Understanding Grace Pt 2

Good morning. Would y'all stand with us? Yes. It is a good thing to give thanks unto the Lord and to praise his name. Amen. And to show forth his loving kindness. Would you join me in prayer? First of all, I want to welcome you to Calvary Chapel this morning. Those who are joining us online, we welcome you. Father, we thank you for this opportunity you've given us this morning

on this first day of the week to come worship in song and study your word. Father, we just want to lift up this time to you. Father, search us. See if there'd be anything else that needs to be.

May we seek you this morning. Be real before you. Father, may by faith we worship you in song and make a joyful noise to you this morning. Fathers, I think of those times that I am so willing to get excited about a game or something. My intensity comes out of the team that's winning, of the team that I don't want to win. All kind of intensity comes out. That you

would, Lord, give me the intensity to worship you this morning. That we would be able to let go,

give you this time, really all of our time, but this particular time together as we corporately come together as believers. To express worship you in song. We do it in other ways, too. At this particular time, to worship in song and to study your word, Lord. We give you praise. We thank you, Lord Jesus. Commitment to you and giving our hearts to you. Recognizing that we needed to ask forgiveness for

those sins, the sins as we are sinners, Lord. And you saved us, Lord. You paid the price. I think that, again, as I... I want to share this morning, Lord, that acronym for grace, God's riches at Christ's expense. We thank you, Lord, for taking the cup. You bore it for us. The word says without the shedding of blood, there's no remission of sin. We know that picture, Lord, that type that went on in the Old

Testament of sacrificing those lambs and those wolves. And that was a bondage of sin. You paid the price. You've given us an inheritance with you, Lord. We thank you, Lord.

We would just be strengthened, Lord, to live for you, to be real before you, rewards and all. The sin which so easily besets us, Lord, let us lay it aside. As we have so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside that cumbersome weight that so easily besets us, Lord. And look to you and trust you, Lord. You are so worthy of our praise. We praise you, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Lord, we thank you. Father, we thank you for sending your Son.

And Jesus, we thank you for doing exactly what you said. You said, I would not leave you comfortless, but I'd send you the Holy Spirit. We thank you that you did to convict or convince us of sin, righteousness, and judgment. And so, Lord, we know you're doing that work in our hearts, Lord. Even as we worship, Lord, and we let go and look to you, Lord, you speak to us as we speak to you and worship you

and honor you. We worship worth-ness.

We necessarily feel jazzed. We may be feeling sad about something, being concerned, but in this state in which we are, we raise our hearts to you. We open our mouths to you and pour out our voices to you, Lord. We thank you, Jesus.

We're going to do that little chorus one more time.

Fellowship with one heart, your spirit. Lord, have us to learn that we will be able to, that your word would do its work in our heart. Whether it be correction, whatever you have in mind today, Lord, we lift our time to you in Jesus' name. Amen. The Lord bless you all. Let's have some fellowship.

Good morning. If you could begin to locate your seat, grab your bulletin. We'll get ready to go over some announcements. I love the sound of indistinct chatter throughout a room. It always makes me very happy. Okay. Okay. Over on the left-hand side of your bulletin are the different studies that you can get involved in. We have a bulletin here throughout the week.

So locate one of those to get yourself plugged into from men's and women's studies, home fellowships, youth group, college group. All those are written over there. So find one of those spots. Over in the middle section of your bulletin, first thing it says is Family Life Services Banquet. I have given out all of the tickets to that now. So be praying for that.

Pray for the Ministry of Family Life Services. They do an amazing job of working with moms that are having to make difficult decisions, as well as moms that just, man, they need a little help to get going. with a new baby. And then a couple of other things to take note of. First of all, April 5th, that is the week of Holy Week. Our typical Wednesday night service will instead just be a worship night.

So looking forward to that. So come join us. If you don't typically come on Wednesday nights, come out anyway. Come join us for a time of worship that week as we really set our hearts in particular on focusing on the Lord. And then also April 3rd through the 7th is Holy Week. And so Ministerial Alliance puts together Holy Week. Holy Week is a week that we do every week.

We do services that take place at noon every day. And I put this little flyer here that has all of the locations. I will put it in here next week too because I know that most of you memorize the bulletin. But for those of you that don't, I'm going to put it in there a second time so that you can have this. You might stick that in your Bible. If you're able to make it through any of them, it really is.

There's just such a blessing to gather with God's people from all over the community where you're kind of outside your comfort zone just a little bit because it's not your typical church. It's probably not your pastor that's speaking. But it's really good to do that because it reminds us that, hey, we may go to different churches. We may do some things a little bit different, but that's okay.

We're all worshiping Jesus, and that's the important thing. Also, one thing I did not get into the bulletin is that the mowing sign-up sheet is out there. If you're interested in getting involved in the mowing ministry, that sign-up sheet is out there. And then I'm going to have Sandra come up and share one more time about some kid check stuff and some Sunday school stuff.

