FamilyLife Today®

Portia Collins: My aim is regardless of what my husband does or does not do, I want to be gracious to him. I want to live in light of the work that the Spirit is doing in my heart. Ultimately, whether he does right or not, that hasn't got anything to do with who God is calling me to be.

Ann Wilson: Welcome to FamilyLife Today, where we want to help you pursue the relationships that matter most. I'm Ann Wilson.

Dave Wilson: And I'm Dave Wilson, and you can find us at familylifetoday.com. This is FamilyLife Today.

All right, Portia, so we found out yesterday you're sort of a gamer. Even Ann wants to ask you about Marvel, because she's a Marvel—we go to like Iron Man, and I come back—

Portia Collins: Did you know they had a Marvel video game where you could be—

Dave Wilson: No, no, no, we don't want to know this. We do not need to have—

Ann Wilson: I totally want to know this. I mean, we go to whatever movie, we come home and she has to watch every movie prior or after.

Portia Collins: Right on, okay. But the game was fun, too. So I love Marvel everything.

Dave Wilson: All right, we're not here to talk about Marvel movies. We're talking to Portia Collins, and your book is called Finding Freedom in Christ, which is an eight-week study of Galatians. Can you just rewind a little bit, because we heard your whole story previously? So kind of give our audience a little background of how you came to Christ and what was going on, because we're all like, Galatians you say changed your whole life.

Portia Collins: It did. It did, 100%. As I was saying yesterday, I was a church girl through and through. I knew all the church lingo. I grew up in a little small missionary Baptist church in Mississippi. Like I said, you hear the southern accent. But I knew all the religious things, what the church people do.

But I didn't really know who Jesus was. It was right after I graduated college—it started, I would say, during my college years, but really coming into an understanding of who Christ is and what He does for us right after I graduated college.

One particular night, the Lord, through a series of certain circumstances and things, I had just reached a point of brokenness, of desperation, shame.

Ann Wilson: And you had been living like a prodigal.

Portia Collins: Yes, I was living—now, externally, I looked like the model citizen. I had good grades in college. I graduated summa cum laude. I had a good job, nice car. I got my big girl apartment and all of this, looking like the picture of what it is to be a model person.

Ann Wilson: Having it all together.

Portia Collins: Having it all together. But pulling that back, my heart was so far from God, and I was really the God of my own life. Because of that, there were a lot of hard things that I dealt with that my sin ultimately brought me to. That broke me so and really positioned me to a place where I could hear and receive truly who Jesus is.

So this particular night, I'm dealing with this brokenness, this desperation. I went back to the fundamental thing that I learned as a church girl: Read your Bible and pray. You got to look for the Lord. This seems like a bleak situation; read your Bible and pray.

So it was this growing habit for me where I would come in once I got off work every night, and I would read scripture. I picked Galatians solely off the fact that it was six chapters and I could read it in one sitting.

Dave Wilson: We relate.

Portia Collins: But it was the providence of God. Reading that book changed my life. It felt as if this weight had been lifted from me. All of my striving, trying to put out who I am as this perfect person, that was gone. Then all of the shame that I dealt with from not pursuing Jesus and falling into radical sin, that was lifted as well.

Ann Wilson: To the point where you said you were laying on the floor.

Portia Collins: Yes, I was. After I finished reading this book, I was face to the floor, weeping.

Dave Wilson: I don't know if I've ever heard anybody talk about "I read a book of the Bible, and in that moment God showed up." Especially Galatians. It's pretty deep. It's pretty heavy.

Ann Wilson: But it also makes sense because you're a Bible scholar. You call yourself a Bible nerd.

Portia Collins: I'm a Bible nerd.

Ann Wilson: And so, of course, that's what took you to your face.

Portia Collins: That God would use that. It has become so pivotal. I wrote a Bible study on it. It impacted me so. Even if you know how this came about, there were publishers that wanted me to consider writing something else. And I was like, "No, it has to be this, because this is where my life changed for real."

Dave Wilson: Explain the "I'm a recovering legalist."

Portia Collins: A recovering legalist, a recovering perfectionist.

Dave Wilson: We did our homework. We know you inside and out. Because that's a lot of what Paul's getting at in—

Portia Collins: 100%. If we're honest, apart from Christ, we are just wired to want to be those self-sustaining—we want to do it. We want to feel like we're the one who's doing it.

Dave Wilson: Yeah, we want to earn it.

