own power, in our own strength, in
our own will. Holy Spirit, help us, Help us to
say no to that contrary to your word.
Help us to say no to that which brings your name under
disrepute. Holy Spirit, help us.
We are helpless without you. Each day we do that because
apart from the Holy Spirit Church, we drop the ball.
Need the Holy Spirit thank you. We want to say yes to you, Holy
Spirit. Therefore, the antidote to the
flesh is to be in fellowship with the Spirit.
It is to walk in the Spirit, to be filled with the Spirit, and
to be led by the Spirit. And I ask you again, perhaps
which side will win? Will it be the flesh or will it
be the spirit #4 for my maybe this is my last point, Verse 19
to verse 21, the works of the flesh and inheriting the
Kingdom. And we know from verse 19 to
verse 21, where I said we needed to pause, that the apostle gives
us these works of the flesh, and these are ugly.
These works of the flesh are so ugly.
This is what our sinful human nature produces.
A true Christian is knows not to flirt with sexual immorality,
impurity, jealousy, divisions, and envy, but rather to walk in
the Spirit, not to sow in the flesh church.
At times our hearts get heavy, at times we lose our joy and may
even find ourselves practicing such things.
But I wanted to notice that the Apostle Paul here is very harsh
and is not really sanitizing any of this.
He calls these works sin because that is what they are calling
the believers again to nail this to the cross and repent and
torque in the spirit and each of us may struggle with something
on that list we can actually identify.
Maybe maybe this is my struggle. This is this is my struggle.
I struggle with this for some of us may say, we say perhaps it's
an encourage. I want to say to you that we in
our struggles, we don't stroke things like jealousy and even
maybe call them struggle. No, we repent of it because it's
sin. We don't flirt with sexual
immorality and say no, no, no. I can't help myself.
We repent of it. We don't stroke anger and say
no. Many people know me.
I have a short fuse. Even my family knows me.
I have a short fuse. People know me.
That's the work of the flesh. We nail it to the cross.
And so we may be struggling with with this and maybe some of
these. And so I am giving you both a
warning, but also an encouragement.
Constable writes the following. A Welshman said I cannot help if
a bird alights on top of my head, but I can help if he
builds his nest in my hair. And so you may not be able to
help it if evil thoughts come surging into your mind, but you
can help indulging in those thoughts.
If we don't, it will cost us our freedom.
Finally, he says, I warned you. Therefore those who do such
things will not inherit the Kingdom of God.
Now, I want to say from the onset here that many scholars
and theologians disagree on this part of the text.
Many people I respect, they don't have the same view
regarding this text. One others refer it to
salvation. Other scholars referred to it
really as simply a struggle with sin.
I don't hold the view that I think this relates to salvation,
but I think I don't think that's what the apostle Paul is
addressing. Rather, I do think he is talking
about a real struggle for believers, that believers indeed
will struggle with these things not just in the future, but they
will struggle with those things here and now.
But he says to them in their struggle, do not be mocked.
God is not for whatever man sows that he will reap for any for
one who sows to his flesh will from the flesh reap corruption,
but the one who sow to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap
eternal life. Michael Eaton again.
Allow me to quote him the third time.
He writes the following The Christian is safe in his status
in the Kingdom of God, But the sinning Christian is setting up
for loss of the blessing of the Kingdom, for the powerful
corrective punishments of God, and for the possibility of
ultimately being saved through fire.
We are to walk in freedom, are to walk in the Spirit.
If we sow to the Spirit, the blessing of God will come upon
us in life and in the visible and glorious rewards of
eternity. So this is not losing salvation.
This is about believers who to some extent, because of their I
said, unfaithfulness, may lead to certain rewards, not
receiving certain rewards to which they ought to receive.
But a believer indeed, according to the apostle Paul in Romans
13, can commit some of these things as listed in verse 19 to
verse 23. But also it is an encouragement
to faithfulness and therefore, church, what are we ought to do?
I'm closing now to keep in step with the Spirit.
Number one, I think to keep in step with the Spirit, we ought
to be people of prayer. We must be people of devotion to
God. One author once said that in the
morning the first person you ought to talk to is God.
We ought to keep in step with the Spirit through prayer.
We need to be careful of what we watch on television, on social
media, and the kind of music to which we listen to the
influences. All these things in our lives.
We must be careful to keep in step with the Spirit.
We do this by serving others in love.
We keep in step with the Spirit through reading and studying and
and and and and and devoting ourselves and memorizing
Scripture and going deep into Scripture to know God's will for
our lives. We keep in step with the Spirit
through confession and repentance.
Our Lord in heaven, we thank you for this morning to be reminded
what it means to walk in the Spirit, to call, to be in step
with the Holy Spirit. And Lord, we know that each of
those things mentioned, we cannot defeat those things in
our own strength, in our own power, but we, we need the Holy
Spirit to help us in our journey of faith.
We ask you, please, Holy Spirit, help us.
We may be struggling with a lot of things on that list.
For some of us, it may be a lot of things in that list.
But Lord, we ask you to please, please help us.
Holy Spirit, empower us, fill us, rejuvenate us.
Holy Spirit, we, we want to be those who say no to these things
and yes to you. Please help us.
Lord, we need you. We desperately need you.
Lord Jesus, we ask this in your name, Amen.