This time I wrote some notes. I guess I was a little desperate last week. So we're instituting a new process. If through our kid check system, all the parents get numbers, families get numbers or letters. And if there's any time we need some help with a child, if they're even in the nursery, if somebody gets hurt, I better look at my notes. If the kids just need something or if we are having a little behavior issues or having trouble settling any of the kids down,

we'll talk to the booth. They'll put that code up. So just look at your little, when you check in, your little guardian slip, and that'll tell you if it's you. And then just, as Ryan said, you can just kind of sneak out, pretend like you're going for coffee or do whatever. Last week I had talked about we have so many kids, which is awesome. And they really are.

They're great kids, you guys. God bless you guys. I'm kind of out of that season, but it's great to see young families. That's the future of the church. So, but they're great kids. I love their hearts. And we just had been getting so many. We were needing a little bit more help. And I was talking about possibly cutting out the praise and worship. But, of course, last week the kids were perfect.

So I don't know. I don't know what we're going to do. Just keep praying. Praying for God's vision for the ministry back there. We're growing huge, and I love it. We are having people step up. If you feel God tugging on your heart to help, even if it's just in a classroom or, you know, just for singing or whatever it is, it's a great ministry.

Because our goal is we just want to share Jesus, the love of Jesus, and know that this is a good, this is a family of God. They want to be able to come, not just about fun, but it's a place where they're safe and they can be in a body of believers. And that's so important in the culture that we're in. We want to make sure that this is a positive and it's a good experience.

So. Thank you very much. I hope it was a little bit better.

Thank you, Sandra. And I just want to echo that. I truly believe that what takes place back there with the kids is the most important ministry in this church because them being brought up in the things of God is just, it's such a key right now in the world that we live in. So. Okay. For our responsive reading this morning, we are going to be in Psalm 56. Psalm 56.

We'll be looking at the New American Standard. So we sound the same. If you need a copy of one, there should be one in a row around you. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. If you would stand in the honor of the reading of God's word, I will read the odd verses. If you will follow along with Pastor Allen and the even verses.

Psalm 56 for the choir director. According to Jonathan, Liam, Rehoquim, a Mitchum of David, when the Philistine seized him in Gath. Be gracious to me. Oh, God, for man has trampled upon me fighting all day long. He oppresses me. The foes have trampled upon. me all day long, for they are many who fight proudly against me. When I am afraid, I will put my trust in you. In God whose word I praise, in God I have put my trust. I shall not be afraid.

What can mere man do to me? All day long they distort my words, and their thoughts are against me for evil. They attack, they lurk, they watch my steps as they have waited to take my life. Because of wickedness cast them forth, in anger put down the peoples, O God. You have taken account of my wanderings, put my tears in your bottle. Are they not in your book? Then my enemies will

turn back in the day when I call. This I know, that God is for me. In God whose word I praise, in the Lord whose word I praise. In God I have put my trust. I shall not be afraid. What can man do to me? Your vows are binding upon me, O God. I will render thank offerings to you. And if you read verse 13 with me, for you have delivered my soul from death, indeed my feet from stumbling, so that I may walk before God in the light of the living.

And Father, truly we do put our trust in you, because you are our only place of hope. I thank you for being the God who delivers us. And so Father, as we spend time in your word now, I ask that you would, Lord, teach us as your Holy Spirit. Holy Spirit, I ask that you would fall on this place. Father, instructing us where we need instructing, convicting us where we need convicting, and comforting us where we need that

comfort, Lord. We're relying upon you, in Jesus' name. Amen. You may be seated. And if you would, open up in your Bibles to the book of Galatians, chapter 3. Galatians, chapter 3. As we come to these next set of verses, we come to part two in our series, Galatians chapter 3. Galatians chapter 3. of understanding grace. Paul, first of all, in the book of Galatians, defended the message of

grace that he was giving out. But now he begins to explain the message of grace. Last week, we got into this, and he started off by asking them a series of questions, which I can really sum up with one question, where he says, having begun in the Spirit, are you now being made perfect by the flesh? In other words, now that you've started off in faith, are you now being made perfect because of the things that you are able to do? And of course, it demands a negative answer. Of course

not. Having begun in the Spirit, the only way you can continue is in the Spirit. He then went on to remind them that Abraham, the father of the nation, the father of their faith, was just that, the father of faith, that even Abraham was saved by faith, because we're told in Scripture that he was declared righteous when he believed God. The third thing that we saw is that the gospel had been preached through Abraham when God told him that through you, all the nations of the earth will be blessed. And then anyone who relied upon the law was under the curse, because the law brings a

curse. Because cursed is everyone who doesn't keep the whole law. And we talked about us having that problem. We may be able to keep the law nine times out of ten, but it's that ten percent that'll cause us the problems, because if you don't do it all, then you've broken everything. And then of course, he reminded us, that Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us. As it says in

Scripture, cursed is everyone who hangs on the tree. And so now as we move into this next section, he really deals with what the purpose of the law is. And so this next section, verses 15 through 24, are going to break down like this. We're going to look at the power of the promise and the purpose of the law. And so starting off in verse 15, we begin looking at the power of the promise.

