The Bible from 30,000 feet,
soaring through the scripture from Genesis to Revelation. Would you turn, in your
Bible, to the book of-- Galatians. --Galatians. We made it to Galatians. Let's turn there. I don't know what your
favorite book in the Bible is, but it might be Galatians. If it is, raise your hand. It's your favorite book
in the entire Bible. Raise your hand. Wow. So there's a few of you. Well, we have a couple
here, Billy and Jessalyn. Would you guys stand up? They were telling me
that the book of-- would you just stand up
through the whole service? No, go ahead, you
can have a seat. So Billy said it's
his favorite book. Jessalyn said it's
her favorite book, and when they met each
other and found out that that was each
other's favorite book, it was like a confirmation. Now, it's interesting that this
should be your favorite book, because the tone of
the letter of Galatians is a little bit hard, harsh,
even acerbic at times. So I'm trusting that
your relationship is different than the one
that Paul, in this letter, had with the Church of Galatia. And there's probably
other and better reasons that it is your favorite book. It's an awesome book. It was one of Martin
Luther's favorite books. You know, though, when you get
a letter, sometimes you open it, and you know that the letter
is different from other letters you have gotten, maybe
even from the same person. The tone is a bit different. And this letter is like that. The tone of Galatians
is, well, much different than many of Paul's
other letters. Usually Paul begins a letter
with customary greetings-- grace and peace--
which he does here. But typically he begins his
letters with a word of praise to God, a word of encouragement
for the congregation that he writes to, often
a prayer that is specific to that
congregation in that letter. Those are absent from Paul's
letter to the Galatians. He begins immediately by
defending his apostleship. Paul, an apostle, not by men or
through man, but it's from God. And that is because he is
addressing in this church that he, himself,
founded in Galatia-- he is addressing a
problem, a problem that is affecting his own
personal relationship with that beautiful
group of church people in the region of Galatia. There were a group of people
who had come to the Galatians. We refer to them
usually as Judaizers. Have you ever heard
the term Judaizers? A Judaizer is a claimant
to be a follower of Christ, but is very legalistic,
has a Jewish background, and believes that, if you
want to get right with God, you have to, yes,
come through Christ, but go through the
vehicle of Judaism in order to be fully
right with God. You have to proselytize
into the Jewish religion, keep the Jewish
feasts, festivals, regulations, rituals,
as well as receive Jesus Christ as messiah. Now, what's weird about
it here is that Galatia was a Roman colony. Those who lived in Galatia
were Roman citizens. They were chiefly
Gentiles, though there were some Jewish people
in the congregation, but mostly Gentile,
unbelievers who had come to faith in Christ. So for people to find
them to tell them you have to become Jewish,
not just receive Jesus Christ, was strange, and
it angered Paul. And you see it here
in this letter. He unleashes fury at them. He is crystal clear, and in
certain places, he's angry. Why? Because they're trying to mix
the gospel with other things. It's not just Jesus alone. It's not just faith
in Jesus alone. It's faith in Jesus
plus something else. And anytime you
add a plus to Jesus and say that Jesus is
not enough, anytime you try to mix just
the pure faith in Jesus alone, an act of God's grace
through your trusting in Jesus alone-- when you add something
to the gospel, it's not the gospel any longer. It's not good news. Now the good news
has become bad news. Now you're saying, well,
you're off to a good start in accepting Jesus Christ
as Lord and Savior, but now you need
more than Jesus. And suddenly the good news
doesn't sound all that good. So the Judaizers were
different than Paul. Paul would go into a territory
that had not heard the gospel. He would go into the
synagogue, to the Jew first, and then
also to the Greek. He would sow the seeds of
the pure gospel, many of whom the people that he was
speaking to-- many of whom had never heard the
name Jesus before. So he would give
them the background of the law in the Old Testament. Then he would tell how
Jesus fulfilled it. So he would go into
virgin territory and preach the gospel. The Judaizers did not do that. They weren't trying
to win unbelievers. They weren't trying to
win people to Christ. They were trying to wean
the people from Paul. They were trying to get
the people of Galatia to turn on what Paul
had taught them. So think of the
Judaizers like mistletoe. You know about mistletoe
this time of the year. We often sing about
it in our songs, but you probably also know
that mistletoe is a parasite. It doesn't have its own life. You just don't have
a mistletoe tree. It grows as a parasitic
element by taking its life from another organism. So they needed the hard
work and established church that Paul had, by
the spirit, labored to develop and maintain. And they would come
in, and instead of starting their own thing and
winning unbelievers to Christ, they would take believers
when Paul was absent and say, now let me tell you
all that Paul got wrong and how I can
enlighten you a bit. And so they would wean people
off of Paul the Apostle onto the law. The Judaizers were
like Santa Claus. I don't know why
all these Christmas things keep coming
up, but probably because it's the season. 'Tis the season. Santa Claus makes a list
and checks it twice. He wants to find out if
you're naughty or nice. The Judaizers had a list. They show up, first of all,
in Acts chapter 15 when Paul is in Antioch with Barnabas. It says certain men from
Judea came and said, unless you are circumcised
and keep the law of Moses, you cannot be saved. Well, that ruffled
Paul's feathers. Then it ruffled Paul's
apostolic feathers now. Back then, he went
