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The Condemnation of the Carnal Nature (Galatians 5:19-21) · Reformed Thinking

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Welcome to reformed thinking. Today our mission is to
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basically abandoned polite terminology and look directly at
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a pretty terrifying, unvarnished diagnosis of human nature.
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Yeah, we're not holding back today.
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Not at all. We are looking at the Apostle
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Paul's words in Galatians chapter 5, verses 19 through 21.
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This is the famous passage detailing the works of the
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flesh. We are unpacking what is
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essentially a divine diagnostic scalpel.
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That's a good way to put it. So to you, the listener, if you
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have ever felt that modern discussions of human flaws feel,
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I don't know, too clinical or too polite?
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Like they lack gravity. Yes, lacking gravity.
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If you feel that way, then settle in.
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For this analysis, we are drawing on 2 rigorous
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confessional treatises and these texts.
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They're unyielding in their theological precision.
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They really are. They treat this biblical passage
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not as some abstract theoretical puzzle, but as a severe warning
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see brilliant light shining directly on our absolute moral
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inability without Christ. The authors of our sources
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insist that biblical diagnosis has to start by identifying the
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true disease. You know, before it offers any
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kind of cure. OK, let's unpack this.
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Because to appreciate the cure, we first have to look honestly
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at the disease, right? And to grasp the disease Paul is
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diagnosing here, we need to understand the environment of
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the patients he was writing to. Let's set the scene
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historically. We are looking at a timeline
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around what, 8048 to 49? Spot on.
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Yeah, late 40s. So where are we and what is the
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situation on the ground for these people?
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Well, we are in the Roman province of Galatia,
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specifically the southern region.
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OK, we're looking at churches in cities like the city and
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Antioch, Iconium, Lystra, Derby. Paul planted these specific
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churches during his first missionary.
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Trip and things went bad quickly.
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Oh, incredibly fast. Just a very short time later
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they are in a state of life or death.
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Spiritual crisis. Wow.
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To understand why things degraded so rapidly, you have to
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look at the demographic makeup of these congregations.
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These were primarily Gentiles of Celtic descent.
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Wait, Celtic like Gauls? Yeah, exactly.
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They were Gauls who had migrated from Europe into Asia Minor
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centuries earlier. See, I always find that
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geographical detail fascinating. When we think of the biblical
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world, we tend to think strictly of Mediterranean cultures,
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right? Greeks.
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Romans. Jews.
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Yeah, that's a standard assumption.
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But here we have Celtic tribes right in the middle of modern
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day Turkey. How did their specific cultural
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background influence the crisis in these churches?
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It influenced absolutely everything in Greco Rome
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literature from that era. These Celtic tribes were
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universally noted for, well, volatile temperament.
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Oh, very passionate, highly superstitious minds and extreme
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physical excesses. They were not your quiet Stoic
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philosophers. Definitely not.
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And religiously, they had very recently been rescued by the
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Gospel from some of the darkest Pagan idolatry imaginable.
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They were worshippers within the orgiastic fertility cults of
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Sabel. Ah, the Phrygian Great Mother
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Goddess. Yes, the sources go into
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striking detail about that specific Pagan background.
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And it is honestly starring to read.
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I mean, the worship of Seibel was not a quiet, reflective
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morning gathering. No, it was violent.
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It was chaotic. The text described these
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ecstatic drug induced frenzies, wild ritualistic dancing to
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beating drums, and most shockingly, ritual self
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castration by her most devoted priests.
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Right the golly. Yeah, the golly.
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This was a culture absolutely steeped in blood,
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hypersexuality, and a complete intentional loss of physical
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restraint, like people were expected to lose their minds in
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the worship of the goddess. Which is terrifying.
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That is what these Galatian believers had just walked away
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from. That backdrop is so critical,
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'cause you have baby Christians fresh out of this chaotic,
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unrestrained paganism, they're just learning what it means to
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follow Christ. But now a new, entirely
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different threat has infiltrated their congregations.
