ABSTRACT: Throughout the book of Acts, the apostles teach us not only what to believe about Jesus, but also how to read the whole Bible like Jesus did. Having learned from the risen Jesus himself how “the law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms” all speak of him (Luke 24:44), the apostles learned to see Christ and preach Christ from the whole Old Testament. Peter and Paul in particular display what a true Christ-centered reading of the Old Testament looks like in practice, showing in their sermons how all the Scriptures speak of Christ’s suffering, resurrection, and global mission. By giving careful attention to Acts 2, Acts 13, and elsewhere, Christians today can grow in seeing the Old Testament through the apostles’ eyes.

For our ongoing series of feature articles for pastors, leaders, and teachers, we asked Brian Tabb, academic dean and professor of biblical studies at Bethlehem College & Seminary, to show how Acts teaches us to read the whole Bible.

The first Christians “devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching” (Acts 2:42), Luke tells us. This summary statement prompts us to reflect on what the apostles taught and why they emphasized what they did. My claim is that the apostles (1) instructed the early church about what to believe about Jesus, the crucified and risen Savior and Lord of all, and (2) modeled how to read the Scriptures as Jesus taught them.

The “task of biblical theology,” according to James Hamilton, is to understand and embrace the biblical writers’ “interpretive perspective” as “both valid and normative.”1 Said another way, the apostles teach us what to believe and teach us how to read the Bible. To understand how and why the apostles read the Scriptures in the book of Acts, we begin with their teacher, the Lord Jesus. Let’s turn to Luke 24, where the risen Christ offers a master class in biblical hermeneutics.

Luke 24: Christ’s Master Class

There are many lessons we could draw from Luke 24, which offers the most extensive account of the risen Lord Jesus’s teaching in the New Testament.2 Here I focus on three key points that lay the groundwork for the apostles’ preaching in Acts.

First, Christ gives a concise yet comprehensive course on understanding the entire Old Testament. He does not quote specific verses “written” in sacred Scripture in this chapter (as he does many times in the Gospels), but he makes claims about the teaching of the whole Bible:

“all that the prophets have spoken” (Luke 24:25)
“Moses and all the Prophets” (Luke 24:27)
“all the Scriptures” (Luke 24:27)
“the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms” (Luke 24:44)
“the Scriptures” (Luke 24:32, 45)
“it is written” (Luke 24:46)

Christ’s reference to “Moses and all the Prophets” is a variation of the common summary for the old-covenant Scriptures, “the Law and the Prophets.”3 “Everything written about me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms” is the New Testament’s most comprehensive reference to the three major units of the Hebrew canon — Law, Prophets, and Writings — with the Psalms as the largest, most cited book of the Writings.4 Note the repeated stress on “all” and “everything” in verses 25, 27, and 44 — Christ makes a sweeping claim that whole Bible, from beginning to end, is about him.

Second, the Lord’s biblical exposition focuses on his suffering, his resurrection on the third day, and the global mission in his name. We see this emphasis in Luke 24:46–47: “Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, and that repentance for the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem.” Verse 46 focuses on Christ’s saving work through the cross and empty tomb, while verse 47 prepares for the spreading work to be carried out by his witnesses.

Third, the risen Lord supplies spiritual sight and spiritual power to his people, so that they can understand God’s word and carry out Christ’s mission. The Gospels offer a checkered assessment of Jesus’s disciples. Positively, they leave vocations and possessions to follow him, they preach good news, and they cast out demons. Yet they also misunderstand Jesus’s teaching and plans — especially his calling to suffer and die. They are fearful in the storm, anxious about their next meal, competitive with one another, and sleepy when called to pray. Judas betrays his Teacher, the others run away when Jesus is arrested, and Peter denies him three times.

In Luke 24, Christ “opens” God’s word to the disciples and also opens their minds, giving them clarity about who he is and what the Scriptures reveal as well as the capacity to comprehend (Luke 24:31, 32, 45). He also announces his plan to send “the promise of my Father” to clothe his witnesses with “power from on high” (Luke 24:49), giving them courage to carry out his mission. Jesus reiterates this point in Acts 1:8: “You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses.” Christ keeps his promise by pouring out the Spirit on the day of Pentecost, ushering in “the last days” spoken of by the prophets and bringing salvation for all who call on the Lord’s name (Acts 2:16–21).5

Foundational Convictions of the Apostles

Luke 24 previews the mission and message of Christ’s followers, who preach near and far with Spirit-given courage and Christ-centered clarity. Their teaching reflects (1) their relationship with Jesus, (2) their empowerment through the Holy Spirit, and (3) their belief that the Scriptures are completely truthful and consummately fulfilled by Jesus, the longed-for Messiah and Lord of all.

