9.13.20 Galatians 6:14
But far be it from me to boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me and I to the world.
How Do You See the World?
I. It starts with how you look at yourself
What do you personally take pride in? Within our American culture, our defining moment of pride might be July 4th, 1776, at the signing of the Declaration of Independence. For others, it might be the Emancipation Proclamation. For Michigan fans it might be when the Tigers won the world series or the Pistons won back to back championships under the bad boys. When you take pride in something you’re not afraid to get t-shirts and flags and posters in memory of that accomplishment. You put the diploma on your wall and you say, “I did it!”
What was the wall hanger of Paul’s day? His fellow Christian Jews were taking pride in the fact that they were getting their fellow Christians circumcised. It sounds like a strange thing to take pride in. Why? If they could get their fellow Christians circumcised, then they could claim to be maintaining their Jewish identity, and then they wouldn’t get persecuted either. So when they were able to convince more Christians to get circumcised, they felt like they’d gained another convert to their side. They were proud of it. It was a banner moment for them. But should they have been? By getting them to get circumcised, they were also putting them back under the confines of the law and taking them away from Christ.
Do you have a banner moment? They talk a lot about pride in today’s society. There’s gay pride, black pride, but what about Christian pride? No, that won’t work. God’s Word says that “pride goes before destruction.” Pride can keep us from humbling ourselves to him and relying on him when we’re full of ourselves. Pride puts blinders on who we are. We end up saying and doing things that are wrong when we aren’t aware of our own weaknesses and sins. Pride is something we should resist.
As a Christian, you can end up taking pride in how often you pray or how often you come to church. You can take pride in how often you invite people to church or in how much money you give to church. You can be proud that you never committed adultery or never fell away from church. You can take pride in how you raise your children and how polite they are or how well they do at school. These are all things that you SHOULD do. But at what point do your actions make you sinfully proud of who you are or what you do, where you think that somehow you are worthy of a pat on the back from God?
Pride can come from the opposite side of the spectrum too. You can be proud of how you don’t pretend to be more righteous than others. You are REAL. You have no qualms about having too much to drink, letting some cuss words out, and dressing how you want to dress. You’re not ashamed of who you are, and you aren’t going to try to dress the part of super-Christian for anyone. If your fellow Christians don’t like it, who cares? That’s THEIR problem, not yours. You aren’t going to be driven by what OTHER people think of you. You aren’t going to be driven by pride. Good for you. But isn’t there some pride there too?
II. It depends on how you see Jesus
Paul had plenty to be proud about. He had authentic Jewish blood. He was circumcised on the 8th day. He kept the Passover. He took vows. He didn’t throw away the law as a Jew. As a Christian, he went on missionary journeys. He risked his life on a daily basis. He was persecuted. He was faithful. He never took any pay for his work. He dedicated his entire LIFE to Christ. He made MANY sacrifices for the Lord. But Paul didn’t boast about any of that. Instead, he wrote, far be it from me to boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Stop for a minute. Isn’t that an entirely odd thing if you think about it? If somebody asked you, “What do you remember about your grandpa?” I would talk about how my grandfather was a pastor or my other grandfather was a boxer. But what if I said, “The greatest thing my grandfather did was to die”? It sounds sick. It only makes sense through what God’s Word says about the cross, for God’s Word says that there on the cross Jesus was punished for the sins of the world. There on the cross God created a just way for me to be forgiven for who I am and what I’ve done. God found a way to put me through hell, without sending me to hell. Without Jesus’ death, I end up in hell. If I’m going to stand before God, the cross is all I’ve got, but it’s also all I need.
Paul simplifies life with this view. The cross is all that matters. The one Person and the one thing that saves ALL of us is the cross. That’s it. If we all hold the same ticket for the same reason, we can’t get in an argument over who is better than the other one. We’re all getting to heaven only through the cross.
Think about what happens when the cross ISN’T your sole focus. It’s amazing how angry people can get at each other when they feel like they are doing all the work and making the greatest sacrifices. A wife finds herself spending a lot of time doing laundry, and she’s angry that nobody else lifts a finger to help. She also balances the checkbook and gets the kids to bed. She also prepares food and lunches most of the time. What does her husband do? He mows lawn and weed whacks. He works longer hours than she does. He changes the oil in the cars and pays for the schooling and most of the bills. Nobody else does that!
Oh, the sacrifices! We put ourselves up on the cross of work or family or chores, and act as if we’ve worked harder than ANYONE else, and we’re MAD about it. The sacrifices aren’t made willingly. They aren’t done gladly and lovingly. Why? Because sacrifices are hard work! They tire us out. Because we live in a sinful world with a sinful and weak body where nothing seems to come easy, and we get frustrated. The sacrifices we make often aren’t noticed or appreciated. We don’t seem to have the time and the energy to make the sacrifices, so they are often done shabbily or with bad attitudes.
Isn’t that why we need Jesus all the more? Paul knew his sacrifices wouldn’t save anyone from hell, not even himself. Isn’t that a good reason to remember that we don’t need to be Jesus, when we already have a Jesus Christ who made the sacrifice for us. He paid plenty for our sins, so we wouldn’t have to try and martyr ourselves or make ourselves feel like we were the greatest martyrs in the world. That’s why Paul wrote, far be it from me to boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. God’s opinion of me is not based on how many sacrifices I make, but on the sacrifice JESUS made for me. I am forgiven, with all of my faults, all of my laziness, all of my inept sacrifices. I’m forgiven because of Jesus. He’s it. End of story.