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False teachers, commonly known as Judaizers, have arrived from
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Jerusalem. And they had a very specific
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agenda. They did.
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Now, these men were not explicitly denying that Jesus
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was the historical Messiah. The deception was, well, much
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more subtle. It usually.
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Is right. They were telling these new
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Celtic converts that faith in Jesus was simply the preliminary
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step, like a starting point. Just getting your foot in the
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door, yeah. To be truly right with God, to
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be fully justified and accepted into the covenant community, the
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Judaizers insisted these Gentiles needed the physical
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right of circumcision and absolute, rigorous obedience to
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the Mosaic ceremonial system. It is a lethal theological
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shift. Let me let me try an analogy
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here to see if I am grasping the mechanism of what the Judaizers
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were doing. Don't worry, it's like someone
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giving you a completely free, fully paid for house.
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The deed is in your name, the mortgage is gone.
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It is a pure gift. OK, I track with that.
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You move in and start enjoying it, but then a week later a
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neighbor shows up and says you have to pay a daily toll just to
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use the front door. Doesn't adding a requirement
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entirely ruin the nature of the gift?
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Absolutely. If you have to earn your right
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to walk into the house by paying a toll, it is no longer a gift
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at all, right? It's a transaction Your.
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Analogy captures the theological crisis perfectly.
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Adding human effort to divine grace destroys the grace
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altogether. I'll saw this clearly.
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If justification requires our performance alongside Christ's
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sacrifice, then grace is nullified.
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And because of this infiltration, Paul found himself
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fighting a massive war on 2 entirely different fronts.
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Right, because he is caught between two extremes.
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Here, precisely on one side, he had to combat legalism.
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The Judaizers were offering a straitjacket of external
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boundary markers. The system of rules.
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Yes, they were looking at these wild former pagans and promising
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that strict dietary laws, festival observances, and
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circumcision would curb their fleshly appetites.
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They offered behavior modification through rules.
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Which never works. Never.
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And then, on the other side, Paul had to combat libertinism.
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These Gentile believers, hearing Paul preach about Christian
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liberty and freedom from the law, were incredibly tempted to
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use their new liberty as a license.
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A license to return to the sensual Pagan excesses of their
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past. Because they were surrounded by
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a culture of absolute moral chaos, the temptation to slide
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back into it was massive. Paul had to show them that true
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freedom in Christ is neither a legalistic straitjacket nor a
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license for moral anarchy. That dual threat forms the
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entire literary context of the letter.
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The 1st 4 chapters of Galatians are, well, heavily doctrinal.
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Paul spends that time defending his Apostolic authority and
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establishing the absolute bedrock of justification by
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faith alone. He sets up the indicative.
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Right, the objective reality of what Christ has accomplished.
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But then in chapter 5, he pivots to the imperative, how the
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Christian must now actually walk.
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He issues this incredible rallying cry.
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Yeah. Stand fast, therefore, in the
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liberty by which Christ has made us free.
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But immediately after announcing that freedom, he introduces this
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terrifying catalog of human depravity.
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It does. To grasp his logic, we need to
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clarify a crucial term he uses repeatedly.
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When Paul talks about the flesh, is he just talking about our
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physical bodies? Because a surface reading makes
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it sound like he views the physical, material world as
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inherently evil, almost like a Greek philosopher would.
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What's fascinating here is how the sources breakdown the Greek
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vocabulary to dispel that exact misconception.
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OK, lay it out for us. The Greek word Paul uses here is
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sarcs. It emphatically does not mean
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the physical body. OK, when Paul wants to talk
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about the physical body like bones and muscle, he uses a
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completely different word, soma. Soma got it.
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The physical body, the soma, is created by God.
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It is inherently good, and it will be resurrected in glory.
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But sarks, which appears 28 times in this short 6th chapter
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letter, means something much darker.
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So how did the authors define sarks in this context?
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They define it as the fallen, unregenerate human nature that
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we all inherit from Adam. Our sinful nature.