to Jerusalem, had a convention over this,
a meeting over this, resolved the issue. But here it is popping up again,
and so he writes this letter to combat it. 2,000 years ago, some of
the strict Jewish rabbis believed that there was
no hope for the Gentiles. I'm giving you this background
because Paul is called an apostle to the Gentiles. He's called that in this book. God raised him up-- though
a Jewish rabbi himself, raised him up to give the
message of the Jewish messiah to the Gentile people. But he also knew that many
of his contemporaries, many of the rabbis believed that
Gentiles had no place at all in the economy of God. They had sayings. They had sayings that
come from their writings. One of them is that
God created Gentiles to kindle the fires of hell. Their belief is that God
created certain people-- Gentiles, non-Jewish people--
for the express purpose to just make hell hotter
than it already is. That was their saying. God created you to
kindle the fires of hell. Here's another saying they had. See if it rings a bell
in something Jesus said, but quite opposite. Some of the Jewish
rabbis back then said, there is joy in heaven when
God obliterates one sinner from off the earth. Jesus said, there's joy in
heaven when one sinner repents. To counteract that horrible
philosophy and theology that God is wanting to
obliterate and ruin people, Paul went to Galatia. He labored in Galatia. What is Galatia? It's that region of central
Asia Minor, modern day Turkey. Paul went there on his first
and second missionary journey. Some of the cities were Antioch
of Pisidia, Iconium, Lystra, Derby, where Timothy was from. He went there on
his first journey. He went there on
his second journey, and then later on, he
writes this letter. Now, I mentioned Martin
Luther, that Martin Luther loved this book. It was one of his
favorite books. He called it the great
charter, the Magna Carta, the superior charter. It became known as the
Charter of the Reformation. And I brought with me
Martin Luther's commentary to the Galatians. I'm not going to read it to you. It's quite lengthy, but I'm
going to read a section to you. This particular edition
I love because this book was printed in 1749. So I'm holding a book
that was printed, used, read, and preached
from before this country came into existence. And in the beginning of his
commentary to the Galatian church, he talks
about the greatness of the book of Galatians
in that it highlights the great doctrine
of justification by faith, which you know
Martin Luther was all about. And he says, of
our justification-- "that is to say how
not by ourselves, neither by our works, which
are less than ourselves, but by another help, even
the Son of God, Jesus Christ, we are redeemed from
sin, death, the devil, and made partakers
of eternal life." And then he said,
"therefore I am compelled to cast away all shame and to be
bold above all measure," which he is in this book. Martin Luther said the letter
to the Galatians is my letter. I am wedded to it. It is my wife. I don't know how his wife
felt about that statement, but I guess, Billy, she
liked it as much as he did, like you guys did. So you're off to a good
start if Martin Luther said that about this book. So Galatians is sort of
a mini Book of Romans. It takes those
same central themes that are written about
in length and in depth in the book of Romans-- justification by
faith, especially-- and highlights those
because of the particulars that were going
on in that church. In this book, the word
law appears 32 times. The word faith appears 21 times. So largely he is writing
about the difference between trusting in the law
and relying on Jesus Christ by faith. That's why you see those
words come up so often. Now, you can divide the book
up into three easy sections of two chapters each. There are six chapters-- chapter 1 and 2 form
the first part, 3 and 4 the second part, 5
and 6 the third part. The first part, chapters
1 and 2, are all personal. Paul is defending
his apostleship. Paul is talking about
his relationship to Old Testament law. Paul is talking about
his experience in Christ. So personal, chapter 1 and 2. The second section, doctrinal. He talks about justification by
faith, cites several examples, gives several
scriptures about how we are saved not by any of
our works, but all by Christ. The last section, chapters 5 and
6, are the practical chapters. It's what all of the
doctrines should lead to. And in particular,
he wants to show the legalists, the Judaizers,
that the doctrine of grace leads to good works. They were worried. If you just preach
grace, you're going to let people do
whatever they want to do, and they won't obey Christ. They need the
parameters of the law. They need the strict
bumper guards of the law. Paul says, not so. The quickest route
to spiritual maturity is the doctrine of salvation
by grace through faith. So that is the practical
section of the book. We deal now with the first
part, chapters 1 and 2. Let's peruse it and look at
a few outstanding verses. In the first two
chapters, as I mentioned, they're autobiographical. Paul will defend his own
authority as an apostle, and he will defend the
doctrine of justification. That's why he says Paul,
an apostle, not from men, nor through man, but
through Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised
him from the dead. Down in Verse 6, he lays
it right on the line right from the beginning. I marvel that you are
turning away so soon from Him who called you in
the grace of Christ to a different gospel,
which is not another, but there are some who trouble
you and want to pervert the gospel of Christ. I scratch my head when I
consider the predicament that the Church of Galatia
had gotten themselves into. What I mean is they
had heard the greatest Bible teacher in the world
next to Jesus Christ himself, and very quickly after the
founding of that vibrant church in Galatia, they
started going backwards. It doesn't take long. It doesn't take long into
the next generation often in church movements
when churches start slipping backwards,
