PropositionThe same Spirit-filled community that gently restores a brother overtaken in sin also expects each believer, without comparison or self-deception, to carry and one day give account for his own work before the Lord.
Introduction
The church has been compared to a body — it’s called a body in Colossians. But the comparison isn’t just a name; it’s a comparison between the physical body and the body of Christ. Paul does this especially in chapter 4 of Ephesians — he talks about the body, how the hand needs the foot, and the foot can’t say to the hand, "I don’t need you," and the hand can’t say that to the foot, and no one can say that to the eyes. And above all of this is the head, and Christ is the head of the church. We need each other. We need to be working together — every part, as he says in Ephesians, supplying that which is needed, every joint and ligament supplying, for what purpose? Until we all come to the stature of the fullness of Christ. That’s what it’s about — every one of us bringing his part, doing his thing, whatever that is — some more obvious than others, but all important. In fact, he says a little later that the things we give the least importance to, the things we see the least, are the most important — the things we exhibit, the hands, the eyes, they’re there, but there are more important parts than that. So we need to see that every part is important — that’s the point. Oh yeah, you’re all here — but some people aren’t here, and when someone is not here we need to know that, we need to be helping one another, finding out what each other needs, praying for one another — all of that is part of the body. We are brothers, and we need to bear one another’s burdens. So in Galatians 6:1-5 we have this.
I. Bear One Another’s Burdens – 6:1-3
He says, first of all, we should bear one another’s burdens — we should not be bearing burdens by ourselves. If my eye hurts, the hand doesn’t just say, "oh, you can’t do anything" — no, I do something to help the eye. Or if one hand hurts — you’ve heard the expression, one hand washes the other — well, you ever try to wash your hands without the other? It’s a little hard to do that. Well, that’s what we’re talking about — bearing one another’s burdens.
A. The Exhortation – 6:1-2
“Brethren, if a man is overtaken in any trespass, you who are spiritual restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness, considering yourself lest you also be tempted.”
1. The Sinning Believer – 6:1a. The expectation, in verses 1 and 2 — first, he talks about the sinning believer. Verse 1a: "Brethren, if a man is overtaken in a trespass…" Now, is he talking to believers or unbelievers? Believers — he says "brothers." Brothers, if a man is overtaken in a trespass — he’s talking to believers about believers. A believer is still able to sin. Did you know that? You know that — you looked in the mirror. Yeah. A believer is still able to sin. I grew up in a family where they taught — my father was a pastor, and they taught, once you’re saved, you don’t sin anymore. I’ve heard my father say, "I’ve been saved now thirty-five years and never sinned once." What? Oh, Papa, I think I know better than that — I thought I saw you with our old Mary the other day trying to get her out there in the field, and you weren’t exactly a Christian about that. But somehow that was a mistake, it wasn’t a sin. Well, we know better than that.
James 3:2 says we all stumble in many things — everybody. 1 John 1:8 says, if we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us — we’re lying if we say we don’t have sin. Two verses later, verse 10: if we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us. Well, what about that? We’re all sinners, we have sin in us, we sin — what’s going to happen? Well, between verse 8 and verse 10, verse 9: if we confess our sin, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sin, to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. But we have to confess it. Is that it, that’s all we do? That’s it — we confess our sin. We don’t have to do penance for our sin, we don’t have to promise this and promise that. We sinned, we confess it to God — "I sinned" — naming the sin, of course. Now you don’t have to beg God to forgive you — if we confess it, he forgives it, go on about your business. Well, that’s what he says.
So he’s talking to brothers about brothers, and this brother that he’s talking about here was caught in a trespass. Some people say he’s caught in the trespass — what does that mean? He was doing the act of sin, and someone caught it. Well, that’s possible, but I don’t think so — I’m looking at commentaries, and they say, oh, how about the woman who was taken in adultery, John 8 — in fact, it says, "we caught this woman in the very act." You know, I’ve often wondered why is only one person there — we have this one woman here, she was taken in the very act, she committed adultery — what about the other guy? Somebody else was there, I know. But only one, in any case, she was taken in the very act. That’s a point — that’s a little different word, same root, but a different word [καταλαμβάνω] — so I don’t believe that’s what he’s talking about. Rather, I think he’s talking about: he was caught by the sin. He was surprised by the sin — the sin came upon him, and he was, kind of, taken by surprise. A little different word from the same root [προλαμβάνω], as I said. So he was taken by surprise — but that doesn’t excuse it, it’s still a sin.
And I have a little problem about most sins being a surprise, because we play around with it — play around, play around — this is a little autobiographical here — and all of a sudden you’ve got it, it’s in. "Oh, I guess I got surprised." No, you didn’t — you planned on it. Sometimes read James chapter 1 about the genealogy of sin, that’s what I named it — it talks about how sin builds up and builds up, and all of a sudden you’ve got it, it brings death. So, he was caught by the sin — whether he got himself in there and got caught, whatever — he was caught by the sin, and that person needs help, he says. That person needs help with that, because he sinned. Now, that’s a sinning believer.
