Galatians (Session 2) Chapter 1

okay we're in the second session in our review of the epistle to the galatians and we'll just jump right in the text in a moment in the chapter one in the previous session of course we did a sort of a sweeping review of the book of acts pointing out that the message that peter and the rest apostles presented in the first chapters was the gospel of the kingdom and the result of that was this stone stephen so that was a a second rejection at least the first rejection really being in john 12. excuse me matthew 12. and they were given another chance so to speak to the sanhedrin itself they stoned stephen's result so it's from that point on the message then is taken to the samaritans and to the gentiles in acts 8 and acts 10 and 11. but between those two events this interesting character by the name of paul gets saved gets converted it's interesting that god selected paul to present this new thing this the the the a the mystery of the church which replaced temporarily the offer of the kingdom and but there are many believers of course that continue to be faithful to the jewish religion did not recognize this new program of grace and that's exactly what this epistle is going to really focus on this whole issue reaches a boiling point that results in the conference in jerusalem in acts 15. god's program for today was to take the take out of the gentiles of people for his name and that responsibility was primarily focused on paul and the special ministry to the body the body of christ the church the kingdom program will be resumed once the body is completed and the the council for jerusalem is a pivotal part of the book of acts it actually appears to have actually been in four parts four meetings a public meeting in which the program that the the success that they had in antioch of syria and elsewhere was announced and extolled then there's a private meeting with the leaders to try to resolve some of these issues and that led to a public debate and finally the council session where they the matter was hopefully finally settled the people that were being confronted uh with and by and so on is the judaizers these were jews that would not receive the simple message of grace that that paul and peter and others were presenting they tried to mix it with the law creating an a a non-biblical blend if you will of the message of the kingdom and the the church message and their aim really was to entice gentiles into the jewish system they taught that a person was saved by faith and by keeping the law so these teachers that were running around promoting what would the ju the this form of judaism uh were unsettling the churches especially in galatia and that's what paul's going to hit head-on here the judas wanted the believers to follow jewish laws and customs of the holidays circumcision keeping the sabbath that sort of thing this was what paul will call the other gospel another gospel the only gospel according to paul that god approves and blesses is the gospel of the grace of god that will lead to a whole discussion of justification by faith in christ alone and we're not saved by making promises to god we're saved by believing the promises he's given us these legalizers and this is just one form of legalism we're going to be talking about legalism in a broader sense shortly these are what you some people would call old testament christians uh called judaizers here from a coined latin word yodezo which means to be or live like a jew it's a religious designation rather than a national description and they were opponents of the early christian missionaries they were called judaizers because of their fundamental belief that gentiles should live like jews and follow the mosaic law and those jewish customs as a prelude to becoming a real christian is the concept and uh it's not that they were wicked people uh they did not that they didn't have good intentions but for them the issue is a matter of principle and from god itself but the implications of their insistence upon ceremonial law jewish ceremonial law especially for the young christian church was theologically and socially divisive and very volatile and and it's one thing to pre to uh preach grace to the jews who had that background it's quite another to preach that mixture to a mixture of jews greeks and syrians and others especially while they were still in a jewish synagogue see the jew knew what he had he had circumcision the glory of israel the pride of judaism of one god and and a very high sense of morality what did the gentiles have any jew could explain it to them they had false gods fornication immorality drunk from from that point of view so the jew took for granted that he should that this gentile should become a jew just as the earlier proselytes did and then become a christian so they were christians preaching christ but with becoming adopting the jewish traditions as a prelude as part of the package and this of course is what all ultimately led to the council in acts 15. and what paul is going to make very clear here is the gospel was not an addendum to judaism not a supplement to the law but rather the end the end of and the fulfillment of the law and is actually antithetical to it and that's what was so hard for them to grasp especially in those early years see the new kingdom that god was establishing would go beyond the boundaries of israel obviously not just nationally but also theologically and socially and so even though jesus as the messiah came from the line of david everyone that believes in him will be freed and things that you could never be freed of from the law of moses that's really what she's going to bring home here so for paul it was not a a both and kind of situation or either or the choices between one or the other grace or law and uh or between faith and works or moses and christ and great the point is grace will exclude all works to do works as a contradiction of the grace that's what he's going to point so there's a whole battle emerging here against legalism grace is god's answer to pride and if you you can't study any portion of the scripture without discovering that god hates pride and grace is god's answer to pride good works do not make a good man it doesn't work that way a good man does do good works that's because of the true liberty has there's a false teaching substituting law for grace and there's something strange about an error that once it grips