Beginning and Finishing

"Are you so foolish? Having begun in the Spirit, are you now being made perfect by the flesh?"
Galatians 3:3

I love to read. I am usually reading two or three books at the same time. Rarely do I only read one book to finish, before I pick up another. One thing I really like, is when I get to begin a new book. There is just something about the newness and the freshness of it; the chance to start in a new story, a new world of imagination (mostly, but not entirely, dealing with fiction). It is like starting over.

When we become new believers, followers of Christ, 2 Corinthians 5:17 tells us, that we become something new. Not something old but changed, or cleaned up. No. We became something new - a new creation. The Holy Spirit in us, making us new. What a thought! The Holy Spirit of God dwelling within us. Each one of us, as believers in Jesus Christ, are made new in Him.

Paul was talking to the Galatians about "works of the flesh" being taught to them by "legalizers," men who insisted that salvation was of Christ, but that works were also necessary for salvation. In other words, yes, salvation is by grace through faith, but you also needed to keep this list of rules and regulations, to really be saved. At least that is what the "legalizers" were teaching. And having begun as a new creation in Christ, made new by the Holy Spirit of God, the Galatians were being swayed by this Pharisaical teaching.

In our world today, there are hints of this teaching still around. You must dress a certain way. You must sing the right songs, accompanied by the right instruments. You must look a certain way, and read a certain translation of God's Word. However, no matter which translation you use, it tells us in Ephesians 2:8 that we are saved by grace, through faith in Jesus Christ, and that it is a gift. When someone wants to give me a gift, they don't first give me a list of things I must do, or put a check mark beside, in order to receive the gift. No. They just give the gift to me. There is no list you must do to receive salvation. Or to maintain it. On the cross, Jesus said, "It is finished" (emphasis mine). In my book, when something is finished, that means it is done, with nothing more to be added. It is like when I finish a book. When I turn that final page and close the back cover, there are not any more pages to turn. The book is finished. Nothing more to be added.

We have begun in the Spirit, just as Paul tells the Galatians. So let us also finish in the Spirit, and not get carried away by those who would come and try to impose a set of rules and regulations on us. That is putting a yoke of bondage upon us for which Christ never intended. We are free in Christ. Let's go out there today and live like we are free. We have begun in the Spirit, let us finish in the Spirit. Amen.