From Cursed to Blessed

Galatians chapter 3. for those of you visiting with us, we're doing a verse by verse study through the book of Galatians. And as we continue in our study of this book, we come this morning to chapter 3, verse 10. And what we do every Sunday is we just look at the Bible, we listen to God, and then we allow that to shape how we believe and how we, behave.

This is God's word. And that's who we want to, to hear from, every, Sunday. I am not creative enough to stand up here and just make stuff up. but all I can do is tell you what God says, and, we will be enriched by that and blessed by that, and all of us, including myself, will be instructed, and challenged and encouraged by it also.

But anyway, as we're looking at the book of Galatians, we come this morning to Galatians chapter 3, verse 10. My goal this morning is to cover verses 10 through 14, and the title of the message is from Cursed to Blessed, from Cursed. To blast. Well, today is a big day in the NFL.

It is championship Sunday. And, so let's begin today with a football story. Last week at the Indianapolis Colts and Chargers game, which was taking place in Indianapolis, I think it was during halftime, they were recognizing the winners of the punt pass and kick competition that the NFL does every year, and they had all the winners out there in front of 80,000 fans from the youngest to the oldest, the winners in their respective age. divisions and they were reading off the names of the winners and the 80,000 fans in the Indianapolis stadium were politely, applauding.

Each one, but then they came to a 14 year old girl named Anna Grant, who was a freshman in high school, who was one of the winners, and they read off her name and she raised her hand and, and waved like all the others did. And all of a sudden, there was a chorus of boos that descended upon this 14 year old high school freshman. Why you ask? She was wearing a New England Patriots jersey.

And Indianapolis Colts fans just don't have a lot of love for the New England Patriots, and so all of the venom that they had against the Patriots descended upon her because she was wearing a Patriots jersey. Well, she laughed it off and she didn't seem overly offended by it, but some have been offended by it, and one of them is a guy, Andrew Tippett, who is the community affairs director of the New England Patriots organization. He saw that happening and was just horrified by it and felt bad that she was being booed when she should have been recognized for the, the fact that she had won in her division.

And so he made some phone calls.

He called Bob Kraft, the owner of the New England Patriots organization, and made a few other phone calls and worked out some arrangements for Anna Grant. And then he called Anna Grant, I believe it was on Monday. And she answered the phone and he said, I am Andrew Tippett, and I saw what had happened to you at the Colts game and how you were booed, and I, I feel terrible about it and we want to make it up to you if we can. So what we would like to do is to invite you to next week's New England game, which by the way is today, this afternoon.

And we would like you to be our guest captain, and we would like for you to go out on the field with Tom Brady and the other captains, for the coin toss. and we want to honor you in that way, and we would like for you to stick around for the game and so we would like to provide free tickets for you and your parents and your two brothers to be able to be at the game and enjoy the game. And in terms of where you're going to be sitting, we have some seats for you in the owner's box.

You will be sitting.

in the luxury box of Bob Kraft himself and enjoy the game from there. pretty amazing going from being booed by 80,000 people to being honored and blessed beyond anything she would have imagined just seven days ago. But I share that with you, this morning to set up this imaginary scenario. I want you to imagine that you are at Anna Grant's home this week and you are talking.

to her, and you're saying to her, man, look at what's happened to you 7 days ago, you were being booed, and now this Sunday, you're being honored and blessed beyond anything you would have imagined. Anna, how did this happen? How did you get from point A to point B? Now imagine that she said, well, it's actually very simple.

I was at home, my phone rang. I answered the phone, there was a voice on the other end telling me of all these arrangements, and inviting me, and I spoke into the phone receiver and I said, OK, I'll do that. And that's how it happened. Now, that would be a fairly accurate answer from one standpoint.

But imagine your response to that. Would you say, wow, Anna, can I look at your phone? so, so this is the phone right here that you, you answered. This is the phone that, that connected you to all this.

Wow, man, what make and model is this? This is a Panasonic 3000. based on what you're telling me in this story, you've convinced me I have got to get a phone like this. Would you respond that way?

No, and if you did, she would say, excuse me, let's rewind. Let me tell you in a fuller version what's actually happened, because you should not be obsessing on the phone. If you focus on anything, you should be focusing on a guy named Andrew Tippett, who made all of the arrangements and contacted Bob Kraft himself, made all these arrangements, and then reached out to me over the phone and invited me. To experience what I am experiencing this Sunday, that's where the focus should be, not on the phone.

