Galatians 5:13-26 "Walk by the Spirit" Introduction: Freedom and the Law (5:13-15) Were you surprised by Paul's statement in verse 14, the whole law is fulfilled in one word: 'you shall love your neighbor as yourself.'"? You should be surprised by that! Paul has been beating up on the law for so long, that you should be a little taken aback! Paul has said that you are not under the law. Why then does he now say that the whole law is fulfilled in the command to love your neighbor as yourself? Paul says this because the gospel does demand a certain way of life. It demands a life lived "according to the Spirit." This is because you are sons. You are no longer children who are no better than slaves. The law does not control you-- It is not your master. You are not in bondage to the law's demands. You have grown up. You have entered the freedom of the Son of God, our Lord Jesus Christ. But do not use that freedom in the service of sin. How should a mature, adult son live? Jesus is the model of a mature, adult son. He is the Son of God who has entered into the inheritance of his Father. If you want to know how a mature son lives, look at Jesus. And Jesus was the one who said that the command to love God with your whole heart, and the command to love your neighbor as yourself, fulfilled all the law and the prophets. If you serve one another through love, then you fulfill the law. Notice that Paul never speaks of fulfilling the law when prescribing Christian conduct, but only when describing the results of the Christian life. In other words, you do not have "fulfilling the law" as your goal. Your goal is to love one another as Christ has loved you. And when you do that, you fulfill the law! Paul has emphatically shut the door against legalism the idea that you win the favor of God by your works, and against nomism the idea that you begin by faith, but are perfected by works; now he turns to antinominianism, or libertinism the idea that you can live however you like. And he warns that antinomianism, where everyone does what is right in his own eyes, results in biting and devouring one another. God's standard for how we treat one another is summed up in one word: Love. 1. Flesh and Spirit (5:16-18) 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. If you are led by the flesh, then you are under the law. If you are led by the Spirit, then you are not under the law. What does Paul mean by flesh? The word "flesh" (sarx) literally means in Greek very much what its counterpart means in English: meat. And so it would be easy to think that Paul is contrasting the physical with the spiritual. Some Greek philosophers took that approach an early Christian heresy called Gnosticism said that the body was evil, and so the Christian needed to escape from the body and live a purely "spiritual" life. But that is not what Paul is saying. "The flesh is what man has made himself in contrast with man as God made him." (240) The flesh is man as he has become, rather than man as God meant him to be. In short, "The flesh is man as he is apart from Jesus Christ and his Spirit." (240) I suggested two weeks ago that Galatians 4:21-31 sets up the last two chapters of Galatians. Paul says that there are two women two covenants and two children. There was Ishmael, the son of the slave woman, who was born according to the flesh. And there was Isaac, the son of the free woman, who was born according to promise, or, in verse 29 "according to the Spirit." In other words, there are two humanities. There is humanity according to the flesh those who are in Adam (or to use Paul's language, in Ishmael, as it were). And there is the humanity according to the Spirit those who are in Christ (children of the free woman). The flesh is what characterizes this age. The Spirit is what characterizes the age to come. To be born according to the flesh means to be controlled by the powers of this world it means to have your whole identity bound up in what you see and hear around you every day-- many have described this as, the world, the flesh, and the devil. But to be born according to the Spirit means to be controlled by the power of the kingdom of God to have your whole identity bound up in Jesus Christ. Now, flesh is not inherently bad. after all, this age was created by God as good, and Jesus Christ himself came in the flesh. Now if Jesus Christ came in the flesh, then flesh cannot be inherently evil. Because Jesus Christ is God, and God could never have united himself to an evil humanity. Rather, the problem with the flesh is that it is weak--powerless-- the flesh is unable to do anything to save us from sin, because the flesh is itself under the power of sin it is under the curse of the law. Our world proves this: Look at the news--and I don't care whether you get it from NBC, The South Bend Tribune, Rush Limbaugh, NPR, or World Magazine! They will all tell you that this world is messed up. Day by day we hear of the wickedness and corruption of the flesh. And if you look carefully at your own heart, you will find that things aren't much better on the inside. Think of the anger, the lust, the greed, and the fear that dwell in you. Think of how you have gossiped, and slandered others, how you have stolen from your employer, your parents, or the IRS, how you have lusted after your neighbor's husband or wife, or son or daughter--which Jesus calls adultery. Is your heart focused is it set on things above, or on earthly things? Don't you feel almost torn in two sometimes? You want to do what is right, but you find yourself doing the wrong. This is what the flesh (our ordinary basic desires and impulses) has become The ordinary--the flesh--was created good-- but it has become corrupted and it is now enslaved to sin. The flesh and the Spirit war against each other, "to keep you from doing the things you want to do." What has Paul said about the Spirit so far in Galatians? In chapter 3, Paul insisted that we have received the Spirit by faith not by works of the law, with his