Turning the scriptures to Galatians
chapter 6, we come to, in a sense, Paul's
conclusion, concluding words, and he finishes with a prayer
in verse 18, but in chapter 17 he says, from henceforth let
no man trouble me. For I bear in my body the marks
of the Lord Jesus." The word marks is the word stigmata. He bears in his body the marks
of the Lord Jesus Christ. God's children are marked children. They are set aside children. They are a separated children. And if you look back at the previous
verse, verse 15, sorry. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision
availeth anything nor uncircumcision, but a new creature. And as many
as walk according to this rule, peace be on them and mercy. and upon the Israel of God. And he says to the others, in
a sense, to those others, don't trouble me anymore. Paul is in effect saying, I have
proclaimed the Gospel faithfully to you. I have presented to you
clearly What is the truth about God? I have presented to you
very clearly what is the false religion of men. The false religion
of men who desire to have you circumcised that they may glory
in your flesh and they desire to make a fair show in the flesh. has now come to the end of it
and he's saying, this in a sense is the end of the matter. Don't
trouble me any longer. I have spoken. But it's not Paul who has spoken,
God has spoken. God has spoken through his servant
Paul to these people at Galatia. In these Galatian churches, to
remember, it's a region with A number of churches that we're
not sure of, but there's many churches. He's writing to that
whole region. He's writing to the churches
of God throughout the ages and he's saying, I have proclaimed
the Gospel and I won't need to do any more. God's Word, as Simon
just said to us, comes to this earth. does its work and returns
to Him having completed it. What an extraordinary life the
Apostle Paul had. Just imagine stepping down from
the pulpit here and then being dragged out of this town and
stoned to death. I'm preaching this in this pulpit,
preaching about the Lord Jesus Christ and salvation that's in
him, and preaching that faithfully and faithfully, as he says in
Galatians 3, he says, Christ, before whose eyes Christ has
evidently, he's been evidently sent forth, crucified. It's remarkable, he says, among
you. He has so clearly portrayed the Lord Jesus as the fulfilment
of all the prophecies of the Old Testament, so clearly the
Lord Jesus as God in human flesh, so clearly crucified before them. that they have seen, as it were,
with their own eyes, they have seen, they have been
brought through the Gospel face to face with the Lord Jesus Christ. They were paraded, as it were, 1 Corinthians
4.9 describes the apostles and describes those who bear witness
to the apostolic testimony of who God is. He says, for I think
that God has set forth us apostles last, as if there's this victory
parade in the Roman Forum And the apostles were dragged in
there, appointed, as it were, appointed to death. We are made
a spectacle unto the world and to angels and to men. Wherever they went, it's a remarkable
history, isn't it, of Paul in the Book of Acts. You see in
the Book of Acts a history, a selected history of the events of those
first possibly 30 years of the early church. And Paul went from
persecution to beating to Harassment. In 2 Corinthians 4 he says, We
are trouble on every side, yet not distressed. We are perplexed,
but not in despair. Persecuted, but not forsaken.
Cast down, but not destroyed. Always bearing about in the body
the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might
be made manifest in our body. For we which live are always
delivered unto death for Jesus' sake, that the life of Jesus
might be made manifest in our mortal flesh." He speaks in 2
Corinthians 11 in a passage that I'm sure you're familiar with.