2. The Spiritual Brother – 6:1b-d. a. The Person of Restoration – 6:1b. Now there’s the spiritual brother. He says that the person of the restoration is he that is spiritual — "you who are spiritual, restore such a one." Now, who’s spiritual? Oh, I could name a lot here — all fifteen of them, yeah, we’re all spiritual ones. Well, check it out — the spiritual one is the one who has been walking in the Spirit, chapter 5, we just did that last week — walking in the Spirit, led by the Spirit, living out the fruit of the Spirit. Wow, that’s a big thing. That’s the spiritual person — not the person who just walks in and straightens his tie and says, "oh, I’m here, I’ll write it down" — and maybe he has a better chance of not sinning in that context, but all of us need to be walking in the Spirit, led by the Spirit, living out the fruit of the Spirit, so that when that person needs our help, we, the spiritual one, can help him.
b. The Purpose of Restoration – 6:1c. Then there’s the purpose of the restoration — the spiritual person goes to that person, and he is supposed to restore such a one. Restore that sinner — he needs help, he can’t do it by himself, he has problems with that, and so you need to go to him and help him. He’s going to go to the one who was overtaken — oh my, I thought you were supposed to go to everybody else! Don’t go to everybody else — "oh, I just want to tell you something about brother so-and-so, yeah, he needs prayer, but I’ve got to tell you what he did" — that is gossiping, gossiping using prayer to the Lord as a cover for gossip. You know, if we did this in prayer meeting, we’d probably have more people — you think, oh, we’re going to talk about all the sinners? No, we shouldn’t be doing that. And you don’t even need to go to the pastor — I make a point there, don’t go to the pastor necessarily — if you need help, sure, but you, the spiritual person, can go to that sinning brother and help him.
So the purpose of restoration — guess what the purpose of this restoration is? Restoration! That’s not rocket science. We are supposed to restore such a one — not to condemn him, not to confront him — restore him.
And the word "restore" [καταρτίζω] is used in many contexts. Outside of the New Testament, the word is used of setting a bone — when a bone is broken, you set the bone and put a splint on it, hold it — that’s what restore means. I heard somewhere that when a bone is knit together at a break, it can’t break there anymore — wouldn’t it be great if that’s true? But when we help him, we mend him, bring him back, restore him in that sense.
It’s also used in the New Testament of mending a net. Now, I haven’t done any net fishing lately, but I understand that sometimes when you drag it in, you get maybe a stone or something in there and it tears the net — well, you can’t do much fishing with that net any longer, fish come in, fish go out. So that’s why you see Jesus was walking along the Sea of Galilee and found two brothers with their father mending their nets — they had to mend them. That’s the same word — restoring the net to usefulness for what they were doing.
So one of the parts of the body is broken. Well, if one part of the body is broken, and that whole body is necessary for moving on to the purpose of the church, then we’ve got a hole in the net — we need to mend that, so that the whole church can move on together, and that person is brought back to the Lord in fellowship, and we restore them — get that person back on track, get that person back in the fellowship of the church where he belongs.
c. The Posture of Restoration – 6:1d. Now the posture of the restoration — he says the person is to do this in a spirit of gentleness, considering yourself lest you also be tempted. A spirit of gentleness — wonder where he got that word? Back in verse 22 of chapter 5, gentleness, self-control — that’s number eight in the list, gentle. He’s to go to that one in a spirit of meekness, in a spirit of love too, but not in some kind of censorious attitude. No — I’m there to help him in love: "Brother, I’m sorry this happened, I want to help you out of this, let me help you" — not, "you shouldn’t have done that," he knows that, you don’t need to help him with that. No — help him. "I’m going to help you if I can," and then understand that you could do the same thing yourself — you’re not above that, you’re not coming to him looking down on him, you’re at least on the same level, maybe even below — "I’m being gentle with you, you can overcome this thing."
Then Paul adds, lest he be tempted — lest you be tempted to the same thing. I know this could happen: when a person does something, "oh, let me hear all the glory details" — you know, I could get into that. No, don’t do that — be careful, because you could be tempted as well. See, being tempted is not a sin, of course — Jesus was tempted, and Jesus did not sin. Do you know that we don’t need to yield to any temptation — even the surprising ones, even those that capture us every once in a while? No, we don’t have to yield to any temptation. Remember that hymn, "Yield not to temptation, for yielding is sin" — I believe the blind lady wrote that — so it isn’t everything, but she taught that in that hymn: yield not to temptation, for yielding is sin. Then she says, each victory will help you some other victory to win. That’s what it’s all about — but we don’t need to do the sin.
