The Cursed God | Sermon | The Grove Church, Port St. Lucie

Why Trying to Be a Good Person Is Slowly Killing You

Christian Freedom: Galatians, Week 8 | All sermons

"The law does not grade on a curve. Grace does not grade at all."

Summary

In this message on Galatians 3:10-14, David Hancock, pastor of The Grove Church in Port St. Lucie, Florida, takes apart the invisible scorecard most people live by: good deeds in one column, failures in the other, hoping the math tips our way. Paul quotes the ceremony at Mount Gerizim and Mount Ebal, where Israel answered every curse with "Amen," and lands on one word: all. Keep the whole law, at every moment, toward every person, without a single break. One entry on the wrong side chains you to the cursed mountain and you cannot leave. Then Christ, the only one worthy to stand on the mountain of blessing, came down to the cursed one and did not merely suffer the curse; He became it.

Key Takeaways

A curse is a binding legal decree that sets someone apart for affliction, and Paul uses the word five times in five verses because that is the mountain we are on.
Karma lets the good outweigh the bad. The law does not. One failure is enough.
Justification means a perfect standing before God, and Christ's record can be credited to yours by faith.
Paul calls the Spirit the blessing, because the Spirit applies heaven's promises while we still live on the cursed side.

Read Galatians 3:10-14 (ESV)

For all who rely on works of the law are under a curse; for it is written, "Cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the Book of the Law, and do them." Now it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law, for "The righteous shall live by faith." But the law is not of faith, rather "The one who does them shall live by them." Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us; for it is written, "Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree"; so that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, so that we might receive the promised Spirit through faith.

Talk about it

1. When you were growing up, how did you know you were doing well; grades, trophies, approval, being the good kid? Share one way that old scorecard still shows up in your adult life.

The World Under the Curse: Why Does Everything Feel Like It Is Working Against Us?

The sermon opens with two opposite words: blessing and curse. To be blessed is to kneel before someone greater and receive what only they can give; the flourishing that comes down from the mount above. Humanity was born into that blessing; in the garden we walked with God, fully known and fully loved; the Hebrews called it shalom. But the forbidden fruit promised the good life without God, and we took it. The ground that had fed us like a friend turned against us, God exiled us from the garden, and everything unraveled. Centuries later, God staged a scene between two mountains: Gerizim, green and fertile, the picture of the blessed life; and Ebal, rocky and bare, the picture of the cursed one. The law was read between them, and after every curse the whole nation answered with one word: Amen.

Talk about it

2. The sermon says you know this curse well because you are living in it; every time you say something is not right with this world, every time a good man fails and a bad man succeeds, every time you bleed or cry. Where do you feel the weight of the curse most sharply right now; in your body, your work, your relationships, or the headlines?

3. False teachers in Galatia were preaching that Jesus is helpful but not enough; the way up the blessed mountain is Jesus plus law-keeping. Where have you met a "Jesus plus" message; Jesus plus performance, Jesus plus respectability, Jesus plus having it all together? Why do these messages sound so reasonable?

One Word Ends the Ledger: Why Is Being a Good Person Not Enough?

Paul stops the Galatians cold with one word from that ceremony: all. Cursed is everyone who does not abide by all things written in the Book of the Law; at every moment, toward every person, without a single break. In karma the good can outweigh the bad; under the law, one entry on the wrong side of the ledger chains you to the cursed mountain, and you cannot leave. David sang that he was born into sin; we do not climb onto Ebal by our failures, we are born chained there. But hidden inside the argument is a door: "the righteous shall live by faith." Justification means a perfect standing before God, and Christianity's staggering claim is that Christ's ledger can be credited to yours. It is still a system of performance; but the performance is not yours. It is received by the hardest and easiest act there is: trusting Him.

Talk about it

4. The sermon says we are surprised when affliction comes, as though something strange were happening to us; we ask how God could do this to me, which is a way of saying: look at my ledger, I deserved better. When suffering last came to you, was your first instinct to ask what you had done to deserve it? What does that reveal about which ledger you actually trust?

