As we prepare for our sermon, I'd like you to turn to Paul's letter to the Galatians. We're gonna look at Galatians 5.16 to 6.5. And we're gonna focus our attention really on Galatians 6. one and two, Galatians six, one and two. And I'm gonna, after I finish this reading, I'm gonna read a few verses from the end of James, James chapter five, which are related to this passage. Hear the word of our God. Paul, writing to the Galatians, says this. Chapter five, verse 16, but I say, walk by the spirit and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the desires of the flesh are against the spirit, and the desires of the spirit are against the flesh. For these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do. But if you are led by the spirit, you are not under the law. Now the works of the flesh are evident. Sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such things there is no law. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit. Let us not become conceited, provoking, provoking one another, envying one another. Brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. Keep watch on yourselves lest you too be tempted. Here's one of those one another passages. Bear one another's burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ. For if anyone thinks he is something when he is nothing, he deceives himself. But let each one test his own work and then his reason to boast will be in himself alone and not in his neighbor. For each will have to bear his own load. And just very briefly from the end of James, chapter five, James writes, my brothers, if anyone among you wanders from the truth and someone brings him back, let him know that whoever brings back a sinner from his wandering will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins. The grass withers and the flowers fade, but the word of the Lord endures forever. Please turn back to Galatians. chapter six, looking at verses one and two as the focus of our sermon. Again, this is part of the series we've been doing for the last several weeks on the one and other passages in the Bible, teaching us what are the expectations that Christ and the apostles had for the church as a community of believers in Christ. Let me begin by asking you this question. What do you think about the author of this letter, the apostle Paul? What kind of springs to mind in terms of your thoughts about this particular man? Some of you, no doubt, will think of him as a great Christian leader, a model pastor or elder. Others of you may be particularly drawn and attracted to his zealous evangelistic efforts and his work as a church planter, turning the world upside down. It's really phenomenal if you chart his labors as an apostle from his conversion to his death. Did some remarkable, remarkable things. Others of you may think of Paul as a very holy man, a man who was committed to shaping all of his actions around the law of Christ. That's good, and many of those things are correct, but what did Paul think of himself? What did Paul, how did he judge himself Well, interesting, in 1 Timothy, he's writing a letter to one of his fellow pastors who he is training and teaching, and he calls himself in the opening chapter of 1 Timothy, the foremost or the chief of sinners. That's how he looked at himself. Not this great church planner. Not this great holy apostle. Not this extraordinary leader. But he did what he actually wrote about. He thought of himself below you. I'm the chief of sinners, the foremost of sinners. He gives a list of some of the things that he did which caused him to think this way about himself. He says that he blasphemed Christ. He persecuted Christians. He was an insolent man, a very proud, judgmental, critical type of guy. Ever been around Christians like that? That's how Paul describes himself. In Acts 26, when he is giving a little bit of the history of his conversion, he says that he was from the strictest party of the Jewish people. Faith. He knew the law. He could probably quote out of the Hebrew tongue large sections of the Old Testament by memory, not needing to open his Bible and follow along, just having it right there in his own mind, because they were trained to do that. He didn't associate with sinners. His sin Maybe his chief sin was his pride and his arrogance and his critical spirit. He thought he knew the will of God better than those Christians out there. But in fact, he didn't even know who the son of God was, Jesus Christ. But he experienced the joy of grace. He experienced a God who came to him, and instead of condemning him, took his sins off of his back, placed them on the Son, on Christ, and allowed Christ to carry them to the cross. His experience of grace radically shaped his character. And what he's asking us, and what we've been seeing for several weeks now, is the same thing. How does the gospel change the way you act towards one another? God has been merciful, gracious, kind to you. And he expects you to be merciful, gracious, and kind to the people sitting around you. The experience of grace in Paul's life is seared into his very being. It shapes his character. And we're