You may notice the theme today. I should have just said to my cousin in Knoxville who sent me a text last night. He said, what's your sermon topic for tomorrow? So I sent him the text and the outline. I should have just told him Christ because we sang the 110th Psalm. about our victorious Christ. We sang that song from the little hymn book about him. And we will conclude singing about Christ because Christ is so sadly neglected in so many ways. So we are coming toward the close of our study in Galatians. It looks like we have about three more messages after today from Galatians chapter 6. And we will begin our reading today at verse 11, if you would look there please. Galatians chapter 6 and verse 11. Let us hear God's precious Word. You see how large a letter I have written unto you with mine own hand. As many as desire to make a fair show in the flesh, they constrain you to be circumcised, only lest they should suffer persecution for the cross of Christ. For neither they themselves who are circumcised keep the law, but desire to have you circumcised, that they may glory in your flesh. But God forbid that I should glory or boast in anything, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision but a new creature. Amen. We end our reading right there at the close of verse 15. May the Lord bless this brief reading of His Holy Word. May the Spirit of God give us enabling. May He give enabling to the preacher to preach and to each of us to hear, including the preacher. Our verse is verse 15. Out of the gross darkness that vain men had heaped around the pure gospel, suddenly there burst forth the light and glory of the Protestant Reformation. The precious Word of God that had been hidden and kept back from the people was made accessible to them once more. It was exactly as our Lord Jesus Christ said, you shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free. When the shackle of spiritual darkness and ignorance came off, so did the darkness of personal and political slavery come off. We celebrate every year with our brethren around the globe the wonderful deliverance that came from the Lord to His church through the Reformation. And what the Reformers saw in our scripture text, verse 15, is today just as necessary to declare as it was 500 years ago. So coming to verse 15, For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth anything, nor incircumcision, but a new creature. Here, first of all, is salvation in Christ. Secondly, stopping the ceremonies. And third, second time creation. So here are the points. And we begin where we should begin and where we should end with Christ. Salvation in Christ. Notice those four words at the beginning of verse 15. For in Christ Jesus. Those beautiful words, for in Christ Jesus is salvation. Being in Christ is being in the fold of the One Shepherd. Being in Christ is being in the cleft of the rock, in the refuge of the soul, in the place of eternal safety and eternal rest. In Him, is all power in heaven and in earth. In Christ the Father is well pleased. In Him shall the Gentiles trust, the prophet said. In memory of Him is the Holy Supper, and in Him I put my trust. Where is your trust this morning? Where is your reliance? On what do you depend for your safety in this world as well as in the world to come? I also ask, who would dare to temper with these four beautiful words, for in Christ Jesus, So seeing that they've been tempered with, I was literally shocked with unbelief by the present day Bible commentators on this verse. All of the present day Bible commentators that I read on this verse leave out the first four words. That's very serious. And why are they missing? Well, they're missing from the most modern Bibles. Most of the modern Bibles, the ESV, English Standard Version, the New American Standard, the New International Version, the list goes on and on and on. Why are they left out of these? because Westcott and Hort left them out. And I cannot understand for the life of me why Westcott and Hort left them out, but I will say why I think. There are five favorite, what Westcott and Hort called the most reliable, most ancient manuscripts. Well, out of those five of their favorites, Four of them have this verse in them. But their number one most favorite of them all, Sinaiticus, has it boldly right there in it. So why did they leave it out? There's no problem. Westcott and Hort to leave it out. from the New Testament, for they leave it out 43 times. It is no problem for them to leave out the name Jesus because they leave it out 78 times. It is no problem for them to combine with that the name Lord that goes on Jesus Christ, for they leave all that out 157 times out of the New Testament. It grieves my soul. John the Beloved wrote around 90 A.D. in his first letter, chapter 2, verse 18, there are many antichrists even now. That is literally those that are against Christ, hating his deity, his Godhead, proto-Aryans, proto-Unitarians. And I will not absolve Westcott and Hort of either of those titles. Oh, these precious words for in Christ Jesus. And in Him alone, we have life and hope and salvation. And in spite of all the Christ haters in the world, we see first of all, salvation in Christ. Not only in four of their five most ancient manuscripts, they say, but also in the rest. Okay. Secondly, let's notice the verse says, neither circumcision availeth anything nor uncircumcision. Neither circumcision or uncircumcision, neither of them are to be used as a tool of mockery or slavery between professing believers. The verb that is created here, neither availeth, neither nor availeth, means totally without power, without strength, without might, useless, worthless, meaningless. Circumcision as well as uncircumcision are nothing, the Lord says. John Calvin's words are just as applicable today as they were 440 years ago. Calvin wrote, the principles laid down in all of Paul's case against the obsolete, passed away, out of date, no longer valid ceremonies certainly applies, as he said, to the empty ceremonies of potpourri. That's what he said in his day. that today it is just as applicable as it was in the 1500s to the humanly invented rituals, ceremonies of Roman Catholicism. There are two reasons for this that I say this. Number one, coming from the Roman Catholics. Number two, coming from the Reformed camp. There is the clarion call coming from both. Number one, the current most up-to-date catechism of Roman Catholicism says it all. Now, many of our Reformed brethren are shouting Semper Reformanda, meaning always reforming, always refining, and always applying God's truth. And I believe that with all my heart. We must always be refining. We must always be applying the truth. Roman Catholicism is always refining and doing it in a very deceptive way. I want you to see this. Yes, since the old Saint Joseph Catechism wasn't good enough, and since the Council of Trent was not enough, there had to be Vatican II. So what must we do? We must search the scriptures. And