I begin with that this morning because that's exactly what happens in Galatians chapter 3, in verses 6 through 9, for those of you who were here last Sunday. Paul says, basically, I will tell you how we came into the blessing of Abraham. God promised Abraham 4000 years ago, I'm going to bless you mightily, and in you all the families of the earth are going to be blessed. And Paul says, I'll tell you how it is that we came into that blessing of Abraham.

It was simply by faith. That's his answer. That's his explanation. He says in verse 6.

Even so, Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness. Therefore, be sure that it is those who are of faith who are sons of Abraham. Verse 9. So then those who are of faith are blessed with Abraham, the believer.

Now if that is all that Paul said, we might say, wow, so it's just faith. All it takes is faith and And this blessing automatically happens. Well, in one narrow standpoint, that is true. But if we focused on the faith, Paul would say, wait a minute, faith is critical.

Faith is critical as a link from us to the one who has brought us salvation, but he would say, listen, I don't want you to focus on the faith as much as you focus on the one in whom we put our faith. And so in verse 10 he basically says, let's rewind this tape and let's play it back in slow motion. I'm gonna re-explain for you, the process of how we entered into the blessing of Abraham and all of the blessings that we have in Christ. And hopefully this time through I will be able to show you the details of how it actually took place.

From our standpoint, guys, we come into the blessing of Abraham by faith. That's all we have to do. But that's not all that had to be done for us to come into the blessing of Abraham, right? Somebody else had to do a lot for us so that we could then by faith come into that blessing.

And Paul does not want us to lose out on the details of how this actually took place. And so if you want to, keep an outline, oh, I meant to show you her picture while I was talking about her. That's Anna Grant. Sorry about that.

Now moving on, in, in this message, we're going to look at 5 details that tell the story of how we became so gloriously blessed simply through faith, 5 details. and the first detail we find in verse 10, and that is this, that at the outset, we were cursed by the law of God. If you really want to know the story of how we have entered so richly into the blessing of Abraham, the first detail you must recall to mind is that at the outset, we were actually cursed. So it's not like we were in a neutral state, and we went from that neutral state into a blessed state.

It's not like we were spiritually middle class people doing OK. making ends meet, and we went from that to being multimillionaires. No, spiritually speaking, we were not in a neutral state. We were actually in a dungeon at the bottom of that dungeon, we were condemned sinners condemned to die.

There was nothing we could do to deliver us from that state. And God moved us from that curse state, delivered us, and has brought us incredible blessing. So we have traveled quite a distance from being cursed under the law of God, to being blessed by God Himself. At the outset, we were cursed by God's law.

Look what he says in verse 10. He says, for as many as are of the works of the law, anyone who puts their trust in the law in terms of thinking, well, if I'm just good enough, and I just keep the law, Paul says they are under a curse. And basically, the net effect of his point is that all people are under the curse of the law. And now look at what he says, for it is written, and now he quotes from Deuteronomy 27:26 from the Greek Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Old Testament, where it says, Cursed is everyone who does not abide by all things written in the book of the law to perform them.

Paul would say, listen, I'm not making this stuff up. I am quoting from the law itself. Near the end of the Book of Deuteronomy, all of the commands have been given and then a list of blessings and a list of curses, blessings for those who obey the law, curses for those who don't. But at the end of all of that, it says, cursed is everyone who does not abide by all things written in the book of the law.

Do you guys see what that is saying? Cursed is everyone who does not abide by what all, everything in the book of the law. Now raise your hand. How many of you would say that throughout the entirety of my life, I have always abided by everything written in the law of God.

None of us could say that. So what that means? We're cursed. We're cursed.

The law pronounces a curse upon everybody. Everybody who does not abide by everything in the law of God. what, guys, we need to even as believers, again, Paul is speaking to Christians here, even as believers, we need to linger over that reality and realize that apart from Christ, this was my status. As a condemned cursed sinner under the law of God, this past week, I was going through the 10 Commandments.

I like to do this from time to time and just size myself up, up against the standard of the 10 Commandments. Even as believers we need to do that. And what guys, throughout my life, countless times I have violated the letter or the spirit of every single one of God's 10 commandments. I strike out on every single one of them.