gonna see more of this type of reasoning, this gospel reasoning, in our sermon today. Two points that I wanna make. First, we're gonna see how Christians are often falling out of line. That's our first point. Falling out of line, and then second, restoring your fellow Christian. Falling out of line, restoring your fellow Christian. Now there's a tendency with the theme that we've been preaching on to, with its emphasis on bearing with each other, forgiving each other, there's a tendency to abuse this teaching and use it to promote unholy living. Paul never does that. And I wanna start with that point. Paul has a high view of holiness. Look at verse 16 again, chapter five. But I say, walk by the Spirit and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. This is his general expectation for the Christian. He speaks about the desires of the flesh, he gives us a list of all of them and he says we're not to do those things. We're to resist them, we're to engage in a holy spiritual battle against the desires, the sinful desires that remain in us. Instead we're to walk in the spirit. He wants the people of God to be more like Christ. Tremendous gospel blessings of forgiveness, which really, it's staggering. We don't really understand it as much as we think we do. All of your sins, even the ones you don't even know you committed, Jesus Christ has wiped them out. They are off the record of God you have been totally and completely Exonerated before the tribunal of the triune God Do you really believe that I don't think we do I But it's true. That's the message of the gospel. Paul, you persecuted Christians, and God is going to cleanse your record of that. You killed deacons. Cleanse your record of that. You were a proud, arrogant jerk of a man who thought you knew more than God, and he pardoned you. That's up. Powerful message and we as Christians sometimes get scared with that message who if we tell people that then that's just gonna make them want to sin more No It's the truth When you look at Paul in Romans chapter six, he's dealing with this dilemma when he tells the Jews and the Gentiles of the mercy of God in justifying sinners. Apart from their works, we're accepted by God in the beloved, Not by anything we've done, but by Christ alone. In Romans 6.1, Paul says, what shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? Let's sin more so that God is glorified in his mercy more and more. Paul says no. No, because in the saving work of Christ, not only does he act as a substitute in your place before the judgment of God, He also unites you with himself and you are a new creature in Christ. So you cannot be born of the Spirit of God, united to Christ, without somehow reflecting the character of God. Not perfectly, none of us are perfectly holy, but we are holy to some degree. Our call to love one another, to bear with each other's sins, to forgive one another, doesn't create a more worldly lifestyle. Now in fact, if it's done correctly, it promotes godly living. Jesus was very engaging with people that you and I don't rub shoulders with much. The low of the lows in his time. You remember the stories about Jesus hanging out with sinners, the tax collectors, the prostitutes. And he would show compassion and mercy to them, but after he did that, what would he say to them often? Don't worry about it, I got your back. Now he would say, you've received the mercy of Christ, sin no more. Sin no more. Christ never promoted unholy living. So we see a high view of holiness in what Paul's writing. But we see something else, a realistic view of sin. And we gotta have both of these working together in our theology, in our understanding of things. Oftentimes, when we get too high of a view of holiness, too high of expectations, we create a church environment that is crushing and that lacks gospel grace. Paul despises that type of characteristic within a church. He has a realistic view of sin. He sets the ideal before us, but we don't live in an ideal world. The fact is that although we want the perfection of holiness, we find ourselves enticed by the flesh to sin. Paul says it here, verse 17, for the desires of the flesh are against the spirit. And he's talking about every single person sitting here. You've got fleshly desires, and if you're born again, you also have the spirit. The desires of the flesh are against the spirit, the desires of the spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other to keep you from doing the things you want to do. Anybody ever experience this? You really, genuinely want to do what pleases God. And you don't. That's a struggle. Creates a lot of shame. guilt Within your own soul and the devil loves to feed on that He loves to feed on that We can never confuse the doctrine of sanctification with the doctrine of glorification. Sanctification is what Paul's talking about. There's flesh in you, there's spirit in you, the two things are combating each other in an internal spiritual battle that we feel Sometimes you are overcome by the flesh, other times you walk in the spirit. The ideal is for you to continue to walk in the spirit more and more