Sunday Sermon 10/25/2026 | FREE — Week 4 | The Finished Work of Jesus |
FREE — Week 4 | The Finished Work of Jesus | Brett Smith
What if the Christian life was never meant to be lived through your own strength, but through the life of Jesus living in you?
In Week 4 of our series FREE, guest speaker Brett Smith continues our journey through Galatians with a powerful message about the finished work of Jesus, the goodness of God, and the freedom that comes from living by faith rather than religious performance.
Throughout this series, we’ve been discovering a foundational truth:
The gospel needs nothing added to it and nothing taken away from it. Jesus is enough.
But what happens when we believe Jesus saved us by grace, yet try to live the Christian life through our own effort?
In Galatians 3, Paul confronts the believers with a powerful question:
“Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh?” — Galatians 3:3
The Galatians had received the Holy Spirit through faith, not through their ability to keep the law. Yet they were being drawn back into a system that measured their righteousness through their own performance.
And we can fall into the same trap today.
We believe Jesus did everything necessary to save us, but then live as though everything else depends on us.
We begin by grace and attempt to finish by works.
But the gospel was never meant to operate that way.
Jesus didn’t simply do everything necessary to save us. He continues to be the source of the life we live.
Our foundation is the goodness of God, perfectly revealed through Jesus Christ.
Hebrews 1:3 tells us that Jesus is the exact representation of God’s nature. When we look at Jesus, we see what the Father is truly like.
He is good.
He is loving.
He is holy.
And He never designed us to achieve perfection through our own strength.
We were designed to be transformed through the life and presence of Jesus Christ within us.
This is why Paul asks whether the Galatians received the Spirit and witnessed miracles through works of the law or through hearing with faith.
The Christian life is supernatural from beginning to end.
In 2 Corinthians 3:16–18, we discover that transformation comes as we behold the glory of the Lord. We are changed from one degree of glory to another through the work of the Spirit.
Transformation isn’t something we manufacture. It’s something God accomplishes within us.
Brett also explores what happens when we build our lives on the wrong foundation.
Jesus described two houses: one built on rock and another built on sand.
Both experienced storms.
But only one had a foundation strong enough to withstand them.
Our foundation matters.
And the foundation of the Christian life isn’t our performance, religious accomplishments, or ability to keep every rule.
Our foundation is Jesus Christ and His finished work.
Galatians 3 reminds us that Abraham was counted righteous because he believed God.
The promise came through faith.
Not through law-keeping.
Not through human achievement.
Not through religious performance.
And Paul declares:
“Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us.” — Galatians 3:13
When we try to establish righteousness through our own works, we place ourselves under a burden we were never designed to carry.
That burden produces guilt, condemnation, comparison, exhaustion, and the constant feeling that we’re never doing enough.
But Jesus came to redeem us from that burden.
The law revealed our need for a Savior. Jesus became the answer to that need.
Through faith in Christ, we are no longer defined by our inability to measure up.
We are children of God.
We have been clothed with Christ.
We are heirs according to the promise.
And we have been invited into a life far greater than merely trying to avoid failure.
Jesus said in John 10:10:
“I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.”
Salvation is more than the promise of heaven someday.
It’s the reality of Christ living His life in us today.
As W. Ian Thomas taught, being in Christ changes our destination, but Christ living in us changes how we live here on earth.
This is the heart of the message:
Stop trying to produce through human effort what only Jesus can accomplish through His Spirit.
You weren’t created to live the Christian life independently of God.
You were created for relationship with Him.
To trust Him.
To receive from Him.
To surrender to Him.
And to allow His life to be expressed through yours.
So ask yourself:
Am I living from the finished work of Jesus, or am I still trying to finish something He has already accomplished?
Grace isn’t simply how the Christian life begins.
Grace is how we continue to live it.
📖 Key Scriptures:
• Galatians 3:1–5 — Having begun by the Spirit, are we now trying to be perfected by the flesh?
• Galatians 3:6–14 — Abraham’s righteousness through faith and Christ redeeming us from the curse of the law.
• Galatians 3:23–29 — Through faith in Christ, we are children of God and heirs according to the promise.
• Hebrews 12:2 — Jesus is the founder and perfecter of our faith.
• 2 Corinthians 3:16–18 — We are transformed by the Spirit as we behold the glory of the Lord.
💬 Highlighted Quotes:
• “Jesus did it all.”
• “He went from did it all to doing it all.”
• “The truth, the gospel needs nothing added to it or subtracted from it.”
• “Our transformation is supernatural, we could never pull this off. And we were never meant to.”
• “You were designed to be made perfect in and through the person of Jesus.”
• “Salvation is so much more than being saved from hell.”
• “Allow your failures to point you to Jesus, let Him redefine failure.”
• “Christ gave Himself for us to give Himself to us!” — Major Ian Thomas
• “The Christian life is the life of the Lord Jesus Christ lived two thousand years ago, lived now by Him in you!” — W. Ian Thomas
🌟 Key Themes:
• The finished work of Jesus Christ
• The goodness and nature of God
• Jesus as the perfect revelation of the Father
• Grace versus religious performance
• Righteousness through faith
• The purpose of the law
• Freedom from guilt and condemnation
• Transformation through the Holy Spirit
• Christ living in us
• The blessing of Abraham
• Our identity as children of God
• Living the abundant Christian life
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