1 Corinthians 10:13 says this: "No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it." The temptation comes, and God brings a way of escape. First of all, your temptation and your sin is not unusual — your temptation comes to you, and it’s like everybody else has had it too. You can’t say, "well, I had such a thing, why me?" No — no temptation has taken you that everybody else has not had. And God does provide an escape route if we look for it, and if we find it — looking for the escape route and finding it — then we don’t have the temptation, we’re out of temptation. So we need to get our mind off the temptation, onto the escape route, and get going for the Lord. That’s the exhortation.
B. The Explanation – 6:2-3
“Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ. For if anyone thinks himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself.”
1. He Shows the Right of the Law – 6:2. The explanation — explanation, I got this, you Greeks, from one little word, gar [γάρ] — to an English person it looks like "yap," but it’s gar, because it means "because." So this explanation is in verses 2 and 3, and verse 3 has a gar in it too. He shows the right of the law. The law? I thought we were not under the law! Oh, no — we’re under a law. He says, "Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ."
So the Judaizers were telling the Galatians they had to keep the law of Moses — that’s the wrong law. The Mosaic law was under the Old Covenant, given to Israel in the Old Testament. Under that old covenant, they kept the Mosaic law; in the New Covenant, we keep the law of Christ. Why? So we can be saved? No — salvation in both covenants, old covenant way back here, is by grace through faith plus nothing. Oh, what do you do? Well, you believe God. Well, then, after you do that, how do you please God? You keep the Mosaic law — that’s it, that’s the Old Testament. Then comes the cross — the Old Testament spoke of that, they were looking forward, they were saying, "I believe what God is going to do, whatever it is up there, I believe that," and they received salvation — Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him for righteousness, that’s it.
Then he comes to the fulfillment of the prophecy, for Christ to die. He died, and he took on him all the sins that had been sinned — and then all the sins that were going to be sinned — all put on Christ, and Christ died for all those sins, past, present, and future — all sin is paid for at the cross. What’s the wages of sin? Death. And God says, anybody who sinned, dies — the wages of sin is death — but then Christ came along and said, "I’ll die in their place," so all the sin is passed on to him, and he takes care of the sin — the sin is no longer a question between us and God, the Lord took care of that, Jesus took care of that on the cross. Now we have the same thing — we look to the cross, and we say, "I believe in Jesus," and I believe that he gives eternal life for those who believe in him — that’s taken care of. See, I’m not saying, "oh Lord, pay for my sin" — no, it isn’t a sin question any longer, it is a Son question: what will you do with Jesus, who is called Christ? That’s the question, and that’s the answer — Jesus.
So there is a right law for today, and that’s the law of Christ. What is that law? "Love one another" — it’s on the board back there, love one another — but there’s more to that. John 13:34 says: "A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, as I have loved you, that you also love one another." Now, we live under grace — but grace has commandments. Oh, why — we’re back under law? Yeah, we’re under the law of Christ. The law of Christ — he says in John 14:15, "If you love me, keep my commandments," plural — not just love one another, but keep my commandments, all the things that he commanded you. Back there we have one about going into all the world, make disciples of all nations, teaching them to observe all things which I have commanded you. So we have a law to follow, but that law is out of love, out of grace — he gives us everything, that we please him. In the Old Testament, they did it that he blessed them; here, he blesses us, and then we do keep the laws of Christ. That’s what this is all about — keeping the law of Christ, loving one another. So he shows the right way of the law, the right of the law.
2. He Shines a Light on a Flaw – 6:3. And then he shines a light on the flaw, verse 3: "For if anyone thinks himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself." In the process of helping the sinning brother, don’t get an exalted feeling. Don’t say — you go in there and help him, and he says, "oh, that’s wonderful, thank you, thank you, thank you, that’s right, I’ll help you anytime you want me to" — one does it all, you are no more than you were before you started.
Now, we quoted 1 Corinthians 10:13 concerning temptation, but there’s another verse in that context — the verse right before it, verse 12 — very important. It says, before he says "no temptation has taken you," he says, "Therefore let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall." That’s the one before it. That seems to be what Paul’s saying here — he’s saying, when you go to help him, be careful about yourself, don’t get high and mighty. You’re serving God — let God do the work, you don’t take any credit. And then in 2 Corinthians 10:17-18, a little further on, he says, "But he who glories, let him glory in the Lord. For not he who commends himself is approved, but whom the Lord commends." See, that’s it — it’s okay to boast, but boast in the Lord, not in you — even if the Lord has done something through you, and someone says, "oh, that was wonderful, you are a great thing there" — don’t take it to heart, the Lord did something, whatever he did, he gets the glory. That’s all we need to know, and I’m happy for that — sometimes you still have the temptation, but the Lord did it — if you’re going to glory, glory in the Lord.