Portia Collins: And so that's me. Even now, as a woman in ministry, I know there are so many things that I know from reading the Bible that functionally is a war every day, taking what I know and applying that and allowing God to work in my heart, because I want to do a good job.

The problem is not pursuing excellence. The problem is not being a person known for doing a good job. The problem is when we start to root our identities in that and that we think that our place before God is of our own doing. And that's not the case. Our standing before God is because of Jesus, period. There's not a comma there or a semicolon; it's Jesus, and there's nothing else that we add to that.

For some of us who struggle with identity and we like to be identified by the things we do, we have to come back to books like Galatians and see, listen, there's nothing that you do that changes ultimately how God sees you. Jesus changes how God sees you.

Dave Wilson: Well, here's a question I got to ask. You're probably thinking the same thing, is how do we get that out of our mindset, this legalistic, rules-based—because it's in every one of us, even if you know the Word. And as parents, we can put that on our kids.

Ann Wilson: Well, I was going to say, I put that on you. Like, "Don't you know the Word? Like, what are you doing over there?" And you're right. What are our kids doing?

Dave Wilson: She's not kidding. She does put that on me. But I remember one time doing a chapel for the Detroit Lions, and I said to the guys—or I think it was Bible study—I said, "Let me ask you something. Games on Sunday. From Thursday to Sunday, do you sin?" They're like, "Nope." Monday to Wednesday, do you sin? "Yeah."

It's like they had the mindset of "I got to be really good because I want God to bless me on the biggest day of my week, Sunday." My salary, everything. So that's in there. It's that works theology that if I do good, I do good, God's going to bless me. If I don't, now I'm closer or farther. And Paul is destroying that argument.

Portia Collins: So, it makes me want to go particularly to a passage where Paul is saying the law came 430 years after the promise.

Ann Wilson: What does that mean? Explain that.

Portia Collins: Okay, so the promise that was made to Abraham—we always "Father Abraham had many sons." Okay, so the Lord promised to Abraham that He would make him into a great nation. This promise is honestly far-reaching. He wasn't just talking about a whole bunch of people; He was really talking about how He's going to save His people. God's covenant to save His people came 430 years before even one law was written.

If He gave us the promise before the law, then why do we think that we got to keep the law for the promise to be good? He never intended—that was never the purpose of the law. The purpose of the law was to help us—in the text, it calls it a schoolmaster. Basically, it was to keep us from going further and further into sin. And then it was also to show us we ain't as great as we think we are.

Because without the law, we would gloss over the depths of our sin. We even see that—I've been reading in my Bible in a year—I remember you saying you read. So so far we've gotten—now I'm up to Joshua. Even now I see those folks didn't know that they were just messing up and just crazy as all get out until the law came.

Dave Wilson: Please do your own version of the Bible. We talked about this. The Portia Standard Version.

Portia Collins: And here's the thing. Even when Moses—finally there's so much specificity in the law, and it's like, how does he even know to talk about? Because they were already doing it. So this is a response to what's already happening to say, "Hey, you should not be doing this." That was the purpose of the law, to really expose our sin and not to crush us, but to turn our faces toward true hope.

Dave Wilson: I mean, it's Galatians 3:24. You're talking about where it says, "So then the law was our guardian until Christ came in order that we might be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian. For in Christ Jesus, you are all sons of God through faith." 100%. Is that where you get the theme Finding Freedom?

Portia Collins: 100%. I mean, honestly, it's all through the book. I love the way Paul writes, and you will notice this in most of the epistles that Paul writes. He gives you this rich doctrine at the beginning. He lays out what it is that we should be knowing. He's correcting the error. And then on the back end, he gives us the "now what." I always say the $10 words that I use: orthodoxy and then orthopraxy.

Dave Wilson: What we know and what we do.

Portia Collins: Right, what we know and what we do. And that's no different here in this book. He's showing us in the beginning part, "This is what I want you to know." He's correcting something that they've fallen into error in. He's laying out that doctrine. And then when he gets to chapters five and six, he's like, "Now, let me show you what that looks like."

So the doctrine first sets them free in that it corrects a mentality that has them bound. They think I got to add circumcision to me believing in Christ so that I can be saved. In fact, they had been convinced of that from some other religious folks who thought they knew what they were talking about.

He's freeing them of a bad mentality, and then he's showing them, "Now this is what it looks like to walk in freedom on the back end." Not because you're earning something, but this is what happens if you truly believe in Christ and you've been indwelt with the Spirit, then this is what it looks like to live freely.

Ann Wilson: It's a lot like Ephesians. "This is what we know, this is who He is, and this is how we live."