There's not even one of them that I can cling to and say, Well, at least I've done this. I've broken 9 of them, but at least I've never broken this one. No, I have broken all of them. And let me just share with you one detail about some of the 10 Commandments.

When you look at the 10 Commandments, there's a lot of prohibitions, a lot of negative commands there. And, and understand that in the Hebrew language, there's two ways to deliver a negative command. what they would do is they would put a negative particle attached to a command that is found in the Hebrew text. And if the word L, was attached to a command that denoted an immediate prohibition just for that moment in time.

For example, if I were speaking Hebrew and we were about to eat dinner and I saw one of my children reaching for a jar of cookies. Or let's say a plate of cookies, and I said to them, Don't touch those cookies. If I were speaking Hebrew, I would use the L prefix. In other words, I'm not telling them you are never throughout the entirety of your life ever to touch those cookies.

What I'm saying is you are not right now to touch them. In about 30 minutes, you will be able to touch them all you want and eat them, but right now at the immediate time, do not touch the cookies. So that was the way in Hebrew they conveyed an immediate prohibition at a point in time. However, if someone in Hebrew wanted to deliver an overarching permanent prohibition, they would put the prefix low.

in front of a command that means don't ever do this. It means never do this. I would say to my kids, don't touch those cookies. I would use the immediate prohibition.

However, if I were to say to my children, do not play with gasoline around an open flame. I would use low in front of that. Don't ever do that, not just right now. Don't do that, but don't ever do that throughout the entirety of your life.

And guys, it is that low negative prefix essentially that is attached to the prohibitions that are in the 10 Commandments. And so God says to the to to us, never have any other. gods before me throughout the entirety of your lives, never have any other gods before me. Never make an idol, never worship an idol, never serve an idol, never worship anything other than me.

God commands. Never take God's name in vain. Never take the name of the Lord your God in vain. You understand how when you put never on there, you then understand Why a violation of the law is so serious, because once we violated this once, we can never say that we have never done that.

We will always be in a state of having done that at some point in our lives. God also says in the 10 Commandments, never murder. Now, I know most of you, hopefully all of you would say, well, I've never murdered anybody. but the New Testament sets a higher standard when it comes to murder.

In First John 3:15, the apostle John says, Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer. Have you ever hated anyone throughout, your life? and maybe you might say, well, I've never actually hated someone. Well, how about have you ever been angry with someone?

And Matthew 5:21, Jesus says, it has been said, thou shalt not commit murder. Then he says, but I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother shall be guilty. In other words, to just be angry with a brother, you are guilty of murder in your heart. Another command in the 10 Commandments is never commit adultery.

Never commit adultery. This is God's expectation. This is the law's demand of us never commit adultery. And for those who may have never committed the physical act of adultery, you are still condemned by this because in Matthew 5:28, Jesus says, Everyone who looks on a woman with lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.

That is the standard of Scripture. And so we have violated that command. Never steal, never lie, never covet anything that does not rightfully belong to you. And guys, if we went through all 10 of the 10 Commandments, we would see that we have failed miserably.

At every one of them we have failed millions of times throughout the entirety of our lives and hence we are cursed by the law because we have failed to live according to everything that is written in it. In fact, so deep is this curse. And so severe is the law that even if theoretically I were to live my life up to the age of 60 and always perfectly obey the law, and then at the age of 60 I tell a lie and I break the law on that instance, do you realize just that one sin is enough to bring me under the curse of the law?

That's the teaching of the Bible, because I will have failed to live according to everything, all that is written in.

The book of the law in James 2:10. James says, Whoever keeps the whole law, think about it. This is someone who actually has put forth effort, and they have kept the whole law and yet stumbles in one point. He has become guilty of all of the law.

The full weight of the law comes down on the person at that point. We need to understand and appreciate that, guys. the greatness of our crimes is measured by the standard of the greatness of the one against whom we have committed those crimes. And God is the lawgiver.

He is infinitely holy, righteous, and just. That means every single offense you ever commit in breaking God's law is infinitely as bad as God is infinitely holy, righteous and good. And so the law curses us because we have failed to obey every word all the time that is written in the book of the law. What does it mean to be cursed under the law?

