Glorying In The Cross

This is the conclusion to Paul’s letter to the Galatians. Not long after the gospel was preached here and people were saved, there came in a group of people who were called Judaizers. They taught that is was not enough for a person to just embrace Jesus Christ, but that they also had to embrace the law of Moses.

In other words, Christianity was simply the fulfillment of the Hebrew religion and if you were going to get in, you had to obey the Mosaic law. It’s ceremonies and it’s rituals. This is the purpose of this letter, to declare that we are complete in Jesus. Now look at our passage.

Vs. 14, here is the crowning statement of the Christian faith. “God forbid that I should glory, that I should boast, that I should take pride in anything else except the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

A man’s boast measures himself. If you want to find a key to a man’s character, find out what it is he glories in, he boasts in. What is it he takes pride in? in Philippians 3:4-9; Paul had much he could have boasted and gloried in, same is true with many preachers today. Paul said; “I refuse to glory in anything else but the cross.” Now that is a strange thing for a man to glory in. it does not seem so today, but back then the cross was not a trinket you wore around your neck. It was a thing of shame, a tool of death.

Paul is dealing with the subject of glorying. These Judaizers were coming in saying, “I’m sorry, but you don’t have everything yet.” Many Christians glory in the achievements. Paul could have gloried in spiritual achievements. He came close to it in 2 Corinthians 12. You can either glory in what you are doing or in the cross. You cannot do both. Why glory in the cross? Three reasons.

I. The Cross Gave Me a New Life. vs. 15

1. 2 Corinthians 5:17. Notice the broadness of it. “If any man.” John 1:12; Romans 10:13 and the narrowness of it. “In Christ” John 14:6; Acts 4:12

a. This is a glad note, we can start over again, fresh, forgiven.

b. When God forgives, He forgets. You and I can’t.

c. The cross gave Paul a new start. Thanks to Calvary I don’t live here anymore.

2. Change the word circumcision to something like baptism or church membership

3. This does not minimize baptism or church membership. They have no meaning without you being a new creature. This is the only thing that counts.

4. Has glorying in your achievements made you a new creature, has baptism, church membership?

5. You can be an atheist, an agnostic, or a Jehovah’s Witness, but has it made you a new person?

II. The Cross Gave Me a New Lifestyle

1. Isn’t it reasonable that if a man is made new, that he would have a new outlook? Vs. 14

2. Paul said, I glory because the world is crucified unto me, and I to the world.

a. As far as the world is concerned, I’m dead. The world used to like me, cater to me, invite me to her parties, but now I am dead. They don’t even know I exist.

b. As far as I’m concerned, the world no longer exists. I’m not talking about the world as far as people, but everything that the unredeemed world values.

c. There was a time I was tied to the world and the world was tied to me, but now we are dead to each other.

3. Then I thought, how alive am I to the world? How much do I do, and do you do to be pleasing to the world, to be attractive to the world?

III. The Cross Gives Us a New Pattern for Living; vs. 16

1. Paul says, “I glory in the cross, because it has given me a new prescription for living.”

2. As many walk according to this rule, will have peace and mercy.

3. Peace is the positive aspect of God’s blessing. Everything you need to live your life by.