Freedom From the Law

PRAYER PRACTICE

Spoken Prayer – Out loud, pray for God to speak to you through your reading. Praise God for giving us His word. Ask the Spirit to help you read with faith, and to live out what you hear from God through the passage.

 

DAILY READING

Galatians 5:1-6

 

DEVOTION / REFLECTION

Faith Active in Love

by Pr. Dave Mann

 

We have been soaking up the Apostle Paul’s strong words from his letter to the Galatians on Sunday mornings and more during weekday readings. Today’s reading summarizes the first four chapters of the letter, and then we turn a very important corner in verse 6.

 

First, the summary. The Christian gospel is NOT another law – Do this, don’t do that, and then God will be happy with you and bless you. No! It is so easy fall into that kind of thinking. It is a very slippery slope. We are predisposed to walk down the road of the Performance Plan (as Pr. Steve has so skillfully preached), both in our relationship with God and in our relationship with other people. But if we go that way, there is no satisfying the demands of Performance. It is never enough! We can’t just “perform” in one area and then stop. We slip down the slope, feeling obligated to perform according to the entire Law! And worse yet, we stop trusting in Christ. We cut ourselves off from the confidence that what Christ has done is sufficient for us. By trying to do things to earn God’s love, we are in fact saying that what Christ did is not good enough. He needs our help! Really?!

 

Liberation from the Law is the message of Galatians 1-4. So, is there no place for our doing anything that is good and right? There certainly is, but the motivation is entirely different from trying to earn God’s approval. Paul turns the corner in verse 6. Our doing something or our refraining from doing something is not the key thing at all. What is important is that what we do is based on love – the love of God for us. Because God loves us so much and has provided all that we need, we are eternally grateful. We do indeed act, but our actions are reflections of God’s love for us. 

 

We are set free from the never-ending spiral of the Performance Plan. We are liberated to act on our gratitude for his undeserved love!

 

O Lord, forgive me when I forget how sufficient your work on the cross is for me.  Thank you that because of your love for me, I can now demonstrate how grateful I am by reflecting your love toward others.  Amen