In Romans 4:15, Paul says the law brings about wrath. To be cursed under the law means that we are under the wrath of the lawgiver, which is God Himself. Paul says, I wanna, I wanna tell you the details of the story of how we entered into the blessing of Abraham, the blessings of salvation that we enjoy right now from day to day, and, and telling the story, the first detail that we need to remind ourselves of and appreciate is that at the very outset of this story, we were cursed.

Under the law of God, because we failed to live according to everything that is written in it.

There's a second detail that he wants to rehearse before us, and that is this. And that is that we could never earn a righteous decree from God, through our obedience to the law. What by that is we were cursed under the law. And there was nothing we could ever do to clean up our act or whatever wherein God would look at us and say, what?

You're righteous. Based on your performance over the last few years, you are righteous. Paul is saying that could never happen. He says in verse 11, that no one is justified by the law before God.

Nobody is justified. In other words, no one can ever be decreed righteous by the law before God. why? Because they're already cursed by the law.

What he's saying is there's nothing we can ever do to get out from underneath that curse because we have a record of having violated the law of God. So we are helplessly cursed by the law now. this should resonate with us because most people who have lived a wicked lifestyle, they've been involved in a bunch of sin, a lot of people at some point just stop one day and say, what, I am really a bad person. And I have not been living right and what I'm going to do?

I'm going to clean up my act. I'm going to, and they even sense that they're under God's judgment for that, but their first instinct is, I got to do better. I think from now on I'm going to be more of a nice person. And there are actually non-Christian people who say, what, I'm going to stop doing this.

I'm going to stop doing that, and I'm going to pull away from these relationships. I'm not going to hang around with these people anymore, and what? I'm going to try to be a good person from here on out. And then they live their life trying to be a good person, the very best they can, and their hope is that by cleaning up their act and being a better person, that God will look at them and say, what, Based on your performance over the last 5 years, I declare you righteous, or at least righteous enough to get into my heaven.

But Paul says that this can never happen. In Romans chapter 4, Paul says, By the works of the law, no flesh will ever be justified or rendered righteous before God. In fact, even in the Old Testament itself, there are passages that abundantly make this clear. For example, in Psalm 14 and in Psalm 53, it says, God.

Looked down from heaven upon the sons of men, and what did he see? What God saw is there is no one who does good, not even one. Psalm 53, There is no one who does good, not even one. Romans 3:10, there is none righteous, not even one.

God has not looked at anyone other than Jesus, who we'll get to in just a second. He's never looked at any of us and our Behavior under the law, and said, based on your performance, you and my eyes are a righteous person. Now, we might be righteous in our own eyes. In fact, we often are righteous in our own eyes.

We might even be righteous in the eyes of other people. Maybe we're outperforming other people. And other people look at us and say, Man, you are righteous. We can be righteous in our own eyes and righteous in the eyes of other people, but we can never be righteous before a perfectly holy and righteous God.

You say, Well, what of all the good deeds that we have done? There have been times where I have obeyed the law, and I, I've been tempted to lie and I didn't lie. Doesn't that count for for something? Well, as for such righteousness that we generate in ourselves, Isaiah.

And Isaiah 64:6 says, all of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous deeds are like a filthy garment to God. the only person that could say this is someone who has seen a superior righteousness. See, when you see God like Isaiah saw him and you see perfect righteousness, all of a sudden you look back at your own righteousness that you used to be impressed with. And it's like this is a filthy garment.

So we are cursed under the law of God. There's nothing we can do to rectify that. There's nothing we can do to get out from that cursed status. There's nothing we can do based on our performance to generate from God a decree of righteous.

In fact, Paul knows that he's talking to Galatian Christians who have been duped by Judaizers. He knows there are Judaizers in the attendance at this church service where this book is being read for the first time, and so Paul knows that he can't just go say something. He needs to show from scripture how it is true. So look at what he says in verse 11.

Now that no one is justified by the law before God is evident from Scripture 4, and now he quotes from Habakkuk 2:4, The righteous man shall live by faith. The justified man, the righteous man, shall live by faith. All right, verse 12, he does some logic here. However, the law is not of faith.

On the contrary, now he quotes from Leviticus 18:5, He who practices them shall live by them. So Paul is saying the law itself, the Old Testament itself, the Hebrew scriptures themselves communicate that the only way that a man can become righteous is by faith, ultimately faith in God. And people that are living by the law are not living by faith in God. Ultimately, they're living by faith in themselves.

