We
ourselves are Jews by birth and not Gentile sinners; yet we know that a person
is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, so we
also have believed in Christ Jesus, in order to be justified by faith in Christ
and not by works of the law, because by works of the law no one will be
justified. (Galatians 2:15-16 ESV)
I have
been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in
me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who
loved me and gave himself for me. I do not nullify the grace of God, for if
righteousness were through the law, then Christ died for no purpose. (Galatians
2:20-21 ESV)
We make a decision every
morning when we wake up. It is a choice
between two kinds of living and thinking.
One option is to believe that hard work, diligence and seeking to do our
best will cause God to love us. The
other option, affirmed by Paul, is to live in light of the cross of Jesus. It is a grace filled life that enters into
whatever a day’s work may bring with the assurance of God’s love. This is the only option for living in the
freedom that came as a gift through the death of Jesus Christ. How many of us chose the former? We are bent on the need to perform and
somehow we get deluded into thinking there is something we can do to get God to
love us more.
The Gospel breaks through
this illusion of work’s value and brings us the promise that the starting point
is a grace we do not deserve and lays the foundation for living and working in
ways more productive, more rewarding and freeing than under the servitude of
our sinful attempts at doing our best.
The life we now live “is by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and
gave himself for me.” Grace motivates
us to be good, not “for goodness sake” as the popular Christmas song puts it,
but for love’s sake.
The puritan Thomas Watson
describes this goodness without the gospel this way, “Morality is insufficient
for salvation. Though the life is moralized, the lust may be unmortified. The
heart may be full of pride and atheism. Under the fair leaves of a tree, there
may be a worm... If morality were sufficient to salvation, Christ need not have
died. The moral man has a fair lamp—but it lacks the oil of grace."