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Yes, it is the active principle of rebellion within us that is
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spiritually dead, utterly hostile to God, and entirely
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incapable of submitting to His moral law.
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The flesh is man turned entirely inward, seeking absolute
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autonomy from the Creator. It is the ego demanding the
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throne. Precisely.
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That distinction changes the entire reading of the text.
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He is not condemning the physical matter at all.
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He's condemning our inherited, corrupted nature.
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And that brings us to the thesis statement of this entire
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passage. Verse 19 starts with this phrase
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Fanara de estin da elgate sarcos, which translates to Now
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the works of the flesh are manifest.
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The Greek syntax the sources point out here is really
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striking. The word fanera, meaning plain,
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clear, public, or obvious, sits at the absolute front of the
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sentence. Why does Paul organize the
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grammar that way? He places it there for maximum
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rhetorical impact. He is screaming to the reader
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that the results of our fallen nature are not hidden.
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They aren't secret. Right.
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They are not subjective. They are blazing like neon
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signs. The authors make a strong point
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about how this single sentence dismantles modern therapeutic
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approaches to human sin. Oh, that's not true.
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Today, society tends to view human flaws as hidden internal
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struggles, vague motives, or complicated psychological
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conditions that require, you know, endless internal auditing
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to even identify. Yes, we use so much clinical
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padding. We say someone has an attachment
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issue or environmental conditioning.
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Like a virus. Yeah, we make the problem sound
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like an invisible virus they caught by accident.
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Paul says the exact opposite. The Flesh operates a highly
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productive, visible public factory.
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A factory. I like that.
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Image You do not have to guess if someone is walking in the
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flesh. The output is empirically
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observable, the sources argue. This reality refutes any
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pragmatic church model that seeks to downplay the outward
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ugly reality of sin to maintain cultural relevance.
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If there is a corrupt route, there will be corrupt visible
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fruit. It cannot be hidden.
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And the vocabulary Paul uses reinforces that chaos.
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He calls them the works of the flesh, using the plural form.
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I love the contrast the sources draw here.
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It's brilliant. The works are fragmented.
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It is a machine spitting out 1000 different destructive
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products, pulling the human soul in a million contradictory
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directions at once. You can be driven by lust one
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minute and raging pride the next.
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Contrast that with what comes a few verses later.
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The fruit of the spirit. Singular, A unified, harmonious,
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integrated character. The flesh shatters a person into
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pieces. The Spirit puts a person back
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together in the image of Christ. That's a great summation.
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So Paul begins to list these fragmented works.
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He gives us 17 specific vices, but as our sources point out,
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this is not just a random brain dump of bad things that popped
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into his head. Not at all.
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It is a deliberate, meticulously structured catalog of total
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depravity. The sources organize Paul's list
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into 4 distinct categories. In the categories, OK.
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This categorization proves mathematically that total
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corruption infects every single domain of human existence.
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Yeah, now it's not that every person commits every sin on the
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list to the maximum possible degree.
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Right, that is a common misunderstanding of total
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depravity. Yeah.
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Rather, it means that no part of human nature escapes the
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infection. Our sexuality, our spirituality,
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our relationships, our bodily appetites, they're all
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compromised. Let us examine the first
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category, sensual and sexual vices.
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Paul lists three Greek words here, pornea, ekatharcia and
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assal Jaya. We need to define those
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carefully. Pornea is the root for our
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modern word pornography. However, in the 1st century
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context, it functioned as a broad, sweeping term
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encompassing any illicit sexual activity outside the biblical
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bounds of marriage between one man and one woman.
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So it covers the physical acts. It covers the physical acts, but
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then Paul moves to Akatharsia which goes deeper.
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Right, because sin never stays just on the physical surface.
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Exactly. Akatharsia translates to moral
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uncleanness or impurity. It moves beyond the physical act
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into the realm of thoughts, desires, and the consumption of
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things that defile the mind. The internal rotting.
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Yes, the internal rotting that precedes the outward action.
