Our Sermons

Bible Passage: Galatians 3:23-29
Pastor: Pastor Schlicht
Sermon Date:  July 13, 2019

For two years during college I was a dodgeball referee for the local YMCA. It was an adult coed dodgeball league and yes, it was about as ridiculous as you’d expect. From matching headbands to hockey pads, I saw it all on the dodgeball court. The crazy thing is that they had to pay a referee for an adult dodgeball league. My entire job consisted of blowing a whistle to start the game, and then when someone got hit by the ball and didn’t go out, I had to call them out. I shouldn’t have been necessary, but I definitely was because those adults were not mature enough to play without a referee. In fact, one fine Saturday afternoon after a heated exchange over whether the ball hit him or not, one man threatened to punch another player. I told him I would have to call the authorities if he couldn’t control himself. My experience as a dodgeball ref indelibly impressed upon me this truth: Age is no determination of maturity. 

Although there may be a correlation between the two, there is no guarantee that simply getting older makes you more mature. My father once told me, “You’ll wait your entire life for some people to grow up and some never will.” And that is even more true spiritually speaking. There are Christians who have gone to church their entire life, but still remain infants in faith. And there are those who have only known their Savior for five years who are pillars of spiritual strength. So what accounts for spiritual maturity? How do we strive to grow in Christ, not simply exist as Christians? This is what I want to talk about in Galatians today. 

This is the fourth week of our Galatian sermon series and we are right in the middle of the letter. The Apostle Paul spent the first two chapters defending the honor of Christ and his ministry in Galatia. A big part of that defense was repeatedly proving the point that no one can be justified by the works of the Law. A question now arises, which some Judaizers may have even used against Paul. “If no one can get right with God by following the law, then why did God give the law? Is Paul saying the Old Testament law was useless? And so Paul, sensing the natural objection, addresses this question in chapter 3. And in doing so he brings up the greater implications of our freedom from the law, namely that of maturity in Christ.

We begin with verses 23-25 “But before this faith came, we were held in custody under the law, imprisoned until the coming faith was revealed. So the law was our chaperone until Christ, so that we might be justified by faith. But now that this faith has come, we are no longer under a chaperone.” Paul says that the Mosaic Law was not useless, but it had a temporary purpose. It was to preserve and guide the nation of Israel as it’s chaperone until Christ came. The word “chaperone” is a translation for the Greek παιδαγωγὸς which is a person or position which no longer exists in our society today. This is a very interesting illustration used by Paul.

The παιδαγωγός was typically a slave, purchased by a wealthy Roman family to keep watch over young children on their way to and from formal education. The παιδαγωγός were often educated slaves who helped with ancient homework and ensured the kids kept basic moral and civic laws. Their primary function seems to have been guardianship and discipline. An ancient guy named Libanius wrote: “For pedagogues are guards of the blossoming youth, they are keepers, they are a fortified wall…they beat off the lovers’ assaults, becoming like barking dogs to wolves.” [Antioch as a Centre of Hellenic Culture as Observed by Libanius] (Some of you parents are thinking this is a great idea!) When the child reached a certain age of responsibility and maturity the pedagogues no longer had any authority over them. Sort of a graduation of sorts, I suppose, these children were now thought mature enough to go to school and live as good citizens on their own.

So Paul, takes this concept of pedagogues, which is his idea in the word “chaperone”, and says the law was a παιδαγωγὸς, until Christ came. The OT laws disciplined the ancient Israelites. It guarded them so they remained distinct as God’s people and were not be scattered into other nations. God had made a promise; he promised to send a Savior from these people, the “seed” of Abraham, Jesus Christ.  That’s the purpose of the OT law in the end, to get to Jesus. The sacrifices were designed to remind them of the one who would come and be sacrificed once, for all people. Whether it was the festivals, the cleaning rituals, fasting, what have you, they were all a shadow of things to come (Hebrews 10:1). They were destined to be temporary. This pedagogues of the Mosaic Law guided the nation of Israel along until they reached maturity, until Jesus came and set them free. 

Paul makes this explicit in chapter 4, “What I am saying is that as long as an heir is underage, he is no different from a slave, although he owns the whole estate. The heir is subject to guardians and trustees until the time set by his father. So also, when we were underage, we were in slavery…But when the set time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those under the law, that we might receive adoption to sonship. As New Testament Christians, those living after Jesus we are called mature sons of God, free to live as God’s children on our own, without any chaperone. We still care about God’s moral law, of course, the ten commandments and the will of God. But no outward ordinances are required. The laws of God are no longer written on tablets of stone, but on hearts of flesh (2 Cor. 3:3). The Holy Spirit lives in us through faith in Christ. We are free to live as God’s mature children.

