Freed to Change, Part 2

Today on Summit Life with J.D. Greer. Welcome to Summit Life, the Bible teaching ministry of pastor, author, and theologian, J.D.

Greer. I'm your host, Molly Vidovitch. Okay, next time you're in a bookstore—wait, do they still have those?—go take a look at the self-improvement section. You'll see rows and rows of books promising to unlock the secret to a better life.

But the truth is, no matter how many diets you follow, no matter how much positive thinking you do, none of those tricks are actually going to fulfill your deepest needs or fix your greatest problems. Today, Pastor J.D. explains the only way for us to truly change and be set free from our sinful hearts.

He titled this message, Free to Change. So grab your Bible and turn back to the book of Galatians as we get started. Here's how Paul starts chapter three. You foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you before whose eyes Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified.

In other words, at one point you understood the gospel so clearly, but now it's like you've completely forgotten that. Verse two, I only want to learn this from you. Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law or did you receive the Spirit by believing what you have heard? Now, this is really important because this is the first time the apostle Paul mentions the Holy Spirit in Galatians, and the Holy Spirit is going to become his primary theme for the next four chapters.

And here is his question. Listen, how did you first receive the Spirit? Did you first receive the Spirit because you did something?

Was it because you went through some ritual? No, it happened because you put faith in the finished work of Christ. Well, then he said, after beginning by the Spirit, do you now think you're going to finish by the flesh? Does God give you the Spirit and work miracles among you by your doing the works of the law or is it by believing what you heard? Just like Abraham who believed God and it was credited to him for righteousness.

Here is the game changing question. If you initially received the Spirit by believing, why would you think growing in the Spirit would be achieved in any other way? No, he says, the way we grow in the Christian life is the same way we began in the Christian life through faith in Christ finished work. The words, it is finished, you see, listen, are not just words that we believe one time to find forgiveness. They are words we believe again and again to experience spiritual power. His ongoing power in us is released in us through renewed faith in the gospel. As we continue to put faith in the finished work of Christ, the power of the Spirit is continually released in us. Or think of it this way, by believing it is finished, we gain the power to continue. And you thank God that his acceptance of you is not based on how much spiritual fruit you show. It's not based on how you feel.

It's not based on what you've accomplished. It's based on Christ finished work. And then as you rest there, you will start to bear spiritual fruit. In verse six, Paul now compares it to the experience of one of the most famous Old Testament people, Abraham. He's just like Abraham. Then he quotes Genesis 15, six. This is a quote here, like Abraham who believed God and it was credited to him for righteousness.

Genesis 15, God makes a promise to Abraham that from him would come a great nation that would provide forgiveness and salvation for the world. The problem when Abraham gets this promise is that Abraham is old and he's childless and he's long given up thoughts of having a child. When Abraham believed God's promise, however, two things happened.

Number one, he was declared righteous, it tells us. Second, when Abraham believed, number two, his dead sterile body was given the ability to reproduce. Paul then asked the Galatians, what part of this exactly did Abraham accomplish by his own strength?

Was it some technique or new way of positive thinking? No, it was all God. All Abraham did was believe what God promised and he kept believing it. If that's so, Paul says, then why would we think, why would we think we can achieve spiritual life by our own strength through obedience to the law? In fact, Paul points out that when God made the promise to Abraham, Israel hadn't even been given the law yet. Look at verse 17, my point is this, the law, which came 430 years later, had an invalidated covenant previously established by God or thus cancel the promise. Obedience to the law, in other words, can't be a condition for obtaining the promise.

He wasn't even around yet. Righteousness and spiritual life are given to all who simply believe the promise of Jesus, that it is finished just like he said. This is the kind of spiritual power that many of you are missing. And the only way that you get it is by believing the promise that it is finished. It is finished is not just the way we obtain forgiveness for the past. It is finished as the way we obtain power in the present. The Galatian error was that after they had started through faith in the gospel, they thought they would be perfected or they would thought they would come to maturity by the power of the flesh through obedience to certain laws or circumcision or obedience to dietary restrictions or whatever. Now the very first week of this series, I pointed out to you that those are not the same things that we usually turn to.

