One time or another we all fall into the trap of sin – some of us more often than others – and then we struggle to get over it. I don’t know whether it is because we struggle to forgive ourselves or whether we’re simply disappointed, but it remains difficult to get rid of that piece of sin. Like a heavy piece of baggage that we’re dragging along. It breaks our stride. It breaks our self-confidence. It damages our usefulness to God.

I get many e-mails from people saying that God cannot use them, because there’s a heap of sin in their way. How can God ever use such a sinful person? I’m too dirty to open my mouth to convey God’s pure message of salvation. And therefore I keep quiet.

I suspect that people who struggle with this are still caught up in the law of God. I remember when I was a child the Ten Commandments were still read in church every Sunday. And if my dad read the shorter version in Matthew 22, some people in the congregation would get really upset, because that was not God’s law. We must be confronted with the law every Sunday. And that is exactly what it was, a confrontation with the law. A fight in which you repeatedly had to be reminded of your inability to live a pure life before God.

How short-sighted we are to permit the law to punish us, because that is not what God had in mind. God doesn’t want us to start with the law. Yes, God’s intention is that we eventually get to the law, but we should get there through Christ. Christ puts the law of God in another light. Christ takes the sting from the law. On its own the law cannot help us with salvation and absolution. On the contrary – it simply makes us feel guilty and as a result we’re not available to be used in God’s work. And that is why people sometimes say that they are too sinful to do something for God.

Our obedience to the law cannot liberate us from sin.

16 We know very well that we are not set right with God by rule-keeping but only through personal faith in Jesus Christ. How do we know? We tried it—and we had the best system of rules the world has ever seen! Convinced that no human being can please God by self-improvement, we believed in Jesus as the Messiah so that we might be set right before God by trusting in the Messiah, not by trying to be good.

Talking about liberation and salvation, I would dare to make the following comparison between the salvation offered by Jesus and the law:

The law writes up your sin. Jesus writes off your sin.

The law ties up. Christ unties.

The law puts up borders. Christ breaks down borders.

The law builds high walls – some too high to get over. Christ breaks down walls.

The law locks doors. Christ opens doors and throws the locks away.

Has the law become redundant? No! We still need the law of God, because it guides us on the way we should go. And when we look at the law for directions from God, it will go well with us. And that is the intention of God’s heart with the law.

We simply have to look at it through Jesus, because Jesus takes the stick, the hiding, the punishment form it. When I understand that punishment is no longer part of the picture, I’m no longer afraid of the law. Then it becomes my mentor, my friend who walks with me hand in hand and helps me stay on the good road.

Jesus is the only door through which we can reach God. The door is open. Let’s take hands and go through. It’s the only place where we can leave our sin behind. Then we can hop, skip and jump again, because we’ll be free of sin. And then we can help others. Others who may be struggling with the package of sin just like us.

Galatians 2:15-21

Reflection

Do you know that nothing you do can buy you a place in heaven?

Do you accept the salvation that Jesus offers you?

Go and live it!

Prayer

Our Father who is in heaven, thank you that You didn’t stay there. Thank you that your Son came to earth to die for our sin. Thank you that your Spirit is in each of us. Thank you that we can be free. Please help us to live in such a way that sin cannot break our stride. Please help us to help others to leave the package of sin outside the door to heaven that Jesus’ death opened for us. Amen