Acts 4 illustrates these points well.6 Peter and John heal a lame man in the temple precincts and proclaim salvation in Jesus’s name, prompting outrage and opposition from the Jewish council — the same group that previously tried and condemned Jesus. To this hostile assembly, Peter boldly asserts that Jesus is “the stone that was rejected by you, the builders, which has become the cornerstone,” and thus salvation is available only through Christ’s name (Acts 4:11–12). The Jewish leaders’ response is striking: “When they saw the courage of Peter and John and realized that they were unschooled, ordinary men, they were astonished and they took note that these men had been with Jesus” (Acts 4:13 NIV).

These verses explain that the apostles’ clarity and courage come from their relationship with Jesus. They exhibit “boldness” (ESV) or “courage” (NIV) as they openly bear witness to their Lord even when experiencing resistance or persecution. These men aren’t just naturally gifted, charismatic leaders; they experience supernatural boldness as they are “filled with the Holy Spirit” (Acts 4:8). The disciples lack the formal biblical education of the Jewish scribes,7 but they were schooled by Jesus, the Master Teacher. Note that Peter’s claim that Jesus is “the cornerstone” (Acts 4:11) alludes to Psalm 118:22 — the very passage Christ himself cites in Luke 20:17 to explain the parable of the wicked tenants. The chief priests, scribes, and elders who questioned Jesus’s authority in Luke 20:1–2 interrogate his disciples in Acts 4:5. Peter identifies these opponents as “the builders” of Psalm 118:22, who have rejected Jesus — “the stone” whom God chose as “the cornerstone.” Throughout the book of Acts, Jesus’s witnesses demonstrate this same Spirit-given courage and Christ-taught clarity as they interpret and apply the Scriptures.

The apostles’ teaching and practice shows that they believed that the Scriptures were God’s true and authoritative word that Christ has fulfilled. Acts 4:24–28 illustrates this foundational conviction. The gathered believers cite the opening verses of Psalm 2:1–2 as the words of the sovereign Creator God spoken through David, by the Holy Spirit. They refer to the psalm’s human author, David, as “our father,” reflecting their belief that the sacred writings are relevant to them as God’s true people. The church appeals to the Spirit’s divine agency because they know that these inspired words reveal God’s wise purposes. They also cite this psalm to explain why Jews and Gentiles set themselves against Christ and his people. They recognize that this conspiracy against the Lord Jesus follows the script of the Scriptures and thus fulfills God’s secret plans. This conviction that God has spoken in the Scriptures and fulfilled his purposes in Christ emboldens his people to endure suffering and keep speaking with clarity and courage (Acts 4:31).

How the Apostles Teach Us to Read the Whole Bible

In Acts, the Spirit-empowered witnesses preach a message of salvation through Christ alone, while following Christ’s model of biblical exposition. While Luke’s second book is sometimes called “the Acts of the Apostles,” the book is not fundamentally about the disciples’ great deeds. Acts 1:1 explains that the Gospel of Luke recounts “all that Jesus began to do and teach” until his ascension, which signals that Luke’s second volume (Acts) is about what the risen Lord continues to do and teach after his ascension into heaven. Christ is not absent or inactive but carries out his work “through his people, by the Holy Spirit, for the accomplishment of God’s purposes.”8

“The apostles teach us not only what to believe but how to read the Bible.”

As Christ’s witnesses carry out his mission to “the end of the earth” (Acts 1:8), they also expound the Scriptures just as their Lord taught them in Luke 24. In Acts 26:22–23, for example, Paul reflects his Lord’s emphases on the fulfillment of Law and Prophets, the necessity of Christ’s suffering and resurrection, and the mission to the nations. While Jesus anticipates the outreach to the nations in Luke 24:47, Paul unpacks the biblical hope that the Messiah “would proclaim light both to our people and to the Gentiles” as he himself has been carrying out this mission, instructing the Gentiles “that they should repent and turn to God” (Acts 26:20).

Peter and Paul are the two most prominent preachers in Acts, so let’s examine their first recorded sermons (in chapters 2 and 13) to see how they interpret the Law, Prophets, and Writings with a particular focus on Christ’s suffering and resurrection and the global mission in his name.

Lord and Christ: Peter’s Message in Acts 2

The risen Lord promises to send the Spirit to empower his people (Luke 24:49; Acts 1:5, 8), and Luke records the dramatic fulfillment of this promise in Acts 2:1–4, when the gathered disciples are “all filled with the Holy Spirit” and speak in other tongues on the day of Pentecost. In response to the questions and confusion of the onlookers (Acts 2:12–13), Peter announces that Old Testament prophecy has been fulfilled. The apostle proves from the Scriptures that Jesus is the promised Messiah and risen Lord, that he has sent the Spirit as he promised, and that he saves everyone who calls on his name (Acts 2:14–36). Peter’s sermon focuses on three key passages from the Prophets and the Psalms.