the mind it assumes an importance that the truth never had it's interesting to discover the zeal and the commitment of various false cults when they adopt a false teaching it's amazing how some deviant issue assumes an importance that the basic truth never had earlier legalism always seems to take the heart out of christianity and it replaces it with a heart of stone you see that in groups that are very very legalistic heart of christianity is god's free grace in jesus christ and so the whole idea is let the law do its work it's honorable work of showing man his sin his need for a savior but the law can't save never could the the end of the law is death and all it can do is condemn so the distinctives of this particular epistle uh is is that it it's very different than the other apollo's epistles it's very severe it's very stern very solemn the the galatian believers were actually in peril because the foundations of their faith were being attacked by the judaizers it's interesting this epistle contains no word of commendation praise or thanksgiving it's a tough piece it's a very very emotional piece there's no request for prayer it started me to realize that in paul's epistles he's the only one that asked for prayer you don't find the other ones doing that interesting enough but in this one he doesn't do that either and no one's this mentioned no one's mentioned by name that's with them there may have been people with them but they're not mentioned by me and uh the heart of paul this incredible human being is gonna be laid bare and it's gonna be deep emotion very strong feeling expressed in fact i can't think of any expression more intense than the one you're about to encounter in this first chapter it's a fighting epistle paul has no toleration for legalism and another contrast i think is very illuminating the epistle of the romans is probably the most profound piece of writing on the planet earth put it up against all comers it comes from the head of paul galatians comes from the heart of paul they both deal with similar issues but from in a very different style so galatians takes up controversially what romans develops very systematically the book of romans is really the definitive statement of christian doctrine by paul and galatians is a declaration it's an emancipation declaration freeing you from legalism of any type and martin luther was his favorite he felt he felt wedded to it and it was considered the masthead if you will of the reformation we'll get into that when we get into chapter two a little bit so we have here a manifesto of christian liberty an impregnable citadel a veritable gibraltar against any attack in the heart of the gospel according to tiny and some of the other writers a mortal victory is set up on its brow i love that phrase it's the strongest declaration and defense of the doctrine of justification by faith either in or out of scripture and we're going to talk about that here in a minute because many people even that are well taught christians fail to really understand what that means we generally in the within the institute student body try not to use the word salvation because it's confusing it's used many different ways we'll get to that in a minute here we're talking about justification by faith this whole thing is god's polemic on behalf of the most vital truth of the christian faith and it protects it against any kind of attack see not only is the sinner saved by grace through faith plus nothing he's saved the safe center lives by grace and that's what's going to really develop in the final chapters of this epistle but as we do this the mosaic law is in no place discredited despised discarded disregardedly disregarded its majesty its perfection its demands its fullness and purpose are maintained and these qualities make it utterly impossible for man to come to god through this root because of its perfection the perfection it requires excludes all of us but its presence communicates to us our need for an alternative the alternative that's open for man of course is to be justified before god in a way that totally bypasses the law it doesn't keep the law it bypasses it it's by faith so justification is the by faith is the real theme here earl rockhammer likes to say i have been saved i am being saved and i will be saved you see what does that mean he loves to do that because to serious students that's confusing what do you mean and i want to talk a little bit what i like to call the paradigm of salvation and there are three tenses there's a past tense a present tense and a future tense of the concept of salvation when we speak of salvation we usually get confused if we don't if we're not more precise the pres the past tense of salvation properly called would be justification what is that it's a gift from god of everlasting life that's received by faith alone in christ alone boy that's fabulous you accept jesus christ your passport to heaven is stamped permanently not guilty you haven't changed you may still you know whatever you were doing you know you haven't changed but you're declared not guilty why because christ paid for that and he did 100 percent of the job trying to add to what he did is blasphemy trying to add to what he did is a form of denigrating the completeness of what he did okay that's justifications straightly then we get into a present tense of salvation what is that the term that's more descriptive is sanctification and that's a work in progress every one of us in this room me included obviously are a work in progress he's not finished with any of us every one of us in this room needs to raise the bar a notch on our walk sanctification it's a progressive work that involves faith and the works of the believer your works are not contributing to your justification that's blasphemy but your works manifest the sanctification that's in progress in you so that's the present tense the future tense is called glorification what is that the result of all the previous that's when you you're destined for a new body a new existence a new dimensionality all believers will be glorified but not all to the same degree that's what the judgment of seed of christ second corinthians chapter 5 verse 10 is all about and so on so some will have more glory or rewards than others now this gets to you a lot of people have really hung up on this question of eternal security and i won't go to paul here although i could with dozens of