II. Bear Your Own Burdens – 6:4-5
Now, so that was bear one another’s burdens, verses 1-3; now he says bear your own burden, verses 4-5.
A. The Examination – 6:4a
“But let each one examine his own work,”
This is the examination: "let each one examine his own work." See, examination of your own work and service for the Lord is biblical — it’s good to examine your work. What am I doing? Am I doing it right? Lord, help me to see whether I’m doing this or that, whether I’m living right, whether my ministry is what it ought to be. That’s good — but not for the wrong reason. Don’t do that to see if you’re saved. Salvation is not by your works — you are saved by grace through faith, plus not one thing. So we don’t look at ourselves and say, "oh, I wonder if I’m saved, I wasn’t doing very well" — no, or "I did a great job, I know I’m saved now" — no, no. We know we’re saved by looking at the objective Word of God. The Word of God says, he who believes has eternal life. How long is eternal? Forever. When we receive Jesus Christ as Savior, that tells us: you have eternal life, you’re going to live forever with the Lord.
So the examination, then, is not to say whether I’m saved or whether I’m anything. The examination is to tell: am I serving where the Lord wants me? Am I serving how the Lord wants me? Am I exercising all the gifts that God has given me? "Oh, I didn’t get any gifts." Oh, yes you did — everyone gets a gift, he’s gifted at least one, and probably more. Am I doing those things? How can I discern what my gift is? We have a little section on that — but yeah, we need to know what our gifts are, and we need to be exercising them, and we ought to be asking ourselves, asking the Lord, am I doing what you told me to do with my gifts? And that would be some indication of our reward as we stand before the Lord (1 Corinthians 3; 2 Corinthians 5).
So the key, then, is that we should examine our own work, not someone else’s — don’t be looking around, "was he doing what he’s supposed to do?" Well, am I doing what I’m supposed to do? That’s the examination.
B. The Exaltation – 6:4b
“and then he will have rejoicing in himself alone, and not in another.”
Now, after that comes exaltation: "and then he will have rejoicing in himself alone, and not in another." Now, the believer finds, after objective biblical examination, that he’s doing all that he knows to do, all the Lord expects of him — then he can rejoice. But even then, he rejoices in the Lord, not in himself — so he’s rejoicing, and it will not be comparing himself to other people, but comparing himself to what the Lord has for him to do, the course that the Lord set before him. He may say at the end of his life, as Paul did, "I have fought the good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith" — that’s it, that’s what the Lord’s going to be looking at: did I finish the course, did I do the course that the Lord had for me to do, not somebody else’s, my own course. Would I like to be in a larger church? Well, this church is plenty large, I haven’t filled it up yet — the Lord hasn’t filled it up for me. No, it isn’t that I should be, "oh, I want to have ten churches under my…" No — what it is, the Lord has called me here, to this place, I’m happy doing it. Someone says, "oh, you’re still working?" Yeah, I’m still working — they think I’m dead by now! No, I’m still here. One lady called and said, "do you need health insurance in your church?" I said, "lady, I’ve been on Medicare for eighteen years." She said, "oh, I didn’t know that." In any case, what I’m saying is: doing the thing that God has called you to do, and doing it willingly, doing it joyfully — that’s the thing. That’s exaltation.
C. The Explanation – 6:5
“For each one shall bear his own load.”
Now, explanation — for, there’s that word "for" again, gar. "For each one shall bear his own load." Wait a minute — verse 2 said, bear one another’s burdens; now we have verse 5, each one shall bear his own burden. Sound contradictory? Yeah, it does. The key is found in this: there are two different words. The word in verse 2 is baros [βάρος], which is a burden too heavy to carry by yourself — a load that’s on you, and it’s just too heavy to carry, we help that person, someone comes along and helps lift the load — that’s the kind of burden he’s talking about, and we saw that in the sin, and so forth, that he is under — that load, there’s someone who comes in and helps them carry that burden. But verse 5 has a different word, phortion [φορτίον], which refers to a soldier’s pack — when a soldier goes out to war, he carries a pack on his back, he carries in that all the things he needs to serve in the army. So verse 5 is looking at the judgment seat, where each person stands alone before God and either gains or loses reward as a result — but he’s standing there by himself, no way for anyone else to help. We used to sing a long time ago, "you gotta walk that lonesome valley, you gotta go there by yourself, no one here can go there for you, you gotta go there by yourself" — he’s talking about death, but then after death comes the judgment, and we stand there by ourselves too. You may say, "well, I was a member of Twin Lakes Baptist Church, and we did some great things there" — the Lord says, what did you do? "Oh, I was there." Exactly — everyone is going to have his own burden, everyone has to carry his own burden, and everyone will stand before the Lord for that.