III. It continues because of how you see Jesus
The cross affected Paul’s whole world view. Through the cross Paul said that the world has been crucified to me. Paul looked at the world as if it had all been crucified: he saw everyone as crucified: through cross colored glasses. They all already died for their sins when Jesus died for them. And if Jesus paid for them to be forgiven and be in heaven with Him, then that must mean that Jesus WANTS them in heaven too. He wants them to repent of their sins and believe in Jesus, being baptized as well.
That’s an important thing if you think about it. Some people think that Jesus only died for believers and that He didn’t pay for the sins of unbelievers. Some people believe that God really doesn’t want everyone to be saved, but only the ones that He specifically chooses to be saved. So in their minds, when they see someone who has gone down a dark road of sinful living, they might say to themselves, “God doesn’t want them. God hasn’t chosen them.” So how would they look at them? As the enemy. As people that they might as well not even bother with, right?
But if I look at everyone as someone that Jesus died for and actually WANTS in heaven, it changes how I look at them. It doesn’t matter if they’re black, white, old, young, nice or mean, good or bad. Even if they’ve dug in their heels against Christianity and made my life miserable, they’ve already died for their sins when Jesus died on the cross for them. Why would I just write them off without at least trying to reach out to them or praying for them? What would it matter what they’ve done if Jesus still paid for their sins and they have time to be brought to repentance and faith in Jesus? Instead of being filled with hatred towards them or writing them off, I could still look at them as fallen sinners, captured by Satan, who God still wants to be in heaven. And if God wants them in heaven, then maybe I should too? If Jesus went through the effort of dying for them, then maybe I could make some effort to try and share the Gospel with them too?
And that leads us to our last little phrase here where he says that the world has been crucified to me and I to the world. Paul then realized that if Jesus paid for the world, then he could play a role in spreading the Gospel to the world, no matter WHAT it would take. Even though people would resist him and persecute him in the process of trying to convince them that Jesus was their Lord, he could take painful risks to see to it that they heard the Gospel as well.
Paul said in Acts 20:24, “I consider my life worth nothing to me, if only I may finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me—the task of testifying to the gospel of God’s grace.” He was beaten, nearly stoned to death, imprisoned, and nearly torn in two by a wild mob of his fellow countrymen, all for sharing the gospel with them. Paul even said in Romans 9:2, “I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, those of my own race.” Who would wish such a thing on himself? It shows how MUCH Paul loved his fellow countrymen, and his actions showed it. Paul dedicated his life to reaching out to Gentiles, going on at least three mission trips. He gave up great status with his fellow Jews. He lived on the road and in jail. That’s how his focus on the cross changed his entire life.
What about you? Has the cross changed your life? Would others in your life see you as one who is willing to make sacrifices for others?
It doesn’t have to be sacrifices of going on a mission trip to a foreign country. It can be as simple as coming to worship. It can be paying tuition at our school for your child to know Jesus. It can be bringing your children to Catechism and worship, praying, giving offerings, reading a Bible story to your grandchild and making sure he or she goes to Sunday School and knows his Bible, and sharing a worship service on Facebook. Yet some even find excuses why they can’t even do these simplest of things! Just getting to church seems to them like the greatest sacrifice they could ever make.
Think too of the simple sacrifices you can make in your everyday life - working overtime for your family, mowing the neighbor’s lawn, doing the dishes when no one else will. Trying to go the extra mile for an employer who doesn’t pay you what you’re worth. Doing homework that you think is needless. Picking up after your children when you’ve told them to clean up after themselves, without throwing a fit. You don’t do these things because they are fun or easy. You do them because it needs to be done and you can do it. When you compare it to the cross of Jesus, it’s nothing in comparison to what He’s done. These are simple and easy sacrifices. Much easier than going through hell.
Yet how often do we find ourselves unwilling to make those sacrifices? How often would we rather play the part of the martyr while sacrificing hardly anything instead? God have mercy, and thank God He has. Paul fell short too. He called himself the chief of sinners. He knew the good he wanted to do, that he didn’t do. So he, like we, need to keep our focus on one thing, and one thing only. Far be it from me to boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me and I to the world. Why do we boast in the cross? Because there, and only there, do we find the one sacrifice that paid for our forgiveness and the one sacrifice that gives us heaven.
We are coming up on another election. You can’t help but be focused on it. Each side is telling us it will be the end of the world if the other one gets voted in, for any variety of reasons. Voting is a civic duty that we should take seriously as citizens of the United States. What is your main reason for voting? They talk about people who are single issue voters, where only one main thing matters to them. It might be the personality of the person who is running. Are they likeable or not? It might be taxes, abortion, crime, welfare, or the border. They vote on their one main issue.
When it came to Paul’s focus, how he saw the world, he was focused on a single issue Savior, found at the cross. Without the cross of Christ, we lose focus. We lose purpose. We lose direction. We lose forgiveness and salvation. God give us such a focus as well to see the entire world as crucified and live our lives in sacrifice to him. Amen.