things i'm gonna go right to christ himself in ju in john chapter 10 there's a couple of verses that have become my favorite we could spend the whole hour giving examples on this but let's just take one that to me seals it jesus says in john 10 i give unto them eternal life and they shall never perish neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand wow that's pretty cool no one can pluck them out of his hand but he goes on my father which gave them me is greater than all and no man is able to pluck them out of my father's hand you realize that there's two hands involved i always picture it like this his and his father's could i get out of there if i tried i don't think so if i can lose my salvation then i have a new name for god if i can lose my salvation i have a new name for god if i can quote a walter martin ism here butterfingers because it's his responsibility at this point in fact in john 17 that intimate prayer between the son and the father that truthfully should be called the lord's prayer what we call the lord's prayer is really the disciples prayer the lord's prayers read john 17 this intimate exchange between the son and the father in that prayer he hands the responsibility entirely back to the father boy i can't think of anything more secure than that you say well wait a minute in first corinthians 9 27 paul says that he holds himself in his objection lest after he preaches to others he himself might be a castaway and you do realize that paul lived his life in paranoia for fear of losing his salvation absolutely not he wrote the book on eternal security it's called romans chapter 8. what is he afraid of losing not a salvation he can't do that he's afraid of losing his inheritance and that's a whole another study a precious study and you want you really want to get into the epistle of the hebrews or other places to get into that i won't take it here but the main point is our security is is essential and that's going to in effect be one of the things that the judaizers will be attacking so we have the past tense of salvation where you're separated from the penalty of sin there's a present tense where you're separated from the power of sin and the future tensor is separated from the presence of sin the separation from the penalty of sin we call justification nailed it because of 100 of what jesus christ did he did it completely for each of us it is finished he said the present tense were separated from the power of sin we call that sanctification what does that mean before you're saved you didn't have this capability now that you're saved you have the capability of calling the holy calling on the holy spirit and not having sin reign over you you may stumble now and then but it will no longer reign in your life why because the holy spirit and that's all that's the incredible saga of the book of romans to get into the details of that so we're separated from the penalty of sin by christ's death we're separated from the power of sin by drawing upon the holy spirit and that will ultimately lead us to the separation of the very presence of sin which we call glorification so here again we have three tenses past present future all of which are dimensions if you will of the term when we typically talk about salvation that's that's why the term salvation is confusing because there's parts of it that you can't lose yet there are aspects of which that you can forfeit if you're not careful but it's not your eternal security issue okay justification is for us sanctification is in us justification declares the sinner righteous sanctification makes the sinner righteous justification removes the guilt and penalty of sin sanctification removes the growth and the power of sin in your life hope that's helpful so today galatians is god's strongest word against legalism the flesh loves to do religious things holidays rituals thing to do good do-gooders whatever and most religious not just me most religious systems today mix law and grace in some way that's garbled confused way of salvation that actually is a way of bondage christ tried to make us free keeping the sabbath dietary laws earthly priesthood holy days obeying rules all of these are swept away by galatians that doesn't mean you can't celebrate certain things but it's not being under the law so form a celebration and so we have that all replaced by liberty glorious liberty for the believer so let's take a look at the outline of the book the first two chapters are personal speak of his ministry this method and his message the third and fourth chapters are doctrinal and then five and six are practical what do we do about it looking at another way the authenticity of the gospel will be the primary premise in chapters one and two the authentic aspect of the gospel that paul is preaching it's genuine as to its origin that'll be the burden of this chapter it's genuine as to its nature that'll be its second chapter then we get into the two chapters that are doctrinal which will speak of the superiority of the gospel that it's a new relation that it affects and it's new privileges that it releases to each of us chapters three and four and then we get to chapters five and six we'll it which expressed us the liberty we have in christ how love service ends the law bondage and how the spirit ends the flesh bondage and then some concluding remarks so okay we're in chapter one finally after that rather extensive review genuineness to its origin let's galatians chapter 1 verse 1. you never thought we'd get there did you paul an apostle not of men neither by man but by jesus christ and god the father who raised him from the dead paul an apostle that term what does that mean that's a personal commission from god in this case is what he's emphasizing here and that's all it takes recounted for you in acts 26. typically the word apostle means the sent one uh usually the apostles prefers to speak of himself as a servant or bond slave of jesus christ and paul indeed does neither by man but by jesus christ see jesus laid his hand on paul called him set him aside for this office that's what we read in in acts chapter 9 verses 15 and 16. by jesus christ and god the father who raised him from the dead it's interesting to see that this authority is tied to the victory over death which means victory over the law the resurrection is central to the message of the gospel jesus victory over death is our reason to hope it would be paul