sliding sideways, giving up on core values and core
issues, compromising in this area and that area. I marvel, says Paul,
that it's been so quick. You've done it so soon-- that you have moved
away or turned away from him who called you
to a different gospel. Now, notice Verse 7. He uses a very important word. He said, it's not another, but
there are some who trouble you. That's the Judaizers,
and they want to pervert the gospel of Christ. The word pervert could
be translated turn back or reverse. Think of it this way. Instead of making
progress in Christ, instead of putting it from
first gear into second gear, you're moving your Christian
vehicle in reverse. You're going backwards. You're going back to the Old
Testament, back to the law, when the law was simply meant
to be a place holder for grace. You've put your Christian
walk in reverse. You're going the
opposite direction. Josephus, the Jewish
historian, tells us that, after Jesus was crucified,
there were still sacrifices going on in the temple. I bring this up because
the Bible tells us that, when Jesus was crucified,
something in the temple itself was torn. Do you know that was? The veil. The veil-- the veil that
separated the holy place from the holy of holies. It was enormous. It was very tall. There weren't
ladders high enough to get up there and rip it. It was ripped from top to
bottom, not bottom to top. The implication is
God tore the veil, was making the statement that
you, who are on the outside, can come in. You can draw nearby faith. I'm giving you access to me
now by the death of my son. The only way the sacrifices
could have continued after that is for the veil to
be sewn up again. That's what religion does. God rips open the veil
and says, come close. Man says, let's sew it back up. Let's take the
freedom that we have, and get rid of the freedom,
and go back into bondage, into rituals, into religion,
into rights and ceremonies. Man always has the tendency to
take the veil that God ripped and sew it back up, to
put things in reverse instead of moving forward, just
like they did an Acts chapter 15-- those certain men
from Judea who said, unless you are circumcised
and keep the law of Moses, you can't be saved. Well, that was news to
them, because they just believed in Jesus, and
Paul and Barnabas said, you guys are saved. Now these men from Judea
are saying, not so fast. Have you become a Jew? Have you been circumcised? Are you keeping the
covenant commandments? Are you keeping
the laws of Moses? Because if not,
you're not saved. They're going back in reverse. Here's what's unfortunate. You say, well, that was then. Today things are far different. Not so fast. Religion tends to grip
our souls with an ironclad kind of a grip. I meet people who come
to faith in Christ. They get all
excited about Jesus, and freedom, and liberty,
and salvation, and growth. But then they meet a group
of Christians who are saying, well, we've decided
to keep the Sabbath, and the Old Testament
rituals, and we're getting in touch with the
Jewish roots of our faith, and we're practicing Judaism. And it sounds fun and
fascinating to kind of look at the biblical feast
of the Old Testament, but if you read
Galatians, you realize that you can go too far, and
it's more than a celebration. Some people are told you really,
as New Testament believers, should keep these
practices if you really want to be pleasing to God. They're going backwards. They're saying here, put
the handcuffs back on me. Put the shackles back on me. This freedom is way too much. I need to do something. I need to keep a ceremony,
or this free kind of worship is a little too much. I would rather go back
to an older liturgical form of worship that's
a little more rigid. Now, why is that
tendency so prevalent? Here's why. It's really the
pride of mankind. There's something within us
that says, if I do something, if I add my effort,
and my ritual, and my ceremony to
the work of Christ, somehow I'm going
to be better off, and God is going
to love me more. It's hard for human nature
to accept a free gift, to just say, really? I just believe and
I'm right with God? Don't I have to do anything? Nope. It's been done. You need to believe in
what has been done for you. You need to run and cling to the
one who did the work for you. Yes, He did. Don't go backwards into
religion, or ritual, or ceremony. It's fine to study it and
acknowledge it for what it is, but you are free in Christ. That is the large point
of the book of Galatians. In Verse 8, "but even if we
are an angel from heaven, preach any other
gospel to you, then what we have preached to
you, let him be accursed." But this is in chapter 1. This is in the area where
he's usually saying, dude, you're doing awesome. High five. Praise God. You guys are awesome. He's saying, he who
gives you something different than what you've
received, let him be anathema-- is the Greek word, anathema. It's a word that means devoted
to destruction or Hades. Let me translate it
so you understand how strong Paul is here. He's angry, and he
is to the point. He's saying this. If we are an angel from
heaven, preach any other gospel than what you have
received, to hell with him. Let him be damned. That's as strong of a
language, or wording, or idea that Paul the Apostle
ever postulates. Let it be cursed, anathema,
devoted to destruction. As we have said before,
so now I say again, if anyone preaches any other
gospel to you than what you have received,
let him be accursed, for do I now
persuade men or God? Or do I seek to please men? If I still please
men, I would not be a bond servant
of Jesus Christ. Paul, relax. Why are you so up in arms, man? Show a little freedom yourself. Chill out. Think of it this way. If you go into the doctor
and after a few tests he diagnoses that you have
an aggressive form of cancer, would you want him to chill
out, relax, use grace with it, hope for the best, give your
patient a pat on the back, let him go? No, if you're a good doctor,
you will deal very aggressively with-- you're angry at that
