June 22, 2025
Indianola Presbyterian Church, Columbus
“Measure Your Life in Love "
by Rev. Trip Porch
June 22, 2025 Based on Galatians 3:23–29
There’s a moment in the musical Rent that gets me every time. It’s right at the start of the second act and often brought back as a cast encore. The lights dim, the full cast steps forward, and someone begins to sing:
“Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes.
How do you measure, measure a year?”
I’m sorry to get that earworm permanently lodged in your brain this morning, but I think it is a question worth asking… what do you use to measure your life? What mirror do you hold up to your life to know when you are on the right track? How do you measure a year in your life?
In daylights, in sunsets?
In cups of coffee, in inches, in miles, in laughter, in strife?
This is what the chorus of the song famously suggests before eventually landing on the answer:
“How about love, measure your life in love.”
That lyric came rushing back to me this week as I sat with today’s scripture. Because Paul is wrestling with the same question: How do you measure a life?
In Galatians 3, Paul writes to a community caught in an old way of measuring. Before Christ, he says, we were imprisoned under the law, guarded, restrained, kept in line by this system of rules. He calls the law our disciplinarian, which in the Greek is “paida-gōgos,” like a strict tutor or hallway monitor, always watching, ready to scold or correct.
It wasn’t evil. But in hindsight, Paul clearly thinks it was a measuring system that was restrictive, too rigid, and not Christlike.
The law told people how to behave, how to belong, who was holy and who wasn’t. And for a time, it was the best they had. But Paul says that era is over. “Now that faith has come, we are no longer subject to a disciplinarian.”
“In Christ Jesus, you are all children of God through faith.” Something new has broken in. And it’s not a new set of rules to follow, it’s a new way to measure your life.
Not by performance. Not by labels. Not by law. But by grace. By faith. By love.
Paul writes one of the most breathtaking lines in all of scripture:
“There is no longer Jew or Greek,
there is no longer slave or free,
there is no longer male and female,
for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.”
That’s not just poetic language, it’s revolutionary.
In Paul’s world, those categories weren’t just social constructs, they were rigid concrete identities. They defined your place in the church, your place in society, they even defined your worth as a person. To say you were a Greek or you were a Jew put you in a clearly defined box and told people everything they needed to know about you. But for Paul to say those categories are no longer the measure, that they no longer matter at all because you’re all one people in Christ, is to shatter the hierarchy. To say that the things that used to divide us no longer define us at all.
And yet, here we are, thousands of years later, still tempted by the very categories Jesus came to dismantle.
We still sort people into rigid boxes. We still put up walls to divide and draw lines in the sand, deciding who’s in, who’s out, who’s right, who’s wrong, who belongs, who doesn’t.
We cling to labels like they’ll save us. We defend boundaries like they’re holy. We often would rather have clear categories than courageous community.
But Paul’s new vision for the church, for the body of Christ, is not about comfort. It’s about communion.
It’s not about uniformity, but unity in Christ. If we’re no longer to measure by rules or roles, or by gender or race or social class, then how?
Maybe the musical Rent was onto something. Measure your life in love. In how deeply you care. In how courageously you forgive. In how often you speak up for the forgotten. In how generously you welcome the stranger.
In how faithfully you remember that every single human being is someone Christ has clothed in grace, mercy, forgiveness, and love.
So when you look at someone else, no matter who they are, remember you’re not just looking at their identity,
who the law of the world has defined them to be. You’re looking at someone clothed in Christ. You’re looking at a sibling. You’re looking at love.
So, beloved, how will you measure your life?
Not by the world’s metrics.
Not by what the law says.
Not by how well you’ve played the game of success.
But by love.
By how fully you see others.
By how faithfully you build bridges.
By how freely you include those the world leaves out.
You are not who the world says you are.
You are not your job title.
You are not your income, your GPA, or your Instagram grid.
You are not the category someone else tried to stuff you into.
You are God’s own child.
Clothed in Christ.
Free to measure your life in love.
Amen.
WE GATHER IN AWE AND PRAISE
PRELUDE “Sabbath Sunrise” Delsa Richards
INTROIT "This Is the Day" Pablo Sosa
WELCOME Rev. Trip Porch
One: This is the day that the Lord has made
All: Let us rejoice and be glad in it.
*CALL TO WORSHIP
One: In Christ, we are made new.
All: No longer divided by category or status.
One: In Christ, we are one body.
All: Clothed in love, called by grace.
One: Come, let us worship the One who unites us.
All: Let us measure our lives by the love we share.
*HYMN 19 “God of Great and God of Small” GOD OF GREAT AND SMALL
*PRAYER OF CONFESSION Jessica VonZastrow
God of mercy, we confess that we often measure our lives by things that do not last—success, approval, appearance, or status. We draw lines that divide, preferring the comfort of categories to the challenge of community. We forget that all are your children, clothed in Christ and held in love. Hear our prayer.
Silent prayer…
Forgive us, O God. Unravel our need to compare, compete, and control. Teach us to measure our lives not by law or label, but by the love you pour out through Jesus Christ. Amen.
*ASSURANCE OF PARDON
*RESPONSE OF PRAISE 659 “Know That God Is Good” MUNGU NI MWEMA
*PASSING OF THE PEACE
One: The peace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all,
All: And also with you.
WE LISTEN FOR GOD’S WORD
ANTHEM "Balm in Gilead" arr. Sam Batt Owens
Betsy Tullis, soloist
CHILDREN’S MESSAGE Sharon Renkes
PRAYER FOR ILLUMINATION
SCRIPTURE Galatians 3:23-29 CEB
Now before faith came, we were imprisoned and guarded under the law until faith would be revealed. Therefore the law was our disciplinarian until Christ came, so that we might be reckoned as righteous by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer subject to a disciplinarian, for in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith.
As many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is no longer Jew or Greek; there is no longer slave or free; there is no longer male and female, for all of you are one in Christ Jesus. And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's offspring, heirs according to the promise.
Holy Wisdom, Holy Word
Thanks be to God
SERMON Rev. Trip Porch
WE RESPOND TO GOD’S WORD
*HYMN 300 “They’ll Know We are Christians by Our Love” THEY’LL KNOW WE ARE CHRISTIANS
PRAYERS OF THE PEOPLE
TIME OF OFFERING online giving is available at www. indianolapres.org/give
OFFERTORY “Little Cradle Song, Op. 124 No. 6” Robert Schuman
*OFERTORY RESPONSE 648 “Thankful Hearts and Voices Raise” THANKFUL HEARTS
*PRAYER OF DEDICATION
God of abundance, take these gifts and use them for the healing of the world. May they build bridges where there are walls, nourish where there is need, and speak love where there is division. Bless both gift and giver, that all might be one in Christ. Amen
*HYMN 322 “We Are One in Christ Jesus” SOMOS UNO
TIME OF COMMUNITY SHARING
CHARGE & BENEDICTION
POSTLUDE “My Savior's Love” Charles H. Gabriel
Acknowledgments: Unless otherwise indicated, all texts and music are printed and broadcast under OneLicense.net license #A-702452