Welcome to the In Touch Podcast with Charles Stanley for Wednesday, June 29th. Christians are granted freedom through the cross of Christ, but that life of freedom can come with scars. Let's close out the study of Galatians by learning more about Liberty's brands. This is the last message in our series on Galatians. So if you'll turn to the sixth chapter, and we'll just read two verses together. And the 17th verse is the primary verse that I want us to deal with here. But the 17th and 18th verses, Paul said, From henceforth let no man trouble me, for I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus. Brethren, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit.
And let me just sort of go back for just a moment, remind you in all these six chapters what's happened. That in this epistle Paul was writing a declaration of freedom. That is that we who are believers, we don't have to get ourselves in bondage trying to please him, trying to keep from disappointing him because he says in this passage several things that I want to remind you of briefly as we just sort of go through here. First of all, he said in this book that the purpose of the law in chapter three was not to get us into heaven, but in verse 24 it says rather to bring us to the realization that we are totally inadequate within ourselves to do anything to merit salvation.
So he says the law is our school teacher and not a method of saving us. The second thing he wanted to remind us of here is the fact that our only hope is in the justifying process of Jesus Christ. He says in chapter two verse 16, knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by his faith in Jesus Christ, which interpreted in our day as saying this, there is not anything that you and I can do in any way, in any form or fashion to merit any favor from God. That grace is God's gift to us and justification means that God, looking at your life, the moment you receive Jesus Christ as your Savior, that means that the righteous judge acquits you of all guilt and all sin in your life and therefore you become a free child of God. The third thing he says in chapter two verse 20 is that our only hope of living the Christian life is not wrapped up in us either, but also in relationship with Jesus Christ when he says, I have been crucified once and for all with Christ, nevertheless I live, yet not ever.
Christ lives in me and the life which I now live, I live by faith and the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. First of all, there's nothing I can do to be saved. The Lord wasn't given to save me but to bring me to the end of myself. My only hope of salvation is in the justifying process of Jesus Christ through grace and my only hope of living the Christian life is claiming crucifixion with Jesus Christ on the cross which he says is my experience. And then he says, my only hope of joy and freedom now that I've been justified is simply to be found in chapter five verse one when he says, stand fast there therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage which is Paul's primary reason for writing this letter and that is to remind those Galatian Christians, you don't have to go back to where you were living under the burden, living under the law but only to realize that you need Christ and Christ Jesus only. He says, don't get entangled that you've been freed from that now that you've been saved by the grace of God. Do you know what it is within mankind that wants to do something?
Maybe not a whole lot. Some people want to do a great deal. Some people just want to do a little itsy bitsy, just got to do something in order to get God's pleasure. You know what it is within us that wants to do something?
What is it? It's spelled P-R-I-D-E. You know, I'm willing for God to save me but surely I've got to do something and sometimes a lost person says, now wait a minute, you mean to tell me that God will forgive me for all of my sin and all I have to do is just believe in him? Right. But what does believe mean? It does not mean that I have to go back and clean up anything, change anything, make a bunch of promises, make a bunch of commitments. You see, our problem is that our old pride, it's just almost impossible for us to bow before a holy, righteous God, a righteous, holy, merciful, loving, kind God who says salvation, the gift of eternal life is totally yours free.
You can't do anything for it. Do you know that that's more humiliating and more difficult to accept than if God says, all right, do you want to be saved? Number one, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, fifteen, twenty-five, thirty-five, forty-five, seventy-five, hundred and five, hundred and ten, hundred and thirteen, when you complete the hundred and thirteenth goal, you will be saved. You know what we do? We say, let's get at it right now.
That's what we would do. But you see, it's awfully humiliating to have to bow before a holy, righteous God and him say to you, you can't do anything. That is humiliating to pride. But he says that's man's only hope. And all through this book he says, now that God has given you a life of grace and freedom and liberty, don't slip back over here trying to do anything to get God's pleasure, merit His rewards or try to work out some kind of lifestyle so that you won't disappoint God.
You can't disappoint somebody who knows all about you to begin with. So he wrote this book to answer the problem among those Galatian Christians who were now having been saved, going back to take up all the Judaistic law upon themselves so they could be good Jewish Christians. That's why this book is so very important. It's separated once and for all that Christianity is the gift of grace. It is the gift of the person of Jesus Christ.