cancerous organism that is eating away at your patient. You want to do everything
you can to stop it, cut it out, deal with it. Same is true for a shepherd. David said the Lord
is my shepherd. He said his rod and his
staff bring me great comfort. Now, a staff was what
the shepherd would use to direct the
sheep, but a rod was a little club hung from the
belt used to beat up wolves. Paul is trying to direct
his sheep with the staff, but like a good shepherd,
he's got the club out. He's saying, where
are those wolves? I'm ready to consign
them to anathema. I'm going to beat
up some of them. I want me some wolf flesh. Now, suppose an angel appeared
right here on this stage. We're having church now, and
a big, fiery angel appeared. Well, first of
all, there's never been an angel on this
platform, except for last night there was one. Lenya was up here
with the woman. It was a great event. Any woman show up for that? Excellent event. But let's say an angel came,
and an angel started speaking. We would be wowed,
oohed, awed, amazed, but we should be
asking questions. What is the angel
directing me to do? What is he saying? And is what he is
saying different from what the Bible says? Because there have
been apparitions that people have seen. It's awesome. You had to have been there, man. Mary appeared to
us in a tortilla. It was so amazing. Or our Lady of
Fatima, or Medjugorje, or in the 1800s when the angel
Moroni appeared to young Joseph Smith with the golden
plates, and gave what is today known as Mormonism-- an angel from heaven. But if that angel gives
to you a different gospel, let him be accursed. Now, he goes on. In the rest of the
chapter, he gets personal. He talks about his background
in legalism in Judaism. Go over to chapter 2 Verse 4. "And this occurred because of
false brethren secretly brought in who came in by stealth
to spy out our liberty, which we had in Christ Jesus,
that they might bring us into bondage." That happened in
Antioch, and it's happening again now in Galatia. Now, back into that
instance in Antioch, Acts 15-- "to whom
we did not yield submission even for an hour
that the truth of the gospel might continue with you." The chapter continues. He's still dealing
autobiographically. He talks about a run in
he had with the apostle Peter, who came from Jerusalem,
that Peter played the hypocrite and acted like a good Jewish
person when Jews were around. But when Gentiles
were around, he's hanging out with the
Gentiles, but compelling them to live like Jews. So Paul said, I called
him out on that. Go over to Chapter 3. That brings us to the
second section of the book. This is the doctrinal section. He gives several arguments
about salvation by grace. And look at Verse 1. "Oh foolish Galatians." I told you it was
a different letter. The tone is different. When you get a letter
from somebody and it says, I think you're foolish
for doing this, you know it's not
a friendly letter. "Oh foolish Galatians,
who has bewitched you?" or beguiled you, or
cast a spell on you, "that you should
not obey the truth before whose eyes Jesus
Christ was clearly portrayed among you as crucified?" "Oh foolish Galatians." In another translation
of the New Testament by JB Phillips, the
Phillips translation, he translates it this way. "Oh you dear idiots of Galatia." That sort of captures the flavor
that Paul is writing with. Now, he is obviously referring
to the fact that, whoever these preachers were,
these Judaizers, they wowed the Galatians
enough, they made an impact enough
by their preaching, their style, whatever it was,
that they're turning away from the gospel
that Paul gave them. And I notice how we
are as human beings whenever we discover
a new truth, a new book, a new author. We're wowed by it. Wow, man, I'm reading
things I've never seen before in the Bible. Well, maybe you've never
seen them before in the Bible because they're really
not in the Bible. You have to read their book to
discover it's not in the Bible, but it should be in the
Bible because I think it really is in the Bible. I'm not saying we shouldn't
be wowed by good authors, but we should always use
discernment and ask ourselves what saith scripture? We should be like the
Bereans who check out what Paul said to make
sure it goes along with the body, the bulk of all
of the rest of the scripture. So he continues. "This only," Verse 2, "I
want to learn from you. Did you receive the spirit
by the works of the law or by the hearing of faith? Are you so foolish having
begun in the spirit? Are you now being made
perfect in the flesh?" I'm going to read a little
portion of JB Phillips's incredibly capable
translation in this section, beginning in Verse 1. "Oh you dear idiots
of Galatia, who saw Jesus Christ, the
crucified, so plainly, who has been casting
a spell over you? I will ask you one
simple question. Did you receive the spirit
by trying to keep the law or by believing the
message of the gospel? Surely you can't be
so stupid as to think that you begin your
spiritual life in the spirit and then complete
it by reverting to physical observances." Look, if you can't
be saved by the law, then why are you
going back to the law? It's an ironclad, logical
set of statements. That's the idea here. Go down to verse 5 of chapter 3. "Therefore, he who supplies
the spirit to you and works miracles among you, does he
do it by the works of the law or by the hearing of faith? Just as Abraham--" this is
just like he did in Romans-- "just as Abraham believed God,
and it was accounted to him for righteousness. Therefore know that only
those who are of faith are sons of Abraham." As Jews, they were
incredibly rooted in Abraham. They were incredibly
proud that Abraham was their spiritual father,
the father of faith, the father of their faith,
their belief system of Judaism. Men were sons and
daughters of Abraham. And they believed that being
related to Abraham genetically was a guarantee of
their future salvation, so Paul takes them way
back to the Old Testament to Genesis chapter
15 after the battle Abraham had with the kings
