Rev. Doug Floyd

Pentecost +4 2025
Rev. Doug Floyd
Galatians 6

Two weeks ago, Fr. Les focused our attention on these words from the Nicene Creed: We believe in one holy catholic and apostolic Church. He proceeded to discuss how Jesus Christ founds the church, forms the believes into one holy communion, and reveals His glory in His people, in His church. It is Christ from first to last; it is Christ all the way down.

I love this line from his sermon, “From Christ the good things have flowed and are flowing into us…From us they flow on to those who have need of them.”[1] Christ changes us and works in and through us to reconcile the world to Himself.

How do we encounter Christ Jesus? We know the Apostles lived and walked with Him for three years. Jesus spoke to Paul on the Damascus Road. There are stories today and throughout history of Christ Jesus revealing himself in dreams and visions. I know some people here have had those dramatic experiences. And yet, is this is not the norm for encountering Christ, hearing Christ, following Christ.

Though Paul’s own story begins rather dramatically, we see how Christ reveals Himself to Paul in studying Torah, in the council of Apostles at Jerusalem, in his friendship with Barnabas and others. We encounter the risen Christ primarily in Scripture, in worship, and in the community of faith. Christ often reveals Himself to us through other people.

In our reading today, Paul emphasizes the life of Christ in the midst of our relations with God’s people. He says, “Brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. Keep watch on yourself, lest you too be tempted. ² Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ. ³ For if anyone thinks he is something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself. ⁴ But let each one test his own work, and then his reason to boast will be in himself alone and not in his neighbor. ⁵ For each will have to bear his own load.” ^[2]

Today I want to tease out the tension between the first two verses and the fifth verse. I want to consider this in light of Fr. Les’s exhortation, “From Christ the good things have flowed and are flowing into us…From us they flow on to those who have need of them.”[3]

In Psalm 68:6, we read, “God settles the solitary in a home.”^[4] He has set us into the ecclesia, the called-out community of Christ, the church. Christ has set us in a family and from that family, he will make Himself known. Solitary encounters with Christ are a blessing, but they are not the norm, and they are not the pattern of how Christ changes us and makes Himself known to us. He does so in and through the community of the faithful, the communion of saints.

In Galatians 6:1-2, Paul emphasizes the role of the entire community in caring for one another. First, he addresses our responsibility to one who is struggling. Transformation takes time. It took St. Augustine 15 years of grappling with the faith to let go and follow in the way of Christ. We struggle. Just because someone struggles with sin, with a transgression, we don’t give up. Sadly, it is easy for the church to sometimes give up on struggling people. I had a friend who struggled with mental illness, and the pastor told me, “Doug, we’ve washed our hands of him.”

So many people fall through the cracks of supposed successful churches. How do we embrace those who struggle? Now this may be a good place to reiterate Paul’s big message in Galatians. Some people were convinced that the path of following Christ involved circumcision. The Gentile had to become a Jew through circumcision in order to enter the fullness of Christ. This way of thinking would divide the community between men and women since circumcision was a ritual for men. It will also divide the community between the circumcised and the uncircumcised.

The mark of the covenant with God is not circumcision but faith. Faith becomes a sign that God is already at work in our hearts. We don’t work up faith, but the Spirit opens our hearts to faith in Christ. Abraham lives in faith in the word or command of God before he is circumcised.

When we speak of being redeemed by God’s grace, we are speaking of Christ Jesus restoring us to communion with God. It is a work of grace from start to finish. In each of his letters, Paul will give moral instruction. He is not suggesting this moral instruction plays a role in our redemption, but rather this is how the family of God lives together. In Galatians 6:1, we are exhorted to gently restore those struggling with sin. We may confront, pray, encourage, and support them as they seek to walk free. We don’t wash our hands of one another. We love one another. We seek restoration.

Then in verse 2, Paul appears to expand his exhortation. “Bear one another’s burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ.” What is the law of Christ? In John 15:12-13 Jesus tells his disciples, “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.”^[5]

The law of Christ compels us to love as Jesus has loved. To lay down our lives for one another. We are bound together. We live in the way of the cross, pouring out our lives into one another and bearing each other’s burdens. I can look out across our community and see so many ways this kind of burden bearing has been made known.

When I was so weak I could barely stand in church, Peter came up to me and said, “I’m driving you home. You can get your car later.” Again and again, I’ve seen how people have joined together to meet the needs of other people in the body. Christ is revealing Himself in the midst of this shared life.

He also reveals Himself when in the midst of friction, conflict. These times give us the opportunity to confront our own hearts while also learning to love those who see the world in a very different way. I need to be challenged.

Henry Cloud tells a wonderful story about bearing one another’s burdens. He tells the story of his late brother-in-law who was a Navy SEAL. He specifically focuses on brutal training of hell week when these cream-of-the-crop soldiers are pushed beyond their very limits. By the end of this grueling process, they are dropped in the ocean. Sometimes their bodies simply give out. They are too weak, too tired to go on. They can ring the bell and stop.