First, he appeals to “what was uttered through the prophet Joel” to explain the events of Pentecost (Acts 2:16). The coming of the Holy Spirit is a crucial development in the biblical story line, fulfilling ancient prophecy and demonstrating that “the last days” have dawned (Acts 2:17). The Spirit’s work in the Old Testament focuses on select individuals, such as prophets, but Joel depicts a new era in which all God’s people would experience the fullness of the Spirit’s presence. Joel’s prophecy recalls Moses’s words in Numbers 11:29: “Would that all the Lord’s people were prophets, that the Lord would put his Spirit on them!” This ancient hope is realized on the day of Pentecost, when the Spirit is poured out on “all flesh” — men and women, young and old. The Spirit’s coming empowers Christ’s witnesses for their mission to the nations, and Acts 2:5–11 offers a preview of this global mission as people “from every nation under heaven” hear good news in their own languages.9

Next, Peter asserts that death could not keep hold of the risen Christ.10 He supports this claim in Acts 2:25–28 by appealing to what “David says concerning him” in Psalm 16:8–11:

I saw the Lord always before me,         for he is at my right hand that I may not be shaken;therefore my heart was glad, and my tongue rejoiced;         my flesh also will dwell in hope.For you will not abandon my soul to Hades,         or let your Holy One see corruption.You have made known to me the paths of life;         you will make me full of gladness with your presence.

Peter declares that David, the author of this psalm, “foresaw and spoke about the resurrection of the Christ” (Acts 2:31). Many interpreters treat Psalm 16 as a predictive prophecy of the Messiah. However, the repeated first-person language throughout the psalm — “I,” “me,” and “my” — more likely reflect David’s own confidence before God. Thus, I understand Peter’s appeal to Psalm 16 as an example of what Hamilton calls “promise-shaped typology,”11 the fulfillment of a biblical pattern. In this psalm, the king takes refuge in God and trusts in God’s character and faithfulness in the face of adversity and mortal peril. Christ goes even further, as he is kept through death and raised to unending life. Moreover, the Lord’s promise to give the king an enduring house in 2 Samuel 7 shapes how David expresses his faith in God and his expectations for the future in Psalm 16. Psalm 132:11 interprets the Lord’s covenant promise to David as “a sure oath from which he will not turn back,” which explains Peter’s appeal to God’s “oath” in Acts 2:30. The resurrection of David’s greater Son secures the hope of everlasting joy and life after death for David and all believers who take refuge in his Lord.

Finally, the apostle quotes David’s words in Psalm 110:1 to explain where Jesus is now and who he is as the seated Lord. Peter asserts that Jesus has “poured out” the Spirit after being exalted to the right hand of God (Acts 2:33). This is precisely what Jesus promised in Luke 24:49 and what God himself promised to do in Joel 2:28–29 (cited in Acts 2:17–18). Thus, the exalted Christ is responsible for the miraculous events that the gathered crowd sees and hears. Peter then supports this stunning claim by appealing to Scripture (Acts 2:34–35). David himself did not ascend to heaven but says,

The Lord said to my Lord,         “Sit at my right hand,until I make your enemies your footstool.”

The apostle’s point is crystal clear for those who recall that Jesus quotes the same psalm in Luke 20:41–44. Christ poses a riddle: How does David call his messianic son “Lord”? Peter clarifies that David’s Lord, not David himself, sits at God’s side. The command “sit at my right hand” repeats Peter’s claim that Christ has been “exalted at the right hand of God,” while also recalling the earlier quotation of Psalm 16:8 (“he is at my right hand”). Once Peter has established Jesus’s heavenly location (at God’s side) and explained his divine activity (pouring out God’s Spirit), he concludes, “God has made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified” (Acts 2:36). God has thus kept his sworn promise to establish the throne of David’s descendant (Acts 2:30). The risen and exalted Lord Jesus rules over all nations, has poured out the Spirit in the last days, and now saves everyone who calls on his name (Acts 2:21).

Light to the Nations: Paul’s Teaching in Acts 13

After the Holy Spirit directs the church in Antioch to set apart Barnabas and Paul for a new work (Acts 13:2–3), the missionaries travel to Antioch in Pisidia, where Paul offers a “word of exhortation” in the synagogue (Acts 13:15 NIV).12 In his lengthiest recorded sermon in the book (Acts 13:16–41), Paul summarizes God’s past dealings with Israel, proclaims that Jesus is the promised Savior from David’s stock, and warns his hearers not to disregard this message of salvation. The missionaries then explain their outreach to the Gentiles by appealing to Isaiah (Acts 13:46–47).

Paul offers a sweeping survey of “the Law and the Prophets” that closely parallels 2 Samuel 7:6–16. In Acts 13:17–23, he rehearses the election of the patriarchs (Genesis), Israel’s rescue from Egypt (Exodus), their wilderness wanderings (Numbers), their conquest of Canaan (Joshua), their rule by the judges (Judges), the selection and removal of Saul (1 Samuel), and God’s choice of David as king and covenant promises to David’s offspring (1–2 Samuel). In Acts 13:32–37, Paul explains that God has kept his promises to the patriarchs by raising Jesus from the dead, offering biblical support from Psalm 2:7, Isaiah 55:3, and Psalm 16:10.