when he won with Omar, and you know that story. In chapter 15, Abraham
is getting older, and he's kind of mopey. He's like 86 years
old, and he says, Lord, what are you going to
give me, seeing that I'm old and I have no one who's my heir. The only one I have is
Eleazar of Damascus. God says, Abe, step outside. Look up. Look at those stars. Can you count the stars? If you can, know this-- so shall your descendants be. I'm going to make
your descendants, you old childless man. You're going to have
a progeny, a nation-- nations will come from you. And instead of Abraham going,
oh, God, that's a funny one. That's awesome. You're a joke teller. That's great. It says Abraham believed God. Whether he said amen out loud--
the word in Hebrew is amen. Maybe Abraham said, amen. Or maybe he just in his
heart said, I believe that. At that moment, it says God
accounted that act of faith to Abraham as righteousness. He's right with me. He's justified. That's that seminal statement
that Paul so often goes back to. "Therefore--" Verse 7--
"know that only those who are of faith are the
sons of Abraham." Abraham was 86 years old when
God gave them that promise. At 86 years of age, Abraham-- get this-- a Gentile. There was no Jewish nation. He was an unbeliever. He was from Ur the Chaldees. He was Iraqi. He was between the Tigris
and Euphrates River Valley. He was a Gentile. He was not circumcised, but
as an uncircumcised Gentile, Abraham believed God, and God
said, you're right with me. You're justified. He will be circumcised,
but not until he's 99, which I don't even
want to talk about that. It's OK when you're eight
days old because you never remember it, but a 99
year old male would. But the act of circumcision
did not justify him. He had been justified
for years already. So Paul goes back to
the calling of Abraham. Abraham believed God. It was accounted to
him for righteousness. Abraham obeyed. He was circumcised. You could call that a work, a
human work, a human endeavor. But he wasn't saved by that. It was simply an
attestation of his faith. Now, that is always
what we deal with. We are always dealing with
inhumanity, no matter what part of the globe we live in,
no matter what culture we are confronted
with, no matter what religious background or
backgrounds we have around us. All of humanity, all
culture, all time frames can be boiled down to
one of two religions. There are only two religions
in the entire world, two ways to approach God. One is the religion
of human achievement. The other is the religion
of divine accomplishment. It's either I'm going
to do something. I'm going to work hard. I'm going to subscribe to this
and go through these rituals, or pilgrimages, or whatever. Or God is going to
do it, and I'm simply going to believe
him, and that faith is enough to
transform my behavior, and work on me from the inside
out, rather than the outside in. All of the world can be divided
into one of those two camps. It's either human
accomplishment or divine. Go down to verse
10 of chapter 3. "For as many as are of the works
of the law are under the curse. For it is written--" now
he's quoting from the law. See, Paul is smart at this. They trust the law. We believe in the law. So he goes, OK,
I'm going to quote from the fifth
book of the Torah, from Deuteronomy chapter 27. "As many as are of
the works of the law are under the curse of the law,
for it is written in the law cursed is everyone
who does not continue in all things which are
written in the book of the law to do them." So the law doesn't
bring a blessing. The law brings a curse,
unless you are perfect. If you are perfect
and able to do all the requirements
of the Mosaic law, then it's good for you. But because no one is perfect,
therefore it is not a blessing. It is as the law says it is. It brings a curse. Cursed is everyone
who does not continue in all things which are
written in the book of the law to do them. Verse 11-- "but then
no one is justified by the law in the sight
of God is evident." Now he's quoting
that great verse from second chapter of Habakkuk. "For the just shall
live by faith, and yet the law is not a faith,
but the man who does them shall live by them." Now, let me explain that one. That is a direct quote out of
Leviticus chapter 8 verse 5. "The man who does them
shall live by them." Leviticus 18--
excuse me-- verse 5. So the law doesn't ask a
person to believe in it. The law doesn't ask a person
to try really, really hard and do your best to keep it. The law demands strict,
complete, and perfect obedience. That's why Paul says
there's no blessing in that. We're not perfect. Nobody can keep that. Nobody has kept that. It's a yoke of bondage,
he will go on to explain. It demands strict,
complete obedience. So here's Paul's argument. Since the Bible says,
since the scripture says in the Old Testament the
just shall live by faith, if you are under the law,
you're not living by faith. If you're not living by
faith, you're not just. You get his argument? It's like a lawyer
in a courtroom. It's very, very logical,
almost pedantic, one link to the other. And his syllogism is ironclad. The just shall live by faith. What is the solution? Verse 13-- "Christ has redeemed
us from the curse of the law having become a curse for us,
for it is written cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree. That the blessing of Abraham
might come upon the Gentiles in Christ Jesus, that we
might receive the promise of the spirit through faith." Jesus was put on a cross, a
Roman method of execution, not a Jewish. The Jews never crucified. It was a humiliation. It was a curse because of
an Old Testament scripture that talks about
curses is anything that hangs on a tree
is a signal of a curse. So Jesus, because He
became the curse of sin, or He took the curse of sin
on Him, and He died in a way that is humiliating to the Jews. He became the substitute whereby
God is able to impute or confer the righteousness of
that sinless sacrifice onto anyone who believes in him. That's the transaction
