Galatians - No Other Gospel: The Gospel

[Music] here's the great thing do you guys know this that all of these things whenever you have we have a teaching here then uh the video team just rocks it they are amazing and these people work so hard they've been working particularly hard today in this whole week because they've been working on some some just different configurations and things like that so um but they get this teaching up the next day so if ever you're like amy really talked too fast last night or you like i missed something or if the keynote doesn't pop up tonight it's all good you can go online you can watch and you can get all these notes for the things that amy talked too fast on so so well i'll just go ahead and get started if it starts working fabulous otherwise you know use your imagination it looked really pretty just so you know last week we looked at the galatians a little bit who they were and a little bit kind of surprised us that we can be a little bit like that yep and we spent quite a bit of time on paul and um i just want to i just want to remind you guys of that and keep that kind of tucked away in your back pocket because that we spent a whole lot of time talking about how paul as an apostle was sent by the lord so the words that we keep reading as we cross reference over to first corinthians and we read in acts and we go into galatians these are the commands of the lord this is the word of god and paul has authority to say these words here and i'd just like us to keep that in mind as we look at this we are today is our focus is going to be on the gospel that's what your homework was focusing on all this week and i don't know it's probably not okay to have a favorite but probably as a christian this is probably okay to have you know that the gospel is the it's the main thing if you've been an atheist for five seconds you're like yeah we talk about the gospel a lot because not only does it matter for your eternal security but it matters even like how we are daily and how we are treating people and loving each other the gospel is the main thing so i had you guys even go into a little bit of detail on that day one because it might have seemed repetitive on on that where i wanted you to go in and kind of list things out i don't know how you guys do homework in in stuff like this i uh i'm a bulleter you know like the whole complete sentence thing i totally ditched that back in probably ninth grade so you know when they'd say put your answer in complete sentences nope we got rid of that and so now we do a whole lot of bullet marks but i love that as it pertains to the gospel because you're able to kind of list out each detail and then i asked you guys to also personalize the gospel on that very from date week one or day one of this week and the reason for that is because how easy is it for these verses that are specifically about the gospel to glance right over them i've read these 50 times i've read them 500 times i've heard these thousands of times and they don't sit there you know and so it helps to kind of personalize that a little bit so you can go oh this is why the gospel means that much so i wanted to kind of start with that and i'm going to have you guys turn to first corinthians 15. we're going to read first corinthians 15 3 through 8 and again being intentionally repetitive here guys because this is a big deal we want to get this first corinthians 15 starting in verse 3 for i delivered to you as of first importance what i also received that christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures that he was buried that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures and that he appeared to cephas and then to the twelve and then he appeared to more than 500 brothers at one time most of whom are still alive though some have fallen asleep then he appeared to james and then to the apostles last of all as to one untimely born he appeared also to me now i know we read some of that last week we probably read all of it but again that's the gospel right there so when we are look talking about something that's essential it doesn't get much more essential than the gospel than these things so these are the elements that are there can y'all picture in your mind my list it's there so the first one is that christ died that was the first one that you see there in verse 15 in chapter 15 right there in verse is it three in verse three that christ died we're not even going to get any further than that because that's the first part that we get then the second part is of the gospel is that he died for our sins this is the backdrop of why the gospel is so awesome we need to have this concept of our sins and we're going to look at each one of these in a little bit more detail next he was buried he was raised on the third day and he appeared to witnesses those are the things i'm going to say those again since y'all can't see him christ died for our sins he was buried he was raised on the third day and there were witnesses right there first corinthians 15. that is the gospel message now these are so important and so i wanted to drill down on each of these a little bit so that first one that christ died this is amazing when you think about who we're talking about you know those scriptures that we looked at where last last week that you know jesus was sent of god and these he said these are the words of god in john 8 58 if you want to write that down if you want to flip to it really fast but john 8 58 is the one that said jesus said to them truly truly i say to you before abraham was i am giant statement giant statement he's saying i am referencing back into the old testament when you remember that whole little bush was on fire and to moses it says i am that i am same thing jesus is saying here not that i'm 2000 years old he is saying to the people that are that he's talking to to the leaders and the jewish leaders he's saying that i'm god i am god that's a giant statement especially as we think about the what we were talking about in the gospel christ died okay but we're talking about that he is god another passage you can write down john 10 36-38 john 10 36 through 38 and it says do you say of him whom the father consecrated and sent into the world you are blaspheming because i said i am the son of god if i am not doing the works of my father then do not believe me but if i do them even though you do not