Psalm 2:7 provides clear biblical support for Christ’s resurrection. Brandon Crowe rightly calls the resurrection “the logical key” to Paul’s entire speech.13 The phrase “by raising Jesus” in Acts 13:33 parallels references to the resurrection in the immediate context:

“God raised him from the dead” (v. 30).
“He raised him from the dead, no more to return to corruption” (v. 34).
“He whom God raised up did not see corruption” (v. 37).

The resurrection does not make Jesus God’s Son; it powerfully confirms his divine sonship (see Romans 1:4) and also marks a new era of the eternal Son’s reign as the enthroned king.14 The risen Son reigns at God’s right hand (Acts 2:30, 33–35), and he extends salvation and forgiveness to those who call on his name (13:26, 38). Paul cites Psalm 2:7 as biblical proof for the resurrection, and it is significant that Psalm 2:8 promises “the nations” and “the ends of the earth” as the royal Son’s inheritance and possession. The missionaries make this global expectation explicit in Acts 13:46–47, when they announce their turn to the Gentiles.

Paul also quotes Isaiah 55:3 and Psalm 16:10 in Acts 13:34–37 as additional support for Christ’s resurrection. The brief reference to Psalm 16 parallels Peter’s extended argument on the day of Pentecost (see Acts 2:24–32, discussed earlier). The “holy and sure blessings of David” in Isaiah 55:3 recall the Lord’s covenant promise to establish the throne of David’s son in 2 Samuel 7:12–16. Christ has fulfilled this promise through his resurrection and now extends blessings to God’s people through his heavenly reign.

Paul and Barnabas face strong opposition from Jewish leaders when they return to teach the following week, and the missionaries respond with biblical clarity and courage in Acts 13:46–47:

It was necessary that the word of God be spoken first to you. Since you thrust it aside and judge yourselves unworthy of eternal life, behold, we are turning to the Gentiles. For so the Lord has commanded us, saying,

“I have made you a light for the Gentiles,         that you may bring salvation to the ends of the earth.”

“The apostles offer God’s people sound teaching and faithful guidance for understanding and applying the whole Bible.”

They directly quote Isaiah 49:6, which summarizes the mission of the Lord’s chosen Servant to restore Israel and extend saving light to the nations. In what sense did “the Lord” command the missionaries to turn to the Gentiles? Isaiah 49:6 records the Lord God’s commission to his Servant. In Luke 2:32, Simeon rightly identifies the Christ child as “a light for revelation to the Gentiles, / and for glory to your people Israel,” reflecting the hope of Isaiah 49:6. In Acts 1:8, the risen Lord Jesus commissions his witnesses “to the end of the earth,” reflecting the precise wording of Isaiah’s Servant prophecy. The Lord Jesus then reveals himself to Paul and calls this zealous persecutor to be his chosen servant sent to the Gentiles (Acts 9:15; 26:16–18). Thus, Isaiah’s prophecy is God’s biblical message, which the Lord Jesus fulfills and then applies to his disciples as they share in his Servant mission. Paul and Barnabas’s quotation of Isaiah 49 clarifies that the outreach to the Gentiles is not simply a backup plan because of Jewish opposition. Rather, they turn to the Gentiles as an outworking of God’s revealed purposes for his Servant Jesus and his servant people.

Conclusion: Lord, Teach Us to Read!

Jesus and his apostles offer God’s people sound teaching and faithful guidance for understanding and applying the whole Bible. The Master Teacher explains “the things concerning himself” in all the Scriptures (Luke 24:27), and his disciples do the same in the book of Acts. While we cannot claim the same level of certainty in our interpretations as the inspired biblical authors, we can and should seek to embrace their foundational beliefs about the Scriptures’ total truthfulness, binding authority, and comprehensive fulfillment through Christ in the last days. Jesus and his witnesses teach the Bible with a focus on the Messiah’s suffering, his resurrection on the third day, and the mission in his name to all nations. Luke 24 and the apostles’ teaching in Acts can enlighten our own Bible reading and encourage us to participate in the Servant’s mission to the end of the earth until his return.

Audio Transcript

Welcome back to the podcast on this Monday. We’re going to start the week with a doozy of a question: Do we love God only by obeying him, or do we also love him verbally by using affectional language about him and to him? A hugely important question today that gets at the very heart of what we call Christian Hedonism.

The question is from an anonymous listener. “Pastor John, hello to you! My pastor recently admitted that he does not love God, or Christ, emotionally. He said he loves God, or loves Christ, by keeping his commandments. Obedience is love, he claims, returning often to 2 John 6 — ‘This is love, that we walk according to his commandments.’ And to 1 John 5:3 — ‘For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments.’ I’ve known many other Christians in my life who seem to have no place for emotional or affectional language for God. They like to relate to him merely in similar categories of obedience. Is this healthy? How important is it to cultivate affectional language for God as God? And what would you say to those who are uneasy with such language for their relationship with God and only ever use this obedience language?”