Henry’s brother-in-law, Mark, had already completed the process and was standing on the shore. His friend Bryce was in the ocean. His body was failing. He couldn’t go on. He was about to ring the bell when he looked up and saw Mark fist pumping the air. Mark was shouting, “You can do it Bryce.”

In that instant, Bryce says that a surge of energy rushed through him and suddenly he was revived. He completed the course and became a SEAL. In one sense, we are cheering one another one, “You can do it!” Christ is strengthening His body through us.

Verse six indicates a very different work of Christ in the body. Paul writes, “For each will have to bear his own load.” ^[6] Wait, didn’t Paul just say, “Bear one another’s burdens”? This forces us to pause and ask, “What’s going on here?”

As I thought about it and read other writers this week, I heard many emphasize that we all stand before God alone. It is true that I must take responsibility for my own actions.

In the Gospels, we see Jesus dining with sinners as He invites them into the kingdom. He is generous and open-hearted. Then we see Jesus turning to His disciples and saying, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.”^[7]

He calls all His disciples into the way of the cross. He also welcomes outsiders with abounding generosity. We must encounter the love of God, the grace of God, the healing power of God in Christ. As we follow, He will lead us in the way of the cross, for this is the way of encountering the heights and depths of God’s love. In verses three and four, we hear Paul exhorting us not to think that our strengths make us superior. He writes, “For if anyone thinks he is something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself. But let each one test his own work, and then his reason to boast will be in himself alone and not in his neighbor.” ^[8]

As we follow Christ, we are called to humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God. I’d like to tease out one another aspect of bearing our own load. The Lord created each of us in particular ways to reveal His particular glory. If we think about the letter rebuking the tendency to use circumcision as a way of achieving a higher spiritual status, we could link this to Paul’s list of the works of the flesh. He writes, “Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these.”^[9]

Circumcision is a work of the flesh, seeking some spiritual status. Only Christ redeems. If we look at the list of works of the flesh, they are all focused inward on self. These works break down community, divide friendship, collapse marriages.

Now consider the fruits of the Spirit. These are not works but the fruit of God working in us and through us. “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.”^[10] These fruits move outward from us to the world around us.

A few highlights: Love – We are commanded to love God and one another; kindness – living in a way that is beneficial to others; joy – straining beyond ourselves to the hope of things to come such as the harvest, the completion of a project, the breaking into creation of God’s saving grace; peace – concord between groups, harmony, a well-ordered culture. Each of the listed fruits point us beyond ourselves to the world around us.

I think of Dean Kamen, the engineer inventor. Kamen never married because he wanted to spend his life making things that would improve people’s lives. Some of his inventions include a portable dialysis machine, a water purifier that is used in African villages, a wheelchair that can climb stairs, and the new coke machines that can give you any Coke product you desire. He invented that machine for Coke based on an agreement that they would help him get his water purifier to those in need in Africa.

When we think of Scripture, we may tend to think about pastors, teachers, evangelists, prophets, and apostles. Actually, the Bible is filled with varying skills used to bless the larger community such as farmers, craftsmen, merchants, engineers, musicians, explorers who appear to be surveyors, historians, gatekeeper, storytellers, cooks, bakers, millers, weavers, seamstresses, midwives, and much more. We might even add curators to that list because “a curator is a guardian of cultural heritage.:

The work of Christ in us takes shape through us into the world. Makoto Fujimora suggests, “The first question that should be asked as people walk into our church buildings is, ‘What did you make this week?’”[11] We all can play a role in what Makoto calls “Culture care.”

He is thinking about the incarnational aspect of our faith. It is not simply about what ideas we thought about God this week but what took shape through our lives. Think about your life. What do you do? What do you like to do? God creates us with all sorts of gifts and desires.

I end with the line from Fr. Les’s sermon, “From Christ the good things have flowed and are flowing into us…From us they flow on to those who have need of them.”[12] God has created every person here with gifts that can enrich our church community and the greater community around us.

[1] Pentecost +2, Rev. Dr. Les Martin < https://stbrendanschurch.org/sermons/pentecost-2-2/>

^[2] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Ga 6:1–5.

[3] Pentecost +2, Rev. Dr. Les Martin < https://stbrendanschurch.org/sermons/pentecost-2-2/>

^[4] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Ps 68:6.

^[5] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Jn 15:12–13.

^[6] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Ga 6:5.

^[7] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Mt 16:24–25.

^[8] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Ga 6:3–4.

^[9] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Ga 5:19–21.

^[10] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Ga 5:22–23.

[11] Fujimura, Makoto. Art and Faith: A Theology of Making (p. 62). (Function). Kindle Edition.

[12] Pentecost +2, Rev. Dr. Les Martin < https://stbrendanschurch.org/sermons/pentecost-2-2/>