It says, I speak in terms of human relations, even though it is only a man's covenant, yet when it has been ratified, no one sets it aside or adds conditions to it. Now the promises were spoken to Abraham and to his seed. He does not say and to seeds as referring to many, but rather to one and to your seed that is Christ. What I'm saying is this, the law, which came 430 years later, does not invalidate, a covenant previously ratified by God. So as to nullify the promise for if the inheritance is

based on law, it is no longer based on a promise, but God has granted it to Abraham by the means of a promise. Now, as he begins this section, talking about the strength of the promise, we're reminded that God had given Abraham promises. And we'll talk about those in just a minute. But to start off with, he reminds us that when man makes a covenant, when man makes a promise, in this case, when man signs a contract, it's a binding contract.

And if when man signs a contract, it's a binding contract. How much more when God makes a promise, is it a binding promise? I remember the first time we ever bought a home. I sat down at the table and the lady sat across from me that, that was the, the mortgage lender. And she put down the stack of papers. And as she put down the stack of papers, she explained to me one after the other,

what all the papers were. And I signed all of them. And after I signed all 397 pages, I got done. And I was like, so basically what I'm understanding is this. I just signed my name 397 times to say that I would keep my end of the bargain and pay my bill. And she goes, yeah, pretty much, pretty much. That's exactly what you just did in signing your name. All of

those times, listen, that contract that I signed was a binding contract. And if humanity knows how to make a binding contract and keep a binding contract, then it's a binding contract. And if humanity knows how to make a binding contract and keep a binding contract, then how much more does God know how to keep a binding contract? Or maybe we would use the word covenant, a binding covenant, or maybe we'll use the biblical term that's used here, a binding promise, because God is the God of promises. He goes on to say,

and the promises that were spoken in these promises were given to Abraham and to his seed. Now that should prompt you to ask a question. You should think to yourself, well, what promises is he talking about? Well, we're reminded of the promises that we have read already about when it comes to Abraham. God had made Abraham certain promises. God had promised Abraham that he would

make of him a great nation. He had promised Abraham that through him, all the world would be blessed. He had promised Abraham that if you could count the stars, then you would be able to count all of your descendants. And he promised Abraham that when you believe in me, I declare you as righteous. These promises, were made to Abraham. And if man knows how to keep a binding promise, and how much more does

God know how to keep a binding promise? Therefore, the promises that were made to Abraham were guaranteed. But notice what he says. Now the promises were spoken to Abraham and to his seed. He does not say into seeds as referring to many, but rather to one and to your seed, that is Christ. When the promise was given, he said, Now there's three main areas of promise that Abraham was given to. The first, and if you want

to write these down in the margin of your Bible, these would be good things for you to go back and look up later. The first is given in Genesis chapter 12, verses one through three. That was where he promised to make of him a great nation. In Genesis chapter 15, he promised that his descendants would be more than the stars of the sky. And then in Genesis chapter 22, he made

Abraham a promise. He said, And through your, seed, all the world shall be blessed. All the nations shall be blessed. He says, And it was not to your seeds, plural, meaning the entire nation of Israel, meaning the entire law that came through the nation of Israel, but to your seed, singular. And it speaks in that singular statement of the seed of Christ. That tells us something. Let me

put it in words that we understand. Jesus is the promise. The promise that was made to Abraham and that through you, all the world will be blessed, spoke of the coming of Jesus Christ. Because through the coming of Jesus Christ, we all have been blessed. Because when Jesus Christ came, he took upon himself all of the sin of humanity, and he became the savior for all of us. And so

through your seed, all the nations of the earth shall be blessed. Now, I don't know about you, but I know that God has a great deal of promises in the Bible. But do you know what promises I tend to pay the most attention to? The promises that I have a tendency to pay the most attention to are the ones that deal with the here and the now. Do you ever notice that? All the promises about God

supplying all of our needs, all of the ones that seem to be somewhat, maybe a little bit selfishly motivated because I think about how it affects me here and now, those are the ones that I claim the most. And those are the ones that I oftentimes find myself the most moved by. But we forget that the greatest promise that God ever made to us was the promise of a savior, of a savior who would come to take care of the one biggest problem that I have, and that's my sin. Because you see, all of those other promises of God taking care of us, those are all wonderful things, and I don't want to discount any of those. They're amazing promises.

But listen, all of my bills could be paid, and I could still be going to hell. My health could be perfect as long as I'm on top side of planet earth until that day God finally takes me home, and I could still be going to hell. I could have everything that I want as far as this world was concerned, but I'd still be going to hell until I understand that the one greatest need that I have is sin, and the greatest way that God conquered that is to be was through the promise of Jesus Christ. He said the promise was him. He goes on to say this. Let

me explain it even more in verse 17. He says, what I'm saying is this, the law, which came 430 years later, does not invalidate a covenant previously ratified by God so as to nullify the promise. I love this about Paul because he knows he's explaining difficult things, and he knows he has to convince, and that's exactly what he does. He says, let me put it to you this way. The law that was added 430 years later doesn't nullify the promise of righteousness

that was given to Abraham. Because if you follow through the book of Genesis, you see that Abraham was declared righteous by his faith, and then you go through Isaac, and then Jacob, and the 12 patriarchs, and you come all the way down to the book of Exodus, and 430 years later, God gives them the law. It says that law doesn't nullify the promise. Just because there was a law added doesn't mean that God was like, well, let's forget about all that righteousness by faith stuff that I gave to Abraham. Now the only way that you can be

righteous is by keeping a certain list of works. Now the only way that you can be righteous is by doing a certain number of things. Now the only way that you can be righteous is by being perfect. No, the law that came later doesn't nullify all of those promises. We'll talk about what the purpose of the law is here in just a minute, but it can't nullify all of those things because God had already

the truth of where righteousness comes from, and that righteousness comes by faith. He says in verse 18,

But God has granted it to Abraham by means of a promise. If our righteousness came because of our works, it would simply be what God owes us, but it's not. It's what God promised us by his grace. And so this promise that God made to Abraham that is the same promise he makes to us has great power because God never goes back on his promises, and there's nothing that can nullify it. Now this would have brought up a question in the mind of the Jewish people.

