No Other Gospel
SERMON MANUSCRIPT
Set Free
Galatians 1:1-10
Benjamin Durbin
1/12/2013
You can watch the celebration as well.
"Set Free - No Other Gospel" 01-12-14 from Roger Durbin on Vimeo.
You can watch the celebration as well.
"Set Free - No Other Gospel" 01-12-14 from Roger Durbin on Vimeo.
Intro:
The apostle Paul was a church-planting missionary. After
he planted a church and left a region, he continued to supervise new
congregations through his letters. One of these letters is this epistle to the
Christian churches in the area of Galatia in Asia Minor, which he planted on
his first missionary journey in Acts 13 and 14. Paul writes to these Christians
concerning the truth of the Gospel. There were some teachers who had been
presenting a whole different way of relating to God than the true Gospel that
he preached and taught them. To Paul,
everything was at stake if this young church were to lose grip of the true
gospel.
Key Verse:
I am astonished that you are so quickly
deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning
to a different gospel— (Galatians 1:6, ESV)
The Big Idea: There is only one gospel. There is
no other Gospel than that the Lord Jesus Christ gave himself for our sins to
deliver us and was raised. This scandalous grace is what sets us free.
The True Gospel:
Paul, an apostle—not from men nor through man,
but through Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised him from
the dead—and all the brothers who are with me, To the
churches of Galatia: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord
Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins to deliver us from the
present evil age, according to the will of our God and
Father, to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen. (Galatians 1:1-5, ESV)
•
While founders of other religions came to teach, Jesus
came to deliver. (vs. 4)
Buddha’s last words:
"It may be
that after I am gone that some of you will think, ‘now we have no teacher.’ But
that is not how you should see it. Let the Dharma and the discipline that I
have taught you be your teacher. All individual things pass away. Strive on,
untiringly." - http://www.pbs.org/thebuddha/death-and-legacy-part-2/
Jesus’ last words:
When Jesus had received the sour wine, he said, “It
is finished,” and he bowed his head and gave up his
spirit. (John 19:30, ESV)
Grasp: The
average person on the street believes that a Christian is someone who follows
Christ’s teaching and example, but Paul implies that is impossible unless one
has first been rescued.
Illustration: You
do not throw a drowning woman a manual on how to swim, you throw her a rope.
Jesus is much more than a teacher, He is
a rescuer and deliverer.
•
This means that we are sinners in need of
deliverance. (vs. 4)
Sin didn’t make us bad, it made us dead. And we won’t
belittle Jesus by urging you to fix that.
•
Jesus paid the debt of sin on our behalf (vs. 4)
•
Jesus was raised defeating sin and death
itself. (vs. 1)
Christ’s death is not presented here as a general
sacrifice purchasing us a “second chance” to get life right, but rather it is
presented as a substitutionary sacrifice. This means that Jesus did all that we
needed to do, but cannot do. Jesus did all we should have done, in our place,
so when he becomes our Savior, we are free .
•
Before we asked for a rescue, God planned
it. (vs. 4)
There is no indication of any other motivation or cause
for Christ’s mission except the will of God. There is nothing in us which
merits it.
•
This means that salvation is sheer grace
•
Jesus achieved the rescue we could have never
achieved ourselves.
If we contributed to our rescue of if we had rescued
ourselves, then we could pat ourselves on our backs. The Apostle Paul’s gospel
is clear, that salvation from first to last is God’s doing. It is grace all the way down. In Romans he
writes…
For those whom he foreknew he
also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order
that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those whom he
predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified,
and those whom he justified he also glorified. (Romans 8:29-30, ESV)
•
The only one who gets “glory forever and ever” is God
alone.
But we love to be our own saviors. Our hearts love to
manufacture glory for themselves. So then we find messages of self-salvation
extremely attractive…We quickly move on to Jesus plus something else, and so
must have the believers in this young church plant.
False Gospels:
I am astonished that you are so quickly
deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning
to a different gospel—not that there is another one, but there are
some who trouble you and want to distort the gospel of Christ. But even if
we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the
one we preached to you, let him be accursed. As we have said before,
so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one
you received, let him be accursed. (Galatians 1:6-9, ESV)
So the history behind this text is that there's a group
of men from Jerusalem called the Judaizers who have come down into the churches
of Galatia, and they're teaching the Christians in Galatia, who were Gentile
pagans, that in order for them to be fully Christian, they must first become
Jews. They need to be circumcised and be obedient to the dietary laws and the
festivals. So they're adding to Christ. They are changing the gospel...and Paul
is saying that even if an angel shows up and tells you a different gospel and
wants you to put them on golden tablets...Run!!