Right? And so what I gave you was a number of laws, modern day laws that we turn to. We don't turn to the same thing they turned to in the first century. None of you were like, Hey, how about circumcision? And how about avoiding pork and that kind of stuff?

You don't do that. You turn to a different set of laws to try to perfect yourselves. So I gave you just real quick, a few weeks ago, I gave you how different denominations, depending on how you're raised, what laws they tend to point you to. So if you are from a, for example, liturgical background, or let's say Catholic background, then it was ceremonies and sacraments and, and the Eucharist and baptism and confirmation salvation was faith in Christ. Plus all those things.

If you do this and this, this plus the finished work of Christ is what will bring you closer to God. If you grew up in a, in a Baptist context as I did, then the tendency was probably to put all the emphasis on the rules. Here's what Christians look like. Here's what they talk like. Here's what they don't listen to. Here's what kind of movies they don't watch.

Here is what they, here's everything about them. And in these traditions, the definition of Christian was always really, really narrow. It was only if you conform exactly, not just to faith in Christ, but also to our narrow definition of what a Christian talks like, looks like what they believe.

And only if you do that, are you considered a real Christian. And that's because the emphasis was all on external conformity, but it is not the law that can change us. It is not conformity to anything that could change us.

Not any of that can produce a single ounce of spiritual life in me. Most liberal churches put emphasis on certain social justice rules. Now, the way you become a real Christian is by adopting certain societal agendas. And hear me, some of the agendas they put forward are good, but the emphasis is all on what you are to do rather than on the power of the spirit released through faith in the gospel. It's just a new progressive version of the law.

Do this and you will live. The focus that you leave these churches with is on a list of things we are to do rather than on the power released through faith in what Christ has done. There is no version of the law, whether it's Jewish or whether it's Catholic or whether it's Baptist or whether it's progressive that can save you. We mega churches, we hate those guys, right? We tend to put emphasis on our own set of laws. Now, what are we known for?

What are mega churches known for? Practicality, right? Well, we make Christianity practical and we give you life principles, practical applications of faith. I love practicality, okay?

This is sort of my nature. I like giving people lists and I get it, but we cannot, listen, you cannot, and you will not grow through the law. We grow only as the spirit's power is released in us through continued faith in Christ's finished work. Paul is pointing us to a power that cannot be accessed through the law. It is only accessed through faith in the gospel.

And by the way, please note that when I talk about finding freedom from the law, I'm not, listen to this, I'm not talking about simply dumbing down the law. Joyce Meyer, I listen to her on the radio sometimes. She said not too long ago, she said, and I quote, I finally realized that the gospel is not about rules. All right, so far so good. It's about loving God and loving each other.

So what have you done this week to help out somebody you know? Oh, I've gotten freedom from the rules and now I just have to love God and love people? As if that is any easier? Love God and love each other is what Jesus said was the summary of the law. I'm in big trouble if that's what the gospel is. With all due respect, just love God and love people is not the gospel.

It is the very essence of the law that we have grievously failed to keep. The gospel is not love God and do your best. The gospel is that you did your best and it wasn't enough.

So God in his love sent his best who did for you what you could not do for yourself and all you can do now is receive it by faith. And that's where the power is, not in some resolution to love God and love people. Demar Lloyd-Jones, a 1950s British pastor talked about a controversy that was raging in his day between, I'll use modern terms, but a seeker sensitive church and a more doctrinal church. And he said the argument goes like this, should we focus in our messages more on practicality, like here's how to live it out, or should we focus more on teaching doctrine? He said in the seeker sensitive churches wants you to make it relevant and the doctrinal churches wants you to make it deep.