5. The sermon called jealousy a blinking sign in the heart, announcing that you believe you have earned the good life. Where has that sign been blinking for you lately? What would change if you stopped reading your own ledger?

Stop Climbing: Whose Ledger Are You Actually Trusting?

The sermon puts two people in the room. The first has been climbing all their life; they pray not for fellowship with God but to climb, they serve not out of love but to climb, they give not with joy but with duty. When they fail badly, they work harder to make up for it. The second person has stopped climbing. They have seen that they cannot move, that they are prisoners on the wrong mountain; so they died to the law and put their faith in the One who crossed over to carry them home. The choice costs exactly one thing, your pride, and it pays in blessing.

THE PROMISED BLESSING Paul calls the Spirit the blessing, because the Spirit begins applying heaven's promises while we still live on the cursed side. We stand with hope on the mountain of despair, joy on the mountain of sorrow, peace on the mountain of fear; and we stand there with every nation, the promise to Abraham all along.

Talk about it

6. Be honest: which of these two people have you been this season; the climber, or the one who has stopped climbing? What would the people closest to you say?

7. The sermon says the blessed life bears fruit instead of thorns. Under the law, we served and gave in order to get something back; and when people did not repay us, we pricked them. Where does your serving or giving still produce thorns? What would it look like to give from overflow instead?

The Heart of It: Why Did Christ Have to Become the Curse?

Before the ceremony of blessing and curse ever began, God commanded Israel to build an altar; not on Gerizim, but on Ebal, the cursed mountain. There they offered burnt offerings, consumed by fire, and peace offerings, a shared meal between God and man; fire and fellowship on the wrong mountain. That altar was pointing forward. Christ, the only one worthy to stand on the blessed mount, left the greater Gerizim above and came down to Ebal to get us; the ransom price was His life. He did not just take our sin, He became sin; He did not just enter exile, He became exile; He did not just die, He became death. And when He cried out, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me," He lost what no human being has ever lost, because no human being has ever had it: perfect unity with the Father. He was abandoned so we could have the Father's presence; He became the thorns so we could become the fruit.

Talk about it

8. Sit with the phrase "the cursed God." What changes in you when you see that Christ did not pity you from a safe distance, but became the very thing that stood between you and the blessing?

Questions This Sermon Answers

What does "curse" mean in Galatians 3:10?

Paul uses the word curse five times in these five verses; blessing appears only once. A curse is a binding legal decree that sets someone apart for affliction; to be in chains on the mount of ruin. Paul repeats it because that is the mountain we are on.

What does "all" mean in Galatians 3:10?

The Greek word pasin means exactly what it says: all. Keep the whole law, at every moment, toward every person, without fail; pure constant love to God and others without end and without break. One failure is enough to bind you; this is not karma at all.

Why does Galatians 3:13 say "cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree"?

"Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree." To be hung on a tree was the public sign of divine judgment. Paul quotes it to show what happened at the cross: Jesus did not merely suffer the curse; He became it. They even crowned Him with thorns; the sign of the cursed ground pressed onto the head of its Maker.

What are Mount Gerizim and Mount Ebal?

Two mountains in the promised land where Israel staged a covenant ceremony. Gerizim is green and fertile, picturing the blessed life. Ebal is rocky and bare, picturing the cursed one. Half the nation stood on each while the law was read between them, and after every curse the whole nation answered, Amen.

Vision for the Christian Life

The Grove to become a people living the blessed life on the cursed side. Sons and daughters standing with joy on the mountain of sorrow, peace on the mountain of fear, and offering the fruit of heaven to a world still tangled in thorns.