believe me believe the works that you may know and understand that the father is in me and i am in the father this is jesus talking the one that we know died as a as according to the gospel he is saying that me and the father are one and skeptics of the bible will say well no no he wasn't meaning that he was just meaning that he and he and god the father were really tight that is not accurate because we know that afterwards they picked up stones to to kill him to stone him because that would have been blasphemy so he is declaring here that he is god and the reason that's so important is as you look in the old testament and you get to see those pictures of what the sacrificial system looked like the sacrifice was always supposed to be a pure spotless perfect lamb it had to be because if it's not perfect if it's not if it's if it has any mar to it at all then it couldn't atone for the sin new testament that's old testament picture of a new testament truth same thing for us we have sin that must be paid for and the only thing that can pay for that is a perfect sacrifice and that's what jesus was in second corinthians 5 21 that's where it says for our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin he was sinless a perfect sacrifice for us so that's the first part of the gospel christ died the second part is that he died for our this is a big part here we can get these passages in romans you can look at romans 3 10 and romans 3 23 romans 3 10 is the one that says none is righteous no not one like just like to be really clear nobody is righteous in romans 3 23 he says for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of god all it's like by jesus is really the great equalizer in this we have all sinned nobody is an exception to this so the first part of the gospel was that he died christ died for our sins and then there's this other little thing that's tucked in there did you guys see the part where it says according to the scriptures when i see things like that i want to go well where i want to see let's look it up so the two places where it's talking about it says that christ died and he was buried and it says he rose and that he rose from the grave and it says according to the scriptures isaiah 53 8-11 that's this really cool prophecy that the prophet isaiah is giving about jesus and in verse 9 of isaiah 53 he says and they made his grave with the wicked and with a rich man in his death although he had done no violence and there was no deceit in his mouth so he was perfect he was a perfect sacrifice but it says that he would be buried even says that he would be buried in the grave of a rich man which we also know happened that was prophesied by isaiah back in the old testament so that is what it's saying in first corinthians that he was buried according to the scriptures the next one is that he would rise from the dead in psalm 16 10. it says for you will not abandon my soul to shield or let your holy one see corruption all the way back in the old testament the psalmist is saying that jesus would rise from the dead their body would not see corruption would not see decay why is the resurrection such a big deal right first corinthians 15 14 answers that question for us first corinthians 15 14 says and if christ has not been raised then our preaching is in vain look you can see [Music] if christ has not been raised and our preaching is invading our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain paraphrase if the resurrection doesn't didn't happen this is all worthless it doesn't matter the fact that jesus rose from the dead is critical to the gospel and while it might seem like if you came if you didn't come from a christian background and you're kind of reading the bible for the first time somebody raising from the dead is probably gonna seem to be the most like fantastical piece of the gospel like wow that's a little crazy that someone would rise from the dead and yet the the resurrection is remarkably provable like it it's it's proved in so many different ways it's amazing i i i want to go into so a couple things but truly if you've not listened to um you know go on athecreek.com and type in resurrection because pastor brett and several sermons has gone through detail why the resurrection is so provable but just a couple things on this did you notice it said it was witnessed by more than 500 500 at one time okay if we have a court case now and there's like a handful of folks that standing around that say either that did happen or didn't we're like oh yeah without a doubt that went that that's the way it went down because you know these four people saw it or these two people saw eyewitness accounts we give great credence too more than 500 saw him at one time but then not only that so you have all of this this 500 that saw him but even when it mentions that james and then paul is one untimely born saw him that's kind of remarkable because both of those were definitely skeptics so james was the brother of jesus and he if you read back in the gospels his family jesus family kind of thought he was a little crazy like they just thought he wasn't okay so he appears to jesus or he appears to james in his resurrected form so that's that's pretty big to paul paul was i mean to say he was a skeptic is putting it lightly right he is persecuting the church so then you if you follow that even further and all you have all of these people that saw jesus you see the apostles and then you see like how they died brutal brutal deaths not one of them denied that jesus rose from the grave it's a really critical piece to the gospel that we have to know so here are here's the gospel i'm going to put this up here again christ died for our sins he was buried he was raised on the third day and he appeared to witnesses that's the gospel right there in a nutshell paul felt so strongly about this message we learned last week that he would go remember he took the long trek through galatia to tell everybody to preach the gospel and then he would take the long trek all the way back to make sure the churches were good to put elders in place to to like make the gospel solid in these areas in first corinthians 2 2 paul says i wish that i would know nothing among you except christ and him crucified if you ever feel like you know everything's just getting way too complicated stick to those things stick to christ and him crucified that was paul's mission