This would have brought up the question in the mind of the Gentile people, and quite frankly, if you know anything about scripture, I hope it brings up a question in your mind too. So why the law? If the law can't do anything for us, if it can't make me righteous, then why would God give us this law? What is the point? What is the point of God giving us this law? Well, let's look at these next set of verses because

he's going to explain it to us. Picking up in verse 19, it says this, Now a mediator is not for one party only, whereas God is only one. Is the law then contrary to the promises of God? May it never be. For if a law had been given, which was able to impart righteousness or impart life, then righteousness would indeed have been based on the law. But the scripture has shut up everyone

under sin so that the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe. But before faith came, we were in custody under the law, being shut up to the faith, which was later, to be revealed. Therefore, the law has become our tutor to lead us to Christ so that we may be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor. So why the law?

He's going to give us three reasons. Number one, the law was added because of transgressions. The law was added because of transgressions. I want you to think about something. We all as human beings typically have two main reasons for transgressions. One is because of the law. Two is because of the law. The other is because of the law. The other is because of the law.

When we have two main issues when it comes to sin, right? The number one issue that we have when it comes to sin is we all have blind spots in our life when it comes to sin. All of us, saved and unsaved alike. We have a tendency to have blind spots when it comes to the areas of sin in our own life. Let me give you a little bit of an illustration. Anybody in here ever been camping

before? Now, when you go camping, the first day that you're camping, you start to smell a little funky, right? You start to get that subtle, full blending of sweat, campfire, and mosquito repellent, all blending into this amazing cocktail of gar that's all over you, right? And you begin to stink. And the first day that you're camping, you notice it, right? You're like, oh man, do I need a shower? Man,

when I get home, it's going to feel really good to take a shower. On day two of camping, you know what you don't notice as much? You don't notice as much how much you stink. Why? Because you've been living with it. And pretty soon, you don't even notice that you stink anymore. As a matter of fact, you find yourself going, I actually kind of like the smell of campfire.

And you have no idea how bad you stink because you stink and everybody else around you stinks, right? And so you're all just used to each other's stench because you've been living in that gar for like three or four days now. But then you do something. You go home, right? And on your way home, you stop at a gas station to fill up with gas. And the guy behind the counter, some guy

named Earl, looks at you and goes, and you know when Earl behind the counter looks at you and acts like you need a shower, things have just gotten serious, right? Like you've gone nose blind to how bad you smell, but nobody else has gone nose blind to how bad you smell. And then you get home and you smell how great your home smells. And your dog really likes you a lot because you stink really bad and dogs love stink. And you go, man, I need to take a shower because now you're

exposed to something else that smells good besides you. You see, it's one thing when it's camping and it's our stink, right? But it's a whole other thing when it's our sin. You see, we become nose blind to our own sin and we can't see it. We don't always pay attention to it. And so the law is added because of our sin. And so the law is added because of our sin. And so the law is added because of our

transgression, our transgressions, because we oftentimes are blind to the sin that we have in our own life. Sometimes because we justify it. Sometimes because we plain just don't think it's that big of a deal. Because in general, the standard that we use to measure ourselves by is a horizontal standard. You see, as long as I'm better than you, or at least in my mind, I'm better than

you, then I'm doing pretty good. But what the law does as it's added because of transgressions is it creates a vertical standard. No longer am I comparing myself with all of the other people that stink. Now I'm comparing myself to God who is perfectly pure and holy. So the first problem that we have, the reason why it's added because of transgressions is because we don't always

realize the sin that we have in our lives. But number two, humanity needs a governor on their sin, right? We need a restrictor plate on the sin that's in our lives. And that's exactly what the law does. Do you know that most people live in a state of transgression? And that's exactly what the law does. Most people have a law built into their heart. It's called a conscience, which is why even though

they're willing to cross the line, they know there's a line. And so the law creates a governor over the sin in our lives. It creates a restrictor over the sin in our lives. The problem is the more we cross the line of that restrictor, the more we cross the line of that governor, the more we cross the line of that law, the less we feel it and the more we become blind to it. But that law is so good

it creates a standard in our lives that we say, there's the line, even though I'm willing to cross it, I know what sin looks like. Why the law? It was added because of transgressions. And when the law was added, notice what it says. It says it was ordained through angels by the agency of a mediator until the seed would come to whom the promise had been made. Angels gave Moses the law

and he was the first to make the promise. And he was the first to make the promise. And he was the first mediator of the law. Moses was that first prophet and priest that brought the law down to the people and said, this is God's righteous standard. But from the time of Moses on down through the centuries with the nation of Israel, they always had a mediator, whether it was the

high priest or whether it was a prophet who was the one mediating the law to them saying, this is what the law says, and this is how you're to live. Do you know when they stopped having a high priest in the nation of Israel? About 34, excuse me, about 37 years after Jesus. Was crucified because in 80, 70, the temple was destroyed and the high priesthood was ended.