and more, putting to death the flesh. Never get that state that you're in until Christ returns confused with the Christian teaching of glorification, of perfection. That happens later. When Christ comes to restore all things, this battle is over. But until that time, Christians will sin. Look at what he says in verse six, brothers. He is talking to the church, people who he considers as brothers together with him, equals with him in the family of God. He's not talking to people of the world here. Brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. All-inclusive language here. Paul looks at the believers and he says, if any of you, because you know what? Every single one of you has the potential to fall away. So if any of you, pastors, elders, you're not above this, Paul's not above this, deacons, Sunday school teachers, new believers, mature believers, anyone, anyone, Paul says, can fall into sin. Well, we may think a bad thought about somebody. You know? Yeah, there's some sins that we have a potential to fall in. No, that's not what Paul says. If anyone falls into any sin, you have a potential without fighting against your flesh, without the Spirit of God, anyone in this room has a potential to fall into any sin. That's a sobering thought. and it should humble us and make us cry out together with Jesus in his Lord's prayer, lead us not into temptation. And I think this understanding is going to be very much fundamental to getting what Paul is saying here. Now what does it mean to transgress? If anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. Transgression is falling out of line. Okay, that's kind of what the term means. If you look at verse 16 and verse 25 with me real quick, Paul says, but I say walk by the Spirit. And then in verse 25, if we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit. It's a picture of walking under the guidance of the Spirit. Now it's football season, isn't it? And what do we see at halftime in football games? The marching bands going out. When I was in high school, we used to have these band competitions. And your band was graded on how well you could stay on your line as you're marching in these different configurations. Go watch the Corps of Cadets band for Texas A&M. They keep their lines straight. If you fall out of line, if you're a step off, half a step off, it goes against your grade in these competitions. Think of cheerleaders. We've got some cheerleaders in the congregation. You're doing your cheer. What if you're half a second off of everybody else? Their right arm's going up now and you've still got your left arm up. Everybody in the crowd sees that you're walking out of step with everyone else. Here we are, a Christian community, walking in step with the Spirit, and one of us gets out of step. Transgression, transgression. Falls out of line with the Spirit. At times, it happens. What do we do when a fellow Christian falls out of line, doesn't walk by the Holy Spirit? Well, that brings us to our second point, restoring your fellow Christian. How do we handle a brother or a sister caught in sin, falling in transgression? Are we shocked? I can't believe. that he or she allowed such a thing to happen. Disgraceful. Do we condemn? Always knew there was something about person X that didn't seem right. I always doubted that they were true Christians and now I know. Because we all know Christians never sin, right? It's ridiculous. Think of how that type of spirit must so anger our God. Does it make us secretly feel superior? More spiritual? Maybe someone from another church falls into sin. Huh, we knew it, those Baptists. Doesn't happen to us. That kind of spirit exists. And it may be a particular weakness of us as reformed Presbyterians, I'm not saying it's different from all, but that happens. If only they were more spiritually disciplined, such things wouldn't happen. I want us to think a little bit about this idea of spirituality. We tend to look at people who give the appearance of having their life all together as more spiritual. Think of the stereotypical, I hate to use this word, but it's the only one I can think of that you will relate to, but kind of a stereotypical fundamentalist. We don't drink or smoke, even though the Bible It doesn't condemn those two things. We don't drink or smoke. We don't watch R-rated movies. We have a solid commitment and knowledge of Bible and theology. We have an appearance of godliness. I think when you're around these people, what's the fragrance that they often cast off in their spiritual attitudes? Pride. arrogance, a critical, harshly critical spirit over minor things. Now we can see somebody getting upset when a Christian is denying the Trinity or denying the gospel, that's fine. But there are little things within the Christian community that people will fight tooth and nail over instead of showing grace and love. What does Paul view as spiritual? Who does Paul see as led by the Spirit? Well, look at this. It's a complete opposite of that person I just described. That person was Paul, because that's really a lot of the characteristics of the Pharisees. Brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual, should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. Who is spiritual? The one who takes a brother or a sister in sin and gently brings them back into step with the Holy Spirit. That's a spiritual person. Look at verses 22 and 25 in chapter five. Paul talks about the flesh and all those things we're to put away, but listen to what he says about the fruit of the Spirit. Think about this, ask yourself, is this characterizing you more and more? What is the fruit of the Spirit? The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such things there is no law. