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A Terrible Trade

            I used to have a Wayne Gretzky rookie card.
             However, when I was 12 years old I did not like Wayne Gretzky, so I traded the card to my brother.  A few years ago, I remembered that incident, so I went looking for the card. Sure enough, there is was in a box in my mom’s basement.  Now here is the thing:  even in bad shape, Gretzky rookie cards sell for around $250.  Needless to say, that was not a good trade on my part.  I simply did not recognize what I had and so I traded away something valuable for something with almost no value at all.
            With that in mind, notice how the letter to the Galatians starts: “I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you to live in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel— which is really no gospel at all. Evidently some people are throwing you into confusion and are trying to pervert the gospel of Christ. But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let them be under God’s curse! As we have already said, so now I say again: If anybody is preaching to you a gospel other than what you accepted, let them be under God’s curse… Are you so foolish?  After beginning with the Spirit, are you trying to attain your goal by human effort?” (1:6-9 and 3:3).  
            Do you see what they had done?  They traded “the grace of Christ” for “human effort” as a way to become righteous and that will never work!  We cannot be good enough to earn anything!  The only message that we have, the only hope, the only way to become like God is through his grace alone.  
            In fact, by trading away God’s grace and relying on their own effort they sabotaged their own joy (4:15).  There is nothing more miserable than trying to earn God’s favor, because you never get to a point where you think that you have done enough.  You are never sure of your standing with God if you think it rests on you doing the right things.  
            As someone once said, “Grace is a gift for the hopeless – not compensation for the hard-working”.   
            Never trade God’s grace for your hard work.  It will be the worst trade you ever make.

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