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Blog

Grace

Galatians 2:16,19,21 – You can’t break the law when there is none!

Here is the revelation that is shaping my life today – we want freedom but struggle when it’s given freely. We don’t trust love to shape us, so we crave manipulation of the law. We miss God completely if we can’t break free from this story.
Galatians 2:16,19,21 NLT
[16] Yet we know that a person is made right with God by faith in Jesus Christ, not by obeying the law. And we have believed in Christ Jesus so that we might be made right with God because of our faith in Christ, not because we have obeyed the law. For no one will ever be made right with God by obeying the law.” [19] For when I tried to keep the law, it condemned me. So I died to the law-I stopped trying to meet all its requirements-so that I might live for God. [21] I do not treat the grace of God as meaningless. For if keeping the law could make us right with God, then there was no need for Christ to die.

Observation

Death to religion. If by religion we mean what man must do in order to be made right with God, then in Jesus religion has died a final and full death. Obedience has no place in our right relationship with God. I am made right with God by Jesus plus nothing. “A person is made right with God by faith in Jesus Christ.” Every time we add some obedience we destroy completely the grace of God in rescuing us in Jesus. You can’t have it both ways. It’s either you and your obedience or it’s Jesus plus nothing of you. There are no mixers going down here, it’s straight grace or it’s no grace. Okay, add ice, as long as the ice is gratitude for the free drink.
Why is it we focus so much on obedience, behaviour, doing right, instead of celebrating that despite me I am right? We want to be in control. And we can’t handle love that does not require payment. Righteousness that is free and goes on being free is just too much freedom. We don’t trust freedom to get the results of good behaviour. But God does not give a toss about fear-based behaviour and being correct, He is only concerned with connectedness. He wants me to live present to His presence, for presence is salvation. It is only in the freedom and pleasure of His presence are we transformed in mind and hence behaviour. So the way is made completely freely always open to His presence. This is all that matters, everything else is a consequence. “So I died to the law-I stopped trying to meet all its requirements-so that I might live for God.” If you don’t die to the law you will never be resurrected to the fullness of life in the Kingdom of God. There is no place for the law in the relationship God has designed and desires to have with me.


Application

Die, die, die. Stop all your efforts, all the ridiculous and insane focus on being good. You’ve been made good so enjoy yourself. Celebrate Jesus with deep gratitude for the complete freedom of being right with God. Now live in His presence without fear, without assessment of worthiness, without condemnation or disqualification. All voices are silenced by grace – all you can hear now is “you are my son/daughter, whom I love and are well pleased.” This is resurrection life. It starts here, it’s founded here, it runs on these truth tracks. Don’t compromise this for anything.


Response

Thank you that you accept me with a giving love that has no demand strings attached. You make me acceptable, you keep me acceptable, it is so good to be so right, so accepted, so loved. I am indestructible in a love like this. I am free from fear, free from poor self-image, free from condemnation. Thank you for this amazing life in your acceptance and love. And thank you for burning the law books, I was doomed by their poisonous words.


Meditation

Meditation truth – a person is made right with God by faith in Jesus Christ, not by obeying the law.
Consider
How much law talk still infiltrates your relationship with God?
How free are you from fear and condemnation?


JOURNEY DEEPER
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