that would probably suggest that first corinthians chapter 15 is the most important chapter in the bible because without that we have nothing and paul specifically defines the gospel in the first four verses of first corinthians 15. it's interesting how christ died for our sins according to the scriptures that he was buried that he rose again the third day according to scriptures that's it he makes no reference to the fact that he's a great teacher he makes no reference to the fact that he was a great example he makes no reference fact that he did miracles no that's not the gospel the gospel is that he died for our sins didn't just disappear his death fulfilled a hundred different precise specifications he died for us according to the scriptures very specific most best documented death in history he died for his sins across scripture he was buried only paul emphasized the death of the burial as part of the gospel because he ties it to the baptism and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures now when paul says scripture's there in first corinthians 15 he's talking about the old testament where does it say in the old testament he's going to be raised after three days all over the place in genesis 22 it says it in effect and in jonah of course even and others so we the reason i use the powerpoint slides it keeps me from digressing too far because okay i'll try to stay on track here paul's aim here is to show that his message and ministry come directly from christ and not from men and he did not preach a second hand message that he learned from peter or the other guys he's going to emphasize that this came directly from christ independent of these other guys and god seems to take every possible measure to separate paul's ministry from the 12. that's going to lead to another issue here that i i have to tell you you say gee chuck that's a little different than you said in some of your early tapes absolutely because i'm learning too because like you know there are many people that teach that uh in acts chapter one when they took lots and picked matthias to be the replacement for judas they picked the wrong guy they should have waited it was really paul they should have had that slot and that sounds good at first until you really understand you have to back up and understand that paul's ministry was separate from the twelve there are twelve tribes in israel there are twelve apostles that'll rule over the twelve tribes that's separate from paul's ministry to the gentiles when you study the kingdom you'll discover when you study the church that's the kingdom of god everything's in seven seven churches and so forth when you study the kingdom and only matthew uses that term the kingdom of heaven as distinct from the kingdom of god and most most scholars miss this they're not synonyms matthew uses the kingdom of heaven 33 times he's the only one that used that phrase the others use kingdom of god and matthew uses king of god five times and sometimes in in the in contain in contiguous verses what's matthew talking see the kingdom of heaven is a king of god is everything that god created great kingdom of heaven is a kingdom that's on the earth with a capital with geography that christ has yet to establish it's a very important study and you'll notice when you study it this everything's 12. there are 12 tribes 12 castles over those 12 tribes there are 12 kingdom parables there are 12 kingdom mysteries and when you get to the new jerusalem there's 12 foundations and there's 12 tribes in revelation 7 and that are sea that are sealed etc and so when you go on it's astonishing to realize how specific that is and it's a specific uh kingdom to be on the earth anyway paul's ministry is this distinctly separate one to the gentile much of his regret by the way he has heart was for the jews and he every time he spoke to them though he had riots they almost had to rescue him from those things and so uh but he did write a letter to the hebrews but once you understand the background you'll understand why he didn't sign it even though they knew who he was and knew where it came from but that's another study we're going to get off the subject here but okay we got to verse 2 we're getting there okay and all the brethren which are with me unto the churches of galatia grace be to you and peace from god the father and from our lord jesus christ now that sounds so familiar that's typical salutation of paul do you realize he's the only one that said that he's the only one that uses the word grace but this this time though this is there it's formal it's brief but if you know the rest of it it's cool and it's terse in contrast to his usual warmth and personal greetings no one is here specifically mentioned because he's getting right at it he's angry he's getting tough here grace to you and so forth that's the typical gentile greeting that says of cataracts meaning uh uh it means unmerited favor then he uses the jewish phrase shalom uh peace grace and peace garrison shalom and see only when you know the grace of god can you have experienced the peace of god it's always grace and peace it's not the other way around because the peace depends on the grace anyway who gave himself for us for our sins that he might deliver us from this present evil world according to the will of god our father see he gave himself for our sins you can't add to that you can't add to that there's nothing we can add to the value of christ's sacrifice for us why that he might deliver us from this present evil world that's the purpose of god's grace to deliver us from this and the means the source of god's grace was the sovereign will of the father the source of the sovereign will of the father pretty straightforward paul's gospel is centered on christ his death his burial resurrection as summarized in first corinthians the first four verses of first corinthians 15. it is not centered on moses and the law which is astonishing for a pharisaical posture here it's a gospel of grace that brought peace it's a gospel of liberty that he might deliver us we'll see emphasize the next verse and the judaizers are bringing into the churches bondage according to the law that's what they're bringing in and many christians are getting entangled in that even today christ's death has delivered us from this present evil age and has given us a new standing in liberty and that's what he's going to hammer home in the fifth chapter