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Finally, we reach asalgia, which is translated as licentiousness
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or sensuality. That's a big word.
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What does that look like practically?
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This is a terrifying stage. This is the casting off of all
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moral restraint. It is a public, shameless
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flaunting of sin where a person no longer even cares what others
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think. They have lost the capacity to
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blush. They celebrate to degradation.
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The progression there is chilling.
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It moves from illicit action to internal impurity to public
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shamelessness. It's a downward spiral.
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And the sources take these ancient Greek terms and apply
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them directly to our modern context, utilizing recent
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statistical data. The statistics are sobering.
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They reference studies from the Barna Group and Covenant Eyes,
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which reveal staggering numbers within the modern church.
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According to the data cited in the text, up to 64% of
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professing Christian men and 21% of Christian women admit to
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regularly consuming Internet pornography.
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That data is a perfect illustration of pornea and
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akatharsia manifesting right in the pews today.
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Yeah, the sources use this data to build a heavy critique.
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They argue that the church has tolerated a hidden pandemic of
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sexual immorality because pulpits have refused to preach
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the terrors of the moral law, preferring instead to comfort
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people and their carnality. It shows that human nature has
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not evolved one single inch since the 1st century.
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We look at the Seibel cult with their physical fertility rights
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and think we are so advanced, but we aren't, not at all.
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We have just digitized the Seibel occult.
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We put it on screens in our pockets, isolating the
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individual, bypassing all community accountability and
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creating a constant feedback back loop of fleshly desire.
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The delivery mechanism changed, but the heart condition is
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identical. Spot on.
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Which brings us right into the second category, spiritual and
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occult vices. Paul lists Idolatria and
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Pharmakeia. Let's start with Idolatria.
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Idolatria is idolatry at its core.
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This is worshipping anything other than the Triune God.
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In Galatia, that meant bowing to carve statues in a Pagan temple.
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Very literal idolatry. Yes, in our context, idolatry is
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far more subtle but equally deadly.
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It could be your career, your family, your political
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affiliation, or your own self-image.
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So anything we place ultimate value on.
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Right. Idolatry is elevating any
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created thing above the Creator. It is looking to a finite object
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to provide the security, meaning, and identity that only
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the infinite God can provide. And then there is pharmakeia,
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which is typically translated as sorcery or witchcraft.
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The Greek root is where we get the word pharmacy.
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Now obviously Paul is not condemning modern medicine here.
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So how do the authors explain the mechanism of pharmakeia in
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the ancient world? Well, the sources highlight that
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in extra biblical literature, like the writings of Plutarch
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and Philo, Pharmakeia referred specifically to the mixing of
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drugs, poisons and magical potions to cast spells or
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manipulate spiritual forces. OK, so active manipulation.
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Yes. Think about the psychological
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mechanism behind that. It represents humanity's attempt
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to assert absolute control over their environment and their
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destiny through demonic assistance, rather than
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submitting humbly to the sovereign Providence of God.
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That desire for control is the key, isn't it?
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Submitting to a sovereign God requires giving up the reins of
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your life. It does.
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It requires trust. It requires trusting His will,
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but a magic potion, a spell, or a ritual offers the illusion
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that you can pull the levers of the universe yourself without
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any moral accountability. It's all about autonomy.
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And again, the sources do not let us off the hook by
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pretending this is just ancient superstition that we have
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outgrown. They pull in modern Pew Research
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data showing that over 60% of American young adults believe in
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astrology and psychics. That is modern pharmakeia in
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action. It is the exact same
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psychological and spiritual impulse.
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People are looking to the alignment of the stars, to tarot
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cards, to crystals, or to modern manifesting techniques, trying
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to bypass the Sovereign God to secure power, protection, or
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knowledge about the future. Right, trying to manifest their
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own reality. Exactly.
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We are still mixing the potions, we are just doing it through
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algorithms and social media influencers.
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When Christianity recedes in a culture, people do not become
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purely rational secularists, they become pagans again.