Portia Collins: Colossians, all of them. Romans. If you go through and you look, you will see he gives you that doctrine and then he shows you. So he's giving them a doctrine of, listen, y'all ain't free. What you're thinking, your mind's bound because you think that you got to supplement your faith. That's wrong. He corrects that and urges them, "I want you to think freely. This is what the gospel is." And then he tells them on the back end, "Now this is what this looks like when you live this out."

Dave Wilson: Mom anger happens. The yelling, the snapping, the hiding in the bathroom with cold coffee. But what's really underneath your anger? Mom of four Janelle Brittenstein shares practical help and biblical hope in a free five-session video series. Start today at familylife.com/momanger.

Dave Wilson: So you're a mom, you're a wife. How do you apply your identity in Christ, finding freedom? Walk us into that. What's that look like in your kitchen, in your family room, other areas that it really impacts?

Portia Collins: I think the first word that comes to mind is grace. To be married, you need a whole lot of grace.

Ann Wilson: What was that groan about? It's hard to give grace.

Portia Collins: I know, I know. But here's the thing. If you understand the grace that has been given to you, it's so hard to withhold that grace. Me and my husband have gone through situations where he has been what I call—this is real southern, okay—flat-footed wrong. Wrong.

Dave Wilson: Do you say that to him?

Portia Collins: I do. "You are flat-footed wrong, sir." I put the "sir" on it.

Dave Wilson: I thought we were talking about grace here.

Portia Collins: I'm getting to it. I'm getting to it. He has been absolutely wrong, but I've been able to extend grace to him in those things, and that's been informed by the grace that I received from God. So I think that's the first thing that we see that a book like Galatians—go ahead.

Ann Wilson: Stop right there. So give us a contrast, because I'm sure there have been times where you haven't extended grace to him. So tell me the difference of what it looks like when you don't extend grace in his demeanor and his countenance compared to when you do extend grace.

Portia Collins: He's not receiving anything that I'm saying. And we know that. You asked me a rhetorical question. So when you don't give grace, he's like, "I'm out. I don't even hear." It's like immediate shutdown because you're crushed. He's crushed. That's essentially what when we are graceless, we ultimately crush those that we're engaged with.

And think about that. That would be the same with us. If we didn't have the grace of God, we would be crushed. It's the law. We can't do it. We can't. And here's the thing that's another thing that Paul says in here. If you go try to keep the law, this ain't no "I can pick and choose when and how many laws." There's 600-plus laws that were given. If you want to be a keeper of the law, you got to keep all 600-plus of them.

Ann Wilson: That's what I mean. It's crushing.

Portia Collins: It is a crushing, and this is why the purpose of the law was never given so that we could try to meet it and fulfill it and attain our salvation in that. It was given to expose, for us to see what we needed to see. To see ourselves and how we really aren't that great, but to also see the hope of Christ, what we have.

Dave Wilson: I mean, how do we dig out? Because most marriages, including ours, have been a law-based—we would never say that, but it's like, "Hey, you said you'd be home at six. You're not even close to coming home. This has happened multiple times this month."

Ann Wilson: Or with our kids. "I don't want to give grace. I want you to get home and help me with the kids." I'd walk in the house and she'd throw a kid at me because all day—

Dave Wilson: "I've worked hard." Yeah. So, I mean, and you get stuck—couples get stuck in that. It's comparing life's work. "Do for me as much as I'm doing for you," and we always see our input more than the other. That's not grace; that's really law. How do you dig out?

Portia Collins: My aim is regardless of what my husband does or does not do, I want to be gracious to him. I want to live in light of the work that the Spirit is doing in my heart. And ultimately, whether he does right or not, that hasn't got anything to do with who God is calling me to be, how God is working in my heart.

See, sometimes we want to use excuses and we say, "Well, if he didn't do this, I wouldn't do that." And that ain't what the Bible says. In fact, when we look in chapter five, Paul says—and this is what I love to go to this part. Most of us in here probably can name off really quickly the fruit of the Spirit, all nine of them. But I always like to tell people: Back up a little bit. Bump back a little bit. Because you truly can't understand the beauty and the blessing of the fruit of the Spirit until you see what the works of the flesh are.

So here's my point that I'm trying to make. My husband is not going to bring out in me something that ain't already there. Let me give you an example. If I'm angry about whatever he's doing, there's a way that I can respond. I can respond with graciousness, with addressing what this is. Or I can, as Paul says, speak out in fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy.

