Sermon Snippets

I've spent a night in jail.

I was protesting a traffic ticket and failed to appear in court for my hearing four months later.  I realized I missed it afterwards and thought I covered my basis to stay out of trouble. But it was not to be and two evenings later, there was a knock on my dorm-room door and I was escorted to the Kosciusko County Jail.

They took my fingerprints, my mug-shot was taken, and I got to change into an orange striped jumpsuit.

I believe it ended up being only 7 hours or so, but it was a miserable night.

Sleeping in the drunk tank wasn't really possible. There was nowhere to go and nothing to do. I was stuck.

The apostle Paul knew what being locked up was like too. Several different times in Galatians 3, he talks about how living legalistically is the equivalent of being in a spiritual jail (see vs. 22-23)

Apart from Christ we are prisoners and slaves to legalistic living that tries to be good enough to earn salvation and the approval of God. Unfortunately, that path does not end in life, only imprisonment (3:21).

The good news is that Jesus Christ freed us from having to resort to legalistic living. If we place our faith and trust in what He did for us, we are given the free gifts of freedom, righteousness, and salvation by God.

Paul brings this up to the Galatians because while they were saved by faith, they were dangerously close to buying into false doctrine that said they needed to live by rules and not by faith.  It is not just a salvation issue, but it's clear that legalism is a danger after our initial conversion and regeneration.

I would never volunteer to go back to jail. The entire experience was miserable.
Why then would we want to go back to a legalistic approach to life spiritually? It brings about similar misery and confinement when freedom is what God calls us to.