wanting to keep the main thing the main thing so then we have these false gospels that creep in and that's where we see in galatians that paul is going to get a little hot under the caller about isn't he so galatians 1 7 that's where he says but there are some who would trouble you and want to distort the gospel of christ so you guys know i love my old dictionaries and so when i look up distort in my old dictionary it says to pervert turn aside to turn from true meaning or to misrepresent misrepresent even is to distort the gospel of christ these are strong words because then later after verse 7 he says let anyone who distorts the gospel of christ be accursed it doesn't get much worse than that so we have some other gospels even today right we have a lot of other gospels i'm going to throw up a list of a couple that i thought of but i know that there's more but we're going to talk about even like how we spot some of these false gospels but i didn't want to go here until we spent a good chunk of time in what the gospel is so i hope you have that list running through your brain of this is what the gospel is of those core pieces because we want to know what the real thing is before we're even going to be alerted to what is the fake stuff which paul says is no gospel at all so here's one you've probably heard of this one this one is called the prosperity gospel and the prosperity gospel is you know it's this is the on the tele-evangelist side this is that you know if you just believe god if you pray if you donate to the church you will be wealthy healthy and wise you're going to be blessed you're going to have the greatest life and you're going to have the fanciest car and you're going to have a big house and it's going to be awesome that's a prosperity gospel it's a very transactional gospel like if i do this then god's going to give me this but that is a false gospel remember i try to think like how the prosperity gospel how would that have worked for jeremiah we just studied him here at ac the weeping prophet that no one ever listened to him prosperity gospel did he pray yeah was he doing what the lord was calling him to do and is it walking in the will of the lord yep didn't get the big house he did not get the big house or how would that have worked even for paul paul was not living his best life he spent time in prison he was tortured and he ends up getting his head cut off by nero so the prosperity gospel is not going to work out for there either another gospel that we can see is the we are basically good gospel i and this one this very much dilutes that second piece of the gospel which was remember he died for our sins the basically good gospel is going to deny that there's even this whole sin problem it's gonna say as long as you're good outweighs your bad as long as you you know do some community service and you you know you just have a good heart you're gonna be you're gonna be good that is not biblical those romans passages we read takes out any question we all sin all sent and our sin is so like we're just really good about saying is you know really like die for bad is my sin that bad and it is i think if we had an actual uh really good picture a really biblical picture of what our sin nature is we probably could do nothing but talk about the gospel because we it would increase our desperate need for it so much because we'd be so convinced that no when we're seeing that sin on someone else they're like you don't even know how bad my sin is we have to have this right picture of what our sin nature is and the you know we're the basically good gospel is going to deny that part of the gospel that second part that we are sinners how about the gospel of me how much time do we have tonight i know that i i know that this probably affects men everybody can suffer from being self-centered and you know focusing here um but ladies man the enemy is doing a just an absolute piece of work on us and it partly comes from places of we are more feeling type people right we like to you know if it feels right then that must be right and our feelings can trump truth in a hurry if we're not careful with this one but the gospel of me is so tricky because what it does is it shifts the focus and it'll make it even sounds really really good it might even make it sound really uh spiritual even it'll use words like if you just know your true self if you just know who your authentic real self is you will know your truth you will be able to serve the lord better if you just if you just know what your number is you're going to be do able to do this i would ask where is the focus it's a whole lot of digging and a whole lot of introspective first of all how depressing is that to focus on yourself all the time it's not going to be pleasant the gospel of me wants you to look inward it wants you to follow your heart it wants you to believe in yourself but it is about you and so when the gospel is all of a sudden about you well now we're in a whole lot of hurt because can i make my sin go away nope am i compromising the deity of jesus the perfection of his sacrifice because i'm focusing here the last one i want to look at and we'll i'm going to just cover this one briefly because we're going to see this one a little bit more even next week when we look at works and all of those things but this is the gospel plus anything else and i'm not trying to you know be super negative on the jesus plus coffee i'm not trying to be all of those things but it it can sound like we have to it's anything you take the gospel and we need to add something to it it could be um you know it could be a workspace thing it could be something that is actually good we think but the gospel you cannot add to there's nothing that needs to be added to the gospel so i don't do math but this type of math is the gospel plus anything else equals zero it doesn't equal a gospel at all so we'll look at that one a little bit more but the reason i wanted to touch on that one just for a second though too is because you know how when you're um in sunday school or you know when they say like you know the rhetorical question of what's the right answer and everybody says jesus and it's true right it is true but then my only thing i have when we answer that question as i think sometimes we put jesus into kind of this like one box a little bit it's so simple is the gospel simple yes but jesus is is not