So the point that I'm trying to make here is if it's a work of the flesh, that means the larger problem is I need to be going before the Lord and dealing with that. My husband ain't bringing—he's not causing this work of the flesh to pop up.

Ann Wilson: I used to say to Dave, "You have made me like this."

Portia Collins: And no, no. And you were saying, "No, that's not true. That's already there." Exactly.

Dave Wilson: Go to verse 16. You got to tell us, because this is how it applies to a marriage, parenting, you name it. "Walk by the Spirit and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh." So here's the thousand-dollar question. What's walk by the Spirit? What's that look like?

Portia Collins: Well, let's jump on down. I mean, here's the thing. I could say a lot of things, but ultimately the most important thing is what He says. And so He says—first of all, I'm going to kind of summarize what we see in 17 through 21. First He tells us, because He's giving us the blueprint. He's saying, "Walk by the Spirit and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh." He's saying if we don't know what that is, let me show you what the desires of the flesh are.

And He lays that out. He starts saying, and we love to read them first couple of ones, and then we try to skim over the ones in the middle. Because we be like sexual immorality, oh, that's not me. Impurity, not me either. Sensuality, I ain't doing that, I ain't looking. But then He goes idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger. We like to gloss over those.

And you don't know what a fit of anger is? Your husband come in 20 minutes after he said and you just going off. That is a fit of anger. That is a work of the flesh. He's showing us what it looks like. Now it's like a light clicks; there's an awareness. "Oh, this is sinful. This is wrong."

Then He goes on down and He says, "But the fruit of the Spirit, now this is what it looks like when you are walking in step with the Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such thing, there is no law."

And we don't look at this from a performance-based mindset. We look at this as: Am I truly walking in step? It's almost like when you're driving your car and you see that check engine light come on. You don't just keep driving the car. And He's not saying "I want you to do more, try harder." He's saying, "If these check engine lights are on, if you see this, then maybe you need to go back to the feet of Jesus."

Dave Wilson: And I think a lot of what marriage is, and just Christian life, is you don't realize He said fruit. I've preached this before where it's like, "Okay, I don't know how apple trees, orange trees work, but I know they don't go, 'I need an orange. Ugh!'" You know what I mean? I call that the grunt Christian living. You just grunt it out. How does a tree produce fruit? They are connected to the root. That's it.

And that's why I think Paul, under amazing inspiration of the Holy Spirit, said, "Now this is fruit. This is not something you and I can create." If it's not working in your marriage, it isn't because your spouse; it's you, me, are not connected and walking by the Spirit. Because when we walk by the Spirit, it's a natural byproduct; it will happen.

Ann Wilson: But I love this dashboard, the light going on, because I'm just thinking of being a young mom and having kids and you're just constantly frustrated or angry, or you're struggling in your marriage. When I look at all the tension and the anger and the strife that's in my heart, I love that, Portia. Like you can think, "Okay, what's going on with me? And I need to go to Jesus." What would you say? Let's say like that dashboard, that light's going off. What would your prayer sound like?

Portia Collins: "Jesus, help me. Lord, help me to respond in a way that brings You glory. Help me to respond in a way that reflects the love and the grace that You have for me."

And so that's the same prayer that I pray when I'm with my husband, when I'm with my daughter. Because listen, an eight-year-old can work your last nerve. I know. They are getting awareness of their autonomy and they are like—because it's not so much about them as it is about what Jesus is doing in my own life.

Dave Wilson: What a great final word. And again, when you said that, I thought, "Oh, I know a verse in Galatians that sort of captures that." It's a very famous one, Galatians 2:20. "It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave Himself for me."

I would also say this: Her eight-week Bible study is called Finding Freedom. And you can get it at familylifetoday.com; just click on the link in the show notes. I hope a lot of people get it because this is literally transformational, not just as a person, single, but married, and a legacy changer.

Ann Wilson: And I really hope, and I know that this is your prayer too, Portia, that this will create a hunger for God's Word. It's rich and deep and it changes our lives.

Dave Wilson: We're driving down the road—I'm not kidding—she's doing her one-year Bible, and we're driving. I have heard this a thousand times: "I just love God's Word! Could I read it to you?" I mean, it really has changed me.

Portia Collins: Likewise.

Dave Wilson: Before we're done today, let me just say this. At FamilyLife, we really believe strong families can change the world. And when you become a FamilyLife partner, you help make that happen.

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Dave Wilson: FamilyLife Today is a donor-supported production of FamilyLife, a Cru ministry. 50 years of helping you pursue the relationships that matter most.