Conclusion
Help one another — every brother can help carry a burden. But then every brother also has to carry his own burden — every part of the body has a function, and that function has to be carried out so that the body can do its job. Someone has said, the Christian army is the only army that shoots its wounded — let’s not shoot our wounded. Let’s help these people, help the ones who need help, help him bear his burden — and make sure that each of us carries our own burden as well.
Lord, thank You.
Introduction
The church has been compared to a body — it’s called a body in Colossians. But the comparison isn’t just a name; it’s a comparison between the physical body and the body of Christ. Paul does this especially in chapter 4 of Ephesians — he talks about the body, how the hand needs the foot, and the foot can’t say to the hand, "I don’t need you," and the hand can’t say that to the foot, and no one can say that to the eyes. And above all of this is the head, and Christ is the head of the church. We need each other. We need to be working together — every part, as he says in Ephesians, supplying that which is needed, every joint and ligament supplying, for what purpose? Until we all come to the stature of the fullness of Christ. That’s what it’s about — every one of us bringing his part, doing his thing, whatever that is — some more obvious than others, but all important. In fact, he says a little later that the things we give the least importance to, the things we see the least, are the most important — the things we exhibit, the hands, the eyes, they’re there, but there are more important parts than that. So we need to see that every part is important — that’s the point. Oh yeah, you’re all here — but some people aren’t here, and when someone is not here we need to know that, we need to be helping one another, finding out what each other needs, praying for one another — all of that is part of the body. We are brothers, and we need to bear one another’s burdens. So in Galatians 6:1-5 we have this.
I. Bear One Another’s Burdens – 6:1-3
He says, first of all, we should bear one another’s burdens — we should not be bearing burdens by ourselves. If my eye hurts, the hand doesn’t just say, "oh, you can’t do anything" — no, I do something to help the eye. Or if one hand hurts — you’ve heard the expression, one hand washes the other — well, you ever try to wash your hands without the other? It’s a little hard to do that. Well, that’s what we’re talking about — bearing one another’s burdens.
A. The Exhortation – 6:1-2
1. The Sinning Believer – 6:1a. The expectation, in verses 1 and 2 — first, he talks about the sinning believer. Verse 1a: "Brethren, if a man is overtaken in a trespass…" Now, is he talking to believers or unbelievers? Believers — he says "brothers." Brothers, if a man is overtaken in a trespass — he’s talking to believers about believers. A believer is still able to sin. Did you know that? You know that — you looked in the mirror. Yeah. A believer is still able to sin. I grew up in a family where they taught — my father was a pastor, and they taught, once you’re saved, you don’t sin anymore. I’ve heard my father say, "I’ve been saved now thirty-five years and never sinned once." What? Oh, Papa, I think I know better than that — I thought I saw you with our old Mary the other day trying to get her out there in the field, and you weren’t exactly a Christian about that. But somehow that was a mistake, it wasn’t a sin. Well, we know better than that.
James 3:2 says we all stumble in many things — everybody. 1 John 1:8 says, if we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us — we’re lying if we say we don’t have sin. Two verses later, verse 10: if we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us. Well, what about that? We’re all sinners, we have sin in us, we sin — what’s going to happen? Well, between verse 8 and verse 10, verse 9: if we confess our sin, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sin, to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. But we have to confess it. Is that it, that’s all we do? That’s it — we confess our sin. We don’t have to do penance for our sin, we don’t have to promise this and promise that. We sinned, we confess it to God — "I sinned" — naming the sin, of course. Now you don’t have to beg God to forgive you — if we confess it, he forgives it, go on about your business. Well, that’s what he says.
So he’s talking to brothers about brothers, and this brother that he’s talking about here was caught in a trespass. Some people say he’s caught in the trespass — what does that mean? He was doing the act of sin, and someone caught it. Well, that’s possible, but I don’t think so — I’m looking at commentaries, and they say, oh, how about the woman who was taken in adultery, John 8 — in fact, it says, "we caught this woman in the very act." You know, I’ve often wondered why is only one person there — we have this one woman here, she was taken in the very act, she committed adultery — what about the other guy? Somebody else was there, I know. But only one, in any case, she was taken in the very act. That’s a point — that’s a little different word, same root, but a different word [καταλαμβάνω] — so I don’t believe that’s what he’s talking about. Rather, I think he’s talking about: he was caught by the sin. He was surprised by the sin — the sin came upon him, and he was, kind of, taken by surprise. A little different word from the same root [προλαμβάνω], as I said. So he was taken by surprise — but that doesn’t excuse it, it’s still a sin.
And I have a little problem about most sins being a surprise, because we play around with it — play around, play around — this is a little autobiographical here — and all of a sudden you’ve got it, it’s in. "Oh, I guess I got surprised." No, you didn’t — you planned on it. Sometimes read James chapter 1 about the genealogy of sin, that’s what I named it — it talks about how sin builds up and builds up, and all of a sudden you’ve got it, it brings death. So, he was caught by the sin — whether he got himself in there and got caught, whatever — he was caught by the sin, and that person needs help, he says. That person needs help with that, because he sinned. Now, that’s a sinning believer.