You guys understand that connection there? people who are trying to be good enough to get into heaven by obeying the law, ultimately the focus of their faith is in themselves. I, I can do this. I can do better, and I messed up yesterday and I think I can do better today, and here's what the law says.

And with everything in me, I'm going to try to do this, and, and they're trying to be good enough for God to declare them righteous based on their own righteousness. Their faith ultimately is in themselves. It's not faith in God, but salvation comes to those who realize I cannot keep this law. I cannot keep it perfectly.

I am under the curse of the law. I cannot deliver myself out from underneath that curse, based on my attempts at obedience to the law. So what, I'm going to give up on that pursuit of righteousness through the law. I give up, I can't do it.

And I see in another one Jesus, a perfect righteousness. And that is my only hope. I'm going to put my faith in Him. Not in my performance.

For my righteousness. And Paul says, based on this, you can infer all of this even from the Old Testament. And from this, you can infer very strongly. That nobody ever gets justified by the law.

No one cursed by the law ever gets out of that curse or justified by means of obeying the law. You say, Well, what is our hope then? Well, our hope is Jesus. Detail number 3 that Paul wants us to see is that Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by dying on a tree.

All right, that might seem like a meaningless detail, but it's not. Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by dying on a tree. You want to know how we went from being cursed Into the blessing of Abraham. Well, we were cursed.

We couldn't get out from underneath that curse. We couldn't behave well enough to be declared righteous by God. But Jesus redeemed us out from underneath that curse, and he did it by dying on a tree. Look at what he says in verse 13.

Christ redeemed us, and by the way, the word that is translated redeemed almost always conveys the idea of delivering through the paying of a price. It doesn't just mean to deliver, but to deliver by the paying of a price. If somebody in Bible times was interested in freeing a slave that they saw on a trading block, they couldn't just walk up to that slave and say, You are free. I declare you free.

Just go do whatever you want. They couldn't do that. They had to redeem that person. They had to give to the slave trader 30 shekels or whatever that that slave was deemed to be worth.

And then after purchasing that slave, and people would actually do this after purchasing that slave, they said to the slave, you are free. You may go That's redemption. It is delivering through the paying of a price, and here we were slaves under the law, under the curse of the law, and we learn here that Christ delivered us out from underneath that curse. And how did he do it?

He did it by paying a price. And what price was that? It was the price of his life. Look at what it says.

Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us. Jesus saw us under the curse of the law. He saw us struggling to get out from underneath that curse. And there was no way we could climb those dungeon walls.

It was hopeless. And he says, I know what I'm going to do. You need to be redeemed. And I'm going to donate towards that redemption.

And what I will donate is myself. I will give up my life to purchase your freedom. And it says here that Jesus became a curse for us. What he essentially did is he came underneath the curse of the law.

By the way, Jesus never broke the law once in his life, right? He perfectly obeyed the law. He's the only person who's ever lived that the law looked upon and said, You're righteous. I have nothing against you.

You have perfectly obeyed me. He's the only one who was not under the curse of the law, but this perfectly righteous one who fulfilled the law. Comes underneath the curse of the law. And he bears that curse upon himself that we deserve, so that we might then be redeemed.

And bearing that curse upon himself, Jesus absorbed that curse, the sentence was executed against him. Therefore, we are now liberated from the law's demands. And from the judgment of the law because he bore that sentence upon himself. Now again, Paul knows that there's people sitting in the audience hearing this being read who are going, Oh, Jesus became a curse for us, and don't know if we really believe that.

And there's Judaizers sitting there. and they're thinking, you better prove this from Scripture. And so Paul says, OK, here we go. Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us, for it is written, and now he quotes from Deuteronomy 21:23, Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree.

And was not Jesus hanged on a tree? And now we even see God's providence, even in the method of his execution. Jesus in being hanged upon a tree was being cursed of God for the sins that we have committed. In fact, let me read to you from the Greek translation of this passage from the Greek Septuagint that Paul is quoting from here.

In Deuteronomy 21, It says, and if there be sin in anyone and the judgment of death be upon him, and he be put to death and you hang him on a tree, his body shall not remain all night upon the tree, but you shall by all means bury it in that day, for everyone that is hanged on a tree is cursed of God. And he goes on to say, so do not thereby defile the land by letting something cursed of God hanging on a tree overnight. And by the way, what's being talked about in this passage is not death by hanging.

