Stand Firm | Galatians 5:1–5

What good is being set free if you keep living like you're still in bondage?

In Session 5 of The Book of Galatians: The War Within, Pastor Adam Aziz walks through Galatians 5:1–5 and unpacks one of Paul's most powerful declarations: “Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free.”

After reminding the Galatians that they are children of promise and not slaves to the law, Paul now issues a direct command: STAND FIRM! Christ has already accomplished what human effort, religious performance, and obedience to the law could never achieve. Yet the Galatians were in danger of exchanging the freedom they had received through faith for a system of religious obligation that could never make them righteous before God.

Paul makes it clear that freedom in Christ is not something we earn. It is something we receive by faith. And once we have received it, we must refuse to become entangled again in the yoke of bondage.

In this session, we explore:

• What Paul means when he commands believers to "stand firm" in their freedom

• Why freedom in Christ must be defended against the pull of legalism

• What it means to become entangled again in a yoke of bondage

• Why Paul warns that Christ will profit you nothing if you depend on the law for justification

• The significance of circumcision in Paul's argument about salvation

• Why attempting to be justified by the law obligates a person to keep the whole law

• What Paul means by being "fallen from grace"

• The difference between trusting in Christ and trusting in religious performance

• Why righteousness cannot be earned through human effort

• What it means to wait for the hope of righteousness through the Spirit by faith

• How believers can stand firm in grace without returning to the bondage Christ delivered them from

The warning of Galatians 5 is clear: You cannot depend on Christ for salvation while simultaneously depending on your own performance to make you righteous before God.

Christ did not set you free so you could spend the rest of your life trying to earn what He has already given you. You have been made free. Now STAND FIRM!

Study notes and additional resources are available at www.adamandolivia.com/deeper.