Called Unto Liberty

Galatians 5:13  For, brethren, ye have been called unto liberty; only use not liberty for an occasion to the flesh, but by love serve one another.

Religion is a belief system. It is what someone believes to be true concerning their faith. A religion that puts its faith in keeping rules, even good rules to have eternal life is falling short of God’s will. Many religions organizations, including mine, have a standard or behavior code that they feel are important to keep. Any religion that makes these rules or standards the cornerstone of their faith is falling short of God’s plan of salvation. Paul was concern that false teaching was being planted. Some were requiring that the ceremonial law of Moses was necessary to have full salvation. Christ is the liberator of the law, and has set us free to live without being bond by rules. This liberty does not give us license to fulfill the lust of the flesh, for we have been set free from sin, and made free to love God with all our hearts, and our neighbor as ourselves.

Spiritual Weakness

Roman: 15:1“ We then that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak, and not to please ourselves.”-

A strong Christian is one that has put their trust fully in the Lord. They have learned to walk by faith and not by sight. They realized the importance of doing good works, but know that it is not their good works that saves them, but it is grace given by God through Christ that they are made right with God. The weak Christian is still struggling with the flesh and understanding how to walk with God through the Spirit. They still have habits in the human that they need to break. The infirmities, or spiritual weaknesses they have are the results of years of putting their faith in following the law and observing days. Overcoming these things don’t come over night. Those that are strong in the Lord must be aware that their are those that will not understand the liberty they exhibit and be careful not to offend a weaker Christian. The scripture given to us hear specifically is dealing with Jews who still felt that God required the keeping of the law of Moses. We don’t have that specific issue among new converts today, but the principle here is to be patient with new Christian and do whatever we can to help them grow and be strong in faith even if it means putting our ownn personal desires aside.