called justification. That's how it works. Cursed is everyone
who hangs on the tree that the blessing of Abraham
might come upon the Gentiles in Christ, that we might receive
the promise of the spirit through faith. If you like to write in
your Bible, like I do, write in the margins
2 Corinthians 5:21, which we looked at last time. God made Him, who knew
no sin, to be sin for us that we might become the
righteousness of God in Him. That's the substitution
and the imputation. Now, go down to verse
19, because he's still in that doctrinal section. What purpose, then,
does the law serve? What good is it? He says, I'm glad you asked. "It was added because
of transgressions until the seed--" capital
S referring to Christ-- "should come to whom
the promise was made, and it was appointed
through angels at the hands of a mediator." Now, the only
religious institution that God ever initiated,
inaugurated, developed was Judaism. Christianity is not a religion. It is a relationship with God
through the Jewish messiah. The only religious system that
God ever initiated is Judaism, and God put it
there for a purpose. It was a stopgap measure. It was a place holder measure
until the seed should come. Paul says this. Here's what the law does. Here's the benefit of the law. The law acts like an amplifier--
an amplification system. Let's say I had an
electric guitar up here, and I'm playing
it not plugged in. You could hear it, but you would
not hear the richness of it, because it's thin. It's usually hard wood. It might be a semi hollow
guitar with the pickups on it. And you could play it,
and you could hear it, but it doesn't have
the whole sound. Once you plug it
into an amplifier, turn up the volume and the
gain to get a little grit on it, and then-- it takes that and amplifies
it, makes it larger. The law does that with sin. Our sin, before the
law, was like playing the electric guitar unplugged. Once you have the law, the
law acts as the amp and just says, man, have you blown it. Man, are you a sinner. Boy, do you need help, because
you have all these dos, and all these don'ts, and all
these regulations that no one has ever totally kept. So we walk away going,
man, I blew it again. So it is that
amplification system, or it was added because
of transgressions until the seed should come,
to whom the promise was made, and it was appointed
through angels by the hands of a mediator. Go down to verse 24. "Therefore the law was our
tutor to bring us to Christ that we might be
justified by faith, but after faith has come--" that
is, you just believe in Jesus-- "we are no longer
under a tutor." Couldn't be any clearer. The word that Paul uses
for tutor is the Greek word [GREEK]-- literally a child
tender, a babysitter. A [GREEK] was, in
the Greek world, in the Greco Roman
world, usually a household slave employed
by the household whose job it was to be a guardian of a young
child, usually aged 7 to 18. Would supervise,
superintend, take to formal classes,
instruct in certain things up until the time when
that child grew up, and then you don't need
the tutor any longer. So the law was a
temporary guardian. Go down to chapter 4 verse
3, see how he applies it. "Even so, we, when
we were children, were in bondage under the
elements of the world, but when the fullness
of the time had come, God sent forth His son
born of a woman born, under the law to redeem
those who are under the law that we might receive
the adoption as sons, and because you are
sons, God has sent forth the spirit of His
son into your hearts, crying out Abba Father." I love that text. You know it's one
of my favorites. I preached it last
Christmas Eve. Great truths in Galatians now. Now we're getting
the amplification of the whole justification
by faith thing. The Son of God became
a man to enable men to become sons of God. God treated Jesus
like we deserve to be treated so that God
could treat us like Jesus deserves to be treated. We've been given the
adoption as sons, and this is what
Christmas is all about. It's the side of the Christmas
story that is never told. It's OK to have a cross or Jesus
on a cross inside of a church building. Typically a Catholic Church has
that at the front of the altar. But you only see
Jesus in a nativity set outside most churches
and only at Christmas time. That's because the world
can handle that Jesus. They can't handle that Jesus. Like the family who was out
looking at Christmas lights one year, and they loved all
the lights in the neighborhood, and they finally
came to a church where there was this huge,
beautiful nativity display all lit up. And the father said,
isn't that just stunning? And the little boy, the son-- there was a couple boys,
and girl, and mom, and dad. One of the little boys said,
yeah, but something bothers me. Doesn't Jesus ever grow up? He's the same size this
year as he was last year. Well, for some people,
Jesus never grows up. They don't want
Jesus to grow up. They want Him to stay a cuddly
little infant in a manger scene, not grow up and call
people out on their sin, and then get hung up on a
cross to bleed for their sin. They don't want that Jesus. But Jesus was crucified, and
then He rose from the dead. We have the adoption of sons
whereby we call Abba Father. Now we come to chapter 5 and 6. That's where we end the book. As the book ends, it comes
to the third great section of this book. That is the practical section. Here's what I love about it. Paul is basically
saying, listen, grace-- the doctrine of grace, salvation
by grace through faith alone-- promotes spiritual maturity. The very opposite of what
the Judaizers said it would. I feel that grace is
often misunderstood. Just don't tell people all they
got to do is believe in Jesus. If you tell people that,
man, they'll go wild. They'll go crazy. You need the fence, man. You need the bumpers. You need the parameters. Otherwise they'll live
without restraint. No, not if they understand
the gospel of grace, because if they understand
the gospel of grace, it's going to do
something to their heart. Their heart will be changed. God puts His Holy