one-dimensional i wanted to show you guys this passage in colossians i just love this verse so much for these couple verses colossians 1 15-18 this is talking about jesus paul is describing jesus that he is the image of the invisible god the firstborn of all creation for by him all things were created in heaven and on earth visible and invisible whether thrones or authorities all things were created through him and for him he is before all things and in him all things hold together and he is the head of the body of the church he is the beginning the firstborn from the dead that in everything he might be preeminent it's really hard to i i mean that's just an amazing passage of who jesus is do you see it's not just yes he is the answer but he's a whole lot he is the image of the invisible god he is literally holding us together so when we utter that answer of jesus and the simplicity of it yes but think colossians when you think that because there's a whole lot to the jesus that we serve as i look through these false gospels i think there is a couple things and i'm sure there's more this is just what my simple brain comes up with as i analyze what those false gospels look like and there's two things that i think that we can key in on first of all does the thing that i'm looking at diminish my sin and does it diminish jesus and what i'm hoping to give you with this guys is sort of like a practical thing as you are reading a blog or reading a book or listening to a podcast or whatever it is and they're saying something that first red flag if it feels good oh just check it real quick because our feelings kind of get out of whack there does the thing that i'm hearing is the thing that i'm focusing on does it diminish my sin that my my sins not so bad that waters down the gospel and if if our sin is not so bad then why would we need a sacrifice so that's a big one to watch for if the thing that you're reading is or listening to if it's diminishing um your sin and the next one diminish jesus man this one's big um is the thing that you're reading is it pointing you to other things other things that can be even good there's even churches that really focus and trump on the holy spirit the holy spirit is a part of the mystery of the trinity and that's great but the holy spirit will point to jesus so those even right there you got to watch for that is it diminishing who jesus is because then we're getting outside the gospel i'm going to give you guys another example of this so and i don't say i don't throw out these names lightly because unless i really feel like i can point to the person as being a false teacher i usually will not name them um but i've referenced before when we when we've talked about jen hatmaker and a very much a false gospel there so she put out a post um around easter time that somebody had sent me a screenshot of and it was you know there was so many things in it actually guys that i could commend it talked about that jesus you know he he bears our burdens and our scars and it it picture jesus as very loving and compassionate all true i can see that and like i said most of it was going along okay and then she puts in this line and she said this she said sometimes i get weird about god but i remain super obsessed with jesus here's what happens in that line okay we've taken i get kind of weird about god what do we mean by that well we mean that that god that's in the old testament that you know called out the you know the canaanites and i mean wow what he is harsh and he's the grumpy god and we don't like him and we don't understand him new testament jesus i'm down with that he is loving he is kind he is all those things are those true absolutely but we've read several scriptures both this week and last week that the jesus in the new testament is the god of the old testament they're the same so what she sneaks in here is a diminishing of who jesus is she separates who god is and who jesus is that's that's bad teaching and it isn't that it's just she there's other things where she diminishes sin because she redefines sin and so you can kind of talk a couple things on the gospel there that she is outside of outside of the true gospel but i give you that kind of example because man it can sound so good you can even go i don't really like the god of the old testament either and and you can kind of talk yourself into it and you can sort of start a tape sometimes we don't even say it out loud i guarantee you probably a lot of you if you read that you just kind of kept going we're like i'm not going to let that affect me i don't really think about it and i get that i'm not saying that you know you're going to start walking down a false teaching road if you read that but i it's a it's just a note to us of how discerning we need to be with the things that we hear with the things that we listen to because they are sneaking in things uh it there i i can't remember the reference off the top of my head but it's where it talks about that satan will come disguised as an angel of light and we shouldn't be surprised if his servants also disguise themselves as servants of righteousness so don't be but don't be surprised if something feels good if something you know we we dig that just be careful and make sure that that's what the bible is saying because that's what the point of galatians is going to continue to go back and back and back at us there is no other gospel and he's like let me be clear what it is even if you read in the very first verses of galatians he kind of throws it in his intro right at the beginning he says paul an apostle not from men through men but through jesus christ and god the father who raised him from the dead he just like i just want to remind you this is this even that it's the gospel he's just going to keep telling y'all that is where you need to stay you can't add anything to the gospel i want to finish with this passage here because it's not you know all the gospel is great news and i don't want you guys like you know leaving here thinking you got to be freaked out about all these false teachers that are running after you but i want to remind you of second timothy 4 3 and 4 and paul is saying this to timothy and he says for the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching but they will have itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions and will turn away from listening to the truth and