Discussion Questions for Small Groups: Galatians 3

When you were growing up, how did you know you were doing well; grades, trophies, approval, being the good kid? Share one way that old scorecard still shows up in your adult life.
The sermon says you know this curse well because you are living in it; every time you say something is not right with this world, every time a good man fails and a bad man succeeds, every time you bleed or cry. Where do you feel the weight of the curse most sharply right now; in your body, your work, your relationships, or the headlines?
False teachers in Galatia were preaching that Jesus is helpful but not enough; the way up the blessed mountain is Jesus plus law-keeping. Where have you met a "Jesus plus" message; Jesus plus performance, Jesus plus respectability, Jesus plus having it all together? Why do these messages sound so reasonable?
The sermon says we are surprised when affliction comes, as though something strange were happening to us; we ask how God could do this to me, which is a way of saying: look at my ledger, I deserved better. When suffering last came to you, was your first instinct to ask what you had done to deserve it? What does that reveal about which ledger you actually trust?
The sermon called jealousy a blinking sign in the heart, announcing that you believe you have earned the good life. Where has that sign been blinking for you lately? What would change if you stopped reading your own ledger?
Be honest: which of these two people have you been this season; the climber, or the one who has stopped climbing? What would the people closest to you say?
The sermon says the blessed life bears fruit instead of thorns. Under the law, we served and gave in order to get something back; and when people did not repay us, we pricked them. Where does your serving or giving still produce thorns? What would it look like to give from overflow instead?
Sit with the phrase "the cursed God." What changes in you when you see that Christ did not pity you from a safe distance, but became the very thing that stood between you and the blessing?

Related Messages in This Series

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Pastor David Hancock is the Lead Pastor of The Grove Church in Port St. Lucie, FL, a church where believers and skeptics wrestle honestly with faith and doubt.

Wrestling with a question this raised? You can text in your question on any Sunday and hear it answered after the sermon. Or come sit with people asking the same things. Plan Your Visit

Read the full sermon manuscript

In the comedy sitcom My Name is Earl, Earl is so convinced the universe runs on a moral ledger, or karma, that he makes a list of every wrong he has ever done and spends his life paying it back. Most of us operate with some type of an invisible scorecard. Good things in one column, and bad things in another. We think as long as the good outweighs the bad, God or the universe will bless us. But is that actually how God works? Can our good deeds really offset our bad ones? What if all it takes is one failure, one moment of weakness, and it's over? Our verses today make that claim but then offer another path, one that gives blessing and the good life.

We are in our series called Christian Freedom in Paul's letter to the Galatians and today we find out there are two ledgers we can operate in. One brings curse and the other brings blessing. Today, my goal is for each of you to go running out of here not cursed but blessed.

For all who rely on works of the law are under a curse; for it is written, Cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the Book of the Law, and do them. Now it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law, for The righteous shall live by faith. But the law is not of faith, rather The one who does them shall live by them. Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written, Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree, so that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, so that we might receive the promised Spirit through faith.

Our verses today are about two opposite words, blessing and curse.

Blessing means the good life. It means something like kneeling before someone greater than you to receive something only they can give. Essentially to be blessed by God is to receive the flourishing that can only come from the mount above.

Humanity, long ago, was born into this blessing of the mountain garden above.

We walked closely with God high above and far from chaos, division, and death. God blessed us with the joy and peace of His presence. There was no distance, just being fully known and fully loved by God and others. Life, flourishing, abundance, and joy.

Not only did God take care of us, but the garden in a way blessed us. It gave us an unusually rich life, fed us, almost like a friend to us.

There we had no worries, no fears, no anxiety. The Hebrews called this shalom.

But the word curse appears five times across our five verses, while blessing appears only once. The curse is occupying almost all of the attention, like the youngest child demanding to be seen. The word curse means something like a binding legal decree that sets someone apart for affliction. An easier way to understand it is to be in chains to affliction, on the mount below, the mount of ruin. That's the curse.

Paul mentions it five times because that's the mountain we are on. How did this happen?

In the garden, there was a forbidden fruit that promised a different kind of blessing: the good life, but without God. We wouldn't have to kneel to receive anything from God anymore. The fruit looked good to us, so humanity ate.

