Life in the Spirit. (Galatians 5: 13-26)

I once spoke with a woman who had spent years in a church a full of rules and regulations. When she finally moved to a church that simply taught Scripture without adding man‑made religious rules, she told me she felt something surprising: 

 FEAR!

Those rules, she said, had given her a sense of security. When they were gone, she felt exposed.

 I also remember a teenage girl I once met at a youth club who reacted the opposite way. 

 When I told her we are not under the law, she said, “Great — that means I can lie to my mother, I can go out and party, and tell her I’m here at the youth club.” 

 And that’s the problem. Whenever Christians hear that we’re justified by faith apart from any legalistic requirements, some people panic. “Won’t that give me a license to sin? And some say great, that gives me a license that means I can do whatever I want?” So, if we are not under the Mosaic law, what guides our conduct?

That is exactly what Paul answers for us today in the second half of Galatians 5…..