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Aug 20, 2023

Live Free and Die

Live Free and Die

Passage: Galatians 5:1-26

Speaker: Patrick Lafferty

Series: That’s the Spirit: Learning to keep in step with Him who indwells

Benjamin Franklin believed the key to a new and lasting society was more than good governance, free of monarchical rule, but moreover the cultivation of true virtue in its populace. The Apostle Paul sketches the contours of virtue in terms of what we know as the fruit of the Spirit. Franklin’s societal–and personal–project has similarities to what Paul outlines for the church. But there are profound differences in motivation and method. What does it mean to live by the Spirit and in turn keep in step with the Spirit?

Readings & Scripture

PREPARATION: 1 Timothy 1:15-17

LEADER: The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance,

ALL: that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost.

LEADER: But I received mercy for this reason, that in me, as the foremost, Jesus Christ might display his perfect patience as an example to those who were to believe in him for eternal life.

ALL: To the King of the ages, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.

AFFIRMATION OF FAITH/SCRIPTURE READING/CORPORATE PRAYER: Matthew 3:4-11
LEADER: Now John wore a garment of camel’s hair and a leather belt around his waist, and his food was locusts and wild honey. 5 Then Jerusalem and all Judea and all the region about the Jordan were going out to him, 6 and they were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. Matt. 3:7 But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said to them, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? 8 Bear fruit in keeping with repentance. 9 And do not presume to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father,’ for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham. 10 Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. “I baptize you with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.

CENTRAL TEXT: Galatians 5:1, 13-26
Gal. 5:1 For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.

Gal. 5:13 For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another. 14 For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” 15 But if you bite and devour one another, watch out that you are not consumed by one another.

Gal. 5:16 But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. 17 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. 18 But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. 19 Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, 20 idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, 21 envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. 22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. 24 And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.

Gal. 5:25 If we live by the Spirit, let us also keep in step with the Spirit. 26 Let us not become conceited, provoking one another, envying one another.

CELEBRATION OF THE LORD’S SUPPER:
CONFESSION OF SIN: We want to be free but we don’t know how. We make substitute gods and fail them, or we lose heart in ever living with abiding hope in your work for us. Forgive us our refusal to trust your mercy. Forgive us for presuming upon your grace. Help us believe again we live by the help of the Spirit and to keep in step with His longing for us.

ABSOLUTION OF PARDON: Philippians 3:7-9
LEADER: whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. 8 Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ 9 and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith—

BENEDICTION: 2 Corinthians 3:17-18
LEADER: Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.

Related Scriptures

  • Genesis 1:1, 2 
  • Romans 8:12-17
  • Philippians 3:15-17

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS:

  1. Talk about any experience, whether past or present, regarding your own “self-improvement.” In what area(s)? What motivated you? How did it go/is it going? 
  2. Review the text (or refresh your memory from the sermon): what is this freedom Paul insists comes from the gospel and which is only experienced by faith in the gospel? Freedom from what? Freedom for what?
  3. Why might some misinterpret Paul’s references to freedom as license for self-indulgence?
  4. We now enter a season of nomination for future elders, deacons, and deaconesses. Talk among yourselves: who in our Body embodies the fruit of the Spirit, not perfectly, but aspiringly? Who might meet the qualifications for those positions that you might nominate? 
  5. Talk about the primary distinctions we made in the sermon between works of the flesh and the fruit of the Spirit. How do you see those distinctions hold up in observation or experience?
  6. Jesus frequently says “follow me.” Paul will invite younger believers to imitate him (e.g. Phil 3:17) as an example of what it means to follow Jesus. Why is imitation fitting counsel, and yet why must Jesus be more to us than an example if ever we are to imitate Him?

ILLUSTRATIONS:  

QUOTES: 

  • My intention being to acquire the habitude of all these virtues, I judg’d it would be well not to distract my attention by attempting the whole at once, but to fix it on one of them at a time; and, when I should be master of that, then to proceed to another, and so on, till I should have gone thro’ the thirteen; and, as the previous acquisition of some might facilitate the acquisition of certain others, I arrang’d them with that view, as they stand above. Temperance first, as it tends to procure that coolness and clearness of head, which is so necessary where constant vigilance was to be kept up, and guard maintained against the unremitting attraction of ancient habits, and the force of perpetual temptations. This being acquir’d and establish’d, Silence would be more easy; and my desire being to gain knowledge at the same time that I improv’d in virtue, and considering that in conversation it was obtain’d rather by the use of the ears than of the tongue, and therefore wishing to break a habit I was getting into of prattling, punning, and joking, which only made me acceptable to trifling company, I gave Silence the second place. Benjamin Franklin
  • I said grace cannot prevail until law is dead, until moralizing is out of the game. The precise phrase should be, until our fatal love affair with the law is over — until, finally and for good, our lifelong certainty that someone is keeping score has run out of steam and collapsed. As long as we leave, in our dramatizations of grace, one single hope of a moral reckoning, one possible recourse to salvation by bookkeeping, our freedom-dreading hearts will clutch it to themselves. And even if we leave none at all, we will grub for ethics that are not there rather than face the liberty to which grace calls us. . . . We insist on being reckoned with. Give us something, anything; but spare us the indignity of this indiscriminate acceptance. Robert Farrar Capon (HT: Alan Jacobs)
  • Either sin is with you, lying on your shoulders, or it is lying on Christ, the Lamb of God. Now, if it is lying on your back, you are lost; but if it is resting on Christ, you are free, and you will be saved. Now choose what you want. Martin Luther
  • Seculosity, David Zahl
    • They tell us that confidence in the religious narratives we’ve inherited has collapsed. What they fail to report is that the marketplace in replacement religion is booming.
    • Listen carefully and you’ll hear that word enough everywhere, especially when it comes to the anxiety, loneliness, exhaustion, and division that plague our moment to such tragic proportions. You’ll hear about people scrambling to be successful enough, happy enough, thin enough, wealthy enough, influential enough, desired enough, charitable enough, woke enough, good enough. We believe instinctively that, were we to reach some benchmark in our minds, then value, vindication, and love would be ours—that if we got enough, we would be enough.
    • Performancism is the assumption, usually unspoken, that there is no distinction between what we do and who we are. Your resumé isn’t part of your identity; it is your identity.
  • Heresy 2: Your spiritual development is primarily intellectual. Mandy Smith
  • Freedom in Christ does not get rid of good works, it produces them; it doesn’t make them unnecessary, it makes them possible. The Presbyterian Journal (HT: Steve Brown)

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