Okay, I hear three questions.

1. Is it healthy to relate to God only in categories of obedience but not affections? Answer: no, it’s not healthy. It’s confusing at best, deadly at worst. I’ll come back to that.

2. How important is it to cultivate affectional language for God? Answer: it’s very important. However, language is not the ultimate issue. The reality of our hearts’ affections for God is the ultimate issue. The language of affections is important only because the heart reality is important.

3. What would you say to those who are uneasy with affectional language for their relationship with God and only use this obedience language? I would say, “Get over your uneasiness with affectional language, because the Bible is full of it — full of it — toward man and God.” You’re uneasy with the Bible. That’s your problem. And I would say if your heart is really emotionally dead toward God, repent and cry out for life.

Confused or Dead?

Now, we need to be careful here with our words, because it may be that this pastor is not denying that he has real and strong affections for God; he’s just denying that he should call them love, maybe. Love for God, he’s saying, is something else — namely, love is obedience. Now, if that’s what he’s saying, then he may be a good Christian and just biblically confused. In other words, his heart may be right, but he’s naming things in unbiblical ways, and probably he’s confusing his people in the process. It sounds like it from this question.

“God commands that we feel affections for God.”

On the other hand — this is more scary — it may be that he really doesn’t have any affections for God, and in that case he needs to be born again. If there is not even a mustard seed of delight in God, thankfulness to God, hope in God, satisfaction in God, desire for God — if none of those emotions is in his heart for God and Christ, he’s not a Christian. So, let me try to address both of those kinds of people at the same time.

The first kind is the Christian who is confused about the affections that he genuinely has for God and simply doesn’t know whether to call them love or not. And second is the person who thinks he’s a Christian when he has no emotions in his heart for God and Christ at all; he’s just dead emotionally toward God.

Affections in the Christian Life

Now, here’s the main thing to say about the confusion of claiming to love God with obedience but not with heart affections: that’s like affirming fruit but denying apples. I’ve said this so many times. Affirming obedience and denying affections is like affirming fruit and denying apples, because obedience means doing what God commands, and God commands affections. It’s confusing, it’s contradictory, to say, “I obey God, but I don’t have any of the affections that God commands me to have.” That’s just really confusing and contradictory.

1. God commands affections.

For example, Psalm 37:4 says, “Delight yourself in the Lord.” Now, that’s a command. So, a pastor who says he’s obedient to God’s commands would be obedient to the command to delight himself in the Lord. Now, he might not call it love — though I think he should, but he might not. (And I’ll show in a minute why I think he should.) That’s not a deadly problem. To get your language confused is not a deadly problem. Not to have any delight in the Lord is a deadly problem.

But for now, whether he calls delight in the Lord love or not, he is commanded to have delight. And it is simply confusing and contradictory to say he obeys God but does not relate to God with his emotions, because those emotions are commanded. And if he doesn’t have them, he’s disobedient to the command. We can add to Psalm 37:4 the command in Psalm 32:11: “Be glad in the Lord.” And Philippians 3:1: “Rejoice in the Lord.” And many others.

2. The godly model affections.

Not only are affections for God commanded, but that way of feeling in the heart is held out to us as an example — not just a command, but an example — of how godly people relate to God. For example, in Psalm 43:4: “I will go to the altar of God, to God my exceeding joy.” Or Psalm 84:2: “My soul longs, yes, faints for the courts of the Lord; my heart and flesh sing for joy to the living God.” Or Psalm 63: “O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you. . . . Your steadfast love is better than life. . . . My soul will be satisfied as with fat and rich food . . . when I remember you upon my bed” (Psalm 63:1, 3, 5–6).

3. We are to pray for affections.

And not only are affections for God commanded and given as examples of how godly people relate to God, but we are taught to pray for those affections. This is what we ought to do if we don’t have them. Psalm 90:14: “Satisfy us in the morning with your steadfast love.” This is a cry to God to give us the affections for him that we ought to have and may not at the moment have.

And on top of all that, Jesus warns against outward obedience where the heart feels nothing. Matthew 15:8–9: “This people honors me with their lips,” — so, lips are moving; that’s outward obedience — “but their heart,” he says, “is far from me; in vain do they worship me.” “In vain”: that’s a big, terrible, horrible statement. Without heart, our outward obedience is nothing.

So, I conclude that it is confusing and contradictory to say that you obey God’s commands, but that you don’t pursue the very affections for God that he has commanded.

Love Worthy of Christ

Now, one last thing. Why should we use the word love for these affections for God? Now, I’m not saying that love for God is only affections. The Bible talks about love in a very broad way. But I am saying that love for God is not less than affections for God. Now, why would I say that? And I’ll give just one reason: because of Matthew 10:37. Jesus said this: “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.”

