Remember Galatians 2:11-14, when Paul opposed Peter to his face. Why did Paul oppose him? When certain Jews came from Jerusalem, Peter withdrew from eating with the Gentiles to eat with the Jews. Peter, who knew the gospel, stepped outside the gospel with his racism. Paul rightly saw this as an anti-gospel move and called Peter out on it. Peter’s racism wasn’t a private problem, it was a public heresy.

Sin makes us illogical. It muddies our mind, causing us to choose things contrary to the right path. Paul highlights this lack of logic in selecting the law over Christ.

We may struggle through this life, but the marks we bear on our body will one day match the marks Jesus bore on his. And when we enter eternal life we will find, amazingly, we have the garment necessary for entrance into his kingdom.

Our churches should seek to fight the American pastime of loneliness. We want to push against the cultural call to isolation and push into the gospel call to loving our neighbor. The Christian life is hard enough as it is. Isolation makes it only harder.

The Christian life is not easy. It’s messy, bloody, sacrificial. It is a constant walking our sin toward the cross, offering the flesh, nailing it to the wood, and leaving it until it suffocates. It’s horrifyingly ugly and breathtakingly beautiful because it’s the same path that Jesus walked.

What is true freedom? In our day, everyone wants it, but no one can find it.

The biggest “Why?” question we must answer is this. Why are we reluctant to rest in God’s finished work? Why do we insist that we have our hand in our salvation? Why would we, who have never succeeded fully at anything in our lives, want to put our dirty hand into the purifying work of God?

We are too often tempted to sell our sonship for slavery. That’s where our heart leads when we forget the gospel.

When the gospel comes first in our message, obedience flows from it. When obedience comes first in our message, the gospel becomes a side dish rather than the entire meal.

As J.B. Lightfoot says, “The gospel is a rescue, and emancipation from a state of bondage.”