Through Faith Alone
Galatians 3:5-14
October 29, 2023
preached by Pastor Doug Cooper
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Time of Reflection Quotations
“[Faith] is trust in God’s character and obedience to His living voice expressed in His Word. Consequently the object of faith in the Old Testament is the promise of God which awaits its fulfillment in the coming of Christ. Faith looked forward then, just as now it looks backward to its object in Christ.”
“Underline this thought: assurance, peace, access to God, knowledge that He is our Father, and strength to overcome temptation all depend on this-the Son of God took our flesh and bore our sins in such a way that further sacrifice for sin is both unnecessary and unintelligible. Christ died our death… He could not do more for us than He has done; we need no other resources to enable us to walk through this world into the next. You and I need a Savior who is near us, is one with us, understands us. All of this the Lord Jesus is…”
~ Sinclair Ferguson (1948-present), Scottish author, pastor and professor
“The marker of those who understand the gospel of Jesus Christ is that, when they stumble and fall, when they screw up, they run to God and not from him, because they clearly understand that their acceptance before God is not predicated upon their behavior, but on the righteous life of Jesus Christ and his sacrificial death.”
~ Matt Chandler (1974-present), American pastor and author
“Most of us have never really understood that Christianity is not a self-help religion meant to enable moral people to become more moral. We don’t need a self-help book; we need a Savior. We don’t need to get our collective act together; we need death and resurrection and the life-transforming truths of the gospel. And we don’t need them just once, at the beginning of our Christian life; we need them every moment of every day.”
~ Elyse Fitzpatrick (1950-present), American author and speaker
Sermon Passage
Galatians 3:6-14 (ESV)
5 Does he who supplies the Spirit to you and works miracles among you do so by works of the law, or by hearing with faith— 6 just as Abraham “believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness”?
7 Know then that it is those of faith who are the sons of Abraham. 8 And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying, “In you shall all the nations be blessed.” 9 So then, those who are of faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith.
10 For all who rely on works of the law are under a curse; for it is written, “Cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the Book of the Law, and do them.” 11 Now it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law, for “The righteous shall live by faith.” 12 But the law is not of faith, rather “The one who does them shall live by them.” 13 Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us—for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree”— 14 so that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, so that we might receive the promised Spirit through faith.