Now, in that sentence, love for Jesus cannot mean obedience to Jesus’s commands, because he’s comparing love for Jesus with love for our children. “Whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.” Love for our children does not mean obedience to our children. So, the point is, we must love Jesus with the kind of love we have for our most precious family members — only more so — and that is an affectional love.

So, I hope the pastor who said, “I love God by keeping his commandments, not with my affections,” will realize that God commands that we feel affections for God. And I hope that this is just a confusion of language and not a case of real deadness of heart.

In New York Harbor stands a giant copper statue, 150 feet high — mounted on a base that’s another 150 feet high, putting the torch of “Lady Liberty,” as some call her, more than 300 feet above the ground. This “Statue of Liberty” was a gift to the United States, from France, in 1876, marking 100 years since the Declaration of Independence. The statue was dedicated ten years later, in 1886, and has become a worldwide symbol of freedom — of liberty — for more than 130 years.

But we might ask, Freedom from what? The idea of liberty, of freedom, has taken on a life of its own in the modern world, and it can be easy to lose track of the context of freedom. Freedom from what, and for what?

The founding fathers of the United States had a particular oppressor in mind when they cried for liberty: English rule. And more specifically for the U.S. founders, freedom meant government on the consent of the governed, rather than the authority of kings. Yet, in the struggle for independence from Britain, the founders were not afraid to speak of Liberty in grandiose terms:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

The sound of liberty in human ears is a powerful tonic, sometimes healing genuine ills, and other times acting as a poison. The cry for freedom can produce both peaceful elections and mob violence. What began with national freedom from foreign rule can quickly devolve into a cry of freedom against our own chosen government when it turns out we don’t like something. The cry for freedom, unchecked, soon pines for individual “liberty” from any outside “authority,” however human, or divine.

In 1992, Supreme Court justice Anthony Kennedy wrote, in Planned Parenthood vs. Casey, “At the heart of liberty is the right to define one’s own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life.” That is a sweeping, expansive claim, which might have stunned even the most liberal of the founders. And that was thirty years ago.

Declaration of Freedom

Yet as modern as the emphasis on personal liberty may seem, the cry for liberty is far more ancient than modern liberalism, or the mobs of the French Revolution, or the principled documents of the U.S. founders. More than 1700 years earlier, the apostle Paul, at the climax of his letter to the Galatians, made his great declaration for freedom. Which means that the Christian cry for liberty — for Christian freedom — far predates the cries that inform and distort the popular sense of liberty today.

Paul writes in Galatians 5:1,

For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.

This cry for freedom captures the heart of Paul’s burden in the letter. The first half of the verse, the declaration of freedom, anticipates the rest of the letter, from Galatians 5:13–6:10, and the freedom of the Christian life. And the second half of verse 1, the exhortation to stand firm, captures the key truth of Galatians 2:16–4:7: full acceptance with God is by faith in Jesus Christ.

The second half of verse 1, then, leads to verses Galatians 5:2–4; and the first half of verse 1 leads to Galatians 5:5–6, Paul comes back to the first part of verse 1. So, there are two distinct emphases in this text: we might call them “freedom from” (verses 1–4) and “freedom for” (verse 1 and 5–6).

The question for us this morning is this: What is Christian freedom? And this passage answers in two clear parts. And then we’ll find at the end a third aspect that is more subtle, and easy to miss, and so perhaps all the more important to draw out.

So, what is Christian freedom?

Freedom From

First, Paul is clear about what Christian freedom is freedom from. Look again at Galatians 5:2–4:

Look: I, Paul, say to you that if you accept circumcision, Christ will be of no advantage to you. I testify again to every man who accepts circumcision that he is obligated to keep the whole law. You are severed from Christ, you who would be justified by the law; you have fallen away from grace.

Remember, as we’ve seen throughout Galatians, the issue in this letter is justification, that is, how you get right, and stay right, with God. On what grounds, and by what means, might sinners like us be fully accepted by God, and have right-standing with him?

Paul’s answer, as we’ve seen, is that justification is by faith alone. Your full acceptance by God, your right-standing with God, is (1) based on the work of Christ alone and (2) accessed and received through faith alone. For justification before God, we cannot combine our doing with Christ’s as the basis, nor our doing with believing as the instrument. We both “get in” right relationship with God, and — this is important — “stay in,” by faith alone.

So in verses 2–4 Paul issues a succession of three warnings, because it takes vigilance to distinguish between justification and other realities in the Christian life.

Freedoms to Be Defended

Paul says, “stand firm” in verse 1. Freedom is a calling he will say in verse 13; Christian freedom, grounded in justification by faith, is a freedom to be defended. It is not enough to start by faith, and then add works-righteousness. And it also takes care to not presume and apply faith alone in improper ways.