And it wasn't just because of a historical truth. It's because of a spiritual truth. You see the mediator needed to continue to give them the law until the purpose of the law came. Notice what it says. It says until the seed would come to whom the promise had been made because Jesus fulfilled the law. Now he gives us the second reason why the law was given. It was given to shut up all

under sin. Notice what it says. Verse 21, is the law then contrary to the promises of God? May it never be. He says, so are these two things mutually exclusive? Is it contrary to the promises that this law never exists? No, that's a ridiculous thought because if there was a law that could make you righteous, then righteousness would be by the law. But notice what it says. But the scripture has shut up everyone under sin. Yeah, I want to talk

about that word in a couple of different contexts here for just a minute. The words shut up. I'm not using a bad word yet, kids. The word shut up literally mean to confine or to imprison because that is what the law does to all of us. It confines all of us underneath of one problem. And that one problem is the guilt of the sin that we have in our lives. Let me give you an illustration from scripture. There's a story of

Jesus and the religious leaders were trying to trip up Jesus. And as they did so, they brought him the woman who was caught in adultery. Perhaps you know the story. And as they brought to him, this woman that was caught in adultery, they said she was caught in adultery in the very act. Of adultery. Sidebar. How'd they know that she was caught in the act of adultery?

Was one of them involved? Anyway, so they bring in this woman. They said the law says that she is to be stoned because that's the righteous requirement of the law. And so Jesus looks at all of them. He says, he who is without sin among you, let him cast the first stone. And then he stoops down and begins to write something in the sand. Do you know what he wrote in the sand? Me neither. But he started to write in the sand.

But I'll tell you what I think he wrote in the sand. I think he began to write out the sins of everybody that was around him. After all, why else would he say, he who is without sin among you, let him cast the first stone. Who knows? Maybe he wrote down the name of all of the men in that circle who had been with her. And as he began to write in the sand, they were all confined under sin because something interesting began to happen.

They all began to leave from the oldest to the youngest. You see, each of those men who was accusing her of a sin that she definitely had committed. And Jesus told her now go and sin no more. Each of those men had to admit that they too were guilty of sin. You see what the law does for us is the law puts all of us into the exact same. I want you to think about this. There's a wonderful book by a guy named Ray Comfort.

I've talked about him lots of times before, but the name of the book is called hell's best kept secret. Great read a great book, great teaching. I would highly recommend you reading that, but, but he does this fascinating thing. He talks about the fact that the law is for the proud and grace is for the humble because the law shuts the mouths of the proud, right? Because that's

what it does for us. If we think about it, that's what God's law should do for us, right? When we think about just the righteous standing, we think about the righteous standing, we think about the righteous standing, we think about the righteous standing, we think about the righteous standing, of the 10 commandments, because that's what the 10 commandments are. That's what the law is. It's

God's righteous standards. It's him saying, if you want to be perfect, if you want to be accepted by me, this is what it looks like. If you want to be the best, this is what it is. This is what holiness looks like. And so as we start comparing ourselves to those things, we start thinking, well, do I have any idols in my life? Listen, some of you may have driven your idol to church today.

Some of you may live in your idol when you're at home. Some of your idols, maybe in your pocket right now, and you're going to check Instagram on it later. Some of the idols that you may have got knocked out of the tournament yesterday, or you name it. We all have these idols in our lives, right? And if we're being honest, we have to admit, if scripture says you shall have no other gods before me, then I'm guilty. Scripture goes on

to say that if you have used God's name in vain, that you've broken God's law. What does that mean? Using God's name in vain, I think, falls into two different categories. Number one, I think it's using God's name and bringing it down to the level of profanity and using it as a swear word. I think that's one way that we use God's name in vain, but I think it even goes deeper than that. I think the

other way that we use God's name in vain is when we claim the name of Jesus and our lives don't match it. When we use Jesus for our benefits, but our lives don't match that. It's using God's name in vain. Uh-oh. So far, I'm guilty of two of these things, so I have to probably put myself in prison. Well, then he goes on from there to get some of the hard-hitting ones, right?

Like he says, you should not commit adultery. And of course, Jesus strengthened that by saying to even look with lust is to commit adultery in your heart. Well, that nails all of us, right? And then there's murder. If you even have that anger in your heart towards another, that that's really the start of murder. And so in God's eyes, you're guilty of murder. And then he says not to

tell a lie. Well, I don't know about you, but I told myself I look good this morning. I've lied already. And then he says, you shouldn't steal anything. Well, all of us have been guilty of that at some point in time, but you know what? The one that nailed all of us is murder. And so all of us, and I just read an article on this yesterday, great little article by Alistair Begg.