wandering off to myths wait there's a bunch of stuff in there that we can go check check check we have a lot of things that are not sound teaching and we have a lot of folks that are enduring it like you know i'm good with that i get that they have itching ears we want to hear the things that we want to hear even the part about us accumulating teachers to suit our own passions man we are inundated guys you can find a book and a podcast just about anything that will feed your passions we're accumulating those things unto ourselves but they'll turn us away from the truth and into wandering myths but i love paul encourages timothy with this here's what we need to do this is instructions to timothy in light of the false teaching that is so pervasive because yep we got that today just like he did back then here's his awards to me says as for you always be sober minded endure suffering do the work of an evangelist fulfill your ministry you like the little points the bullet points right there he says be sober minded that's the same uh word there that is in first thessalonians um 568 where it says to be watchful of the second coming of christ like it's be alert don't have your head in the sand don't just read your feed and go oh i'm sure it's fine it's probably not fine be alert be so reminded that's his first piece of advice to timothy then he says endure suffering it's not we're going to have hardships we just we just are jesus said in the gospels he said he said you in this life you will have trouble that's another the prosperity gospel is going to have a tricky time with that one too we are going to endure hardship so don't be surprised by it but then he says keep your head up you know he says do the work of the evangelist what's the work of the evangelist that is just to uh preach one who preaches the gospel if y'all have been listening if you've been taking notes you've got all of these bullets of what the gospel is amy's ramming it and beating the same drum over and over and over about what the gospel is you know the gospel and you can you can tell if you're a mom you can tell your kids if you're you your community that you're in but people need to hear the work of the evangelist they need to hear the gospel and that doesn't necessarily mean you run over to your neighbor's door and bang on the door and like you know just start reading first corinthians to them that might work i suppose if the holy spirit leads you to that but there are other ways that we in our daily life just have the joy take the endure hardships thing knowing people that have gone through tremendous hardships and have taken the james approach of counted all joy my brothers when you experience hardships and tribulations of many kinds we had a question at our panel and we weren't able to get to it this last weekend but it was it asked are hardships necessary and your heart kind of breaks because you know that question that where that question came from somebody's going through some really hard stuff and those are hard but they are necessary and they're they're not surprising they're part of this life i think it also offers that nice backdrop for that this earth isn't it and that's what tim and he says or paul says it timothy endure suffering do the work of an evangelist and the last thing he says is to fulfill your ministry he's saying keep going just keep going in galatians later on we're going to read where it says do not grow weary and do in well-doing keep doing what the lord's called you to do what is your ministry is it a ministry at work is it a ministry at home we all have a ministry of some kind even if we think that it we think that only the people that you know have ministry as their job that they have ministry that's not true we all have ministry with people and i and and notice this list guys is the is the answer to what he said in those last couple verses where he said all this false teaching everybody accumulating stuff on i mean it it can be kind of overwhelming and you can feel like ah what do we do with all of this this answer is in response to all that so as we wrap up this week about the gospel it's gonna get even better we're going to see some stuff that's even adding another a layer to the gospel about grace and how we are justified and those are going to be great you're going to have to endure a week on circumcision guys next week aren't you all excited but it's going to be great it's going to be great let's pray lord we thank you for the gospel lord we know that we are in serious need of the gospel you are a holy and just and right god and we are sinners we're tainted lord thank you so much that how simple you made this thank you that you were willing to come and be the atonement pay the price for our sin not just so that we do get to be with you in heaven for all eternity which is amazing news but lord even now as we are walking through these days and enduring hardships lord the the realization of your love helps us to love others more it helps us to see that we're all sinners lord i pray that you would just by your spirit would you speak to us about where we we should be taking the gospel how can we be reaching and doing that work of the evangelist in our home in our communities in our schools in our work what would that look like lord i pray that we would not take these words for granted and read over them like we've just read them you know a dozen times and and not really sit in the fact that we are sinners and you are a good god that came and died for us and rose again we are so thankful lord i pray that you would help all of us to be really discerning in these days where there is so much false teaching lord and the enemy is sneaky and he is deceitful and he comes disguised as an angel of light in words that sound really good but lord i pray that you would make us women of your word that are consistently and just turning to your word flipping those pages and i pray that by your spirit you would show us where we should be show us those essentials show us who more of who you are lord thank you for your gospel thank you that you've saved us in jesus name amen

Channel: Athey Women

Views: 327

Rating: 4.1428571 out of 5

Keywords: Athey Creek, Athey Creek Women, Devoted, Devoted Podcast, Through the Bible, Brett Meador, Amy McReynolds, Bible Study, Women's Ministry

Id: 6g0a0EwMKHw

Length: 35min 41sec (2141 seconds)

Published: Tue Apr 20 2021