He said, I would very humbly say to them that both of those are in error. He said, because the goal of a motivational speech is that you leave with action steps, not a sermon. The goal of a lecture in seminary is that you leave with a page full of notes, doctrinal notes. The goal of a gospel sermon is not that you leave with a page full of action steps or leave with a page full of notes.

The goal of a gospel sermon is that you leave worshiping. At some point, the pen has to go down and the eyes have to go upward and you have to stop saying, oh my God, look at all these things I've got to do for you. And you start to say, oh my God, look at all these things that you have done for me. Because as you are amazed with the beauty of what God has done, what God does, listen to this, is he will begin to change you on the spot. He doesn't change you because you make a list of things you're going to go do and change. You change on the spot because your soul is captivated with the glory of Jesus. And that changes you at the desire level, which is what God wants. God could have created robots who would just obey mechanically. He wanted people who would love him like he loves himself and love others the way that he loves them, who would then begin to do it, not based on compulsion but based on desire.

And that is something the law cannot produce. Only the gospel can produce that kind of change in people because it is the very power of new life. We're trying to teach my son, who is seven years old now, trying to teach him to love to read. I'm like, what can I give my son the motivation to read? And I heard about somebody in our church friend who said, well, we use Pokemon cards.

So I was like, well, I'll try that. And so we go out, I bought him, I think 10 bucks for 50 of them. And so I'm like, you read for 20 minutes, you get a Pokemon card.

So he dutifully goes upstairs, he reads for 20 minutes. First time I gave him one, I handed him one and he said, here's your reward. He looks at it, he said, are there any EX cards in that deck? And I was like, what the heck is an EX card?

He's like, dad, how can you not know what an EX card is? They're the only good Pokemon cards there are. So I was like, oh, well, sure, I'm sure there are.

Just you gotta, you know, choose them randomly and they'll be one. So I looked later at the deck, there's no EX cards in there. So I jump online, I'm like, I gotta find some EX cards. Well, it turns out they're a lot more expensive. I think it was like 40 bucks for 10 of them. I was like, well, is this a good investment for him learning to read, I guess.

So boom, $40 later, I got 10 EX cards on the way to my house and now they're mixed in there and I'm giving them out to him. Now he is reading not for love of reading. He is reading because it's a means to a Pokemon card. Now I was the same way when I was seven years old.

I was the same way probably when I was 10, 12, 15 years old. But somewhere over that time, I developed a love for reading. Now, some of you may not share that passion for reading.

That's not the point. The point is that at some point you want reading to cease to be a means to an end and you wanna become an end in itself. And what God desires for us is not that we obey the law as a way of gaining blessing, not that we obey the law as a way of escaping punishment, not that we obey the law as a way of going to heaven, but we obey God because we love God.

And we seek righteousness because we love righteousness. And friend, that's what's wrong with your heart. The problem with your heart is that you don't naturally do that. No obedience to the law is going to fix that. The law cannot move your heart, the needle of your heart to righteousness. What the law can do is tell you what you ought to be like, but only the gospel is the power that moves that locomotive along the tracks.

And what the law cannot do, God did in the gospel. Only the spirit released through faith in the gospel has power to change your heart like that, which is why D. Martin Lloyd-Jones, one more time, he said, I spent half my time telling my congregation to study doctrine and the other half telling them that doctrine isn't enough because it is faith in the gospel, not doctrinal knowledge, it changes us. Which means, listen, when you're struggling in your marriage, you don't just need to learn new techniques for being a better husband. The power to really change in marriage, listen, comes not from a relevant list from uncle JD, the power for change in marriage comes from the finished work of Christ.