This is the initial step or benchmark of maturity in Christ: We don’t need a chaperone anymore! When you’re a 2-year-old your mother makes dinner, you have to be reminded to say “thank you”. But when you’re mature, you understand what has been done for you and out of actual gratitude, you say thank you because you want to. A teenager still has to be reminded to wake up on time and get prepared for school or work, but a mature child understands the wisdom in being prepared and on time so they get up all on their own. In the same way, as mature Christians controlled by the Holy Spirit, we follow God’s will because we want to, not because there is some law that tells us we have to. We can live out our faith without a chaperone looking over our shoulder. We go to church, not because our parents tell us we have to, but because we understand the love of our heavenly Father and wish to have a relationship with him. This is a stark difference which holds a warning: If you still feel like you worship God because you have to; if you only pray when someone is watching; if you don’t have a desire to read the Word; these are signs of spiritual immaturity. Remember, Christ has set you free from the law as a chaperone. His blood has brought you into the family of God as grown up children. He laid down his life to redeem you, he has forgiven your sins and invited you to receive the inheritance of heaven itself. May the Holy Spirit melt your heart over this kindness that you might be motivated to serve and honor him in love and thankfulness. May you progress toward maturity in Christ and give our lives to God without reluctance or compulsion, but cheerfully in genuine love.

The second step in Christian maturity is found in Paul’s words from verse 27 which builds off what has come before. Paul makes a crazy statement: “In fact, you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. Indeed, as many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ.” Paul is not just talking to the men here. This is an astonishing statement about status. If you were a mature son in a wealthy family, in the ancient world, you received the inheritance. Do you see what Paul is saying? He says you all are sons of God. Regardless of you are on earth, in Christ, you receive the full rights of a son in God’s family. Can you imagine how this would sound to some of the people who were part of a Galatian church? You mean, that even though I’m a slave I’m just as important as my master in God’s family? You mean, even though I’m a woman in a terribly patriarchal society, God calls me the favored son and heir? You mean, despite the disadvantages I have because of my ethnicity, in Christ I am Abraham’s seed who will receive the inheritance of God Almighty? Yes. If you have been baptized, you have been clothed with Christ; you are wearing the Son’s clothes; you are a free, rich, and beloved son of God. 

Paul then doubles down on this and states, “There is not Jew or Greek, slave or free, male or female, for you are all one and the same in Christ Jesus.” This is such a strong statement, and it can almost seem offensive at first, right? Is trying to downplay these differences or marginalize the disparities between them?  Because these differences are real, aren’t they? All three are still around today. They are here in our church. Eastside Lutheran Church is not the height of ethnic diversity in Dane County, and yet there are among us differences of ethnic background, culture, race, even language to an extent. Obviously there is male and female. And though we no longer are slave or free, there are still economic differences.  Some of us have more money than others. Some of us tell people what to do, and others of us have to do what others tell to do. These are the differences which cause so much strife in our country today. We are becoming more categorized than ever due to marketing and media. People on opposite sides only hear and read from people they agree with. The divide between the rich and poor is a chasm; the top 1% owns more than the bottom 50%! Race relations continue to be an issue in American. And has there been another time when gender equality was such a hot topic? How can Paul say “all are one and the same”?

Well, my friends, Paul isn’t in denial. He knows there are categories and disparities. He has already clearly acknowledged the discord between Jew and Gentile Christians. He writes elsewhere about the undeniable and positive distinction of male and female in God’s creation and in marriage. He wrote a letter to a man named Philemon strongly encouraging him to treat his slave Onemismus as a beloved brother in Christ. Paul knows there are differences; he isn’t denying it. What he is doing, is saying, in an incredibly strong way, that the differences which are very present on earth do not matter when it comes to spiritual status. Being baptized into Christ provides a radical, new sense of unity, structured around equal status in God’s family, something which overrides all other ways of assigning worth to an individual. There are differences, but they don’t make us any less or more valuable to God.

In fact, as it happens, as mature Christians, when we affirm our differences it only makes the gospel’s power more evident. If you can’t hear different tones in music, you won’t hear the beauty of harmony when those different notes are brought together in a song. In the same way, if you don’t acknowledge differences among people, you won’t see the beauty of the gospel when people from all walks of life are powerfully brought together in Christ. This is something I notice every Sunday here at Eastside, but especially when we celebrate Holy Communion. Some of you are so different from one another, probably in some cases more than you know. And yet I see you standing and kneeling side by side, one and the same, to receive your Savior’s body and blood, given for you. I see  democrats next to republicans, I see black next to white, I see male and female, I see rich and poor, all coming here to receive the equal rights of sons—the forgiveness and strengthening that is only found in Christ. You may not stop to think about it every Sunday, but the equality and the unity that is demonstrated within these four walls is powerful and it is unique from any other institution or gathering.

This is the second sign of Maturity: Maturity in Christ means affirming that differences and inequalities exist on earth and yet living according to the greater truth: All are one and the same in Christ. In keeping with his pedagogues analogy, to return to these separate categories is regressing to immaturity. It would be foolish and childish to let earthly distinctions separate us as God’s people. Thankfully, the Holy Spirit calls us to freedom through the gospel. As God’s people, our value is not based on  human social structures or categories. Jesus has set us free to be children of equal status!

May God bless your consideration of his Word today and the Spirit’s work in our hearts as we continue to progress toward maturity in Christ. Amen.