They didn't do that back then.

it was someone who had committed some sin that was worthy of death, and then they would stone that person. Then after death, they would hang him from a tree to put him on display as a lesson for anyone who walked by. Well, Jesus was hanged live on a tree. He died on a tree and his corpse.

hung suspended from that tree. After his death. Even more happened to Jesus than even what is spoken about in this passage. He was hung live from a tree.

And in this happening, Jesus was in that moment cursed. Of God. What that must have been like for Jesus. Guys, do we think about this?

Jesus, who was the object of the Father's love from all of eternity. Jesus, who was perfect in every way, who always enjoyed beautiful fellowship with His Father. His father's face was always upon him. His father delighted in him.

But Jesus saw us struggling in this dungeon. Trying to get out and he saw how hopeless it was. And he's like, there's, there's only one way that these people can get out from under the curse of the law. And that is, if I donate myself And I place myself under that curse and actually become cursed.

Of God. And that's why Jesus on the cross said, My God, my God, why have you abandoned me? What must that moment have been like for him, but he was willing. To submit himself to the pain and the agony of that in order to purchase our redemption.

That's why Jesus, even leading up to this, said to His disciples and all of us, Greater love has no one than this. Than that one lay down his life for his friends. Like I'm going to do There's no greater love that we could ever find than this love of this one who was willing to be cursed of God so that we would be redeemed. Now why did he do this?

Well, there are two answers to this question that lead us to detail number 4 and 5. Detail number 4 that Paul wants to point out for us is this that through Christ's sacrificial work, Christ brought to us the blessing of Abraham. If I look at verse 4, and I'm not sure what translation you guys are using, but these are parallel. There's two purpose clauses that are parallel, verse 14, in order that in Christ Jesus, the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, in order that we would receive the promise.

of the Spirit through faith. What was Christ's agenda, and placing himself underneath that curse, and absorbing that curse, and becoming that curse for us? His agenda was so that through his sacrificial work, he could bring to us the blessing of Abraham. In other words, Jesus, imagine you see a slave on the trading block.

He's owned by the person who is trading him. You can't just go up to that slave and say, Hey, I've got a bunch of gifts for you here. I just, just wanted to bless you with this. You can't just do that because that means nothing to him because he's owned by another and that other person can take all of that away from him.

If you really want to bless that slave, you purchase him and free him, then you can give him whatever you like. And that is what Jesus has done. He purchased our redemption so that on the other side of our redemption, He could come to us and say, here, now that you are free, through me and through my death, I have the blessing of Abraham, the blessings of salvation for you to enjoy day by day by day by day on through all of eternity. Jesus wanted to bless you.

That's why he was willing to die and become a curse for you and for me. I want to focus on one word here that I think enriches our meaning. He says, in order that in Christ Jesus, the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, the word Gentiles is the Greek word ethne, ethne from which we get ethnic ethnicity. ethne speaks of the nations.

ethnos is a nation, and an ethnos, basically, would be biblically speaking and practically speaking, an ethnos is any people group identified by nation, by lineage, by history, by language, or even by physical characteristics. We find elements of all of that in various places throughout Scripture. And in the providence of God there are many ethne that fill this this planet, people of various nations, lineages, histories, languages, and physical characteristics, and we learn here that Jesus was willing to become a curse so that he could redeem us, so that he might then bring the blessings of salvation, the blessings of Abraham.

To all of the ethno, not just to the Jewish ethnos, but to all of the ethno on this planet, we actually see this emphasized in Revelation 5:9.

Where it says, worthy are you Jesus, to take the book and to break its seals, for you were slain and purchased for God with your blood, men from every tribe and tongue and people and nation. This was his intention. In fact, in Revelation 7, we learn here's John the apostle who's looking ahead at this, and he says, I looked and behold a great multitude which no one could count from every nation and all tribes and peoples and tongues standing before the Lamb, that's Jesus, and they cry out with a loud voice saying, Salvation to our God who sits on the throne and to the Lamb, praising Him.

From every tribe and tongue and nation.

And Jesus, when that moment arrives, will say, this is what I died for. He will look at all of the ethne as they're praising him, glorifying God, and he will say, I died for this, not just to bring salvation to one ethnos, but to all of the ethni. Jesus Christ is a multi-ethnic savior. And we in the church ought to especially savor this reality.

