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Maintaining the cutting edge By Richard Wilson

As we come to the concluding message of our series of messages through the Book of Galatians,
we come to verse 11, which is the concluding exaltation of the Apostle to the Galatian
churches. It is the final nail he wants to drive into his message and he is making emphasis here
before us. He says, see what large letters I have written to you in my own hand. This message,
this letter that is being sent to the Galatian churches, was so urgent he could not wait for a
scribe to come and be dictated to to write this letter. He himself wrote this letter in his own
hand and there was some clumsiness, maybe, in the handwriting and he said, I want to underline and
score this message to you. There is no reviling from it. There is something that is just so
important here, your soul depends upon it. It's a life and death issue in terms of the church life.
Because whatever happens in the individual souls will happen within the church if allowed to spread
into the church. He says, each individual must be pulling their weight and must be pushing forward
in the matters of the gospel. He says, I want you to realize that if you're going to maintain your
cutting edge for the gospel's sake and there's no choice, we must maintain that cutting edge and it's
not easy to do so. That we must hear the kind of message that is here. The gospel, if we twist it,
if we modify it, if we regard it as something that can be adapted to our lives, you will find that
it will lead to your demise in your Christian life. If we adapt it so that we are going to
accommodate in this case their former manner of life in Judaism and become more like Jews and
Christians or Hebrew Christians, I hear a lot of people talking in those terms these days, that we
find that it will actually mean that your witness for Christ will not only be diminished but you
will eventually abandon it. So he says, if we're going to maintain a cutting edge there needs to be
what I would describe a narrowness about your witness, a narrowness about your theology, a
narrowness that is going to determine to go that narrow way that leads to eternal life,
not the broad way that leads to destruction. And so he is as it were saying here there is a heavenly
or a clearly underlined principle. Here the distinctiveness of living, not merely doctrinal
beliefs. Now there are many people within the Christian church, particularly in Protestant
circles, that have a good knowledge of the faith. They read all the good books. They will be able to
espouse the Westminster Confession, which I believe is a very clear testimony of the Scriptures, a
summary of what the Scriptures teach. But you'll find that many of these people are talking about
the Christian faith rather than living it and being obedient to it. Our life must be genuinely
Christian, not just talking the talk but walking the walk. I don't know where that came from but
somebody says that sort of thing. But it goes well for us, doesn't it? It goes well for us to
realise this. If we are genuine Christians in a world that is hostile to God, hostile to the
Word of God, hostile to the Gospel of God, if we're going to maintain our Christian faith there will
be an offensiveness in our lifestyle if we are living consistently and we've got to maintain
that offensiveness. We have got to be those that maintain a certain cutting edge that is going to
get under the skins of people who love this world, who are under the dominion of the devil and of the
flesh. And we will not be loved, we may be respected sometimes, but we will certainly not be
loved for it. And if you've got a certain characteristic, an instinctive characteristic to
please people, it's going to be very difficult for you to stand out like this. It's going to be very
difficult. Because if we are being loved by this world, the likelihood is that we are not living
the Christian faith. I think it was Malcolm Muggeridge who soon became a Christian, he was
the editor of Punch magazine, a highly humanist sort of a character, and when he became a Christian
he said, if 85% of people are saying the same, mostly they are wrong. And it's very true because
very often we find ourselves in that category. In the Sermon on the Mount we find that in chapter
5 of Matthew that the Beatitudes are saying this very thing, blessed are the poor in spirit for
they shall be comforted. And all the Beatitudes he goes through and eventually comes to blessed
are those who are being persecuted for my name's sake for they shall receive the blessings of God.
Now, whether we like it or not, to live the Christian faith requires us to enter through the narrow gate
and walk in the narrow way. And laid back Christianity that has become so easily accepted these days,
busily evangelicals who are professing to be biblical are trying to be all the time trying
to establish assimilation to the world and yet not give up the faith. And there is this balancing act,
and anybody says to me, Richard you've got to be balanced. Now certainly we've got to be balanced
on the Word of God, but we must not be balanced in this world between Christianity and the world.