2. The Spiritual Brother – 6:1b-d. a. The Person of Restoration – 6:1b. Now there’s the spiritual brother. He says that the person of the restoration is he that is spiritual — "you who are spiritual, restore such a one." Now, who’s spiritual? Oh, I could name a lot here — all fifteen of them, yeah, we’re all spiritual ones. Well, check it out — the spiritual one is the one who has been walking in the Spirit, chapter 5, we just did that last week — walking in the Spirit, led by the Spirit, living out the fruit of the Spirit. Wow, that’s a big thing. That’s the spiritual person — not the person who just walks in and straightens his tie and says, "oh, I’m here, I’ll write it down" — and maybe he has a better chance of not sinning in that context, but all of us need to be walking in the Spirit, led by the Spirit, living out the fruit of the Spirit, so that when that person needs our help, we, the spiritual one, can help him.
b. The Purpose of Restoration – 6:1c. Then there’s the purpose of the restoration — the spiritual person goes to that person, and he is supposed to restore such a one. Restore that sinner — he needs help, he can’t do it by himself, he has problems with that, and so you need to go to him and help him. He’s going to go to the one who was overtaken — oh my, I thought you were supposed to go to everybody else! Don’t go to everybody else — "oh, I just want to tell you something about brother so-and-so, yeah, he needs prayer, but I’ve got to tell you what he did" — that is gossiping, gossiping using prayer to the Lord as a cover for gossip. You know, if we did this in prayer meeting, we’d probably have more people — you think, oh, we’re going to talk about all the sinners? No, we shouldn’t be doing that. And you don’t even need to go to the pastor — I make a point there, don’t go to the pastor necessarily — if you need help, sure, but you, the spiritual person, can go to that sinning brother and help him.
So the purpose of restoration — guess what the purpose of this restoration is? Restoration! That’s not rocket science. We are supposed to restore such a one — not to condemn him, not to confront him — restore him.
And the word "restore" [καταρτίζω] is used in many contexts. Outside of the New Testament, the word is used of setting a bone — when a bone is broken, you set the bone and put a splint on it, hold it — that’s what restore means. I heard somewhere that when a bone is knit together at a break, it can’t break there anymore — wouldn’t it be great if that’s true? But when we help him, we mend him, bring him back, restore him in that sense.
It’s also used in the New Testament of mending a net. Now, I haven’t done any net fishing lately, but I understand that sometimes when you drag it in, you get maybe a stone or something in there and it tears the net — well, you can’t do much fishing with that net any longer, fish come in, fish go out. So that’s why you see Jesus was walking along the Sea of Galilee and found two brothers with their father mending their nets — they had to mend them. That’s the same word — restoring the net to usefulness for what they were doing.
So one of the parts of the body is broken. Well, if one part of the body is broken, and that whole body is necessary for moving on to the purpose of the church, then we’ve got a hole in the net — we need to mend that, so that the whole church can move on together, and that person is brought back to the Lord in fellowship, and we restore them — get that person back on track, get that person back in the fellowship of the church where he belongs.
c. The Posture of Restoration – 6:1d. Now the posture of the restoration — he says the person is to do this in a spirit of gentleness, considering yourself lest you also be tempted. A spirit of gentleness — wonder where he got that word? Back in verse 22 of chapter 5, gentleness, self-control — that’s number eight in the list, gentle. He’s to go to that one in a spirit of meekness, in a spirit of love too, but not in some kind of censorious attitude. No — I’m there to help him in love: "Brother, I’m sorry this happened, I want to help you out of this, let me help you" — not, "you shouldn’t have done that," he knows that, you don’t need to help him with that. No — help him. "I’m going to help you if I can," and then understand that you could do the same thing yourself — you’re not above that, you’re not coming to him looking down on him, you’re at least on the same level, maybe even below — "I’m being gentle with you, you can overcome this thing."
Then Paul adds, lest he be tempted — lest you be tempted to the same thing. I know this could happen: when a person does something, "oh, let me hear all the glory details" — you know, I could get into that. No, don’t do that — be careful, because you could be tempted as well. See, being tempted is not a sin, of course — Jesus was tempted, and Jesus did not sin. Do you know that we don’t need to yield to any temptation — even the surprising ones, even those that capture us every once in a while? No, we don’t have to yield to any temptation. Remember that hymn, "Yield not to temptation, for yielding is sin" — I believe the blind lady wrote that — so it isn’t everything, but she taught that in that hymn: yield not to temptation, for yielding is sin. Then she says, each victory will help you some other victory to win. That’s what it’s all about — but we don’t need to do the sin.
