Freedom In Galatians Part 1

I was sitting and wondering what book(s) of the Bible I was going to read over the Thankgiving Break and I could not decide. Old Testament or New? Epistle or Gospel? Should I study the life of Jesus or one of the saints? Should I research ancient customs and apply it to the books of Kings and Chronicles? All of these questions and more went through my mind so I just started flipping through my nice NKJV study Bible. At the beginning of each book my Bible has a section that gives historical and study information about the book. I like to read these because they discuss such things as different schools of thought regarding authorship identificaion, interpretation of difficult Scriptures and other neat things. After reading a couple of them I read the one for Galatians. One of the sections entitled, "The Christ of (insert book name)" and it gives some direction for the believer who wants to know how this particular book reveals Christ's character and identity. It was only a couple of sentences long and the last sentence says, "The transforming Cross provides for the believer's deliverance from the curse of sin, law and self," and then gives some reference verses to look up. Great!! I figured I would just look up these verses and I would be good to go for the night's Bible study. Then I began to reflect on what we have been talking about in our men's groups and Bible discussion: freedom. Freedom from bitterness, freedom from legalism, freedom from fear, freedom from lust, freedom from (insert your personal chains, manacles and/or darkness.) The more I contemplated the direction of ENCM the more I decided that I was going to study the whole book of Galatians and find out exactly what it says about freedom as well as bondage (or slavery or chains or whatever you wouldl like to call it.) Decision made, I forge ahead into this murky, seldom tread place of true freedom...

"Grace to you and peace from God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for our sins, that He might deliver us from the present evil age according to the will of our God and Father." -Galatians 1:3-4

We hear the middle part of this verse all the time in church: Jesus came to die for you. Following this oft repeated bit of Christianese is a declaration of the purpose of this death- to free us from the present evil age. We further see that not only does kind, compassionate Jesus want us to be free, but it is actually the will of God the Father. Let's stop here and ponder this for a moment. The God who rained fire and brimstone down upon Sodom and sent the ten plagues to Egypt and killed his own people in the desert for disobeying Him, this terrifying and wrath filled being, *gulp*, cares for me? Yes. It is easy to forget this. To picture God the Father as being stern and unrelenting in His expectations for our lives. I think that sometimes it can be easier for us to relate to this kind of God. Many of us have a hard time accepting and believing the unconditional agape love he has for us, described in 1 Corinthians 13. So we allow this perception of the ever disappointed and exasperated Heavenly Father to persist in our minds because this way there is something we can do about the way He feels- pray harder, read the Bible more, share Christ with three, no, make it five people every day, meditate for an hour every day, etc. And we make this list for ourselves and become convinced that this is the way to God. This is how I will make Him happy. This is how I will be set free. No. This is how you will fetter your feet to the darkness when you should be soaring like an eagle. This is how you grow weary as you drag these misconceptions of God after you like so many chains wrapped around your shoulders and ankles. We can all look at our own lives and see the places we have allowed these chains to chafe against us, creating calloused places on our souls where we have a hard time feeling anything. This wrong idea about God has been in place so long that it takes nothing short of the Holy Spirit to break through to our heart and break the chains. This is why Paul begins verse three with "Grace and peace to you from God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ." Without grace and peace working hand in hand in your life there is no freedom. We are saved by grace through faith. Why should any other facet of the Christian life be different? We know that it is impossible to please God without faith. Why? Because it is only through faith that we make the things of God our own. It is only by faith that we can approach His throne with confidence. It is only by faith that we actually believe what the Bible says about God rather than what we say. If you would be free, Christian, from sin, law and self, then by faith make the freedom yours. Allow the work of the cross to permeate your mind, heart and soul. Dare to believe what God has written in His holy book. Allow yourself to be loved by the Creator of All Things. Amen.