Spirit that energizes the new nature that is put
within us at the second birth. So you don't strive to keep
the law because you're saved by grace and just believing. You want to obey. It motivates you to obey. You don't turn
into a rebel, man. You turn into a disciple. The law is different. The law can command
you to do something, but it can never enable
you to do that something. Do this. Do that. Like that little poem I've
often quoted, "do this, do that the law
commands, but gives me neither feet nor hands. A better word the gospel brings. It bids me fly, and
then it gives me wings." So the law says, don't do this. Here's a command. But it never gives
you the enabling. The new covenant gives
you the enabling. You have a new birth. You have a new
relationship with God. All things are passed away,
all things become new. The spirit of God lives
within you, et cetera. So chapter 5 verse 1--
"stand fast, therefore, in the liberty in which
Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again
with a yoke of bondage." Now he is picturing
a poor animal, like an oxen bowed over
from too much weight that he is carrying that's
laced to his neck in this plow. "Indeed, I, Paul, say
to you that, if you become circumcised, Christ
will profit you nothing. And I testify again to every
man who becomes circumcised that he is a debtor to
keep the whole law." Interesting terminology. Stand fast, and don't be
entangled with the yoke of bondage. It's the same terminology
Peter used in Acts chapter 15, that counsel at Jerusalem,
because the Judaizers had gone to Antioch. Paul and Barnabas
go to Jerusalem. Peter is there, and
Peter says, why are you trying to put on the disciples
a yoke that neither we nor our fathers were
ever able to bear? We couldn't keep the law. Our predecessors
couldn't keep the law, but now you're trying
to tell Gentiles you have to keep the law. It's a yoke. We couldn't bear it. Nobody can bear it. Jesus said the same
thing to the Pharisees. Woe to you, scribes
and pharisees, you hypocrites, for you bind
heavy burdens hard to bear. And you lay them
on men's shoulders. That's what the law did. Paul says, don't
be enslaved again. Go down to verse 11. "And I, brethren, if I still
am preaching circumcision, why do I still suffer persecution? Then the offense of
the cross has ceased. I could wish--"
now he's getting-- wow-- very strong. "I could wish that
those who trouble you would even cut themselves off." Now, that translation doesn't
really help us get the idea. The word cut themselves
off is a word that is translated in many
ancient Greek texts as to emasculate oneself. You know what that is? I don't have to
describe that, right? You get the picture? Why would he use such a term? Such a crass term? Because there was
a cult, a group of worshippers that
worshipped Sabelle, and part of their devotion was to
cut off the anatomical parts of the male, emasculation
as a proof of devotion. So Paul is saying, really,
if you're really devoted, you're preaching circumcision. Just go emasculate yourself. I wish you would
just get cut off. Wow, Paul. "For you, brethren, have
been called to liberty, only do not use your liberty as
an opportunity for the flesh, but through love. Serve one another, for
all the laws fulfilled in one word, even this. You shall love your
neighbor as yourself." Here's his point. Grace doesn't make
you indulgent. Grace makes you a servant. Grace, if you really
understand it, will put a new to love
for people within you-- not legalism, not pettiness. You'll fulfill the
law, which is love. Go down to verse 16. "I say walk in the spirit. You will not fulfill
the lust of the flesh, for the flesh lusts are
wars against the spirit, the spirit against the flesh. These are contrary
to one another so that you do not do the
things that you wish." You have two natures as a
believer-- the old nature you were born with,
the new nature you were born with at your second birth. Everything was good
until you got born again. There was no battle. You just sinned. But once you come
to Christ, now you have the Holy Spirit energizing
that whole new nature because you're now
right with God. Now there's a battle. It's worse than Star Wars. It's flesh wars-- flesh
wars against the spirit, one nature against the other. And you cast the deciding vote. So what Paul does here is he
gets 17 works of the flesh contrasted to nine graces
of the spirit, and he says, "the works of the flesh--"
verse 19-- "are evident, which are adultery,
fornication, uncleanness, , lewdness idolatry, sorcery,
hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath,
selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envies, murders,
drunkenness, revelries--" yuck-- "and the like, of which I tell
you beforehand just as I also told you in time past. Those who practice
such things will not inherit the Kingdom of God." Now he tells you
what grace produces. The fruit of the spirit is love,
joy, peace, long suffering, kindness, goodness,
faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such, there is no law. It's called the
fruit of the spirit. You know how fruit
is produced, right? You have these little twigs
and branches on a tree, and you see them. You walk by an apple tree. Do you ever walk by a
tree that's bearing apples and go, man, look at
how hard that tree is working to produce fruit? I think I see it sweating. No, it never happens that way. You know how easy it is for
a branch to produce fruit? All the branch has to
do is hang in there. Just stay connected, man. Just hang in there,
and fruit will happen. You want to be a
fruitful Christian? Hang in there. Abide in Christ. Hang in there with Him. Stay connected to Him. Fruit will happen naturally. You don't have to
push, sweat, force. It will happen. That's what happens in grace. Brethren, chapter 6 verse 1. "If a man is overtaken
in any trespass, you, who are spiritual,
restore such a one in the spirit of gentleness,
considering yourself lest you also be tempted. Bear one another's burdens, and