He called it the sin that nobody talks about. You shall not covet. You shall not covet anything of your neighbors. It seems like the sin that we excuse the most in our lives, is it not? After all, that's the sin that drives our economy, covetousness, right? That's the reason why our economy is in trouble right now is because of covetousness. And as we start looking at those

and realizing that that's God's righteous standard, we have to admit one thing and one thing only. I'm guilty. And that confines me to prison because I am now imprisoned to guilt because of the law. But I also find it interesting. I love the way that the new American standard translates this because it says he has shut up all under the law. You know what that means? It means he

silences everyone's mouth. Those of us that are raising kids, you know that both in working with my own kids and my youth group kids and students over the years, there's nothing more frustrating than confronting a kid in their sin and having them do the same thing. But he did it too. But you don't understand. But it wasn't my fault. And they start justifying themselves. And you know what irritates me more

than anything is when you confront a kid with their garbage like that, and they just will not stop. I want to be like, shut up. Right? And listen, it says it right there. It's the new American standard Bible, right? He has shut up all under sin. You just want to be like, shut up. Stop justifying yourself. You can ask my girls. I've actually told them to shut up. Not real often. I don't say it real often. Okay. Like I'm, I'm angry smiling by

that point in time. And so a couple of students I've told that before too. It's confession time with Ryan. But anyway, eventually you hit that point because you're tired of listening to them justify themselves when you absolutely know beyond a shadow of a doubt, you're not going to doubt that they're wrong. And you know what? That's what we all do before God, isn't it?

We justify ourselves and we give excuse after excuse after excuse for the things that we've done. And we say, it's really not that big of a deal. You don't understand. Everybody's doing it and all these kinds of things until finally God's law does its work. And you finally just go, you're right. I'm guilty. And listen, once we come to that place where we realize that the law has

confined us all the time, we're not going to be able to do it. We're not going to be able to do it. We're not going to be able to do it. We're not going to be able to do it. We're not going to be able to do it. We're not going to be able to do it. We're not going to be able to do it. We're not going to be able to do it. We're not going to be able to do it. We're not going to be able to do it. We're not going to be able to do it.

to the same prison. Once we come to the place where we realize that the law has shut every single mouth, the law has done its job because the law is for the proud. Well, then grace can begin to do its wonderful work in our lives because notice what it says. Verse 22, but the scripture has shut up. Everyone understand why? So that the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to

those who believe. Why does the law confine us all the time? Because the law has shut up everyone under sin? Is it just so that we can live in the guilt of our sin? No, it confines us all under sin so that we can all be set free. Because once I'm finally willing to say, I can't do it. Once I finally am willing to say, I'm guilty. Once I'm finally willing to say, you're right. It's my fault.

And God's grace is right there, ready to rescue us, ready to pull us out, ready to save us from the guilt of that sin. But God can't show his grace to us until our heart is first humbled. Because the law is for the proud and grace is for the humble. You know what else this verse tells us? This verse tells us that there's really only two groups of people in the world.

There are people who are saved and there are people who are not saved. Later on in this chapter, he's going to say, therefore, there's neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, everybody's the same. You're either saved or not saved. And whoever you are here this morning, if you don't know Jesus, you're all in the exact same position. I don't care what your background

is. I don't care what the color of your skin is. I don't care what gender you are. I don't care if you can't figure out what gender you are. You all are shut up under the same problem. And the same problem that everybody is closed up under is the problem of sin. And it doesn't matter. Sin doesn't care what color your skin is. Sin doesn't care what your socioeconomic background is. Sin doesn't

care about anything of who you are. It just says, you're guilty. And I will destroy you. So whoever you are this morning, whatever your background is, everybody's in the same boat apart from Christ. You're stuck in your sin. But the beautiful thing is, once you realize that, you turn your heart towards Jesus, it doesn't matter what your background is. It doesn't matter what you've done to get here.

It doesn't matter what color your skin is. It doesn't matter what your national background is. It doesn't matter what gender. You are. It doesn't matter if you can't figure out what gender you are. Salvation is for you. And you can come to Jesus. And when you come to Jesus, he'll make your heart brand new. Now, listen, he's not going to leave you in the place that

you're in. He's going to help you figure out what gender you are. He's going to help you figure out how he intended for you to be. He's going to help you find your identity in Christ. Because by the way, that's the issue with everybody right now. But anybody can come. And as believers in Jesus Christ, we need to realize there's only two ways to find your identity. And that's the way to find

your identity. Two groups of people. You're either in Christ or you're not in Christ. And if you're in Christ, I want to build you up in the faith. And if you're not in Christ, I want to bring you to the knowledge of Jesus. He says it shuts up all under sin so that all can take part in the promise. And then he brings us to the third thing. And that's that the law, who was our tutor,

notice what it says, verse 24, or excuse me, verse 23. Before faith came, we were kept in custody under the law, being shut up to the faith, which was later to be revealed. Therefore, the law has become our tutor to lead us to Christ so that we may be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor. Now, this next category that he tells us about sounds very similar to being confined,

except it's a little bit different. We're kept under custody. That doesn't mean the custody of the law. We're kept under custody of the law. We're kept under custody of the law. We're kept under custody of the law. It doesn't mean the custody of prison. It's talking about protective custody. It's speaking of the fact that the law was like protection for us. And it made me think

