Authentic Christianity Cancels the Law of Moses

1. Read: Galatians 2:15-21

2. About the Text:

1) The book of Galatians is about Authentic Christianity.

2) Why do we need to talk about it?

3) Paul and Peter had a dispute.

4) When Peter came to Antioch, he didn’t have a problem eating with the gentiles.

5) However, when certain people came from James, he stopped doing this.

6) Paul called him a hypocrite.

7) Paul understood that even Jews were justified by faith in Christ and not the law of Moses.

8) This is because Christ’s sacrifice cancelled the law of Moses.

3. Ref. to S, T, P, O, and A.

1. What does it mean to justify?

1) From the Greek word dikaioo.

2) The word is related to the word “righteousness” dikaiosune.

3) A judicial word that means to declare right, exonerate, declare innocent.

4) A person that is justified (verb form) is a person who is righteous (adjective).

5) “If there is a dispute between men, and they come to court, that the judges may judge them, and they justify the righteous and condemn the wicked” (Deuteronomy 25:1).

2. What could the law do?

1) Provide the knowledge of sin – Romans 3:20 – knowledge of sin

2) “Has then what is good become death to me? Certainly not! But sin, that it might appear sin, was producing death in me through what is good, so that sin through the commandment might become exceedingly sinful” (Romans 7:13).

3) Make a person guilty – James 2:10 – “For whoever shall keep the whole law, and yet stumble in one point, he is guilty of all.”

3. The law can serve only to condemn.

1) “‘Cursed is the one who does not confirm all the words of this law by observing them.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen!'” (Deuteronomy 27:26).

2) Paul quotes this verse in Galatians 3:10 saying, “For as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse.”

3) The law of Moses was called the “ministry of condemnation” (2 Cor.3:9).

4) “I was alive once without the law, but when the commandment came, sin revived and I died. And the commandment, which was to bring life, I found to bring death. For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it killed me” (Romans 7:9-11).

1. The purpose of the Law was to lead us to Christ.

1) “By His knowledge My righteous Servant shall justify many, ??For He shall bear their iniquities” (Isaiah 53:11).

2) “In the LORD all the descendants of Israel ??Shall be justified, and shall glory” (Isaiah 45:25).

3) “Therefore the law was our tutor to bring us to Christ, that we might be justified by faith” (Galatians 3:24).

4) “Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill. For assuredly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfilled” (Matthew 5:17-18).

5) Christ fulfilled the Law.

2. Christ’s sinless life meant that He was always righteous.

1) “And He who sent Me is with Me. The Father has not left Me alone, for I always do those things that please Him” (John 8:29).

2) “For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him” (2 Corinthians 5:21).

3. We are justified by the sacrifice of Christ.

1) “Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him” (Romans 5:9).

2) “Therefore, as through one man’s offense judgment came to all men, resulting in condemnation, even so through one Man’s righteous act the free gift came to all men, resulting in justification of life” (Romans 5:18).

4. We are justified by faith in Christ.

1) “Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith apart from the deeds of the law. Or is He the God of the Jews only? Is He not also the God of the Gentiles? Yes, of the Gentiles also, since there is one God who will justify the circumcised by faith and the uncircumcised through faith” (Romans 3:28-30).

2) “Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 5:1).

5. We are justified by His grace.

1) “that having been justified by His grace we should become heirs according to the hope of eternal life” (Titus 3:7).

2) “being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus” (Romans 3:24).

1. By virtue of being crucified with Christ – “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me” (Galatians 2:20).

2. If one died, then all died – “because we judge thus: that if One died for all, then all died” (2 Corinthians 5:14).

3. “Therefore, my brethren, you also have become dead to the law through the body of Christ, that you may be married to another-to Him who was raised from the dead, that we should bear fruit to God. For when we were in the flesh, the sinful passions which were aroused by the law were at work in our members to bear fruit to death. But now we have been delivered from the law, having died to what we were held by, so that we should serve in the newness of the Spirit and not in the oldness of the letter” (Romans 7:4-6).

4. “Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life” (Romans 6:3-4).

1. Authentic Christianity cancels the Law of Moses because . . .

1) The Works of the Law Cannot Justify

2) Christ Justifies

3) Christians Have Died to the Law with Christ

2. Invitation