Galatians 6:11-18

Galatians 6:11-18 
English Standard Version (ESV)

  We've arrived at the end of Galatians, and we are back where we started -- Paul is looking to the cross, and to the cross alone. 
  If you're Paul, you've got a fair amount to boast in.  After all, he wrote half the New Testament and started churches all across the known world.  He kept up quite the correspondence with churches around the world, traveling and preaching to friends and enemies.  He was stoned outside of one city, to which he promptly returned.  He preached the Gospel with the Roman emperor and some of the leading minds of the day, and God himself personally called him out of the previous life he was leading. 
  So in what does Paul boast?  The cross.  Nothing but the cross.  At the cross, all are made equal.  At the cross, our weaknesses are revealed, and the cost of sin is fully apparent.  At the cross, we realize that all of our best efforts cannot pay the price for our faults.  Only God can fully pay the price, and God freely pays it, out of love, for each and every one of us.
  Now, if even Paul cannot boast of his efforts, then what chance do any of us have?  No, we come as equals to the cross.  We are the lost who have been found, the damaged who have been re-assembled, the enslaved who have been redeemed.  At the cross, we are made new.
  As you rise to meet this day, remember that each person you encounter stands at the same level as you before the cross.  The world would be a much more agreeable place if we treated one another this way.  When you meet the homeless beggar in the street or the hurried businesswoman rushing to her next appointment, treat them with grace -- they are your equal, be they rich or poor, persecuted or arrogant -- we all stand before the cross, equally guilty and equally beloved.  How I wish we would remember that before we mentally judged people or grouped them into categories or elevated some.  Not even Paul could boast, but instead he knelt before the cross, where he found love and grace.