In fact, look at the very end of chapter 3 in verse 29. Paul says, and if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's descendants, heirs. According to the promise. In other words, if you're a believer in Jesus, you thereby by faith become a child of Abraham, a descendant of Abraham.

And guys, guess what? If we are all by faith descendants of Abraham, that makes us brothers and sisters of one another, right? Amen. Regardless of, from a human standpoint, language differences, cultural differences, differences in our lineage, and in the history, maybe even between different ethnic groups and physical characteristics, we are descendants of Abraham.

He is our father. We are children of God, and that makes us brothers and sisters of one another. And Jesus would say, this is what I died for. And what, given this reality, the church should be of all places on the planet, it should be the place where this is savored.

where a multi-ethnic savior is extolled, and where multi-ethnic unity is nurtured, enjoyed, and celebrated. However, this is not historically Always been the case, even in these great United States. In fact, in my lifetime, not just in my lifetime, but in my late teens, A church that I attended when I was younger. I would go to school and I was a minority at the public school I attended.

There were maybe about 30% white people and about 70% people of color, but when I went to church, it was an all white church, and I sad to say I never really even thought about it. I never tried to figure out why that is, but I attended all white churches in the Southeast growing up. And no one, as I recall ever raised that as an issue. And in one of the churches that I attended for three years after we had moved away, sometime later, the pastor of the church wanted to correct that problem.

And there was a black man who was employed by the church as the janitor, and no one was really bothered by having him employed in that occupation for the church. But the pastor knew that this guy was a brother in Christ, and he wanted this man to become a member of this church in the Southeast. And so he brought him before the congregation and said, I want this man to be a member of our church. And the head of the deacon board stood up in this meeting and said, The day that man becomes a member here, that is the day that I leave.

And the church ended up splitting over that issue in my lifetime. I was in my teens when this happened. The church of all places, should be the place on the planet where we celebrate a multi-ethnic savior, who by virtue of his death, made us all descendants of Abraham, thereby making us brothers and sisters in Jesus. Martin Luther King stood in the shadow of Lincoln's Memorial a generation ago.

And he basically uttered two dreams. One dream was that Equal rights. Justice would be accorded to people of color just as it had been accorded to other people in this country. And through the passing of the Civil Rights Act and laws, there's been a degree to where there's been progress with that, although that dream is still not completely fulfilled, but Martin Luther King had a deeper dream that people on either side of the issue and ethnic groups don't often think about a dream that is definitely not realized, and that was a dream of brotherhood between the races.

In fact, listen to what he says in his speech. He says, I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down at the table of Brotherhood together. I have a dream that one day, right down in Alabama, little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as Sisters And brothers. what?

Jesus had a dream. And it happened in this case to be the same dream. And that was the dream that all of the ethne would have their salvation purchased. By him And then they come to him by faith and become descendants of Abraham, thereby making them brothers and sisters in the Lord.

And the church, whatever the rest of society may do, the church should be the place where this supernatural unity is enjoyed, this common lineage. that we all have that traces all the way back to Abraham, and ultimately to God Himself, that that common lineage and common history is cherished. It's celebrated, and it is nurtured. When we realize this, guys, we look back at verse 14 and we realize, man, this is a lot bigger than just telling my story.

Yeah, Christ died, so I would be delivered from the curse of the law, and Enter into the blessing of Abraham, but then you realize I'm just one bit player in a much larger story. I look around and I see people of different colors, different languages, different histories, different cultures, and wow, Jesus is doing this for all of the name. And I am just a part of this. And he didn't just save me, he saved them, and he gives them as gifts to me.

And now I have this family of all of these brothers and sisters in Christ. There's a 5th and final detail that Paul wants us to be reminded of and explaining how it is that we became so gloriously blessed, and that is that through Christ's sacrificial work, Christ brought to us the promise of the Spirit. This is just another way of saying what he's already said. He says in verse 14, in order that in Christ Jesus, the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, so that in order that we would receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.

This is talking about us receiving the Spirit himself. But guys, remember, it's also talking about us receiving and enjoying continuously all of the blessings that come to us by means of the Holy Spirit. Who has been given to us. God didn't just give us a Spirit so that we would have his Spirit.

And that's all. No, God gives us a Spirit, because through the Spirit, he's got a million other blessings. He wants to mediate to us through the Spirit, who has been given to us. It's through the Spirit that God pours out his love and the deepest parts of our being, according to Romans 5:6.

