Galatians 6:14 Do not Boast, Except in the Cross

Galatians 6:14 But may it never be that I would boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.

Christian, let your life be a contrast to the ways of legalists. While they boast in their own doing and in their self-righteousness, you should boast in the cross. It is the cross that has changed you and set you apart. It is only by the cross that you can claim righteousness. Rather than shrinking back from the persecution that comes on account of the cross, press forward in the faith knowing that through the cross you are being perfected.

May it never be that you should boast in yourself. Do not boast in any gifts, whether spiritual, work related, or natural talents and abilities. These will not serve any good in changing your heart and justifying you before God. Neither let yourself boast in any righteousness of your own. “For all of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous deeds are like a filthy garment; and all of us wither like a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind, take us away” (Isaiah 64:6). You own deeds are tainted with sin and imperfect. If the deed itself is good yet your motive is contaminated. Therefore you have no room to pride yourself in or trust in your own righteousness.

Take Paul as your example. Though many were putting confidence in their own flesh, such as the Judaizers—“the dogs… the evil workers… the false circumcision”—any who boast in their good deeds—Paul “put no confidence in the flesh.” If anybody could have boasted in his own righteousness, Paul was that person. He was “circumcised the eighth day, of the nation of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the Law, a Pharisee; as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to the righteousness which is in the Law [that is, the outward Law], found blameless” (Philippians 3:2-6). Yet Paul found that, as to inward righteousness, even he was unrighteous, for he could not keep his own heart from covetousness (cf. Romans 7:7-13).

On account of his inability to be righteous, Paul says, “I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ, and may be found in Him not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith” (Philippians 3:8-9). Paul boasted only in the cross of Jesus Christ. To the cross he clung so that he could be credited the alien righteousness of Christ. He could not boast except in the cross, since the righteousness he boasted in was not his own, but the righteousness of an outside source—Christ Jesus.

In the same way, brothers and sisters, do not boast in yourself, but in the cross of Christ. You are both justified and regenerated only through the cross. Through the cross of Christ you have died to this world and the world has died to you. You have received a new heart from God on account of the cross. Thus on account of the cross, through the work of Jesus Christ, you have been given new affections and desires. You no longer desire the things of the world, not because of any measures you have taken, but because of the regenerating work of God through the cross. Your flesh has been put to death. Because this is true, consider your members as dead to sin and strive to not live by the ways of the world (cf. Colossians 3:1-10). Legalistic religions, on the other hand, attempt to work to cause a change of heart. Such a philosophy is the opposite of the true order of things.