okay let's pick it up verse 4 in the first chapter who gave himself for our sins that he might deliver us from this present evil world according to the will of the father to him be glory forever and ever boy he he can't help himself he has to add this benediction there after verse four he had to it was just uh how can you resist it to him be glory forever and ever amen now this legalism that we're going to talk about is one of the oldest heresies that's known as i say it's not just something back there in the first century it's with us today trying to add something to god's grace every cult every ism you run into has something for you to do in order to be saved they're all at least subtle some quite overt denials of the completeness of what happened on that cross you and i are beneficiaries of a love letter that was written in blood on a wooden cross two thousand years ago paul said to the philippian jailer you may recall act 16 believe on the lord jesus christ and thou shalt be saved period carriage return that's it simon peter said to the sanhedrin neither is there salvation in the other for there's none other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved okay so paul here describes the work of jesus christ for us he's the channel of god's grace he gave himself and as a man he did not cease to be god he was made sin for us you and i do not have the capacity to imagine what that means we'll talk a little bit more about that as this develops but he was made a curse for us and that galatians 3 is going to get into that aspect of it his soul was made an offering for sin you and i usually focus around uh the cert the the the resurrection gethsemane and all that the agony um mel gibson's movie the passion i think did a remarkable job as far as far as it went but it has two major defects it creates the impression that the crucifixion was a tragedy it wasn't it was an achievement that was planned before the foundation of the world the second thing it fails to do is explain who he was he was god himself become a man so to to provide his eligibility on our behalf so the reason for god's grace to bring glory to god only to god only to god he did the whole job forever grace the whole concept of grace is not only a gift to us it's a way of excluding all human effort examples that hannah mother of samuel 1 samuel 2 grace plus nothing not grace plus works grace plus nothing we you and i need to be intent never to be confused about the content and the intent of the gospel the gospel is not to follow christ and imitate his life their books written in that flavor they're wrong the gospel is to receive christ by faith and allow him to set you free to let his life flow through us and there's a big difference in that there's no place in the gospel for salvation that is attained by keeping the law the gospel of the kingdom that was emphasized from matthew chapter 3 to acts chapter 7 is not our message today there will be that day when that is the primary message that's not it that's not ours today but paul continues here and here's here he goes paul says i marvel he's speaking to his galatians his old friend these are churches he's visited at least three times right i marvel that you are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of christ unto another gospel which is not another but there be some that trouble you that would pervert the gospel of christ now the greek here has some insights that we need to get in first of all he's shocked that they're already so soon uh getting messed up and he seems to be surprised that they yielded so quickly there are two words in the greek meeting another when i say i want on if i if i have a if i ask ron g i need another pencil what does that mean another just like the one i had or a different one is it do i just do i need another pencil because i broke the one i have that's one possibility or is it gee this i've got a black one i want a red one or something right in the greek there isn't that ambiguity there's two words for another in the greek one work is heteros which means another of a different kind i want a heteros pencil that is i want one that's different than the one you gave me follow me the other word in the greek is allos which means i want another exactly like the one i just had see the difference in the english you lose it in the greek it's very precise very typical in the greek to be more precise two words called you to the grace of christ unto another gospel that is a gospel of a different kind which is not another of the same kind he's saying but there'll be some that trouble you and would pervert administration it means to twist distort by clever deception they're like like a bewitcher enchanter or what have you see grace is god's way to put the to put pride to the death there'll be no strutting in heaven in fact the only man-made things in heaven will be scars you want to talk about observing legalistic rules you can read paul's epistle to the colossians that 2 16 and so forth or in romans now we know that what things soever the law saith it saith to them who are under the law why that every mouth may be stopped and all the world may become guilty before god the law has that the only thing that can result from the law is to manifest our failures our failures unless you're perfect walter martin used to always say there's two paths to heaven there's a by faith that's one way the other way is by keeping the law being perfect from the time you're born you never make a mistake as you go through life and you're tired presumably short tempered whatever you never make a mistake you go through your whole life never having made a mistake and then what you do when you get to heaven you say move over now there's two of us that was just walter's way of making his point but anyway no the scripture has a unified message it's always been grace from the beginning now let's not confuse ourselves back in eden the promise was given that from the seat of the woman redemption would be achieved abraham we're going to talk about the seed of abraham in this a little further as the dust of the earth and thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed one seed will see that they're all blessed it's a singular and we're gonna make that case when we get into galatians chapter three all the davidic psalms especially psalm 51 nails this isaiah 53 the holy of holies of the old testament in jeremiah 23 zechariah 13 and john the