And the law of Judaism is a law of rules and regulations. And once you accept Jesus Christ, you no longer have to bear what broke down the people of that day who could not live up to it. Now, that being said, let's get into the primary verse that Paul comes in. So all the way through this book he's talking about how free we are, our liberty, our grace and all that God has given to us. And what he says God has done, he's given us all of this in order that you and I may live freely.
But listen to what he says in verse 17, I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, freedom, listen, liberty in Christ not only gives me a position to enjoy, but it also gives me a position wherein sometimes I must suffer. It isn't all peaches and cream. It isn't all just roses. It isn't all just God just taking away all the problems. There are times when you and I are going to have to suffer. I mean right in the middle of your obedience you're going to have to suffer for God.
But look at what he says. I want you to notice the word here. He says, I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, the word bear here is the word in the Greek bastadzo, which means to bear what burdens us. That is to bear something that is weighty upon us. He says, I bear in my body the marks. The Greek word there is stigmata, from which we get our word of stigma.
That is an indication of a lack of something or a mark or a blemish. Here's a man whose life is described as a life of obedience before God. But his body, listen, his body bears the marks of it and not only that, God allowed him to suffer in a fulmin fashion that he said he prayed three times. That doesn't mean he prayed, now lay me down to sleep three times, God take this thing out of my body. But he must have fasted long periods, fasting and praying for God to take this thing away and God wouldn't take it away. You see, in all of our preaching and teaching about God's goodness and grace and love and mercy and provision, we must not get off balance to think, well, brother, if you're obeying God, you'll never suffer. There's not one verse in the Bible that says that. Now here was a man who was free.
Here was a man who was liberated, unshackled, and yet he had to suffer. And what I'm saying to you is this, because you obey God does not mean that you will never suffer. And there is a very lighthearted, frothy, plastic theology around today. Listen, if you'll just do certain things, all the suffering's gone, all the sickness is gone, all the ills are gone, and you're just trumping it on down God's highway to heaven and everything is just going to be just like you want it.
That is exactly what they imply and nothing could be further from the truth. Does not Paul say to Timothy, he says, I tell you that they who live godly in Christ Jesus will what? Suffer persecution. So Paul says, in my body I bear the marks.
Now remember, I'm going to remind you of something here. In those days when Paul said, I bear in my body the stigmata, the stigma of being God's suffering servant. The Galatian Christians knew exactly what he meant because in the temple there where the heathens worship, those who were servants in the temple had the marks, the stigmata, the symbol of the sign of the God imprinted or branded on their body somewhere. It could have been the arm, the forehead of their body somewhere. So they had branded on their bodies their master's name or signature of some sort or a symbol so that if they in some way escaped, they would know who they belong to. Likewise, the soldiers, the Roman soldiers, whatever commanding general this particular legion had, somewhere branded on their body was the name of their commanding officer. That implied ownership, it implied possession, it implied service.
Oftentimes it implied suffering. So when Paul said to these Galatian Christians, in my body I bear the marks of the Lord Jesus Christ, what he was saying is this. In my body you can tell who I belong to. In my body there is the evidence of the suffering for the Lord Jesus Christ. My commanding officer, my master, my Lord, my Savior, I have the marks of Christ in my body. Therefore he wasn't boasting, he was simply saying this is the way it is. Now Paul said there were two reasons that he suffered.
If you look in Philippians chapter 3 for a moment you'll find one of them. And I want to ask you would you be willing to say the same thing? Paul says beginning in verse 7, what things were gained to me, those I counted, loss for Christ. Now listen to what he says, yea?
He says yes. Doubtless I count everything in my life as unimportant, all but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord. For whom I have suffered the loss of all things and do count them as nothing that I may win Christ and be found in him, not having my own righteousness but his. Now listen, can you honestly say that you really and truly want to know God in a deeper way?
How many of you would be willing to say that? I really want to know God in a deeper way. Then to what degree are you willing to go to know him in a deeper way? Now watch this, if God said to you alright you want to know me better? The next 30 days I'm going to lay you flat on your back not going to be able to move but when you come out you're really going to know me.