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They do. They return to the spiritual
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works of the flesh. That is a stark realization.
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The human heart abhors a spiritual vacuum.
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Moving to the third category, we encounter the relational and
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social vices. Now, it is highly significant
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that this is the longest list in the entire passage.
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Really is Paul names 8 distinct terms here?
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Play them out for us. All right, we have Ekthrai which
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are enmities or deep seated hatreds, then Irios which is
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discordant strife, Zilloy jealousies, Thumoi outbursts of
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rage. That's for then Arethii selfish
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ambitions or faction maneuvering, Dicostasii
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dissensions, hair size, dogmatic factions and finally Fanoy which
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are envies. Here's where it's really
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interesting When you look at the historical context we set up
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earlier, placing this massive list of relational sins right in
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the middle of a list about orgies and witchcraft is a
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brilliant rhetorical trap. Oh, it is a devastating pastoral
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maneuver. Think about the Judaizers
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listening to this letter being read aloud in the Galatian
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congregations. When Paul started listing sexual
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sins and sorcery, the legalists were probably nodding along
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enthusiastically. Oh definitely, they prided
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themselves on avoiding Pagan parties.
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Right. They kept the kosher laws, they
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observed the Sabbaths, they thought they were the holy ones
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in the room. But by putting things like
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factions, strife and jealousies in the exact same list, Paul
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holds a brutal mirror up to their faces.
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He traps some complete. The legalists were tearing the
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church apart with bitter theological brawling.
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They were creating an in Group and an out group based on
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circumcision. Paul is telling them your
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self-righteous division proves you are operating in the flesh
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just as much as the Pagan participating in the fertility
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cult. The flesh burns with lust, yes,
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but it also burns with intense religious pride.
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And the sources point out how those specific relational sins
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build on each other. It starts internally with
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ekthrai, that deep seated enmity or resentment.
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The root of bitterness. Yes.
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Then it moves outward into Erischris, which is active
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strife and bickering. It is fueled by Zeloy, the
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jealousy of wanting the status someone else has.
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Yeah, that boils over into Thumoi, those sudden volcanic
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outbursts of anger. Then people start forming
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political camps within the church, which is erythii selfish
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ambition. And the mechanism of legalism
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naturally produces that factionalism.
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How so? Well, if you're standing before
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God is based on your performance, you constantly have
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to compare your performance to others.
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You have to find someone doing worse than you to feel secure.
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Oh, that makes total sense. That inevitably breeds hair
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size, which are dogmatic factions.
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The sources point out that a church can rigidly condemn
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sexual immorality while entirely tolerating slander, theological
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tribalism and bitter pastoral rivalry.
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We see that all the time. But Paul refuses to allow that
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hypocrisy. He gathers the highly
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respectable religious sins and the scandalous gutter sins and
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puts them under the exact same heading of total depravity.
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It is a massive leveling of human pride which leads us to
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the 4th and final category in temperate and bodily vices.
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Here we have menai, which is drunkenness, and conmoy, which
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refers to revelries or riotous feasting.
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The complete loss of self-control through
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intoxication. Yeah.
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And then Paul tacks on this phrase at the end and things
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like these. He makes it clear that he is not
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providing an exhaustive, comprehensive legal code.
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Right, it's a representative list.
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If your behavior shares the moral DNA of anything on this
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list, it belongs in this category.
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He paints A comprehensive picture of human ruin, and then,
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having diagnosed the disease, he delivers the climax of the
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passage. Yes, it is a grammatically
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structured warning designed to shake the foundations of anyone
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listening, he writes. Of which I tell you beforehand,
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just as I also told you in time past that those who practice
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such things will not inherit the Kingdom of God.
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This is the solemn threat, and honestly, it is terrifying.
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Will not inherit the Kingdom of. God, it stops you in your
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tracks. To you listening, you might hear
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this and immediately feel a spike of panic.
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I know I do when I examine my own heart against this list.