about kids that grow up in church, right? When kids are growing up in church and your mom and dad are believers, a lot of us in here grew up in the church, your mom and dad made lots of rules for you, right? They made all these rules that you are going to go to church. You are going to read your Bible. These are the things you can't listen to. This is what you can listen to. These

are the movies you can't watch. These are the movies you can watch. And they made all these and they make all these rules, right? And all of those rules were for a specific reason. They were to keep you protected until you could come to a place of realizing that your accountability was greater than your parents. You have a higher accountability that you answer to. And once you

answer to that higher accountability, your parents don't have to make all those rules for you anymore. Matter of fact, all the years that I've worked with teenagers, I've told them all the exact same thing. And now I tell my daughters the exact same thing. If you want your parents to trust you, so if you're, if you're under the age of 18 in this room today, I want you to listen really closely to me. If you want your parents to trust you, develop your own walk with Jesus Christ.

Once they see that you hold yourself to a higher accountability than even them, they'll give you all the freedom in the world because they know that you're not worried about breaking their rules. You're paying attention to whether or not you're obeying God. And if you will hold yourself accountable to God, no one else will ever have to obey you. Hold you accountable. Let me give you a little bit of story from my own life that has to do with

that. When I was growing up, I was a knucklehead, right? Just like all of you little kids and you're all knuckleheads, right? You can't help it. Especially you boys. God bless you. One day you're going to grow out of your knuckleheadedness when you go, Hey, my parents knew what they were talking about. At that point in time, you're dateable, right? Up to that point in time,

girls, they're not worth talking to. Okay. Just, just know that the dating rules from Ryan. So, so I was that exact same knucklehead kid. I have all these rules. I wasn't going to keep them. The rules, I broke the rules for the most part until finally at the end of my junior year of high school, God got ahold of my heart and I became brand new in Christ. And when I became brand new in Christ, everything about

me changed. I didn't worry about what my parents' rules were. I worried about whether or not I was going to obey my father because parents, believe it or not, your job is not to make your kids obedient to you. Yes, it is. No, it's not. Your job is to make your kids obedient to God because they're only in your house for 18 years tops. Well, actually, I think now it's like 38

years tops, but anyway, they're, they're only in your house for like 18 years, right? And then after that, they'll have to make decisions for their own, for themselves. So you want to make them accountable to God. Well, anyway, I was that knucklehead kid breaking all the rules. The Lord finally got ahold of my heart at the end of my junior year of high school.

Well, in the middle of my senior year of high school, I was like, I'm going to make my kids obedient to God. In the middle of my senior year of high school, my dad got a job in Kansas city. Now I was just about to start wrestling season and my parents really wanted me to be able to wrestle my senior year with all of my friends and, and finish out my senior year of high school in the, in the school that I started in. And so they allowed me as an 18 year old kid and my sister as a 20 year old kid to live in our house until it sold. We lived in that house for four or five

months until it sold. I remember one of my friends coming over one time and being like, you mean to tell me that all you have are lawn chairs for furniture? We had a little bit more than that. We had the old junk furniture. You have furniture you don't care about. You have a TV you don't care about. And your parents are gone all week long. This is the greatest party house I've ever seen

in my entire life. And I was like, leave because we're not doing this because my parents trust me to be here. And I'm not going to break that trust. I'm not going to violate that trust because not only do they trust me, but I'm accountable to God. And they were able to do that. Why? Because they held me in protective custody for a long time. And now I came to a place of

understanding. I came to a place of accountability. Therefore they could trust me. The law held us in protective custody so that we might be justified by faith. He goes on to explain it further. He says in verse 24,

Now, when you and I think of this word, and some of your translations may say schoolmaster, when you and I think of those terms, we think of somebody that just helps us in an educational sort of way. But the Greek word there is a lot stronger than that. The Greek word there is the word pedagogue. It's actually where we get our word paid from. It's not pedagogue,

it's pedagogue. And what this person would do is that if you were a wealthy Roman or Greek family and you had a son, and you had a son, and you had a son, and you had a son, and you had a son, you would hire a man who was a servant. He was a pedagogue. And what he would do is his one goal in life from the age of one to 16 was the whole self care of that child. He taught them morality.

He taught them philosophy. He made sure that they were fed. He made sure that they were clothed. He made sure that they knew manners. He went everywhere that kid went. It was protective custody for the kid. And they would do that until the age of 16. But at the age of 16, they said, that's the age of morality. That's the age that he's a man. I've taught him everything I can. Now he's free to go

his own way. Now he's free to be accountable to the governing authorities. That's exactly what it's saying here. He says, verse 24, therefore, the law has become our tutor that leads us to Christ. In the Roman world, it was to lead them to a career. In the spiritual world, it's to lead us to Christ. And that's exactly what the law does is it eventually brings us to a point of going,