He speaks in defence of his ministry. He speaks about those who are
false teachers. He says, are they ministers of
Christ? I speak as a fool, I am more. In labours more abundant,
in stripes above measure, in prison more frequent, in deaths
oft. Of the Jews, five times I received
the forty stripes, save one." These are the marks that he's
speaking about, isn't it? Five times he received thirty-nine
lashes with a cat and nine-toe. He bore in his body the marks
of the Lord Jesus. It's a very graphic description
in Psalm 129 of the beating of the Lord Jesus. before the soldiers. It says, the ploughers ploughed
upon my back and they made long their furrows. The Jews beaten
him 39 times, 5 times times 39, that's 200 stripes he had on
his back. Thrice I was beaten with rods,
once I was stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day
have I been in the deep. In journeyings often, in perils
of water, in perils of robbers, in perils by my own countrymen,
in perils by the heathen." It didn't matter whether he was
with the Jews or with the pagans, Paul was in peril. In perils
in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the
sea, it didn't matter where he went, he was in perils. In perils
among false brethren. in weariness and painfulness,
in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often,
in cold and nakedness, beside those things that are without,
they were just external things, that which cometh upon me daily,
the care of all the churches." You see, Paul's heart, his body,
His body was marked with the marks of the Lord Jesus, but
it seems to me that he almost adds this at the end of it as
the most heightening and sometimes the most fearful, the most weighty
thing upon him, the care of all the churches. Paul was a man
who passionately cared for the souls of men, cared for the glory
of God, And he goes on to say, Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is offended, and I bear not? If I must need glory, I will
glory of the things which concern my infirmities. Paul is saying
to these Galatians, I have borne witness to the Lord Jesus, and
when I went to you I was marked, and when I left you I was marked
again. I have borne testimony. to hear
my born testimony in my body. He says in 2 Timothy 1, don't
be ashamed, don't be ashamed of the testimony of the witness,
the declaration of our Lord, nor of me, his prisoner. I might
look beaten up, I might look beaten down, but don't be ashamed
of me, but be thou a partaker of the afflictions of the gospel. God's children will be partakers
of the afflictions of the Gospel. And I love what the next word
says, according to the power of God. God has so ordained it. that in the proclamation of the
Gospel the enmity of natural men will be stirred up against
the Lord Jesus Christ as it was in the days of His flesh. The natural man hates the Lord
Jesus Christ. He just hates him. That's what
the scripture declares. They're very happy to have a
Jesus who can be manipulated. They're very happy to have a
Jesus who will operate at their beck and call. But you proclaim
the real Jesus to people. And you will find, and especially
amongst the religious people, you will find the most extraordinary
enmity. I remember when the Lord first
worked in my heart, I went round to my relations and just about
anyone who would bear me talking to them, and I used to talk about
the Lord Jesus to all and sundry, and I was just shocked. For me
it was just the greatest wonder of all that someone who had lived
in such enmity to him for so long, in such open rebellion,
would actually be not just forgiven of sins, but now have him as
a friend. And I can still remember thinking,
this is such good news, and it's such simple news, and it's such
historic news, and it's such important news, that people are
just going to embrace it when I talk to them. This is all just
going to... I just was shocked at the enmity
of it. And when the Lord took me to
India to teach me the essentials of the Gospel, I came back thinking
that the religious world, who was tied up in legalism and in
self-righteousness, and in deep fear often about where their
souls were headed, in deep fear and concern about meeting the
Lord Jesus, having never heard a Gospel of comfort, having never
heard the Gospel of who the Lord Jesus is, I just thought that
the religious world would say, isn't this amazing? This is freedom. The chains have fallen off. God
doesn't look to my good deeds. He looks to the good deeds of
the Lord Jesus Christ. My sins were dealt with perfectly
and completely on the cross 2,000 years ago and before God. I have
no sin." And he closed these people with the righteousness,
the righteousness of God, and he did it from the foundation
of the world, and he did it particularly and powerful for a particular
people, and their sins are gone. He'll call his name Jesus because
he will save his people from their sins. And I thought when
I came back, I thought when I came back on my trips from India,
people would get excited about this. And yet, again, amongst
the professing religious people, there was an enmity stirred up
which I found shocking until I was forced by the Lord yet
