PRAY & READ: Galatians 3:19-29

I love when people keep their promises and hate when the break them. Have you ever broken a promise? Sure, I’ll pay for lunch next time or I swear I’ll never do that again. People will let you down.

God keeps His promises. You can bank on that!

In the previous verses of Galatians 3:15-18 we see that God made a promise before He put in place the Law. This promise more specifically stated that God would set aside a people for Himself. He would be there God and they would be His children. This promise runs like a golden thread all the way through the Bible.

“I will always keep my promise I have made to you and your descendants, because I am your God and their God.” Genesis 17:7

God made this covenant promise to Abraham way before Moses was ever given the Law and it is fulfilled in Jesus Christ. God makes good on His promises. So why is this important for you and me?

There are days we need to know that our God keeps His promises.

There are days we are tempted to loose heart, to give up, to question everything. There are days when suffering surrounds us and we need to know that God is with us, even if He doesn’t end our suffering right away. There are days when we have blown it and we need to know that God delights in us and that we are blood bought and forgiven in Christ. There are days we need to lay our lifeless bodies and exhausted souls in the mighty arms of our promise keeping God.

Sometimes we think can be good enough, keep it all together, and work hard enough to fix our situations. Often we think that we can even do all of this so well that God will accept us more or love us more because of what we do. Really? What can we do that God can not do infinitely greater? How can we be good enough in the presence of self-sustaining, all-sufficient, Holy God?

Simply put, we can’t.

Here is the theological catch point. When we try to earn God’s favor by being good, we are declaring that what we do is greater than His Promise and redemptive work Jesus did on our behalf.

We must be saved and upheld by God’s original promise that He would be our God and we will be His people. This comes by God’s grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone. God does not lie. He keeps this promise even when we are at our darkest times. Find comfort there weary soul.

 

REFLECTIONS QUESTIONS:

1.       Have you ever felt like God doesn’t love you or accept you because of what you have done on not done? If so, this is the great freedom found in the Gospel. That God loves us not by our works, but because of the work of Jesus Christ.

2.       If we become an “heir” to this promise we just looked at above, does it matter how we live? Why?

3.       What are the promises of God you need to remember today?

4.       What are some places in your life now that you need to trust Him? List out some actual steps you can take to be faithful in the promise God has made to you.

 

MEMORIZE: Galatians 3:29 “And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to promise.” 

This week's devotional is written by Bryan Bair. Bryan is a local church planter of SouthPoint Church, which we support as a sister church in Tallahassee.