Sermon Tone Analysis

This week in ONE CHAPTER A DAY we spent the week in the Book of Galatians.

Paul starts his letter in the usual way, identifying himself,

Then, he offers the Galatians a blessing from God,

He wastes no time getting to the reason for writing,

The Galatian church was confusing pure gospel Paul proclaimed to them.

So in His letter he clearly lays again a foundation of justification by faith alone in Christ.

He is very clear with them.

Justification before God is through faith in Jesus Christ—nothing more, nothing less.

This is not a new thought.

Remember on Good Friday.

The thief on his right was a law-breaker in every respect.

Then he came to believe in Jesus.

Faith in Christ was His only virtue and by his faith alone he was justified.

At the end of the day he went to paradise with Jesus.

Let me take to one more place, Acts 16, where Paul and Silas Are in prison, in a jail in Philippi.

He wanted to know what He needed to do to be saved.

So Paul and Silas tell him.

Good news Jailer.

You don’t have to do anything to be “saved.”

All you have to do is believe in the Lord Jesus.

Christ came in

When faith comes, we are simultaneously redeemed from the curse of the law.

But that’s not all.

We are adopted as sons and daughters by faith, AND by faith we become heirs of eternal life.

ONCE we are “saved by our faith” what do we do from now until the time we receive the fullness of our inheritance?

Paul spends the remainder of his letter, addressing the matter of our sanctification.

How we shall live our new life by faith in Christ?

How do I live my best life by faith?

It starts here Galatians 5:1.

Freedom defines our faith-life from now on.

We are no longer bound by the curse and condemnation of the law.

We are free from the Laws obligation, which means you can wake up every morning grateful to God the Father that Christ has done everything for your salvation.

And if redeeming us from the curse of the law wasn’t enough, God has given us the Spirit to make sure we hold on to our faith alone in Christ to the finish line, eternal life.

Peter announced to crowd on the day of Pentecost.

We were given the gift of the Spirit in our baptism.

Tomorrow, in ONE CHAPTER A DAY, we’ll read these words from Ephesians chapter 1,

The Holy Spirit with us guarantees our redemption.

You aren’t meant to walk this life of faith alone, so don’t, Paul invites.

The Holy Spirit walks with you so that you can face your greatest foe, you, your sinful self.

Luther suggests we need return to the grace and power of our baptism every day,

The old Adam in us is to be drowned and destroyed by daily sorrow and repentance, together with all sins and evil lusts; and that again the new man should daily come forth and rise, that shall live in the presence of God in righteousness and purity forever.[1]

After all,

You can stop living for you, to please your fleshly desires.

Your sin was buried with Christ in your baptism.

You were Raised, freed to walk in the newness of life, to live in the freedom of the Gospel to “Go and sin no more” to live

From now on, we are free to live our lives by faith, to live a life that is pleasing God, not because we have to, to be saved, but to live by faith a life that is pleasing to the ONE who saved us.

Thank you, Lord Jesus, for fulfilling the righteous requirements of the law for us.

Thank you, Holy Spirit, for living in us and walking with us, so that we may live by faith a life that is pleasing to God our Father, not setting our minds on the things of the flesh, but walking by faith, regenerated in our baptism to walk in the newness of life in Jesus’ name.

Amen.