so fulfill the law of Christ, for if anyone thinks himself
to be something when he is nothing, he deceives himself." One of the big differences
between legalism and grace is this. Legalism points the finger. Grace opens wide the
arms, seeks to restore. Legalists love condemnation. People who are into
grace love restoration. So you messed up. So did I. Come on in, man. We want to get around you. We want to lift you up. We want to restore you. We may get in your grill
and be honest with you, but we want to restore
you back to fruitfulness, not just tell you your
faults, but restore you. Unfortunately, the church
has become really good at shooting its own wounded,
rather than bandaging them up and getting them
back on the field again. We should be really
good at restoration. Go down to verse 11. We're bringing this
letter to a close in the last minute and a half. "See what large
letters I have written to you with my own hand." I'm bringing that
up to your attention because I'm puzzled
as to what that means. The King James says see what
a large letter I have written to you, which would
infer that he's saying, man, see I've written--
this is a big, long letter. The thing is, Galatians
really isn't a long letter. Compared to Romans, 1
Corinthians, it's not long. It's relatively short. It could mean that he is
writing a longer letter than he intended to write to them. That's one thought. There is another thought, and
that is by the translation here. See what large letters
I have written to you. The thought is that Paul had
an eye ailment, an eye disease. We don't know why. It's thought that, when he was
stoned at Lystra, when they threw rocks at him at
Lystra, and they almost stoned him to death, that he
suffered effects from that. And one is that he suffered
from poor eyesight. And that is what he referred to
in 2 Corinthians 12-- "my thorn in the flesh--" an ailment. We don't know, but it
could be that Paul had to write really large letters. You know what it's like when
you get older, and your Bible-- you used to carry that
little tiny little Bible that you could not read unless
you had a microscope anymore. And so you get the Bible
with extra large print. It's like about that big. One word, it's real big. Perfect. So it could be that
Paul, not just age, but because of that
ailment-- maybe age-- I had to write large letters. There is a third
thought, if I may. It could be that the
letter was written normally because he had an amanuensis,
somebody he dictated it to who wrote it out, but that,
at the end, when Paul wanted to make a point, he
wrote large letters or had him write large letters. We would write something, and
then we would do all caps. And it says, don't miss
this, exclamation point, exclamation point,
exclamation point. And then we'd tell what it is. It could be that he's
highlighting a certain section in large letters. Take your pick. We don't know. I think I know what it is, but
I'll keep my opinion to myself. You've heard it before, anyway. Go down to verse 16. "As many as walk according
to this rule, peace and mercy be upon them and upon
the Israel of God." In other words, those
Jews-- not Judaizers, but those Jews who simply
believe in Christ, as well as the Gentiles. "From now on, let no one trouble
me, for I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus. Brethren, the grace of
our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit. Amen." Amen. You know what he
was referring to? He was referring to the
marks of persecution, the beatings, the stonings. Remember, he said three
times I was beaten with rods. He said that in Corinthians. He's saying you are
boasting in your marks on your body, which
is circumcision. I am boasting about
the marks on my body, which is suffering for the
sake of the true gospel. So he is contrasting their
mark of circumcision with that. Brethren, the grace of our Lord
Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen. Here it is in a nutshell. About a week or so ago, I was
at California Pizza Kitchen having a salad. I finished the meal. I was ready to pay my bill, and
the waitress smiled and said, your bill has already
been paid in full. Gratuity has even been added. So you don't have
to pay anything. Congratulations. I said, well, who was it? They said, well, I
can't tell you that, and they don't want to be known. So what a gift. What a what a gracious act,
when somebody does that. Jesus came along and said,
I'm going to pick up your tab. All of the debt you have accrued
by all of the bad things you have ever said, done,
thought, messed up on I'm going to pay for. It's going to be on my tab. So I'm giving you a free
meal, a free ticket to heaven. Will you believe me? Now, what if I were to say to
the waitress, that's great. Can I go back to the
back and wash dishes? Well, why? Well, I should earn something. Well, that would be
weird, number one. Probably against a
health code, number two. And number three, it would
be an insult to the one who gave me the gift. When you say, I want to
add something to the gospel by a regiment of works, what
an insult it is to the one who paid for your sins
and mine on the cross and is willing to give you
freely salvation by believing in Him. So don't go back into bondage. Stand fast, stand
firm in the liberty, but don't use your
liberty to cause anybody to stumble or an occasion to the
flesh, an excuse to the flesh, because if it's truly
grace you're saved by, it's going to be
manifested in love, and compassion, in restoration,
in the fruit of the spirit that comes by just hanging in there
in your relationship with Him. Father, we close by thanking
you for the work of Christ on the cross and that
it is a finished work. We stand in grace. We stand firm in grace. We stand in our liberty,
and we thank you for the freedom
we have in Christ. In Jesus's name, we pray. Amen. Let's all stand. We hope you enjoyed this message
from Skip Heitzig of Calvary Church. For more resources,
visit calvarynm.church. Thank you for joining us for
this teaching from the Bible from 30,000 feet.