again to go back and look and look at what the scriptures say
about these things. And we find yet again that the
experience of God's people is the experience and the history
that is written here in the pages of the scriptures for us. We
are reading in Galatians a history which the Lord's people have
experienced. The Lord's people have experienced. Paul is writing a biography,
but he's writing an autobiography for himself and a biography of
the Lord's people. They will walk They'll walk according
to this rule. They'll walk according to this
rule as new creatures. They'll walk according to this
rule, glorying in the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ, by whom
the world is crucified, to me and I to the world. They will
see as life brings them along, they will see that He counts
His people worthy of suffering for the Gospel. Simon read it
out of Psalm 149, it's the honour of God's people, not just to
worship Him and to see Him as glorious, it's the honour of
God's people to be counted I love how Paul speaks to a persecuted
church. A persecuted apostle speaking
to a persecuted church. If you remember, Paul was just
in Thessalonians, maybe just for a few weeks, and that small
group was gathered, and Paul was hounded out of town, and
the Thessalonian believers were immediately persecuted. And he
says, Grace, in 2 Thessalonians 1, Grace unto you and peace from
God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. We are bound to thank
God always for you, brethren, as is meet, as is right, because
that your faith groweth exceedingly in the charity, the love of every
one of you toward all, each other aboundeth. so that we ourselves
glory in you in the churches of God for your patience and
faith in all the persecutions and tribulations that you endure,
which is a manifest token of the righteous judgment of God,
that you may be counted worthy of the kingdom of God for which
you suffer. through many tribulations we
must enter into glory. Anyone who wants to live a godly
life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted. Paul is saying, the
marks that you saw on my body, the marks which are now on my
body, Paul must have suffered enormously and the suffering
probably continued in some sense like Jacob limping for the rest
of his days. Paul, he was left at Lystra,
he was taken outside the city and stoned and he was left for
dead. It takes a lot of stones. to leave someone for dead. The
marks were on his body. The Lord's people are a marked
people. The Lord's people will walk in
this world in the footsteps of the Lord Jesus Christ. The afflictions
of our Lord Jesus began at his birth, if you remember Herod.
As soon as he knew that there was another king, he was deceitful
and enraged in enmity, and he slayed all of the children in
Bethlehem, hoping that amongst them all, it didn't matter who
they were, he might have killed him. was tempted of the devil just
after his baptism and at his first preaching back in Nazareth
in his hometown amongst his family and amongst the people who had
known him so well. Isn't it remarkable? He had been
in their company for nearly 30 years. He had worked there faithfully,
never sinning. Never one sin. Never one sin. And yet he comes to preach there
and he rolled out the book that was given to him and it was Isaiah
61. And there was no problem with
him reading Isaiah 61. They knew it, probably many of them off
by heart, and the words were familiar to them. The Spirit
of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to preach
the gospel to the poor. He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted,
to preach deliverance to the captives, the recovering of sight
to the blind, and to set at liberty them that are bruised, to preach
the acceptable year of the Lord. Everything is fine. Here is this
wonderful miracle worker, the son of our village. And then
he says, this day, this scripture is fulfilled in your ears. And he told them of God's sovereign
electing purposes, that there were many letters in Israel,
but it wasn't a Jew It was Naaman the Syrian who was healed. There
were many in those days of famine, in the days of Elijah, and yet
it was the widow of Sarepta, a city of Sidon, you see, a Gentile. That was the woman. And they
all in the synagogue, when they heard these things, he was reading
scripture to them. their national history which
they took such pride in. And I heard these things, they
were filled with wrath. So you see, they're filled with
wrath. When the Lord Jesus is declared as who He really is,
as absolutely sovereign God, who will heal whom He wishes
to heal, who will open the eyes of whom He wishes to open the
eyes, who will set at liberty those whom He wishes to set at
liberty, it's a sovereign God that offends. the righteousness
and the sovereignty that man has, the sovereignty that man
has when he acquired that poison of Satan in the garden. You will
be as gods, courses through the veins of every child of Adam. And they rose up and thrust him
out of the city and led him under the brow of the hill whereupon
their city was built that they might cast him down headlong.