1 Corinthians 10:13 says this: "No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it." The temptation comes, and God brings a way of escape. First of all, your temptation and your sin is not unusual — your temptation comes to you, and it’s like everybody else has had it too. You can’t say, "well, I had such a thing, why me?" No — no temptation has taken you that everybody else has not had. And God does provide an escape route if we look for it, and if we find it — looking for the escape route and finding it — then we don’t have the temptation, we’re out of temptation. So we need to get our mind off the temptation, onto the escape route, and get going for the Lord. That’s the exhortation.
B. The Explanation – 6:2-3
1. He Shows the Right of the Law – 6:2. The explanation — explanation, I got this, you Greeks, from one little word, gar [γάρ] — to an English person it looks like "yap," but it’s gar, because it means "because." So this explanation is in verses 2 and 3, and verse 3 has a gar in it too. He shows the right of the law. The law? I thought we were not under the law! Oh, no — we’re under a law. He says, "Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ."
So the Judaizers were telling the Galatians they had to keep the law of Moses — that’s the wrong law. The Mosaic law was under the Old Covenant, given to Israel in the Old Testament. Under that old covenant, they kept the Mosaic law; in the New Covenant, we keep the law of Christ. Why? So we can be saved? No — salvation in both covenants, old covenant way back here, is by grace through faith plus nothing. Oh, what do you do? Well, you believe God. Well, then, after you do that, how do you please God? You keep the Mosaic law — that’s it, that’s the Old Testament. Then comes the cross — the Old Testament spoke of that, they were looking forward, they were saying, "I believe what God is going to do, whatever it is up there, I believe that," and they received salvation — Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him for righteousness, that’s it.
Then he comes to the fulfillment of the prophecy, for Christ to die. He died, and he took on him all the sins that had been sinned — and then all the sins that were going to be sinned — all put on Christ, and Christ died for all those sins, past, present, and future — all sin is paid for at the cross. What’s the wages of sin? Death. And God says, anybody who sinned, dies — the wages of sin is death — but then Christ came along and said, "I’ll die in their place," so all the sin is passed on to him, and he takes care of the sin — the sin is no longer a question between us and God, the Lord took care of that, Jesus took care of that on the cross. Now we have the same thing — we look to the cross, and we say, "I believe in Jesus," and I believe that he gives eternal life for those who believe in him — that’s taken care of. See, I’m not saying, "oh Lord, pay for my sin" — no, it isn’t a sin question any longer, it is a Son question: what will you do with Jesus, who is called Christ? That’s the question, and that’s the answer — Jesus.
So there is a right law for today, and that’s the law of Christ. What is that law? "Love one another" — it’s on the board back there, love one another — but there’s more to that. John 13:34 says: "A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, as I have loved you, that you also love one another." Now, we live under grace — but grace has commandments. Oh, why — we’re back under law? Yeah, we’re under the law of Christ. The law of Christ — he says in John 14:15, "If you love me, keep my commandments," plural — not just love one another, but keep my commandments, all the things that he commanded you. Back there we have one about going into all the world, make disciples of all nations, teaching them to observe all things which I have commanded you. So we have a law to follow, but that law is out of love, out of grace — he gives us everything, that we please him. In the Old Testament, they did it that he blessed them; here, he blesses us, and then we do keep the laws of Christ. That’s what this is all about — keeping the law of Christ, loving one another. So he shows the right way of the law, the right of the law.
2. He Shines a Light on a Flaw – 6:3. And then he shines a light on the flaw, verse 3: "For if anyone thinks himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself." In the process of helping the sinning brother, don’t get an exalted feeling. Don’t say — you go in there and help him, and he says, "oh, that’s wonderful, thank you, thank you, thank you, that’s right, I’ll help you anytime you want me to" — one does it all, you are no more than you were before you started.
Now, we quoted 1 Corinthians 10:13 concerning temptation, but there’s another verse in that context — the verse right before it, verse 12 — very important. It says, before he says "no temptation has taken you," he says, "Therefore let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall." That’s the one before it. That seems to be what Paul’s saying here — he’s saying, when you go to help him, be careful about yourself, don’t get high and mighty. You’re serving God — let God do the work, you don’t take any credit. And then in 2 Corinthians 10:17-18, a little further on, he says, "But he who glories, let him glory in the Lord. For not he who commends himself is approved, but whom the Lord commends." See, that’s it — it’s okay to boast, but boast in the Lord, not in you — even if the Lord has done something through you, and someone says, "oh, that was wonderful, you are a great thing there" — don’t take it to heart, the Lord did something, whatever he did, he gets the glory. That’s all we need to know, and I’m happy for that — sometimes you still have the temptation, but the Lord did it — if you’re going to glory, glory in the Lord.
II. Bear Your Own Burdens – 6:4-5
Now, so that was bear one another’s burdens, verses 1-3; now he says bear your own burden, verses 4-5.