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, we've been referring to him quite a bit, says this, only he who lives by the forgiveness of his sins, his sin, and Jesus Christ, will rightly think little of himself. If you really apply the gospel to yourself, it creates a humbleness in your dealings with other people. The Holy Spirit teaches us to be like Christ in our dealings with one another. And the goal of all of this is restoration. Paul says, brothers, if anyone is caught in transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him. Restoration in a spirit of gentleness. Love is not meant, this kindness, this gentleness, isn't meant to say, oh, well, do what you wanna do, we don't care. No, but it's the approach we take to getting someone back on track in their lives with Christ. I think we can take a valuable lesson from parenting, and particularly my parenting. Heavy-handed, relentless, stifling discipline is far less effective than grace and gentleness when molding a child's character. Making sure that every particular misstep that they make is severely chastised is actually doing more harm than showing grace to them. In my family, I'm constantly learning from my wife. I tend to be law, she tends to be gospel in our relationship. And even this week, dealing with a certain situation, I was bringing the law to how I was gonna handle it. And thankfully, for my particular child's sake, she introduced me to gospel. And that's important in how we parent. It's the same in the church. If you desire to follow Christ and you fall away, you fall into some sin, What do you think is going to draw you back most effectively? If you're repentant, now we're not talking about someone who is hardened, where you have to exercise discipline and excommunicate them, that's one thing, but if you're broken by it, it's when your church community comes, wraps their arms around you, and reminds you of the love of Christ. Paul talks about bearing one another in the next verse. Bear one another's burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ. Paul's saying this in the context of a fallen brother or sister. Now think for a minute, if you, this happens all the time, but if you see a spouse, a parent, a friend, coming in after shopping at the grocery store. You know, my thing is, let's see how many gallons of milk I can hold in one hand and still hold a couple of baskets, so let's get this over with quickly, and my finger's about to fall off, and you're kind of hitting your head against the door, hoping somebody will come open it for you. You know that? You've probably been there, carrying a bunch of groceries, and someone sees you, The response, the gracious response is for them to come and to unburden you, to carry the burdens for you, to take them off of your hands and to open the door and help you get in. Now how do we do that with a brother or sister in sin? They're carrying the weight of guilt and shame and anger. You ever been that way where you love God and you are so mad at yourself for sinning? Let me tell you how you carry that burden. You come to that person and you help them because the devil's got them in a vulnerable position where he's saying, look at yourself. You call yourself a Christian. You come to that brother or sister and you grab that burden of sin and you take it where it's meant to be taken. You load it on the back of Christ for them. You remind them that that's who they are, they're Christians. They've come to Christ because this is how he is. You take the burden, you help them offload the burden onto someone who can carry it, Jesus Christ. Because you know, when you fall into sin, you get a very clouded, view of the gospel. You soon forget because you're overwhelmed by shame and guilt and anger at yourself. And then the devil seizes that. You need a brother or sister to take the burden and to remind you to put it on Christ. Would you like to be a member of a church like that? I would. Let's pray. Our Lord and our God, we come before you and we pray that you would grip our hearts with the truth of the gospel and what you've done for us and help us to learn to apply those same gracious, merciful standards to others in the church. And Father, what we'll see is not an increase in sin, but a decrease. What we'll see is a church moving towards the goal, a church walking in line as we help each other, but in a right spirit. Oh Lord, teach us to be the people you would have us to be. Grant us the fruit of the Spirit. We pray in His name. Amen.