There are many false gospels such as: Jesus + this
political position, Jesus + tolerance (universalism is blasted in this text),
Jesus + poverty, Jesus + prosperity, Jesus + speaking in tongues, Jesus + my denominational
heritage, Jesus +this other teaching,Jesus + anything. But I want to focus on
two common false gospels rampant in our context. I am thankful to Tim Keller for helping with this terminology. It is useful to describe them, so I will use them here today.
They are the...
Religious False Gospel = Keep these rules and you
earn eternal blessing
---this is going to get hammered throughout the book.
---- this is Jesus plus extra-biblical rules and
tradition
--- in this book we will come to see that grace isn't
opposed to grace driven effort, but it is wholly opposed and Paul is even
hostile against any sense of earning salvation.
Secular False Gospel = "Grab ahold of these things and you’ll
experience blessing now"
The secular false gospel is more sneaky. It strokes our
hearts and ego and says
"God helps those who help themselves.”
It is much more an attachment and sales pitch for faith
in the American dream, than biblical faith in the apostolic gospel.
If you listen carefully,
this popular false gospel is telling you that you can be your own
Savior. Like the little engine that could, you can do it. You can do it. If you
just do this, God will do this for you right now. But, the message of the Bible
is that you cannot do it. That is why Christ came to this earth. He did what we
could not do, dying on the cross to pay for your sins and rising from the grave
to give you life if you repent and believe in him. Telling people that they can
do something they really can’t is not helping people. It is putting them in
bondage.
And it makes people restless... So we get more and more
stuff. And we compare ourselves to others to try and one-up. Then like gangrene
it spreads to our relationships...and we are restless and tired of our spouse,
or disappointed in our kids, or jealous and combative towards our peers at
work...then disillusioned and depressed because the little engine inside of
us...must not be as big as the engine inside the neighbor, co-worker, Facebook
friend, or business owner...
Restless striving...focus on self...it is total bondage.
Only the true gospel sets us free.
Religious and
Secular message = "God
helps those who help themselves.”
Gospel
Declaration: Jesus substituted himself for a people who could not help
themselves
Every false gospel elevates man and downplays Jesus.
Both the religious and secular false gospels are messages
of self-salvation but the gospel comes and turns them both upside down!
And Paul says, those who preach a false gospel, let them
go to hell. (vs. 9)
False Religion
suggests:
Believe in Jesus + Obedience = God’s acceptance
The Gospel Declares:
Believe in Jesus = God’s acceptance + desire for
obedience
Justification:
God declares us right because of Jesus’ obedience
Sanctification: God continually changes us with his power as
we obey
False Religion says God only loves you if you perform
well.
The Gospel says Jesus performed for you.
False religion says you do not need a rescuer in your
place to save you. "You just need look within yourself."
The Gospel says you must have a rescuer, and God gave
Jesus.
False religion says work harder, do better, to gain
approval and favor.
The Gospel says you can now work from the approval you
have in Christ.
Let’s see it in a picture. This illustration is from
Darrin Patrick.
Now look at verse 10 as we close, because there seems to
be an accusation being made against Paul, and he's not having it. I love this.
Apparently there's an accusation being made against Paul that the reason Paul
didn't tell them about circumcision (because that can't go over well to grown
men), and the reason he didn't tell them about the dietary laws, is that he wanted to win friends and influence people.
For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or
am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be
a servant of Christ. (Galatians 1:10)
The accusation is that Paul soft-pedaled the gospel in
order to gain converts. So Paul goes, "If anybody preaches other than
this, let him be damned. “
So, who's trying to win friends now? Paul says if I was
simply trying to win friends I certainly wouldn’t be a servant of Jesus. I
would be doing something else... The implication is if I'm just trying to win
friends then I'm not a servant of Christ. If I'm trying to tickle your ears,
then I do not love Jesus."
So Listen closely....
There is only one gospel. There is no other Gospel than
that the Lord Jesus Christ gave himself for our sins to deliver us. And deliver
us He did. Then, He was raised and we can be raised. Raised to new life in Christ.
Raised to enjoy him forever. He is our prize.
This scandalous grace is what sets us free. It is grace all the way down. IT SHOUTS God
helps those who need delivered and cannot help themselves. It’s all Jesus. There is no other good news.
There is no other gospel.
Communion.