baptist even john about when he introduced jesus christ publicly what did the first thing he said behold the lamb of god that would take away the sin of the world that's a jewish title point of passover and of course jesus all through peter in acts 10 we've talked about that john chapter 1 it's it's all the way through the same message all the ages yet to come revelation 1 5. there is the summary that we all memorize in ephesians 2 8-9 those of you that probably have not memorized another scripture while you know john 3 16 and of course ephesians 2 and 8 2 8 9. but i want to show you something about that we've all memorized this right for by grace are ye saved through faith and that not of yourselves even the faith is a gift of god for by grace you are saved through faith and that not of yourselves it is a gift of god not of works why lest any man should boast now it's interesting this is so well known to most of us i think and yet one of the most awkward questions i get from people is why why did god but didn't god when he created adam know that adam was going to blow it that adam was going to sin of course then why did he allow that path to continue to think through of all the ages all the suffering all that has derived from man's sin overwhelming why did god do that the answer is the verse that precedes that there are this very well-known pair in ephesians 2. we've memorized for for by gray series save through faith wait a minute thing to do is get the verse before that because it explains the riddle if you will that in ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace and his kinds toward us through christ jesus well let's back up a second god is all-powerful we can sort of imagine that anyone that studied astronomy and the powers in the heavens and these galaxies and what that all represents you quickly become overwhelmed with the power that god has expressed in this universe psalm 19 underscores that infinite knowledge we can sort of imagine in our minds somebody that has that knows everything so you can take god's superlatives and perhaps maybe try to imagine them well how do you imagine infinite love god's most cherished cherished attribute is his love how do you demonstrate infinite love well there's one way perhaps create man give him free will knowing that he put himself in a predicament that nothing less than the death of god would avail to get him out of it which is exactly what he did okay why here's the reason that in ages yet to come yet undisclosed he might show the exceeding riches of his grace how in his kindness toward us through christ jesus wow that in ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace and his kindness toward us through christ jesus that's one way he can demonstrate infant love man that's a love letter well let's continue with paul having said all that he's surprised that they've allowed themselves to be diverted but then he issues a two-verse scathing indictment paul says but though we or an angel from heaven preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached to you let him be accursed let him be damned to hell and as we said before and so say i now again if any man preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have received let him be accursed anathema damned to hell in our more common english paul has just made a deliberate and extreme statement twice he calls out a curse on anyone who proclaims the gospel to them contrary to that which they've already received in fact it's interesting that he throws this phrase in there but though we are what an angel from heaven that angel could be moroni as far as i'm concerned and you can go on you know take other examples so paul continues do i not persuade men or god do i seek to please men for if i yet pleased men i should not be a servant of christ but i certify you brethren that the gospel which was preached of me is not after man do i seek to persuade men see the galatians knew who paul was they knew the suffering he went through he was left for dead he was beaten many times he was not seeking popularity quite the contrary you know it's interesting how there's such a movement in certain quarters of trying to be popular to be a seeker-friendly church and there may be a place for some of that but at the same time the the uh history of the real saints are one of standing strong for what they believe not trying to be popular not trying to be acceptable but rather to be acceptable to god not to man anyway paul puts his own known character behind the assertion that his gospel of grace was a revelation from god himself because he continues verse 12 for i neither received it of man neither was i taught it but by the revelation of jesus christ in other words revelation by jesus christ now see paul's apostleship had been challenged by these teachers and they are today you know it's interesting to me how even today if you get into some of these messianic fellowships they love the lord jesus christ and they they really love their bible but they don't have much use for paul they find ways to sort of avoid paul i can understand why they have a tough time not just with galatians the the the place to take them is into the field is into the epistle of the hebrews because he builds that whole case strictly on the old testament scriptures not his authorities apostle anyway see they they questioned his authority because he had not been ordained by men he was because he he was ordained directly by jesus christ as we saw and that's why i had went through and read acts 9 last time and the other thing to watch for as we go through here paul had a number of specific revelations by christ not just the one time on the damascus road and uh concerning the lord's supper that we speak about in first corinthians 11 that was he says i received again paul we missed that unless you're watching for it that that was given to paul as a direct revelation the implications of what's going on there so there's paul's going to list a number of credentials before we're through here the first is he's not a seeker after popularity that's his one of his credentials his revelation was directly from jesus christ that's the second credential see he never was meant to be the 12th apostle replaced judas he could not have met the qualifications not in acts chapter 1 he hadn't met christ yet god deliberately kept paul separated from the twelve so that no man could accuse paul of borrowing his