resounding conclusion in verses 13-14 Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us . . . so that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, so that we might receive the promised Spirit through faith. Then in chapter 4 Paul speaks of our sonship, our adoption as sons, by saying that because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying 'Abba, Father!'" Just as Isaac was born according to the Spirit, so also we are born according to the Spirit (4:29), and therefore, we through the Spirit, by faith, eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness. (5:5) Jesus came not only in the flesh, but also in the Spirit. (At his conception, the Spirit of God overshadowed Mary; and at his baptism, the Spirit of God was poured out upon him) He came in the flesh to redeem those who were in the flesh, but he came in the Spirit so that we might receive the Spirit of God. The ordinary--the flesh--is in bondage to the powers of this world. That is why we need to be born by the Spirit to triumph over the flesh. Jesus Christ came as one born of a woman, born under law, as Paul says in Gal. 4:4 born in the flesh--in other words, he was an ordinary man--a real man. But Jesus Christ was also conceived by the Holy Spirit, and he triumphed over the flesh, over the ordinary-- because the ordinary was held hostage by the powers of this age-- sin, death, and the Devil. And because he triumphed, he brought the freedom of sonship to those who were perishing in slavery. You have not been called to be ordinary-- because ordinary people are under the power of sin fleshly people are under the power of sin. You have been given the Spirit of the Son of God, and you now have received the full rights of sons. Jesus Christ has come as the seed of Abraham, the Son of David, and he has sat down at the right hand of the Father. This means that his people are now delivered from their enemies. YOU ARE NO LONGER a slave. You are an heir. And if you are an heir with Jesus Christ a child born of the free woman, born according to the Spirit, then walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. 2. The Works of the Flesh (5:19-21) Now the works of the flesh are evident. It is obvious what the works of the flesh are. Verses 19-21 give a number of examples. Sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality being driven by your sex drive is fleshly. No, I did not say that having a sex drive is fleshly but rather, being driven by it! It doesn't matter whether you are married or single. If your sex drive is driving you, then you are gratifying the desires of the flesh. Even within marriage, you are to use sex in a holy fashion as a way of showing your love for your spouse not as a way to please yourself! Idolatry, sorcery false worship, making something else more important than the one true God. We are to love the Lord our God above all else! Enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy... Are you the jealous sort? Do you look at others and envy their clothes, or wish you had what they have... Or are you the angry sort? When something goes wrong, do you snap? Drunkenness, orgies, and things like these Paul gives us something for everyone! But notice what Paul says about such things: I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. If your life is characterized by sexual immorality, you will not inherit the kingdom of God. If your life is characterized by fits of anger, envy, drunkenness, strife, rivalries, then you will not inherit the kingdom of God. Notice that Paul doesn't say, "Well, everybody sins, so don't worry about it!" Paul says, those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. Why does he say this so strongly? Well, he has just told you that in Christ, you are the grown-up sons of God. Jesus Christ is the Son of God who has entered his inheritance, and so you, who are in Christ, share in that inheritance. But if you are in Christ, then you will be conformed to his likeness and image. You will look more and more like Jesus. If you have died with Christ, and Christ now lives in you, then these things will not characterize our lives. 3. The Fruit of the Spirit (5:22-24) Instead, what will increasingly characterize our lives is the fruit of the Spirit. Notice how Paul contrasts the works of the flesh, with the fruit of the Spirit. He wants to make it perfectly clear that he is not reintroducing works-righteousness through the back door! He is not saying that having begun by faith, you must now be made perfect by works! Rather, he is saying that the Spirit of Jesus Christ, who has been sent into your hearts, crying, "Abba, Father!" is now bearing fruit in your lives. It is God who is working in you producing good fruit. The seed of the tree of life has been planted in your union with Christ, and that seed of the Spirit is now bearing fruit in the fruit of the Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control The tree of life has been planted in your heart. These fruits are not sequential it is not as though you need to start with becoming more loving, and then joyful, and keep working at it until you get to self-control! No, this fruit for it is one fruit, and not many!-- this many-splendored fruit is nothing else than the fruit of the tree of life. And the tree of life is cruciform cross-shaped! Consider the next verse: And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. The fruit of the Spirit is love, because God loved the world thus: that he gave his only begotten Son for us. The fruit of the Spirit is joy, because we count it all joy to be conformed to the image of the Son, even through suffering because we see that the joy set before us is nothing less than the joy set before Jesus. The cross is a source of joy to us in Christ! Conclusion: Walk by the Spirit (5:25-26) But neither are you passive in this process! It is not a matter of "let go and let God!" As Paul says in verse 25, If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit. [talbot on the seed]