Day 19 - Not By Works by Pastor Philip Olubakin: MP3 Download & Sermon Notes

Who Has Bewitched You?

Galatians 3:1

Paul opens with a sharp question: who has bewitched you? He called it a bewitchment — because turning away from grace back to works is not just a theological error, it is a deception. The Galatians had seen the death of Jesus painted before their eyes, yet they were going back to circumcision and religious performance to earn their standing with God.

The same bewitchment is alive today. If you think you have to pray to be accepted by God — that is a bewitchment. If you think you have to fast to earn God's love — that is a bewitchment.

Everything we have from God, we received by grace. Everything.

• Salvation is by grace through faith. You did not contribute anything to your new birth — just as you contributed nothing to your physical birth.
• You did not earn the anointing by how long you prayed. You did not work your way into being chosen.
• We grow from salvation — we do not grow into salvation.

We Are Saved by Grace for Good Works

This is the balance that sets people free: we are not saved by good works. We are saved by his grace for good works. The works come after. They flow from the salvation, they do not produce it.

I do not pay my tithe to be accepted by God. I pay it because I am accepted by God. I pray not to make God love me — he has already loved me with an everlasting love. I pray because I want to show him how much I want to love him back. The motion comes from my end, not his.

Galatians 2:20

Paul said: I am crucified with Christ. Nevertheless I live. And the life I live, I live by the faith of the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. All my life is by the faith of the Son of God — not by my own works.

Christ Has Redeemed Us from the Curse

Galatians 3:13

Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law — he was made a curse for us. This is sweeping. Family curses are included. Generational negative patterns — redeemed. The blessing of Abraham is now available to the Gentiles through Jesus Christ, that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.

If it is by works, nobody makes it. Not one person.

All our righteousness is like filthy rags. If you fasted every day of your life, convert your hours to years and compare it to one day before the Lord who counts a thousand years as a day. The maths does not work. Nobody earns heaven. Nobody earns favour. We are products of his grace — and that is not a license to sin, it is a foundation to stand on.