We are either one or the other and we've got to be wholeheartedly given to Christ. And being
balanced in the Word of God means that we take the whole of the Word of God and apply it to our
lives. And if you're doing that you will be very unbalanced in terms of the world. And you will be
offensive and contrary to the word of the world if we are doing this. Now the Apostle wants to
underscore this principle. He says the temptation of the Galatian churches was to somehow take the
cross out of the gospel. They wanted to replace that with circumcision, a ritual that the Jews
saw as essentially a right of entry in the Judaism. Now circumcision in the Old Testament
was given by God to Abraham. And Abraham took on that right of circumcision as a mark and the seal
of the covenant that God had entered into with Abraham and all his seed. It was something deeply
profound expressing the kind of faith that arose out of the gospel of the sacrifice. And the gospel
of sacrifice was pointing toward the sacrifice of Jesus Christ who would be our Redeemer, the Lamb
of God that takes away our sin. But the Jews had reduced this ritual as almost a rite of passage
into Judaism. And we know what the Lord Jesus Christ can say concerning Judaism. He repudiated
it as being false because they'd taken the gospel out of it and just left the ethics of national
living and the works of the flesh there. And so he goes on, he says, as many as desire to make a
good show of the flesh those who compel you to be circumcised only that they may not suffer
persecution for the cross of Christ. In other words the temptation there that they were compelling you
to become circumcised. Not in the sense that was given to Abraham that expressed the gospel of
Jesus Christ but more as a badge of identity that the Jews were using to identify who were Jews and
who were not. In other words they said to these Christian people that had come to know the Lord
through the Apostle Paul, they were diligent about following after Paul and saying now Paul has
preached you to you a gospel but he's not entirely correct. If he was correct there would be more of
the Jewish input to it. Remember he called Abraham to be circumcised. Now us Jews have got to be
circumcised. Now the reason why you're coming across so much difficulty and so much persecution
and many of them have lost their lives, many of them have been deprived from their workplace,
many of them had come under incredible scrutiny and persecution because of the gospel. And he says
now just look at us Jews we've got the balance here and if you were to come become more like
Jews we're not asking you to give up Jesus what we are asking you to become more like like Jews.
And we Jews are experienced about how to live in this community as devout people. They're not saying
give up the gospel they're just saying conform more to what we have learned how to live in this
world so we don't offend the world and we can get on with these people rather than become
you know offensive to these people. And Paul says beware of such subtlety because what they're
asking you to do is to become conformed religiously to this world so that you are not persecuted any
longer by this world. In other words give up the cutting edge in your Christian faith and then you
will have peace with this world. You'll be able to do business with these people. They will not be
offended by you any longer because they will see you as different but not offensive. They'll see
you as being well-rounded people to that extent just cultured people. But you are being offensive
to them because of your commitment to this death wish of taking up your cross daily and following
the Lord Jesus. Now they may not have put it just like that but that was the outcome of their
twisting the gospel. And it's a it's a temptation to us all today is it not? It's best just to keep
your mouth shut because you're a Christian in certain circumstances because after all we got
to get along with these people. But what you're doing is that you are basically saying to these
people I don't want to be holy. I don't want to be absolutely righteous. I don't want to be those
that are living to God and dying to self. And if I just shrink back into Christianity that is just
conforming to this world and is almost so part of this world that there is very little difference
between us. Some evangelicals say that the church is only about ten years behind the world in its
behavior and it's been true. What are we talking about now in the uniting church? Whether ministers
are going to be homosexual or not. You know ten years ago I could not have believed that any
church would be discussing that. But now we are discussing it. And in fact it's been legislated
within the church that we must have homosexual ministers. Now once upon a time I was saying
women in in office. We shouldn't even be discussing those sort of things. But why are we discussing
those sort of things now? Because the world is doing it. And we don't want to be out done by
the world. Now this is the kind of things you might say well okay it's not terribly important
one issue or the other. I'll just maintain the gospel. And in fact the cutting edge of the
gospel is not in you. That's why we're not seeing people come to know the Lord. It's because we are
not spectacles of the gospel. And we don't want the persecution that comes with that. And so we
want to be just normal people and therefore the constant cry of the church. We want ministers that
are going to just be a bit more broad in their preaching. We want people to, the ministers,
to feed our felt needs. Not our actual needs, the needs of the gospel, but our felt needs. And so
the church has become a self-help gospel type mode where man is basically able to help himself.
