Sermon Illustrations

When the Judaizers told the Galatians that they had to get circumcised to become good Christians, they were adding the law to the gospel. They were saying that Moses had to finish what Christ could only begin.

To illustrate the problem with this kind of theology, consider the man who had an old baseball autographed by Babe Ruth. The man had heard that the ball might be valuable, so one day he decided to sell it. He was worried, however, because he could see that the signature was badly faded. In order to make it clearer, he took out his baseball and carefully traced over the letters with a marking pen: B-A-B-E R-U-T-H. The effect was to obliterate the real autograph, so that by the time he was finished, he had turned something priceless into something worthless.

It is the same with Jesus Christ. His finished work cannot be added to lest it be received as useless.

(Philip Graham Ryken. Galatians: Reformed Expository Commentary. P&R Press. 2005. p. 199).

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