A. The Examination – 6:4a
This is the examination: "let each one examine his own work." See, examination of your own work and service for the Lord is biblical — it’s good to examine your work. What am I doing? Am I doing it right? Lord, help me to see whether I’m doing this or that, whether I’m living right, whether my ministry is what it ought to be. That’s good — but not for the wrong reason. Don’t do that to see if you’re saved. Salvation is not by your works — you are saved by grace through faith, plus not one thing. So we don’t look at ourselves and say, "oh, I wonder if I’m saved, I wasn’t doing very well" — no, or "I did a great job, I know I’m saved now" — no, no. We know we’re saved by looking at the objective Word of God. The Word of God says, he who believes has eternal life. How long is eternal? Forever. When we receive Jesus Christ as Savior, that tells us: you have eternal life, you’re going to live forever with the Lord.
So the examination, then, is not to say whether I’m saved or whether I’m anything. The examination is to tell: am I serving where the Lord wants me? Am I serving how the Lord wants me? Am I exercising all the gifts that God has given me? "Oh, I didn’t get any gifts." Oh, yes you did — everyone gets a gift, he’s gifted at least one, and probably more. Am I doing those things? How can I discern what my gift is? We have a little section on that — but yeah, we need to know what our gifts are, and we need to be exercising them, and we ought to be asking ourselves, asking the Lord, am I doing what you told me to do with my gifts? And that would be some indication of our reward as we stand before the Lord (1 Corinthians 3; 2 Corinthians 5).
So the key, then, is that we should examine our own work, not someone else’s — don’t be looking around, "was he doing what he’s supposed to do?" Well, am I doing what I’m supposed to do? That’s the examination.
B. The Exaltation – 6:4b
Now, after that comes exaltation: "and then he will have rejoicing in himself alone, and not in another." Now, the believer finds, after objective biblical examination, that he’s doing all that he knows to do, all the Lord expects of him — then he can rejoice. But even then, he rejoices in the Lord, not in himself — so he’s rejoicing, and it will not be comparing himself to other people, but comparing himself to what the Lord has for him to do, the course that the Lord set before him. He may say at the end of his life, as Paul did, "I have fought the good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith" — that’s it, that’s what the Lord’s going to be looking at: did I finish the course, did I do the course that the Lord had for me to do, not somebody else’s, my own course. Would I like to be in a larger church? Well, this church is plenty large, I haven’t filled it up yet — the Lord hasn’t filled it up for me. No, it isn’t that I should be, "oh, I want to have ten churches under my…" No — what it is, the Lord has called me here, to this place, I’m happy doing it. Someone says, "oh, you’re still working?" Yeah, I’m still working — they think I’m dead by now! No, I’m still here. One lady called and said, "do you need health insurance in your church?" I said, "lady, I’ve been on Medicare for eighteen years." She said, "oh, I didn’t know that." In any case, what I’m saying is: doing the thing that God has called you to do, and doing it willingly, doing it joyfully — that’s the thing. That’s exaltation.
C. The Explanation – 6:5
Now, explanation — for, there’s that word "for" again, gar. "For each one shall bear his own load." Wait a minute — verse 2 said, bear one another’s burdens; now we have verse 5, each one shall bear his own burden. Sound contradictory? Yeah, it does. The key is found in this: there are two different words. The word in verse 2 is baros [βάρος], which is a burden too heavy to carry by yourself — a load that’s on you, and it’s just too heavy to carry, we help that person, someone comes along and helps lift the load — that’s the kind of burden he’s talking about, and we saw that in the sin, and so forth, that he is under — that load, there’s someone who comes in and helps them carry that burden. But verse 5 has a different word, phortion [φορτίον], which refers to a soldier’s pack — when a soldier goes out to war, he carries a pack on his back, he carries in that all the things he needs to serve in the army. So verse 5 is looking at the judgment seat, where each person stands alone before God and either gains or loses reward as a result — but he’s standing there by himself, no way for anyone else to help. We used to sing a long time ago, "you gotta walk that lonesome valley, you gotta go there by yourself, no one here can go there for you, you gotta go there by yourself" — he’s talking about death, but then after death comes the judgment, and we stand there by ourselves too. You may say, "well, I was a member of Twin Lakes Baptist Church, and we did some great things there" — the Lord says, what did you do? "Oh, I was there." Exactly — everyone is going to have his own burden, everyone has to carry his own burden, and everyone will stand before the Lord for that.
Conclusion
Help one another — every brother can help carry a burden. But then every brother also has to carry his own burden — every part of the body has a function, and that function has to be carried out so that the body can do its job. Someone has said, the Christian army is the only army that shoots its wounded — let’s not shoot our wounded. Let’s help these people, help the ones who need help, help him bear his burden — and make sure that each of us carries our own burden as well.
Lord, thank You.