They determined to kill him as he preached the glories of God
to them. And he revealed his sovereignty,
didn't he? He just passed through the mist and went his way. They went their way, he went
his way. Now, Lord Jesus was persecuted
because of the claims about Himself. The Lord Jesus was persecuted
when He revealed what men are. When He revealed what men are
in their religion. It's a striking passage in John
chapter 8, when in John chapter 8 verse 31, He speaks of people
who believed on Him. Then said Jesus to those Jews
which believed on Him. Now you would think that He'd
be amongst people. Amongst his own nation who believed
on him, here he would find acceptance. Amongst these people there is
a believing which is damning, there is a believing which is
saving. I don't have time to read the
passage, but I trust that you might yourselves. And you will
see that as this conversation goes on, the Lord Jesus declares
who He is and He declares who they are. He says to these people
who were so proud of themselves in verse 33, Two, in response
to him saying, if you know the truth, the truth shall make you
free, and they answered him, we be Abraham's seed, and never
in bondage to any man. They can't even tell the simple
truth about their own history. They were in bondage to the Egyptians
for 400 years. They were in bondage to Babylon
for 70 years. They'd just lived through bondage
to Rome for the past 50 years. They were in bondage as they
said the very words. bondage, but the Lord Jesus was
talking about a bondage which is much worse, the bondage to
sin. If the Son, verse 36, therefore
shall make you free, you shall be free indeed. He says, I know
you are Abraham, see, but you seek to kill me because my word
has no place in you. You seek to kill me, a man that has
told you the truth. Verse 40, you do the deeds of
your father. He says in verse 42, if God were
your father, you would love me. Now these were professing believers.
For I proceeded forth and came from God, neither came I of myself,
but he sent me. Then they picked up stones to
stone him. They picked up stones to stone
him. They seek to kill him because
he told them the truth. They picked up stones to cast
at him. because he claimed to be God. Your father Abraham, verse 56,
rejoiced to see my day. He saw it and was glad. Verily
I say unto you, before Abraham was, I am. I am God Almighty. And they took up stones to cast
at him. Verse 31, they were Jews. which believed on him." And they
picked up the stones to stone him. In chapter 10 they do the
same again. He says to them, Good works, in verse 32, many
good works have I showed you from my Father. For which of
those works do you stone me? The Jews answered him, saying,
For good work we stone thee not, but for blasphemy, because thou,
being a man, makest thyself God. The Lord Jesus was a marked man. His life on this earth was marked
by persecution. but also wonderfully, isn't it?
The Lord Jesus proclaimed the Gospel and moved on. Paul has proclaimed the Gospel
to these Galatian churches and now he says, don't trouble me
anymore for I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus.
God's children were marked, weren't they? In Exodus Chapter 12 we
have the Passover the first Passover and the houses of the Israelites
were marked. They're marked with blood. God's
children shelter underneath blood and wherever that blood is seen,
where God sees the blood, He passes over. God's children are
marked in this world. Ezekiel chapter 9 is a remarkable
passage of scripture. If you know something of the
history of Ezekiel, he and Jeremiah were prophesying at the time
of the fall of Jerusalem. and Nebuchadnezzar and the armies
of Babylon were coming against that city to destroy it and beginning
at the house of God. And if you read the first chapters
of Ezekiel you will see the depths of the depravity. The elders
of Israel were bowing down, the women were bowing down to Tammuz
and the men were bowing down to the sun and they had desecrated
the temple of God. And God is bringing judgment.