Learning five new steps to be in a more thoughtful husband is not nearly as important as being overwhelmed by the 10 billion steps that Jesus took when he came to rescue you. Or when you are struggling as a parent, or your kid is struggling with sin, and you're like, I can't make them love the right things, and I'm trying to control them, but I can't change their heart no matter what I say, no matter what I do, where do I turn? Is your hope to simply get them to conform to the laws, to give them the right rewards if they obey, to punish them enough and they don't? You can't produce righteousness in their hearts to the law. I'm not saying get rid of discipline, I'll explain again next week how we use the law, but I'm telling you heart change, heart change, new life only comes from the gospel, which means you need to turn your hope toward the gospel and pray in faith for that power that flows from the finished work of Christ to be released in your life and in their lives. It means when you struggle with sin and you have fallen to that same sin again and again, you've got to look at the finished work of Christ and you got to thank God that his acceptance of you is no longer based on how well you live the Christian life, that it is based on Christ's finished work and thereby receive the power to get up. You got to look up from where you have fallen and realize that in Christ, the father has been running towards you already, even before you began to repent because he wanted to restore you and bring you home before you even thought to look for him.

One of the best descriptions of this I've shared with you, I think is that strange little verse in Proverbs that is so wonderfully encapsulates the Christian life. Proverbs 24, 16, the righteous man, the righteous man falls seven times and gets back up again. Imagine being behind a man who fell seven times.

What does that experience like? So he falls once and it's kind of funny, right? I mean, somebody falls in the mall, you know, you pull out your phone, he falls a second time, you're like, oh, I got to send this out to somebody, turn it into a YouTube, put it on the internet. He falls a third time, you start to get worried. You saw a fourth time, you call an ambulance.

Fifth, sixth, seventh time, you're really worried about the guy. Seven in Hebrew is the number of completion, which means that when somebody falls seven times, listen, their whole life is characterized by falling. Now I want you to think about that verse again. The righteous man falls seven times and gets back up again, which means that the righteous man, listen to this, does not show his righteousness by never falling. He shows his righteousness by what he does when he falls because the righteous man, watch this, recognizes that his righteousness is no longer based on how well he runs. His righteousness is based on the finished work of Christ and when he has fallen, Christ still stands. So he shows his belief in the gospel by where he looks when he falls and when he falls, he looks up and he says, thank God that my acceptance is not based on how well I've run.

Thank God it's based on your finished work. I am as perfect in your sight as if I had never sinned because you have become my righteousness. So my hope is built on nothing less than Jesus' blood and righteousness, right? On Christ the solid rock I stand, even though I've fallen. On Christ the solid rock I stand. All other ground is sinking sand.

All other ground is sinking sand. Christ alone is my hope and when I have fallen again, I will say his finished work, it is finished and I can get back up. I can get back up because it is no longer me. It is Christ in me and that race is won. That victory is finished. It is over and it matters what I'm struggling with or where I've been defeated or where I feel powerless.

That victory is mine. I simply believe it and its power flows into me. It is finished is not just a statement you believe one time to escape the penalty of sin. It is finished as a statement you believe repeatedly to gain power over sin.

Do you understand that? Now, like I alluded to you at the beginning, the first and most important sign, the very first declaration you make that declares you believe it is finished is baptism. Baptism is probably the best picture we have because in baptism you're actually put under the water like Christ was put into the earth, buried for your sin. And then you come out of the water symbolic of the fact that Jesus was raised to new life, that his death has canceled the penalty of your sin and his resurrection is the power that will break sin's power over your life. That is an important declaration of faith that releases spiritual power into your life. Y'all, a decision to get baptized often makes the difference I have seen between a passing religious phase and a defining moment that transforms your life. And that is in large part because the Holy Spirit takes the confession of faith and he uses it to infuse you with power.

So when you say to me, and sometimes you say it verbally and sometimes you just say it with your eyes, well, it's just not that important. Well, first I always want to ask people who say that, who are you to tell God, which of his commands are not important? Is that really how you want to begin your walk with Jesus by telling him the things that you're not going to do? Second, I try to tell people you just don't realize the power of the spirit that comes into you when you declare publicly, I believe it is finished.