What happened next was shocking. God came to bless humanity with His presence, because God Himself is the good life of joy, peace, and love, but we hid. Why? We felt shame. Shame caused us to hide from the blessing.

The God who loved us now scared us. But He hadn't changed. It was we who had changed.

And the ground that once felt like a friend became like an enemy. God said, cursed is the ground because of you. Thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you. The ground was now working against us. It goes on to say, by the sweat of your face you shall eat bread, till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken, for you are dust, and to dust you shall return.

The curse didn't just mean the thorns of affliction, but that the earth we cursed almost seemed eager to swallow us up. Like it wanted justice.

So God exiled us from the garden, and we felt it. Our relationships changed, we competed, felt jealousy, anger, fear of others, and distrust. The perfect love was gone.

Everything unraveled.

We were awake in a nightmare.

You know this cursed nightmare well. You are living in it.

Every time you say something isn't right with this world, every time you ask how could God allow this, every time you see a good man fail and a bad man succeed. This is proof of the curse.

Every time you bleed, you cry, or bruise, that is the curse.

The whole world groans under the curse. Every living thing.

Even the atheist knows this curse, though he won't call it that. He lives in it and fights against it with all of his strength. We all fight it. We fight against death, chaos, sorrow, fear, and jealousy. But is our fight working? The curse always seems to eventually swallow us. But there was hope.

Though God exiled us, He wanted us back, but He had to get us back the right way.

That path started with one man named in our verses: Abraham.

God said to him, go to the land I will show you. He promises him a land, one that isn't cursed, a people, and a blessing, the good life of joy, peace, and love with all of mankind.

When Abraham reached the promised land, in a valley between two mountains, Abraham built an altar to God. As a way to kneel before God. Instead of reaching for the fruit of blessing outside of God, he kneels at the altar to say, God, the blessing can only come from you. A small reversal.

Yet, because of a famine and a series of great and terrible things, Abraham's many descendants, now Israel, find themselves slaves in Egypt.

God eventually rescues them and brings them out into the wilderness, where He gives them something to fight the curse. The law. The ten commandments.

The law would function as a type of guardian to keep the effects of the curse back.

Finally, after 40 years of wandering in the wilderness, they get to the promised land. And there, the place where Abraham made an altar between two mountains. This is an amazing scene that never gets the attention it deserves.

There God commanded half of Israel to go up to one mountain, Mount Gerizim, and the other half to Mount Ebal.

Gerizim is green, fertile, and represents the blessed life.

The other, Mount Ebal, is rocky and bare, and it represents the cursed life.

The priests stood between the two mounts holding the Ark of the Covenant, the presence of God, and read the law. The priests declared, cursed is the one who makes an idol in secret, cursed is the one who dishonors their parents, cursed is the one who perverts justice for the foreigner, the orphan, the widow. After each curse the whole nation, both mountains, responds with a single word: Amen.

Amen means let it be so. In other words, if we don't keep these laws we are cursed, but if we keep them we are blessed.

And after they said their last amen, it says, cursed be everyone who does not abide by all these things written in the book of the law, and do them. This is the exact verse Paul quotes.

Why is Paul writing about this story? In Galatia, after Paul started this church, he left to spread the good news of Christianity to the surrounding regions. And when he did, a group of traveling teachers came and started teaching: if you want the good life, if you want Mount Gerizim, the blessed mountain, Jesus is helpful, but He isn't enough. You need Jesus plus law-keeping.

To say it another way, Jesus plus keeping the law, following the rules and performing, will be the only way up Mount Gerizim, the green and lush mountain of blessings and the good life.

It sounds reasonable, a more sophisticated version of karma that essentially sounds like all other religions. God is up there and we must do enough good to reach Him.

But Paul stops the Galatians cold when he quotes the two mountains ceremony. The last thing they said between the mountains: cursed is everyone, everyone, who doesn't abide by all of these things. All of them.

The keyword is all, pasin in Greek, and it means just what it says. All. You must keep the law at every moment, every day. Love at every moment, every single person, even your enemy, without fail. Just pure constant love to God and others without end and without break.