Now this kind of issue is so prevalent within the church today that just conform to the institutions
or to a kind of Christianity that is acceptable to the world is everywhere and is is leading us
of all vitality. And no one wants to bother with us because after all we're just another
group in society that can be taken or left. The point that we want to state here is that we are
simply not to be reflectors, mirrors that reflect, but we are to be the light of the world. We are to
be the source of light because God lives within our hearts. It's very easy to be secondhand and
just reflect what we think should be there, but in fact we are to be the light of the world and
the salt of the earth. We are to be the source of light. So respectable conformity is a tremendous
danger. I know how difficult it is. I mean I was raised in a very establishment type family and
I'm very very hesitant in stepping out of my comfort circle and out of what should be what
the done thing. Very reticent doing it. And here I find as I walk with Christ I find myself
completely outside my family background. I find myself completely outside of my own contemporaries
because in the grace of God, God has not allowed that cutting edge be taken away from me. I exhort
each one of us to examine our lives in this light. Is there sufficient biblical Christianity
that you are going to cut into the conscience of our society so they do not rest until they
see the difference of what Christ does within our lives? Respectable Christianity conforms,
so it satisfies a comfortable professor type Christianity and it gives glory to the flesh
in the end. Many people are content in attending Christian schools not because they want to be
Christians but because they want a good job, they want a good entrance into university,
they want a good education. If you ask them why they want these things it's not because of the
glory of God it's because they want to enter the professions where life's a little bit easier.
A little bit more respectful. My friends that is not what Christian schools have been set up for.
Christian schools have been to make people so that they would be consistently Christian in all areas
of life so that we might maintain our cutting edge and the offensiveness of the gospel might
be seen in the world. It's not a good message is it? Before you can become a Christian you must
die and surrender all. That's why the rich people turned away from Jesus for he had too many good
things because he did not want to yield to one thing you lackest. What do you say to him? Sell
all that you've got and come and follow me he said to the rich young ruler and he's forbidden.
Now that would put so many people out of the running for becoming Christians because of their
riches. Because it's easier for a camel to crawl through the eye of a needle
that a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. Now let us be careful about this. Let us be
careful about this. We need to be utterly given to the Lord and we need to be offensive and we
need to maintain our narrowness. I know it's not a good message but we need to do it with carefulness
and dedication to the gospel. Now to do this we must be guarding against just mere outward display
but dealing with inward grace in our lives. That there needs to be a work of the gospel that leads
to regeneration. A friend of mine who's a Christian was talking about all sorts of
things educationally and he said look we Baptists and you Presbyterians are all going to the same
heaven. I said yeah that's good as long as you're born again. As long as you're born again and don't
rest until we are born again because I know a lot of Presbyterians are not going there because
they're not born again. I can't see the fruits of new faith and new life within them. And same with
a lot of Baptists unfortunately. It's only as we are born again. He said yes point taken well
because if we are regenerate we will live by faith and if we are living by faith
we'll take up our cross daily. We'll die to ourselves and live under Christ.
We will be walking a very lonely often very lonely path because many who are professing
to be Christians won't even walk with us because of our narrowness.
That we only read the times and the spirit of the age the church is caught up in this in big time.
Take up the cross he says in verse 14. He says but God forbid that we should boast except in the
cross of our Lord Jesus Christ by whom the world has been crucified to him and I to the world.
I think one of the blessings in my early days becoming a Christian
was this message was drilled into my soul time and time again from the pulpit and it was taken
deeply into my soul. Taking up my cross daily was something that I understood and in fact I can
recall about a year after I was converted in tears and a fellow by the name of Turnbull,
what was the guy's name, Brian Turnbull, drove this home to me and I was dumbfounded,
nearly in tears. You know Campbell Grammar Boys never cry. I was nearly in tears
and I was about to go to India and I was desperate because I didn't have that martyrdom type spirit
in me. I can recall I don't know whether I could die for Christ and he looked at me and he says
God's grace will be sufficient if that ever came to be and I know that that kind of message was
very important to me in those early days of my Christian faith. They've never left me
because when it comes down to the push come to shove I come back to that message time and time
again. Am I following Christ or am I simply conforming to the standard of a worldly church?
And if we are those who are taking up our cross daily this is central to the gospel.
The first thing you must realize that this life has a very short passage indeed.
I look to the next. I have no interest in this life. I must look to the next.
I realize that this life is short-lived. The next is far more important to me.
