The Promise is Yours! :: Galatians 3:15-22

Now I say this: the law, which came 430 years later, does not nullify a covenant previously established by God, thus abolishing the promise. For if the inheritance is based on the law, it is no longer based on a promise. But to Abraham, through a promise, God has given [and continues to give] grace (v 17-18).

Which came first: the chicken or the egg? 

I’m sure you have all heard this question before. Maybe you’ve even entertained the idea of debating the answer. If you believe in evolution, you would undoubtedly argue that the egg came first ... that we all evolved from a single cell, so to speak. If you are a Christian, though, you know the truth: The chicken came first! How do we know this? Because God said so. As Moses tells us in Genesis chapter 1: And God created ... every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful and multiply (Gen 1:21-22). And then the chicken sat on its egg. There was evening and there was morning, the fifth day. 

OK, y’all know I added that line about the chicken sitting on its egg. But you get the point: God doesn’t trump his promises: His word gives us the answer to most of life’s challenging questions ... including this one: Which came first, the Law or the Gospel? This is the question behind our epistle reading today on this Thirteenth Sunday after Trinity. 

You may be surprised to learn that there are Christians all around us who ... like the evolutionist ... answer this question wrong. I know too many people who set the Law first and foremost in their lives. They then start arguing that ... Of course, the Gospel saves, but you gotta do something first. ... Ya gotta be holy. ... Ya gotta be circumcised. ... Ya gotta feel the Spirit move within your heart. ... You gotta make a decision for Christ. ... Ya gotta choose it. ... Ya gotta earn it. ... Ya gotta work out your salvation. 

And then they call that Gospel.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, listen to the Promise. In our Epistle reading, this morning, Paul reminds of this. He reminds you that the Gospel is rooted on the promise  ... not a command ... and that ... 

THE PROMISE IS, FIRST AND FOREMOST, IRREVOCABLE AND YOURS IN CHRIST

This is our theme. God will never break his promise; It is irrevocable. ... Nothing we can do or fail to do can make God take away that promise. ... And because of that promise, God has given and he continues to give you grace upon grace all the way to eternal life. 

I. [God will never break His promise; It is irrevocable.]

It’s a pleasure dealing with people whose word can be trusted, whose promises are kept no matter what. Sadly, the number of those people seems to be decreasing. We’ve been disappointed so often in people who regard promises lightly and break them easily that we may begin to doubt the validity of any human promise. If you can’t trust my word, who can you trust, we say.

God is the only one whose promises we never have to doubt. He has promised to give us an inheritance that is not based on the Law because it came before the Law. This is Paul’s argument in the book of Galatians. God never breaks his promises: He never contradicts the Gospel. 

So what is the Gospel? I am confident y’all know the answer, even if you are afraid to vocalize it. We have been hearing the Gospel rather prominently for weeks now. To borrow Paul’s words again from his first letter to the Corinthians, the Gospel is first and foremost that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve (1 Cor 15:3-4). 

But that isn’t all it is. The Gospel is the good news that on account of his life, death, resurrection, and ascension of Christ, you have been set free from sin (Rm 6:22), redeemed.  God has washed you clean in baptism and has given you new life by uniting you with Christ in his death and his resurrection (Rm 6:3-4). And because of that we can now hear the Gospel, and see the Gospel. We can know for sure that an eternal inheritance is yours. God continues to assure you of that promise by nurturing and nourishing your faith in the Lord’s supper. 

Brothers and sisters in Christ, this is the Gospel. These all go together. 

And it all came through a promise. 

II. And nothing we do or fail to do can make God break His promise to you.

In fact, not even the Law can do that. That’s what Paul is telling us in our epistle. Believe the Gospel. You may feel like your failures to love God first and foremost will jeopardize your salvation ... but that thought is not true. Your sin is dead; He has paid its debt for you.

Although God gave us the Law ... the Law that condemns us ... he didn’t do that until 430 years after he gave us the promise ... the promise of salvation, the promise God gave to Abraham to bless us all. And this is that promise from Genesis 12: Now Yahweh said to Abram, Go from your country and your family and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. And I will make you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you ... and in you all the families of the earth will be blessed. 

And so it came to be.  

Of course all of the lawyers among us doubted the promise, even as God stated and restated it to Abraham ... Not just once (Gen 12:2-3) ... Not just twice (Gen 13:14-15) ... Not just three times (Gen 14:19-20) ... But at least seven times to Abraham alone (also Gen. 15:5-6, 17:16, 18:14, 22:15-18) before bringing it to fulfillment. Abraham begat Isaac, who begat Jacob, who begat the twelve tribes of Israel, from which our savior was born. God took care of Israel, protecting them under the promise. And then he continued to remind us of the promise.

Only then came the Law. God didn’t give us to the Law to save us; that is the purpose of the promise. God gave us the Law to prepare all mankind for our need to understand the Gospel that comes from the promise. The Law was given to us to teach us that we are sinners and that we cannot save ourselves, that if we say we have no sin we deceive ourselves and that the truth is not in us. The law shows us our dire need to repent and to have faith in the promise.

So, brothers and sisters in Christ, what are you waiting for? Repent and believe the promise. It gives you faith that saves! Blessed are the eyes that see what you see! For I tell you that many prophets and kings desired to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it (Lk 10:23).

III. Now remember that God came to us, first and foremost, with a promise, not a demand. 

He promised to save us ... and he has. He promised to bless you through faith in Christ ... and he has. He promised to redeem you ... And he has. He promised to take care of us... And he does!

We couldn’t go to God, so he came to us ... in the flesh ... as promised. Our Lord Jesus Christ, our God with us, obeyed the Law perfectly, as promised. He became the sinless Lamb of God, perfect in every way, as promised. Like the Samaritan in our Gospel parable today, he didn’t pass by you on the road. He found you bloodied and beaten and then healed all your wounds. He cared for you and gave you his room in the inn. He exchanged his life for your life ... being beaten for you, punished for you, suffering for you ... and finally dying for you. 

Are you hearing the beautiful Gospel?

Our Lord Jesus Christ has risen from the dead for you, ascended into heaven for you, and is now preparing to give you your inheritance. Our Heavenly Father will not take this away from you ... He has given you all that he has, and even though you may have wasted all that he gave you on reckless living. He has prepared a Feast of Forgiveness in celebration that you have come home. This was the promise from the beginning. Therefore, we should be rejoicing today that all who were lost have been found, that all who were dead have been raised.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, is the Law against the promises of God? But no means! For if the law had been given the power to give life, certainly righteousness (would come) out of the law. But scripture confined everything under sin in order that the promise out of faith in Jesus Christ may be given to those who have faith. 

Don’t misunderstand the law. It is still good and true ... because it too comes from God. But those who cling to the Law and its demands thinking they will be rewarded for their work and piety do so because they can’t see what you see and hear what you hear ... that the Law will never save you. 

The promise, on the other hand, does save you. It comes to you in Word and sacraments as a gift ... every time we meet. God comes with the good news ... not of debt demanded ... but of debt paid. God comes to you, blessing rather than cursing. God comes in water, and bread, and wine, and word. God comes to you cleansing, and nourishing, and nurturing. God comes just as he promised. He will never stop coming. He promised.

Let us always call upon him to fulfill his promise every chance we have ... in Jesus’ name.