This isn't karma at all. If one wrong deed goes on the wrong side of the ledger, you go to the cursed mountain. But worse, you can't leave.

Remember, cursed is a legal failure that enslaves you to affliction. The one wrong thing chained you to the cursed mountain.

In fact, it's even worse. King David once sang that he was born into sin. Meaning we are all born on Mount Ebal, chained on the cursed mountain.

Karma can't save us.

You can live your entire life being good, moral, religious, disciplined, generous. You can outgive, outlove, outperform everyone, but all it takes is one failure.

Paul is showing us that God doesn't operate how we do. Each and every one of you is working off your ledger thinking your good means you deserve the blessed mountain.

Let me show you. You are surprised when affliction comes into your life as though something strange were happening to you.

When you experience pain and suffering you ask, God how could you do this to me? That is a statement saying, God I deserve the good life, look at my ledger.

When we aren't successful and others are, we say this isn't fair, I work harder.

When someone else gets what you don't have, you're jealous. That feeling is a blinking sign in your heart telling you that you think you deserve the good life.

But God doesn't work that way. We are cursed, imprisoned to the ruined mount.

So how do we get to the other mountain, to the good life?

Or are we doomed to this nightmare?

In verse 12 Paul says, about works of the law, those who do them shall live by them. He is saying if you want to pick the law as your means to salvation and blessing, you will be held to the standard of perfection.

Maybe you say, this isn't unreasonable. If you say this, which we all do at some point, it simply means we don't understand the justice of God.

The mount above is a world of perfect love, justice, and goodness. The problem is that if God doesn't hold us to this standard, He is unjust. And if we get in, in the state we are in, we just corrupt it all over again. God must be just.

But when Paul says, if you rely on works of the law, you must live by them, he is implying there is another way, another system to operate in, another ledger to choose.

Not one of effort, performance, or rule following.

Or let me say it this way: it is one of performance, but not yours. The performance of another.

Paul says in verse 11, it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law, for the righteous shall live by faith.

Paul is telling us there is another system, the system of faith that leads to justification.

The word justification means to have a perfect standing. To be righteous.

But how can this happen for us?

Christianity tells us Christ's ledger can be ours by faith.

Can you believe it? God found a way. Christ's perfect life can be credited to ours. We must simply do the hardest and easiest thing there is to do: trust Christ.

But Christ must do more than give us His perfect record. We are chained on the cursed mountain. So can He save us, and if so how would He do it?

Watch this. In Deuteronomy 27, before the blessing and curses ceremony began, God told them to set up an altar on Mount Ebal, the cursed mountain, to make two types of sacrifices. Burnt offerings, which meant the animal was consumed entirely by fire. And peace offerings, which were for a sacrificial meal to be shared by the worshiper, the priests, and God. Table fellowship between God and man.

These two sacrifices brought peace and friendship again between God and man.

Now look at verse 13. Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, as it is written, cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree.

This is shocking. Do you see what's going on?

Christ the perfect one, the only one worthy to stand on Mount Gerizim, left the greater Mount Gerizim above: Heaven, Eden, the mount of perfect blessing.

He left to come where? The mountain below, the cursed world, Mount Ebal, to get us.

But how would He get us if we are already owned as slaves by the cursed mountain?

He would redeem us.

To redeem means to purchase, to pay the cost. To pull from one place and put in another. He would ransom us from the cursed mount to the blessed mount.

What is the cost to redeem us? What was the ransom price? His life. He would become the sacrifice. The altar on Mount Ebal was pointing forward to Him who would be the burnt offering consumed by the fire of death and hell, and the peace offering that would bring us back into fellowship with God.

But Jesus doesn't just become the sacrifice. Paul says He is cursed when He is hung on the cross.

Scripture confirms this earlier: anyone who is hung on a tree or pole is cursed. It was a sign to be under God's curse, a sign of divine judgment.