That's what a person is looking to the cross. He's on a death row. He is ready to lay down his life
as a sacrifice to the Lord. We must be doing this daily. We must not look after our own
self-reputation. That is very difficult to maintain our reputation as a good teacher or as
a good person within the professors or just having a good reputation in our community as being a nice
girl. That is not a thing that we need to be guarding against. The glory of Christ and our
reputation with God is far more important. We must be those that will live for God
and die to this world. Now I'm not saying to take away all the responsibilities of this world
because we've got certain things that we've got to look after in this world,
but they shouldn't be the things that we live for.
And therefore to live the Christian life we must die to the flesh, the world and the devil.
And when they rail against us we have not no investment in them
and therefore we can be those that are set free from them.
And therefore Christ is our glory and accepting Christ requires us to accept
Christ's cross as well. There can be no holiness without sacrifice.
And the Holy Spirit enables us to follow Christ day by day
and literally to the point of death. And therefore let us deny ourselves and take up our cross and
follow him because anybody who doesn't is not worthy of him, says the scriptures.
And the Christian life is a life where the very same power rose Jesus from the dead
is also at work within us. That's what we call eternal life. He will enable us to overcome
even though we might look forward and say I don't know how on earth I'm going to follow
Christ in such circumstances. When you get there you will know
for the Lord will enable you and strengthen you for that purpose.
And so walk according to the rule of the new creation, the one that is beyond us.
Okay, the one that lives within us. And don't invest heavily in the things of this world,
otherwise you'll be attached to it. But invest in the things of heaven
and therefore you will be rewarded in heaven for the things that you are doing.
The rule is that we are those who are living under the power of God that rose Jesus from the dead,
that resurrection power, that life of Christ, that new life, for we are new creatures in Christ.
And this rule of this new life will always find residence in the Word of God.
It will be our guide and strengthening agent and it will give us wisdom from on high.
Not the oldest of letter but the message of the Gospel. I was only talking to this fellow last
night that this work of God is not the oldest of the letter but the newness of the Gospel.
And when I first became a Christian, before I became a Christian I couldn't read up to chapter 10
of Genesis. Couldn't do it. As soon as I became a Christian, I not only read those 10 chapters but
I read the entire Bible within six months. And the New Testament several times and all the other
passages that had particular interest to me I read just countless times. It was something that
I devoured. Why? Because the newness of the letter, the newness of the Gospel had entered
into me and the oldest of letter had passed away. It was no drudgery for me but it was life and truth
to me. And we find that this eternal life, these graces of Christ, this righteousness of Christ
that I hunger and thirst for now, this holiness that heaven cannot be gained without,
this exercises of the Kingdom of God and its dominion in my life is the thing that I live
for now. Now I trust that we come to that but you will not gain it if we are visibly trying to
satisfy our reputation with this world. The promise is given to us also that he says in verse
15 and 16, for in Christ neither circumcision or uncircumcision avails to anything but the new
creation, the new creation within us, the new creation that leads us to heaven itself.
And as many as walk according to this rule, that is this new rule of life,
peace and mercy shall be given to us. And upon them and upon the Israel of God, that is the
Church of God or the people of God that knew Israel, and he goes on and he says,
from now on that no one trouble me for I bear in my body the marks of Jesus Christ.
He wasn't as though he was saying you take up the cross and I'll sit in my ivory tower writing
letters to you. He says I know what it means to be Christ's servant and because of the
offensiveness of the Gospel, because it's the only thing that cuts into the conscience of mankind,
I have been persecuted. They usually destroy the messenger if they can't get to the one who is the
origin of that message. And you'll find that for us we have not borne in blood yet, but we have
borne in terms of reputation. They hurl all sorts of abuse to us. They may even deny us jobs. Some
of us who are hold to the law of God will not allow to be employed on Sunday. Now that Sunday
training has come in, many of these jobs when you declare that you will not work on Sunday,
they will not give you the job. Now are you going to maintain that Christian testimony of
keeping the Lord's Day to the Lord? Or are you going to conform to the world
and take the job and say I'll be a Christian on Sunday at work,
in total contradiction to the word of God.
Now a lot of people have made that decision, but in doing it they might as well be like the Galatians
– conform to this world rather than be distinctive and narrow, taking up your cross
and following Christ. That's an example of the many examples that we have here in Scripture.
Let us maintain our cutting edge, and it's very subtle, it comes to us very subtly to conform to
this world. And I'd say to you, guard your souls, because if you give up in one of these little
areas, the likelihood that you start giving them up in a whole raft of things, and all of a sudden
you're absolutely no different, in essence, to the world.
And therefore your Christian testimony is completely shot. Amen.