Would you be willing to do that? You say well if he told me that I would, suppose he didn't tell you. Listen, the truth is that all of us are a bunch of kindergarten folks when it comes to knowing who God is, amen? But we say we want to know him. Paul discovered that one of the ways of knowing him is to suffer. So he says I'm willing to suffer first of all that I may know Christ. Now listen, now watch this, the whole book has been about our freedom. He's freed us. Freed us to do what?
To live in him. But he's also freed us to suffer for him. Listen, you're willing to live for him, freed and liberated.
Are you willing to suffer for him if that's what he requires? That's what Paul's talking about. He says I buried my body but he says listen, I'm free not only to live for him but I'm free to suffer for him because in suffering I have learned something about God I would never have known. Second Corinthians chapter 12. Not only does he say that but look if you will in Second Timothy. Chapter 2 verse 9, listen to what he says. He says wherein I suffer trouble as an evildo that is he says they accuse me of evil that's why they persecute me. Even unto bonds putting me in jail but the word of God is not bound.
Listen, think about this. Paul had such freedom of Jesus Christ they could put him in stocks. You think that he says they may have my body bound but I'm not bound. He says verse 10, therefore I endure all things for the elect's sake that they also may obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus the eternal glory with eternal glory. It is a faithful saying for if we be dead with him we shall also live with him. If we suffer we shall also reign with him.
If we deny him he will deny us. Listen, you see he mixes the suffering in with all the rest. Now Paul says here two reasons he's willing to suffer. First of all to know Christ and the second reason he says I'm willing to suffer is that other people might be saved.
And I wonder how many of us would be willing to say both of those. I'm willing to suffer if it means that's how I have to know him. And when you read 2nd Corinthians chapter 12 Paul says he learned some things through suffering.
He could never figure any other way. He says he prayed and pleaded with God to remove the thorn. Then he says when he really understood God he started thanking God for his weakness and thanking God for his trouble and thanking God for his suffering he says because I discovered something. That when I am at my weakest and going down to the last count he says I've discovered then is when the greatest power of God surges through my life. He would never have discovered that if he had been rolled around in a Roman chariot all over the Roman Empire preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ at ease and pleasure.
That's not God's plan. Paul says I bear in my body the marks that is the results of my suffering because of my faith in Jesus Christ. Now I think you can bear those marks sometimes that may not show physically but that may show emotionally and may show mentally marks of the sufferings of Christ. But let me ask you this. I wonder how many of us if the real truth were known have more scars that came from disobedience than scars that came from obedience both internally and externally.
You know if you cut yourself about four inches down your arm there and about a half inch deep, then you sew it up and do all kinds of things to it. But it will always be there. I'll tell you something far worse than that. It's what you do on the inside that scars up your soul. God forgives you. Listen, God forgives you, never holds it against you in them all, but even God doesn't remove the scars.
That's why you keep remembering them. I believe he leaves them there to remind us, listen, not how bad we've been but how what? How good he is to forgive us. And you see there may be one big one or many on the inside. Nobody will ever see those but God.
But you see what is our proper approach to those? Not to discourage us but to look within and see those scars and thank God for his grace. Thank God for his goodness. Thank God for his forgiveness. Thank God for his love. Thank God for his mercy.
Thank God for his kindness. In fact, did you know in the early days when the New Testament church was being persecuted when they brought them before the Roman legionnaires and they said, if you want to live, you say Caesar in curios, that is Caesar is Lord. If they said Jesus is Lord, off went their head. So many Christians began to volunteer decapitation. They wanted to give their life because of their faith in Jesus Christ. And history tells us many times the Romans laid down their swords and confessed Jesus Christ is Lord only to have their own heads removed. Immediate death in the confession of Christ. And you see a lot of people in the world tonight who know that they know that they know Jesus Christ is Lord because they have been tested with their life.
We think we do. But you see, when I'm free, I'm free to live in him, but I'm free also to die for him. And if I'm not free to die for him, then I am not a free man. Thank you for listening to Liberty's Brands. We would like to invite you to join us in celebrating 45 years of God's faithfulness. Stop by InTouch.org slash 45 years to learn more. This podcast is a presentation of InTouch Ministries, Atlanta, Georgia.
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