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You might be asking if I struggle with one of these sins,
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if I lose my temper tomorrow and exhibit toumoy, or if I stumble
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into envy, am I instantly excluded from the Kingdom?
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It sounds like a works righteousness system.
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Right, it sounds like like we are earning our salvation by our
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perfect behavior, and if we slip up once, we lose our eternal
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security. That visceral reaction is
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precisely why a meticulous understanding of the Greek
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grammar here is an absolute necessity.
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Please give us the grammar. The sources provide incredible
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comfort and clarity on this specific point.
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In Greek, there is a distinct difference between the verb
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puyeo, which can refer to a single isolated action or a
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stumble. Like a one time failure.
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Yes, and the word Paul actually uses here, which is prasantes.
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Breakdown prasantes for us. How does it function?
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Well, cosantes is a substantable present active participle.
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OK translation for the non Greek scholars.
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In the Greek language that denotes A habitual, continuous
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characteristic practice of a lifestyle.
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He is talking about the settled, dependent, ongoing trajectory of
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a person's life. He is describing someone who
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produces these works as the normal course of their
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existence. So he is not talking about the
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believer who falls, is absolutely crushed by the way to
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their sin, repents with bitter tears, and desperately flees
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back to the cross for cleansing. No, not at all.
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He is talking about the person who sets up camp in the mud,
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calls it home and refuses to leave.
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If we connect this to the bigger picture, we see the heavy
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theological stakes involved. The sources firmly reject the
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Armenian error, which suggests a true believer can lose their
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justification based on a momentary stumble or a season of
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struggle. Right, because that view
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completely ignores the clear biblical doctrine of the
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preservation of the Saints. God does not abandon His
22:40
justified children. However, the sources are equally
22:44
fierce in pointing out the opposite error, which is they
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state that someone who lives in continuous, unrepentant practice
22:51
of these sins has absolutely no biblical right to claim
22:54
assurance of salvation. This totally crushes the modern
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notion of easy believism or antinomianism.
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It really does. The idea that you can walk down
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an aisle, pray a simple prayer, claim Jesus as your Savior, and
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then go on peacefully serving the flesh as your actual master.
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Grace is not a permission slip for ongoing rebellion.
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Not even close. If your life is characterized by
23:13
the habitual practice of the flesh, your verbal profession of
23:17
faith is empty. The works you produce prove the
23:20
true state of your root. The sources frame this as an
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eschatological issue. Explain that a bit.
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The Kingdom of God has broken into history through the person
23:28
of Christ, but its final inheritance awaits the end of
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the age. Those who practice the works of
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the flesh demonstrate empirically that they remain
23:39
under the dominion of the present evil age.
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Regardless of what religious vocabulary they use on Sunday
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morning. Exactly the moral law of God,
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acting through this specific list of vices, perfectly
23:51
diagnosis their terminal condition.
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The law is doing its job. Which brings me to an analogy
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that helps clarify how the law actually functions in this
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context. Let's hear it.
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The moral law of God is like a perfect, flawless mirror.
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When you stand in front of it, it shows you exactly how much
24:07
dirt is on your face. It exposes everything.
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It exposes every blemish, every flaw, every speck of the carnal
24:13
nature. It does not lie.
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But you cannot take the mirror off the wall and use it to wash
24:18
your face. The mirror has absolutely no
24:20
cleansing epiphany. Right.
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It can only condemn you by showing you the objective truth
24:24
of your condition. Building on that analogy, the
24:26
sources demonstrate the utter bankruptcy of human nature.
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The Judaizers in Galatia honestly believe they could
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conquer the flesh by placing themselves under the yoke of the
24:36
Law. They thought, staring at the
24:37
mirror harder. Or perhaps making the mirror
24:40
shinier by adding more rules could somehow clean them?
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Paul exposes this as a spiritual impossibility.
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He does. The law catalogs our sins, it
24:51
declares our guilt, but it cannot change the human heart.
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It offers no power to obey its own demands.