For instance, when a parent says to a child, “Clean your room,” we should not assume that is not works-righteousness. The presenting issue is not right-standing before God. The issue is obedience to parents and a fruitful household. That is, unless the parent makes it an issue of works-righteousness by saying, “If you do not clean your room, then you’re going to hell.” If that were the case, the Christian child or teen would have every right to say, “Dear Dad, I cannot earn God’s full acceptance by cleaning my room. I can only get right and be right with God by faith alone in Christ alone. I will obey you, because you are my father, but this is not an issue of justification before God.”

So, as Christians who love and delight in the freedom we have in Christ through justification by faith, we will want to take care to be vigilant in what pressures we put on others, and what pressures we allow others to put on us, and on what terms. To stand firm, and defend justification before God, we want to keep it clear in our minds and words.

Freedom from Circumcision

Christian freedom, then, is freedom from what? We have seen in this letter that justification by faith frees us from sin (Galatians 3:22), and from the curse of the law (Galatians 3:13; and from the elementary principles of the world, Galatians 4:3). Christ’s sacrifice covers our sins, and frees us from the guilt of our sins, and increasingly from the power of our sins.

The most immediate freedom from in these verses is freedom from circumcision. Galatians 5:2 is the first time in this letter that Paul has mentioned circumcision, but this is the flashpoint in Galatia. Because of the pressure from the false teachers, the Galatian Christians seem to have already added the Jewish festivals to their Christianity (Galatians 4:10), and are contemplating accepting circumcision as the decisive step of taking up old-covenant law. So, circumcision represents taking the yoke of old-covenant law, believing it to be a necessary step to belong to God’s people and be found “righteous” on the day of judgment.

So, in verse 2, Paul says, in essence, “If I could just say one thing to you . . .” He says, “Look: I, Paul . . .” In other words, Listen, it’s me. You know me. I brought the gospel to you. Listen up. I’ll shoot you straight: “if you accept circumcision, Christ will be of no advantage to you.” It’s not because circumcision is wrong or damnable in itself. But, in this instance, accepting circumcision would mean that the Galatians now believe that Christ, and faith in him, is not enough to be right with God, and so, to be circumcised would be to rebel against God and Christ. That’s the first warning.

Freedom from the Law

Then a second warning in Galatians 5:3: “I testify again to every man who accepts circumcision that he is obligated to keep the whole law.” When Paul says keep there, the word is literally do. In this situation, where the old-covenant law, through circumcision, has been made an issue (by the false teachers) of right-standing with God, to embrace it is to turn from Christ and his new covenant.

They cannot just add circumcision; to turn there is to turn to the whole law. And now that Christ has come, there is no longer a valid sacrificial system there that God accepts. If you “add the law,” you must do the law perfectly. And you cannot do the old-covenant law perfectly. For that matter, you cannot do all the new-covenant commands either, but in the new covenant we have Christ. In the new covenant, we have his provision for our sins. And so we do weekly confession every Sunday as a church. We fail every week. Every day. We cannot get or keep ourselves right with God by or through our doing.

Freedom from Earning Righteousness

Then, a third and final warning in Galatians 5:4: “You are severed from Christ, you who would be justified by the law; you have fallen away from grace.” “Grace” here, as with doing in verse 3, gets at the underlying issue. We’ve talked in this series about “law” meaning the old covenant, and not law or commands in general. We’ve emphasized the shift in the epochs of history, from old covenant to new. But this letter is not only about old covenant versus new. A second problem lies behind that: doing versus believing, for right-standing with God. Or, earning versus grace.

To accept circumcision, Paul says, will be to fall from grace, because circumcision represents an adding to Christ for justification and unavoidably introduces law and doing into the grace and faith of being right with God through Christ.

“Living the Christian life by grace means that we get and stay in right relationship with God by faith alone.”

What does it mean, then, practically, to live the Christian life by this grace when there are commands in the new covenant? Every Sunday at our church, we rehearse Jesus’s Great Commission to teach all nations to observe all that he commanded. Living the Christian life by grace means that, at bottom, we get and stay in right relationship with God by faith alone, based on Christ alone.

And as we obey Christ’s commands (which we do, increasingly from the heart!), and as we access God’s voice daily in his word, and respond to him in prayer, and gather with this body on Sundays to worship and during the week for fellowship, we do not seek to secure or maintain our standing with God by our doing, but our efforts, our lives, our obedience from faith are channels of God’s ongoing grace to us. Not obligations for justification, but expressions of what we call sanctification. Which leads, then, to what our freedom is for.

Freedom For

Remember, the first half of verse 1 (“For freedom Christ has set us free”) is picked up in verses 5–6. Verse 2 was Paul’s one, direct word of exhortation, about freedom from — from sin, from law, from the curse and death, and from trying to earn God’s acceptance. Now verses 5–6 celebrate freedom for what and summarize the whole letter, from beginning to end — and note the emphasis on faith:

For through the Spirit, by faith, we ourselves eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love.

Our first question might be, What’s this “waiting for the hope of righteousness”? In Christ, don’t we already, by faith, have right-standing with God?

So far in Galatians the emphasis has been on the past (Christ’s completed work) and present (we are justified, now, by faith). What’s this future aspect?