I was thinking my dad, who now comes, they retired recently and they moved here and they're now a part of our church. My dad told me the story that he said, 10 days before you were born, April 21st, 1973, he said, 10 days before you were born, he said, my spiritual life was just sort of right. It was going back and forth and your mom and I had started to get back in church and we were about to have our first son. And so we wanted God to be a part of our lives, he said, but I was just sort of in and out.

And he says, it wasn't, nothing was really, really permanent. He said, the guy basically did what I'm about to do with you. And he said, I want you to come forward.

I want you to declare publicly your faith. He said, he stood us all up. He said, I literally reached up and I grabbed that seat in front of me and I gripped it until my knuckles were white. Cause I didn't want to do that.

Cause that was embarrassing. He said, I was too proud. I didn't want to get out there.

Nobody watched me and see me. He said, and I stood there and I probably argued with the Holy Spirit for five or six minutes about why I didn't really need to go. I thought I'll just keep growing a little bit closer to God, little by little. He says, it's a good thing I was in a Baptist church where we sang 84 verses of Just As I Am or I'd have never made it. He said, he said, and finally, I don't know, somewhere on the 70th verse, he said, I knew, I knew that it was a defining moment for me.

He said, I didn't feel like I had the strength to do it. He said, so I just reached out and I stepped out into that aisle. He said, in the moment I stepped out into the aisle, the Holy Spirit took over. He says, and that transformed my life and changed your eternity because it was a defining moment that changed me, which ultimately one day would change you.

You see, some of you are about to have that same moment. And I know you can give me reasons why you don't think it's that important, but this is what the New Testament says that you do is when you know Jesus and you trust him, you declare it. And some of you have, have believed in Jesus and you've never declared it publicly.

Now, let me add this. Some of you have never made that decision to follow Jesus and your decision to get baptized is going to be simultaneous with your decision to follow Jesus. That's the New Testament way, by the way, immediately when you, when you come to Christ, you you're baptized. Here's a big one. I hear people say, well, I got baptized as a baby.

Do I need to do it again? Listen, I understand you respect your parents and you do not want your parents to feel like you are rejecting your heritage. I totally get that. What I encourage you to, to think about though is this, listen, do not see this as a repudiation of your parents' faith. In fact, see it as a fulfillment of their faith. Because when they baptized you, when you were a baby, what they were saying is, I hope one day my son or daughter grows up to follow Jesus. Do not see it as a repudiation of their faith.

See it as a fulfillment of their faith. Every single time in scripture, we see baptism. It happens after a profession of faith, never before. Acts chapter two, 3000 believed and were baptized. Acts four, 5000 believed and were baptized. Acts chapter eight, the Ethiopian eunuch believed and said, what hinders me from being baptized?

And Philip answered him. If you believe with all your heart, you may not a single time in scripture, do we see baptism done to somebody who doesn't yet have faith. So you need to profess faith in Christ yourself and be baptized as a symbol of that. Have you taken that step and put your faith in Jesus for salvation?

If not, we'd love to answer any questions you have or pray with you. Give us a call at eight six six three three five fifty two twenty. Or you can send us an email right to requests at JD Greer dot com.

That's requests at JD G R E E A R dot com. You're listening to Summit Life, the Bible teaching ministry of Pastor JD Greer. Today's message is a part of our teaching series called Freedom in the In-Between. These daily broadcasts are available because generous friends like you have stepped up and helped us cover the cost.

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That's eight six six three three five fifty two twenty. Or give online at JD Greer dot com. By the way, if you haven't checked out Pastor JD's newest podcast called Ask Me Anything, you'll want to do that today. Pastor JD gives quick, honest answers to tricky questions, and you can find it online at JD Greer dot com or through your favorite podcasting app. I'm Molly Vidovitch inviting you to join us again Friday when we look at the question, If we are free in Christ, why do Christians still follow certain rules? I'm sure you've wondered that yourself at some time. So join us Friday on Summit Life with JD Greer. Today's program was produced and sponsored by JD Greer Ministries.