Jesus did all of this. He did all of that. He fulfilled all of those things for me. Therefore, once it's led me to Christ, now that faith has come, we're no longer under a tutor. See, now that it's led me to Christ, I don't need the law to do that job for me anymore because now I have this beautiful faith in Jesus Christ. So what's that mean for you and I? Well, the law still does its good work

in our world today, even though we don't live in ancient times when the ancient Israelis were teaching each other the law, the law still does an amazing work. If you're an unbeliever here this morning, then the law is going to do its work in your life. And I pray that the law does its work in your life. Because if you're an unbeliever that's here this morning, or you're an unbeliever that's watching on TV, you've never come to faith in Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, then the law is going to do something in you. It hopefully is

going to convict you of sin and of righteousness and of judgment. It's going to convict you of the fact that you are a sinner. It's going to convict you of sin and of righteousness and of judgment. It's going to reveal the sin that's in your heart so that eventually you'll stop justifying yourself so that eventually you'll stop justifying the things that you do. And you will finally come

to Jesus and go, I'm guilty. I'm guilty of murderous thoughts. I'm guilty of adulterous thoughts. I'm guilty of lying. I'm guilty of covetousness. And as I stand here, I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that I'm guilty. Now I've walked people through this little program before, it was interesting to bring them through it and to bring them to a point where the law finally

does its good work in someone's life, because the law is for the proud, to watch it humble somebody. Because as you take them through the law, as you take somebody, and if you're here this morning and you're an unbeliever, and you're being taken through this law, the next question that you have to ask is, knowing that you're guilty of those things, because everybody has to admit that they're guilty of those things, if you have to stand before God, how do you think he will judge you? And typically, most of the time, you have to stand before God. And if you have to stand before God, most everybody says the same thing. What if I don't believe in God? Well, you don't have to.

You don't have to believe in traffic, but if you stand in the road, you're going to face the consequences of it eventually, right? You don't have to believe that there's a God, but let's say, for argument's sake, let's say there is a God and you have to stand before him. How do you think you'd fare? How do you think you'd do? They'd say, not very well, which is true, because if you have to stand before God in your sins,

you're not going to do very well. Then you can bring them that wonderful message of grace. But you see, that is why Jesus died for you. It's because he knew one day you would have to stand before God in all of your sin. And you could either choose to stand before God in your own righteousness, or you can choose to stand before God covered in the blood of Jesus Christ.

Because one day, everybody will stand before Jesus. He will either be your savior, or he will be your judge. The question is, what are you going to do with Jesus today? But do you know, believer in Jesus Christ, that the law still does its work in your life too? Ryan, I thought we talked about not being legalistic. Well, I don't want to be legalistic, but you know, I heard an amazing teaching on this. The teaching that I heard on this

was pretty cool. Bob Hoekstra brought it up, and I never thought about it before. This is just a handful of years ago. He said, the law still works for believers, because when you're a believer, when a believer in Jesus Christ stops living in obedience to faith and starts living in the things of the world, the law comes back in and does its job. Because if we stop living in obedience

to Christ, if we stop living according to faith and start living according to the things of the world, then we have now become proud again. Pride is what has taken over, and that same law that brought us to Jesus is the same law that will bring us back to Jesus. And so I have a question for you, believer in Jesus Christ. How are you doing today? Oh, Ryan, I accepted Jesus a long time ago. That's not what I asked. Are you walking in

obedience today, or are you walking in sin today? If you're walking in sin, then you're no longer walking in grace. You have put yourself back under the law, because you need the law to humble you. You need the law to bring you back into life. And once that law has taken its good effect in your heart, you too can come back to Jesus. So again, I don't know where anybody in this room is this morning in your walk with Jesus Christ.

Wherever you are this morning, I think that the Lord wants to do business with you. If you're here this morning, you've never accepted Jesus as your Savior. I need you to know something. You're under the penalty of the law. You're in prison. And if you're in prison, you're on death row, because that's the only end. The good news is Jesus came to save you. You just have to put

your faith in him. You just have to come to him with all of your sin. And accept what he's already done for you. If you're here this morning and you're already a believer in Jesus Christ, but you have found that you're walking in sin, then the law is ready to do its work in your heart too. And it's ready to bring you back. It's ready to bring you back to Jesus

Christ. So wherever you are this morning, I want you to ask the Lord to allow the law to do its good work in your heart, so that you too can come back to faith in Christ. So that you too can get back in line with where you need to be with Jesus. Amen. Let's all stand. And if you would bow with me. Father, we come to you. And I thank you, Lord, for what your word is able to do in our hearts and in our lives. And Lord, I lift up

the people that are here this morning and just ask that you would do your good work in their hearts and in their lives. Father, would you draw us near to you? Father, if we need that law to do its work, to remind us of our need for a savior, then let it do its work. Lord, if we need to be reminded of the rest that we can have in you, then may your grace do its work in our heart. Father, I thank you for the salvation that comes from you. I thank you for the blood of

Jesus Christ that continually cleanses us from all sin. Father, we thank you and we praise you. In Jesus' name. Amen. Be blessed.

As we leave here, would you go before and strengthen us, encourage us in our walk and witness for you, cause us to live for you daily, Lord, looking to you, the author and finisher of our faith, Lord. Please give us a continued hunger for your word and a desire for the things of you, Lord. And we'll just give you all the thanks in Jesus' name. Amen. The Lord bless y'all. Have a great week.