It is through the Spirit that God shares with us the deep things of God. And when Paul speaks of the deep things of God, he's not talking about the deep intellectual things of God. It's the deep love of God. The deep things in the heart of God, his passion for us, and his love for us, who have been saved through Jesus.

It is the Spirit who strengthens us to know God experientially. It is the Spirit who provides for us access to the Father, who gives us spiritual gifts, so that we can serve others in the body and build up the body of Christ. It is the Spirit who creates unity. Amongst brothers and sisters in Christ, it is the Spirit who is our companion.

He helps us in our weaknesses. He prays for us. He prays with us with groanings that we could never even utter. It is the Spirit who gives to us assurance in a mystical way.

Romans 8 says that the Spirit bears witness continuously with our Spirit that we are children of God and have children, heirs of eternal glory in heaven. He speaks this assurance to us, and the list could go on and on. God gives us a spirit, and with the Spirit comes all of these blessings. that are mediated to us through the spirit.

What is our story? Our story is we were cursed. By the law, under the law. Our story is that we could not get out from underneath that curse.

We could never make ourselves righteous enough to get out of that curse by trying to obey the law and the pathetic ways that we attempted to do. Christ saw us in our helpless state, and he who was perfectly righteous and uncursed actually went underneath our curse, and he bore that curse and even became cursed of God while hanging from a tree, and he did this so that We would be brought into the blessing of Abraham. And so that we would receive the promise of the Spirit. Guys, look at the last two words of verse 14, through Faith So how did all this happen?

We'd say it's, it was just by in terms of what I did, I just believe that's all. It was just faith. Oh, man, I got to get faith like that. So faith must be what really makes it happen.

Yeah, but don't, don't just focus on this because there's a reason that I could be saved by just placing faith. And that is because of what God did through Jesus. See, guys, in a way, we're saved by faith, and by faith alone. But don't tune me out here.

We are saved by works big time. It's just not our works. It's Jesus' works. We are saved by faith in Him.

And in the work that he has done. And that is how we are saved. By faith. Because of what he did.

Let me ask you to bow your heads. Lord, you wrote a check to Abraham 4000 years ago. And Jesus cashed that check. And has purchased salvation.

For people From all of the ethic. And he comes to us having cashed this check to give us freedom, deliverance, and love and relationship and hope. And eternity. With you in heaven.

Making us your children. Lord, I Paul is is writing here to Christians who had been lured away from this amazing gospel. They're getting caught up back in the law again thinking if they can just be circumcised they'll be saved. They're starting to re-observe feasts and festivals and Sabbaths and Thinking by that that they will be saved.

And Lord, as they have moved away from the gospel, they've been agitated, they're disturbed, and in their disturbed state, we know from this book that they were literally practically Bing and devouring each other. And to these Christians who were unsettled, and fighting and biting and devouring each other, Paul comes to them and, and he says, let's just go back to these details. We were cursed. We could not get out from under that curse, but Jesus loved us.

And he redeemed us by donating his life and death, so that we could then become all of us descendants of Abraham, brothers and sisters, and receive the Spirit and all the blessings that come through the Spirit. And Paul reminds these Christians biting and devouring each other of these gospel details because Paul knows that the reason they're in the mess they're in is because they have forgotten these things. Lord, there's some of us right now, there's some in this room who are agitated, who don't have your peace, who are not walking in joy.

And in fact, they're biting and devouring.

And to them, to all of us, you would lovingly say, hey, you've lost sight. Of the core of everything. You forgot your own story. Come back.

Look at who you were. Look at what you couldn't do. And then look at what Jesus did. And look at why he did it.

And look at the blessing you walk inside of every single day regardless of your circumstances. Lord, if we would keep these realities before us, what a difference. It can make. Help us to walk with these gospel details in front of our face.

That we might then walk in your love with our chin held high walking in the blessing of Abraham, as blessed children of Abraham. And loving our brothers and sisters in the Lord as also being blessed children of Abraham, and thereby glorify you. May we live in such a way, may our homes be such, may our marriages be such, may our relationships in the church be such that when Jesus looks upon all of this, he smiles and says, this is what I died for. Help us, Lord, to walk worthily of this glorious gospel.

We ask this in Jesus' name. And all God's people said,