we must also see what they are saying, almost in the language of the Bible and the Protestant Reformation. Very close. They have a doctrine of justification by faith. They have that. But theirs is A justification by not an imputed righteousness, but by an infused righteousness, which gives you power to save yourself, basically. All right. We're not going to get on that. All right. Now, they haven't changed their message, only their methods. More cunning. More art, more subtlety, more cleverness and deceit, even in the use of Reformed terms and Biblical terms with a different spin and a different meaning than what we mean when we read them and when we write them. They still teach that through the ceremony of baptism, listen, this is what the Catechism says, the soul is justified before God. by the ceremony of baptism, which they call, you know, I won't get on that. As faithful Armenians, they still teach that you can lose your justification, but by certain good works, you can get your justification back again. Very bold language saying that. And through the sacrament of penance, which they call it, ceremony of penance, you can still make satisfaction for your sins by going on pilgrimages. Page 361. You can get it online. You don't have to buy one. I paid a whole dollar for mine. By the intercession of the saints, meaning only those saints that have been canonized and gone on, by their prayers, by their intercession, you can still get them to help you with your sins and the sins of your loved ones in purgatory. Mortal sins are generally most often referred to in the catechism now as grave sins, and you must be forgiven by the Pope or you will likely have to burn. Venial sins are light sins. They refer to as light sins, using that very language. which you can satisfy or you can expiate for, page 366, by acts of mercy, by good deeds, serving others, monetary offerings, self-denial during Lent, such penances, this is their language that they close out with on page 367. Listen to their words. I can't figure this one. It's not even in the dictionary. By these penances, you can, configure yourself to Christ. If you can figure out what configure is, I know the term configuration, but wow. Okay, one last part of the useless sacrament or ceremony of penance is, of course, indulgences. Remember, indulgences haven't gone away. Five whole pages devoted to indulgences. According to this, the catechism says that there's still a very large, a vast treasury of merit in heaven. Unused extra good works done by the canonized saints that are just waiting there for purchase. If you don't believe me, just ask any of your Roman Catholic friends or relatives that would be willing to share with you one of their weekly bulletins with the daily Masses listed that are said for the dead. Read the name, as I have done with some of my friends, read the name of each person that sponsors the Mass, the one that pays for each of these Masses to be said for the dead. Now let's close it all out with this. This is on the end of that five-page section. Yeah, what page did I say that was on? Page 374, the last page, here's where they seal it out. Indulgences. Through the indulgences of the faithful, or through the indulgences, through indulgences the faithful can obtain the remission of temporal punishment resulting from sin for themselves and also for the souls in purgatory. Has it really changed? Some of my dear friends are still paying the money on that. We are thankful that salvation is in Christ. We are thankful that there's been a shutting out, a shutting down of useless ceremonies. Neither circumcision availeth anything nor uncircumcision, but a new creature. A new creature does avail something because only God can make a new creature. Finally, second time creation. How beautiful. Ephesians 2.10, For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them. There is power in the new creation. II Corinthians 5.17, Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature, a new creation. All things are passed away. Behold! Here is something worth noting. Behold! Get this! Don't miss this! Lo! Behold! All things are become new. Hallelujah. This new creation includes the sovereign effectual call to life in regeneration. The new birth, literally, born again, being born from above, that God Himself reaches down in a sovereign act and brings us out of spiritual death into spiritual life, putting life where there was nothing but spiritual death and darkness before. The gift of faith is exercised in turning to Christ, looking upon him whom our sins have pierced. exercise by looking upon Him and turning away from sin in the gift of repentance. The gifts of faith and repentance result in daily quickening by looking unto Jesus. And as we begin fortifying or putting to death our sins, what does that mean? Killing the very acts of sin and the desires that rise up in us to sin, putting them to death by the blood of Jesus, by the Word of God. The creature hungrily feeds on the Word of God and cries out in praise and thanksgiving to God and cries out to God for grace and help, sustaining help in this world of sin and death. Well, the same Holy Spirit that creates in us and makes us new in Christ Jesus, liberates us and empowers all those whose sins are forgiven. Those that are genuinely wrought upon by God's saving grace will no longer have use for meaningless ceremonies. It is a sad matter indeed that when participating in such ceremonies or performing such ceremonies, a person can walk away from a ritual or a ceremony and think that because of participating or doing that, that God is in some way obligated to that person. Because I did this. Sadly, it is so that many people think by simply going through useless ceremonies that God is obligated to them. Let us therefore turn from vain religion to the living God. Let us forsake sin. Let us forsake ourselves in our own way and let us dedicate ourselves to the One who bought us with His own lifeblood to set us free. For it is only right that the Lord Jesus Christ who obtained us at such an awful cost should possess us and rejoice over us. with joy, with divine joy, and with singing. We're told that that's His purpose. He's going to sing over us with joy, Zephaniah 317. Let us pray together. Oh Lord, we thank Thee for the truth. We thank Thee for deliverance from dependence, upon any of our own doings, whether ceremonies or otherwise. We thank Thee, O God, for directing us to yonder cross where Christ was crucified for us. We're causing our dependence and our reliance to be totally on the finished crosswork of our Redeemer so that ceremonies are indeed passé. They are not for us. They are not meaningful. They are not ours. But we trust in the living God. So Lord, please write Thy Word upon our hearts. Oh, we thank Thee. that Christ is all and that Christ has the preeminence and will for all eternity have the preeminence. So Lord, glorify thy name in each of our lives. We pray in the Savior's wonderful name.