Future Hope of Freedom

First, we should clarify that “hope” in English sounds far more uncertain in our ears than “hope” in Greek (elpis) did to the Galatians. And hope, as deep confidence, not a thin wish, fits here with a future aspect of justification, when it is indeed by faith.

Paul has the final judgment in view in verse 5, and he does not change his emphasis on faith. Faith in Christ is how we now enjoy full acceptance with God and how we will be found in the right at the end. We enter by faith, stay in by faith, and will be confirmed by faith. Same basis: Christ’s work, not ours. Same instrument: our faith, not our doing. What hope then remains for the future? God’s public declaration of our righteousness in Christ, by faith, for all to know, at the final judgment, confirmed by real evidence of change in our lives.

Freedom for Enjoying God

So, what, then, about freedom for? Paul says in Galatians 5:5 that this is “through the Spirit,” which is critical in understanding Christian freedom. The Holy Spirit changes us. He takes out the old, natural heart of stone, and puts in a heart of flesh. He gives us new desires. He begins his lifelong sanctifying work in us, and we become new. He frees us to be adopted as sons and daughters.

And he frees us for the inheritance of all things, which means that freedom in Christ — freedom for — includes “the things of earth” that God has given us to enjoy him. In Christ, through the Spirit, we are free to enjoy God’s good gifts to the full — which means receiving those gifts consciously from his hand, and tracing the gift to the Giver. And there’s more.

The great new-covenant prophecy in Jeremiah 31 captures so well the “freedom from” and “freedom for” of the Christian life. In Christ, we have freedom from: “I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more” (Jeremiah 31:34). And listen to how Jeremiah casts the freedom for:

I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts (new desires, by the Spirit!). And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord. (Jeremiah 31:33–34)

“Christian freedom is for enjoying what we were made for — who we were made for: God in Christ.”

Christian freedom is freedom for knowing God. For being his, and having him as ours. Through the Spirit, we are freed for holiness, freed for true life, freed to be sons and daughters in the happiest family, freed to enjoy the inheritance of everything, and to enjoy Jesus now and forever. Christian freedom is for enjoying finally and forever what we were made for — who we were made for: God in Christ.

Freedom With

But there is one final reality in this text to understand Christian freedom. And this is Paul’s accent at the end of verse 6:

In Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love.

Paul is not here saying love justifies us before God. He is saying that the faith that justifies us before God is the kind of faith that “works through love.” It is an active (not lazy) faith, a lively (not dead) faith, a Spirit-empowered (not self-mustered) faith. And this love (for others) is a freedom, not a burden. In Christ, we have been freed to love. Which means, third and finally, Christian freedom is not only freedom from , and not only freedom for, but also freedom with.

Jump down to Galatians 5:13:

For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.

Note the confirmations of our first two points: (1) we are called to freedom. Freedom from earning God’s acceptance through our doing, and freedom from sin, and law, and death is not optional, but essential. And (2) freedom is for joy, for holiness, for life, for knowing God — not “an opportunity for the flesh” but life in the Spirit. And then finally, (3) freedom with: “through love serve one another.”

Justification by faith frees us to love others. It frees us from the burden of earning our standing with God. It frees us from being fixated on our status and deeds. And it liberates us, then, to love others — to give attention to their needs, and take the initiative, and expend effort, to meet them.

And not only is Christian freedom for loving others, but it is a freedom with others. This is the subtle point in the text: we’re not alone. Verse 1, “us.” Verse 5, “we.” Verse 6, “love [others].” Verse 13, serve “one another.” And we’ll see in the coming weeks, verse 15, “one another” twice more. And then, verse 26, “one another” two more times. And Galatians 6:10, “especially the household of faith.”

Freedom Together

Christian freedom is freedom together. It is not the kind of liberty that moves us away from each other, to protect our rights, and guard our little packages of liberty. But it is a freedom together, a freedom with, a freedom that is greater and more enjoyable with others. In Christ, we are free to serve others, bless others, love each other; we are freed from self-justification, self-focus, selfishness. We are free to make the happy choice to not exercise some personal right, at times, for the sake of love, as Paul talks about in 1 Corinthians 9–10: “though I am free from all, I have made myself a servant to all.”

“Justification by faith frees us to love others.”

And the freedom of joy together through love is a greater freedom than self-focus. The sweetest, most enjoyable freedom is not alone but together — and often is enjoyed by denying ourselves some personal “rights,” or lesser freedoms, for the sake of others and enjoying the greater joys and greater freedom of love. Freedom with is far greater joy than freedom solo.

So, we come together to the Table. The Lord’s Supper is a table both of liberty and union. Liberty in that we have been set free from our sin and death and hell, and free from the burden of earning God’s acceptance. And we have been set free for life in the Spirit and the joy of holiness and love. And we have been set free together. There is unity in our liberty in Christ.

We call this Communion because in this Table we draw near to, not away from, both Christ and each other.