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So to escape the condemnation of this list, we need an
25:00
intervention from outside ourselves.
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We need the Christ connection. And this is where the despair
25:05
turns to incredible hope. We need the double remedy that
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Christ provides. The sources break this down
25:10
meticulously into the passive and active obedience of Christ.
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This is a crucial distinction in reformed theology.
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Let us start with the passive obedience.
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How does Jesus handle the immense guilt of all these
25:20
horrific sin that we just listed?
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The sources direct us straight to Galatians 3.13 where Paul
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declares that Christ became a curse for us on the cross.
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Jesus Christ stood as the willing substitute for His
25:32
people. He bore the infinite crushing
25:35
wrath of God that was rightfully due to us for our pornea, our
25:39
pharmakeia, our heiress, our factions, and our drunkenness.
25:43
Every single one of them. The justice of God was entirely
25:46
satisfied by Christ's suffering. He absorbed the penalty of the
25:49
fleshly works we produced. His obedience is called passive,
25:53
not because he was inactive, but because he submitted to
25:56
suffering the penalty of the law on our behalf.
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He wiped the slate clean by paying the debt with his own
26:01
blood. Every ounce of wrath we deserve
26:03
for our jealousy and strife was poured out on him.
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But He did not just leave us with a blank slate because that
26:09
would only bring us back to zero.
26:10
That is where His active obedience comes in.
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Yes. Jesus lived the perfect life
26:14
that we could never live. He produced the perfect fruit of
26:17
the Spirit every single second of His earthly existence.
26:20
He loved God perfectly and loved his neighbor perfectly and
26:23
through faith alone. That perfect record, his active
26:27
obedience, his imputed righteousness, is legally
26:30
credited to our account. So we are not accepted by God
26:33
because we finally stopped doing the works of the flesh.
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Right. We are accepted because Christ's
26:38
perfect righteousness covers us like a garment.
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That deals with the guilt and our legal standing in the
26:43
courtroom of God. But what about the ongoing daily
26:47
power of sin in our lives? Because we still wake up every
26:50
day fighting these desires. Exactly how does the work of
26:54
Christ address our daily reality?
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The sources point to Galatians 5.24 to answer this, Paul
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writes, and those who belong to Christ have crucified the flesh
27:04
with its passions and desires. That is a stunning theological
27:08
reality. It really is.
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This crucifixion is positional. It was accomplished once for all
27:13
at the cross. When believers were federally
27:15
united to Christ the dominion, the ruling power of sin was
27:20
permanently broken. But the sources are quick to
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clarify that it is also progressive.
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They are right because we still have the remnants of the flesh
27:27
hanging around. We still have the old corrupted
27:29
desires trying to pull us back into the mud.
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Yeah, the mortification of sin. So the progressive aspect is the
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daily grinding work of mortifying the flesh, putting it
27:40
to death by the power of the Holy Spirit.
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Right. Jesus does not rescue us from
27:44
the penalty of sin just to leave us wallowing helplessly under
27:48
its power. He grants us the Holy Spirit who
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regenerates our will and empowers us to actually fight
27:53
the flesh. We are no longer slaves to it,
27:56
We have the spiritual weaponry to defeat it.
27:58
This robust theology mandates a highly specific application for
28:03
the modern Church, which our sources do not shy away from at
28:06
all. Let's dig into that application.
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They insist that we must use this text first and foremost as
28:12
a diagnostic test for our own souls.
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We must examine ourselves ruthlessly.
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Ruthlessly. Are we hiding behind a
28:17
respectable, polite exterior while internally cultivating
28:21
bitter entities, selfish ambitions, or jealousies within
28:23
our local church or our family? Because if we are, we are
28:27
walking in the flesh. And we stand under the exact
28:29
same biblical warning as the scandalous Sinner we so easily
28:32
condemn. The application in the the
28:34
sources gets incredibly sharp here regarding modern
28:37
sociological frameworks. Now I need to make something
28:40
crystal clear to you, the listener, before we detail this
28:43
next part. A quick disclaimer.