message nobody could accuse paul of inventing his message because he had been a persecutor of the church not a friend at that time and by the way if you study the you know uh encryptions in the scripture you know that in isaiah 53 you've got encrypted in that 12 verses the names of everybody that was the foot of the cross you've got john you've got two james is not three because the third one wasn't didn't accept him until after the resurrection you had uh three mary's you had but you also have matthias there by the way in fact when you study that as a from a cryptographic point of view what's astonishing from the statistics of the frequency of the hebrew letters is there is a name that should be there just statistically because it's made up of very common high-frequency letters and it's conspicuous mathematically in that it's not in that segment of text that name is judas kind of interesting anyway moving on see god never meant for paul to be at the twelve because the twelve's ministry was primarily to the jews and was related to the kingdom and will because they'll be sitting and judging of the twelve tribes paul's ministry was to the gentiles it was related to the mystery of the church the one body of the church it's history here we are at the university of portsmouth and i'm looking at an audience that has people from hong kong malaysia germany some people came a long way for this you know it's exciting one body one body one church see the twelve received their call from christ on earth because their message presented the hopes of israel's earthly kingdom paul received his call from heaven because his message represented the heavenly calling of the church in christ there were 12 apostles associated with the 12 tribes as i've said paul was one man and he was a jew with gentile citizenship that's interesting representing one body in christ let's continue verse 13. we're getting through chapter one we're making it in spite of my deviations here okay for ye have heard of my conversation in time past in the jews religion the word conversation you realize the old english use of that word meaning like what we today call behavior but we have heard of my conversation in time past in the jewish religion how that beyond measure i persecuted the church of god and wasted it i'm fascinated with the old english that's come back in our vocabulary you know to waste them right like i would say manner of life is the conversation the jews religion that's a it's really the reputation and judaism was dearer than life to him then and he wasted it devastated it and he was the ravening wolf of the tribe of benjamin if you know anything about the tribe of benjamin he he was from the tribe of benjamin and he was engaged in laying waste the church as probably only a benjamite could from acts 7 to 9 until things got straightened out here and paul would have lived and died as an advocate of judaism but for the miracle of grace by god's intervening grace the jew's religion taught he was paul was taught by gamaliel himself the highly venerated uh rabbi in those days and uh the jewish faith and worship the jews the eudai desmos is the greek term for the religion of the jews and uh the word for the new testament term is a fresco of religion external observances is the concept here and even james talks about the believer's good works which will be the external evidence of an internal faith different thing okay we got down to his third of the list of credentials his zeal was forsaken for something better than judaism offered getting that we're down to verse 15 galatians when it pleased god who separated me from my mother's room and called me by his grace to reveal his son and me that i might preach him among the heathen immediately i confirmed i conferred not with flesh and blood when he was called he didn't run to the apostles to find out how to do it he separated me from my mother's room and just like jeremiah was the same way he was formed in his mother's womb for this destiny and so was paul although he didn't realize it at the time and but yet he was incredibly well prepared well-educated jew a roman citizen and incredibly well taught in the greek culture which he'll draw upon when he gets to acts 17 and elsewhere god has a specific purpose for each of us and i'd love to ask that i didn't open i meant to do that earlier when we started uh because i know i've got quite an audience here i have no idea where you're from except incredible geographic spreads how many of you in here on the full-time ministry can i see a show of hands okay i've got quite a few there but i'm a little still a little surprised uh how many of you are saved by the grace of god great let me ask the other question again how many of you are in the full-time ministry whether you know it or not okay you see every one of us i often like to ask you jay you're saved great what have you done with it what has god saved you for see i believe i really do i believe every one of us has a specific destiny in god's economy there's something he's called and the great adventure in life is to discover what it is and then to pursue it with your sleeves rolled up god has a specific purpose for each of us which can only be fulfilled when we are serving him according to his plan not ours many good and well-intentioned believers get themselves messed up because they form they're not following they're not listening for god's plan they're developing their own so it's interesting but paul spoke of his conversion in hebrew before the crowd in the temple in jerusalem back in acts 22. he also spoke of his conversion before king agrippa and caesarea in both of those presentations by paul to those audiences both friend and foe he offers his conversion as the greatest proof is discipleship and the truth of the doctrine that a man is saved by faith and not by works there's no way paul with his training would have done what he did to get saved in his first letter timothy he again referred to his conversion by epitomizing the validity of the gospel which he expounded in galatians as in you see that happened in his first letter to timothy but his most effective use is in this epistle itself in the verses here uh from 11 to 17. he goes on he says neither when i up to jerusalem to them which were apostles before me but i went to arabia and then returned again to damascus how long was arabia we don't know the total period is about three years but how much