But it's still more than this. He isn't just cursed.

He becomes the curse.

Paul doesn't use the verb describing what happened to Him as a curse. He used the noun. Jesus becomes the curse.

He becomes indistinguishable from the curse. To look at Him is to see the curse.

The question you must answer is, whose ledger are you putting your faith in?

There is a person in this room who has been climbing their whole life, trying to reach the mount of blessing, Gerizim. Trying to secure the good life through their performance.

They pray not for fellowship with God, but to climb; they serve not out of love but to climb; they are generous, not with joy, but with duty to climb.

If they mess up really badly that day, they work harder, give more, serve longer as a way to make up for what they did.

But there is another person in this room who has stopped climbing. They already see they can't move, they are prisoners on the wrong mountain. So they died to the law and put their faith in Christ, who crossed over, became the curse, to release them from the curse, give them His perfect record so they could cross over with Him to the mount of blessings.

You must decide. Faith in Christ, or faith in yourself to keep the law perfectly.

Whose ledger will you put your faith in? Yours or His?

Put your faith in Christ and put down your pride. That is the cost, your pride.

But the reward is blessing. Paul calls the Spirit the blessing.

The Spirit is the blessing because the Spirit's job is to begin to apply all the promises of the blessing while we are still here in the cursed world.

We stand as sons and daughters on the mountain that was supposed to enslave us.

We stand with hope on the mountain that should bring us to despair.

We stand with joy on the mountain of sorrow.

We stand with peace on the mountain of fear.

And we stand with every nation. That is the great promise to Abraham, that through faith all the nations of the earth will be blessed. People who hated each other in the past now have the Spirit within them supplying them, together, with love, joy, and peace.

Do you see what's happening? The blessed mountain is getting in you no matter where you stand. Do you see how powerful that makes you in this world?

That is why the Christian is the hope of the world. You are a sign there is still hope.

What does this blessed life on the cursed side look like now, practically?

First it looks like someone who has stopped running from God.

You understand your failure no longer enslaves you on the cursed mountain. You are free to keep coming back to God, after every sin, no shame, no guilt, always grace.

Second it looks like someone who is internally strong and emotionally steady. The waves and the wind of affliction can't steal your hope, your love, your joy, or peace. You have access to the things of heaven, the blessings of heaven here on the earth.

Third, your life looks like fruit, not thorns. Once, under the law, when you served and gave it brought thorns into the world. Why? You gave or served to get something in return, and when people didn't return what you expected, you made them bleed. You pricked them, got angry with them. But now, by faith, you have fruit to offer. You don't need anything from the cursed world, but you have something to offer it: the fruit of heaven. So you offer love to the outsider, healing to the brokenhearted, justice to the orphan and widow. You offer peace to a world in fear, and joy to a world afflicted by sorrow. Not to get anything, but because the blessings are overflowing within you.

This is only possible because of Christ.

He left the mount of blessing in heaven to come to the cursed mountain.

And when He told the world He was King of the mountain garden above, they mocked Him and gave Him a crown of thorns. Literally they placed the sign of the curse upon His head.

But that wasn't enough for Him to just wear the curse.

To the horror of creation, mankind hung God on a tree and He became the cursed God.

He didn't just take our sin, He became our sin.

He didn't just go into exile, He became exile.

He didn't just die, He became death.

He became the curse.

In those moments before His death, He cried out, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me. The curse of separation.

The pain of the cross was not the nails as much as the hole in His heart where the Father used to be. No human being has ever lost what Jesus lost on the cross, because no human being ever experienced life on the mount above, perfect unity to the Father.

When Jesus hung and was separated from His Father, He felt the weight of the curse more than anyone ever could.

He entered all the way into the curse to reverse it all.

He was abandoned so we can have the presence of the Father.

He became the thorns so we can become the fruit of faith.

He became sorrow so we can be His joy.

He died so we could have life.

He died and rose to grow the mount of blessing here and now.

Join me. Together, let's follow Him to the mount above.