28:45
We are bringing up some highly charged modern political and
28:49
sociological frameworks because they are central to the argument
28:52
our source material makes. We are not endorsing any
28:55
political viewpoints here, left wing or right wing.
28:58
We are just impartially reporting on the texts provided.
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Right conveying the ideas contained in the original
29:04
treatises. With that said, the treatises
29:07
explicitly reject modern liberal theology and critical race
29:10
theory. They do.
29:12
They note that these modern frameworks attempt to define
29:14
human division, strife and sin primarily in Marxist structural
29:19
and systemic terms. OK.
29:20
So focusing on systems rather than the individual heart.
29:23
Correct. The sources argue that viewing
29:25
human division primarily through those secular sociological
29:28
lenses bypasses the biblical diagnosis entirely.
29:32
Because the biblical view as laid out in Galatians traces all
29:36
division, all enmities, and all factions directly to personal
29:40
depravity and heart level rebellion against God.
29:43
Spot on. The authors argue that if you
29:45
misdiagnosed the disease as merely systemic or structural,
29:49
you will apply the wrong cure. Which makes sense logically.
29:52
They assert that since the root cause of our division is the
29:55
unregenerate human heart, the only valid solution is the
29:59
supernatural regeneration of the Holy Spirit, not secular social
30:03
justice initiatives or political restructuring.
30:06
They maintain that true, lasting reconciliation can only happen
30:10
when individuals are given new hearts by God.
30:12
It all comes back to the necessity of the new birth.
30:14
And once we are given those new hearts, what is our relationship
30:17
to the law if we are not saved by keeping the rules?
30:20
And if the law cannot cleanse us, do we just throw the law
30:23
away? Absolutely not.
30:25
The sources bring in what is known as the third use of the
30:27
law, referencing the Westminster Confession of Faith.
30:30
Explain the three uses briefly. Well, the first use of the law
30:33
restrains sin in society, and the second use drives us to
30:36
Christ by exposing our guilt. The Mirror.
30:38
Yes, the mirror, but the third use is for the believer.
30:42
The law no longer condemns the justified believer, but we must
30:46
actively utilize it as a sweet guide for living.
30:50
A sweet guide. I like that phrasing.
30:52
It shows us what pleases the Father who saved us.
30:54
We obey the moral law out of deep gratitude for the grace we
30:58
have received, not to earn our salvation, resting our entire
31:02
hope on God's sovereign preservation.
31:04
So what does this all mean? It means the X-ray is fixed, the
31:08
diagnosis is severe, and the medicine is lethal to our pride.
31:12
We are worse off than we ever dared to admit, but in Christ we
31:15
are more secure than we ever dared to hope.
31:18
That's beautifully said. True love from the pulpit does
31:20
not coddle sin. It does not use therapeutic
31:23
language to make people feel comfortable in their carnality.
31:26
True love warns the Sinner to flee from the wrath to come.
31:29
It sounds the alarm loudly, but it does so only to point the
31:32
desperate, broken Sinner directly to the cross.
31:35
It is a heavy reality, but a necessary one.
31:38
I want to leave you, the listener, with a final thought
31:40
to Mull over. What if the most dangerous works
31:43
of the flesh in your life aren't the glaring, scandalous excesses
31:47
that everyone loudly condemns? What if they are the quiet,
31:51
respectable relational sins like envy, strife and party spirit
31:55
that you secretly excuse as righteous seal?
31:59
It is a sobering question to examine our hearts with, but we
32:02
do not leave you without hope. Never.
32:05
The apostle Paul, who penned this terrifying list of the
32:08
works of the flesh, also wrote these sweet, magnificent words
32:11
to another broken church in First Christians 6.11.
32:15
He said, And such were some of you, but you were washed, but
32:18
you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of
32:20
the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God.
32:22
Such were some of you. What a promise.
32:24
Thank you for joining us for this deep dive on reformed
32:27
thinking.