of that was in damascus then down to arabia and then back to damascus we don't know but the point was he didn't go to jerusalem he didn't get briefed by peter and john or whoever or james no by the lord because then after three years i went up to jerusalem to see peter and abode within 15 days but that's after the three years yeah he had a brief encounter with with peter but all this happened before he had them and the see the apostles had the message of the kingdom still paul had the message of grace to convey no new truth was added to paul's message after he met in jerusalem it wasn't like he got straightened out by somebody so after three years he labored in antioch for a year and after several see after several years alone with his lord in arabia he returns damascus so we're not talking about 35 maybe 34 35 a.d but he's in enemy territory damascus arabia what have you former friends make the fiercest enemies they say huh the plot to take his life caused him to seek shelter in jerusalem and the same thing happens there short visit two weeks his enemies tried to kill him again he is always under threat of being killed these people took their religion seriously the only people that seem to take it their religion seriously today is the fastest growing religion on the planet earth islam when we're here paul his brethren risked him away to caesarea where he boarded a ship and went to his hometown in tarsus but he and we we read all that last time when saul was coming to jerusalem he said join himself to disciples but they were all afraid of him so they believed not that he was disciple you can imagine they treat him with great distrust but barnabas took him and brought him to the apostles declared to them and then how he had seen the lord on the way and that he had spoken to him and how he preached boldly at the baskets in the name of jesus and he was coming in and going out in jerusalem he spake boldly in the name of the lord jesus and disputed against the greeks but they went about again to slay him so no surprise but essentially peter did not start paul on his apostleship he visited him as an equal peter and paul in fact you're going to see shortly paul is going to dress peter down and peter accepted that and so it's interesting when they met here no doubt peter had much to say to paul when they first met now as i say it's a repeat here god never meant for paul to be part of the twelve his ministry is primarily the jews related to the kingdom paul's ministry that that paul's ministry was the gentiles who was laid to the mystery of the church the twelve received their call from christ on earth because their message presented the hope of israel's earthly kingdom paul received his call from heaven because his message presented the heavenly calling of the church in christ so 12 apostles associated with 12 tribes paul is one man a jew and a gentile with gentile citizenship representing one body in christ you know it's interesting to make a list of the of people who experienced their finishing school in the wilderness moses did that 40 years in the back side of the desert elijah same thing david the same thing lord himself and even that paul eludes this strange incident in second corinthians 12 which this is time i'll forgo here you can check it out yourself and that's maybe where he got the revelation that he describes in ephesians 3 from that direct experience of the christ in second corinthians 12. paul continues his credentials here but of the other apostles saw an unsaved james is the lord's brother now the things which are right unto you behold before god i lie not now he says by the way it's yokov i often ask people to have you seen the epistle of jacob in the new testament they'll look at that well that's that's james jacob in effect the lord's half-brother and uh james the son of zebedee was by the way was still living at this time the rest of twelve were probably away preaching and james the brother lord is here german apostle though not one of the twelve as barnabas is later so-called but anyway moving on afterwards i came into the regions of syria and celestia and that was unknown by faith unto the churches of judea which were in christ see he was not well he was well he was not well known in judea if we were going to really they're terrified of him probably but he wasn't idle he went to work at in tarsus for 10 years in the surrounding country and so the believers obviously were afraid of paul if it were not for barnabas to uh bridge that that tension paul probably never would have been accepted and uh this and the reason that's important understand that almost itself proves that paul had never leaned on the jerusalem church for approval no there's an atmosphere of distrust anyway after this he goes to syria the antiochus in syria don't confuse that with the antioch and pacifica but by this time the churches heard indirectly the wonderful news of paul's conversion and the fruits that were coming by and that's what they celebrated in the council for uh in acts 15 but but they had heard only that he which persecuted us in times past now preacheth the faith which he once destroyed and they glorified god in me this is paul summarizing all of this in verses 23 and 24. and so the apostles recogni paul's main point they recognized his distinctive ministry to the gentiles and of course the council of jerusalem as we've gone through here is the gentiles are not under the law that was paul's primary outreach and a key passage coming up in in were forthcoming here paul's credentials not seeking popularity revelations from christ his zeal was forsaken for something better he preached grace before he met any of the other apostles and later they added nothing and we'll see that in chapter two in chapter two we'll also see they recognized and acknowledged his apostleship and peter will even yield when he when paul dresses him down for not uh following through from the council in acts 15. and that so we'll have seven specific credentials that paul's laid out we have looked at four of them in chapter one the last three will be highlighted as part of our review of chapter 2. so for the next session obviously you want to read galatians chapter 2 and as you as also skim through acts 15 to keep that in focus as we go let's stand for a closer word of prayer

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Length: 59min 50sec (3590 seconds)

Published: Thu Oct 15 2020