Ezekiel is hundreds of miles away and he's taken back to Jerusalem
in prophetic visions and he sees the glory of God, the presence
of God coming up away from that temple and God marking his people
before he sends destruction on it. He says in chapter 9, and he
cried also in my ears with a loud voice saying, cause then that
have charge over the city to draw near even every man with
his destroying weapon in his hand and behold six men came
from the way of the higher gate which leadeth towards the north,
and every man a slaughter weapon in his hand. And one man among
them was clothed with linen, with a riotous inkhorn by his
side. And they went in and stood beside
the brazen altar. And the glory of the God of Israel
was gone up from the cherub whereupon he was to the threshold of the
house. And he called to the man clothed
with the linen, which had the writer's inkhorn by his side. And the Lord said unto him, Go
through the midst of the city, through the midst of Jerusalem,
and set a mark on the foreheads of the men that sigh and cry
for all the abominations that are done in the midst thereof. And to others he said in my hearing,
go ye after him through the city. So the marking happens first
and then after him through the city and smite. Let not your
eyes bear, neither have ye pity. Slay utterly old and young, both
maids and little children and women, but come not near any
man upon whom is the mark and begin at my sanctuary. Then they began at the ancient
men which were before the house. These people are marked. The children of God are marked.
It's interesting, isn't it? The children of God are those
who are marked by how they respond to what happens around them.
You set a mark upon the foreheads of the men that sigh and cry
for all the abominations that are done in the midst of their
life, that grieve and lament. I'm glad that Simon said it earlier
because it needs to be said again, isn't it, that the children of
God They take no pleasure in the judgment of God coming upon
people, nor do they wish it. They are pleading as Paul did
in the book of Galatians that these people would be turned
by the Lord. They grieve and lament. One of
the marks of God's children from the scriptures is that they grieve
and lament over the religion that they see around them that
claims to be the religion of God. It's not something they
rejoice in. They are not proud of the fact
that they know the truth and others are in error. They grieve
and lament. They weep and sigh, they sigh
and cry for all the abominations, all the abominations that are
done in the midst of it. God's children, like Paul, found
himself in a situation where he was so deeply grieved. You see, people are grieved because
they care. People grieve only because they
care deeply. They care deeply about eternal
souls. They care deeply about the glory
of the Lord Jesus Christ. Such is one of the marks of the
Lord's people. The Lord's people are marked
by how they respond. They are marked by how they respond
to the Word of God. Paul has set out before the Galatian
Church and before all the world, and it continues to this day,
he sets out those that walk according to this rule and peace be on
them. They are the recipients of peace
and mercy and upon the Israel of God, and to the rest, he says,
don't let them trouble me. I'm not going to be troubled
anymore. I have proclaimed the Gospel."
You see, that's the role of the Church, isn't it? In the midst
of a world which is persecuting and in enmity, they might curse. that we will bless. They might
persecute, they might say all sorts of things about us, and
our job is simply, as the Lord allows, to proclaim the Gospel. You see, the only hope The only
possible hope for lost sinners in this world is that they might
hear the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. They must hear the Gospel
to be saved for our lost friends, for our lost family. That's why,
as Simon said earlier, the gathering of the Lord's people together
to proclaim the Lord Jesus Christ as He really is, is absolutely
vital to the salvation of their souls. It's absolutely vital
that they hear the Gospel to be saved. What a remarkable privilege
that God has laid before His people. And in that, Paul Having proclaimed the Gospel,
knows that the children of God will be marked with peace from
God. In this troubled world, They
will have peace. They will see that the persecutions,
as we saw earlier, are promised persecutions. If you read the
Lord Jesus' statements in the Upper Room, He says again and
again, this world will hate you. If the world hates you, you know
that it hated me before it hated you. If you were of the world,
the world would love his own. But because you are not of the
world, but I have chosen you out of the world, Therefore the
world hateth you. Remember the word that I said
unto you, The servant is not greater than his lord. If they
have persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they have
kept my saying, they will keep yours also. But all these things
they will do unto you for my name's sake, because they know
not him that sent me. These things I've spoken unto
you, chapter 16, that you should not be offended. They shall put
you out of the synagogue, yea, the time cometh that whosoever
killeth you will think that he doeth God's service. And these things they will do
unto you, because they have not known the Father, nor me. But these things have I told
you, that when the time shall come, you may remember that I
told you of them. And these things I said not unto
you at the beginning, because I was with you. But now I go
my way to him that sent me. He goes His way and He leaves
His apostles in this world to bear witness to Him. And part
of the witness that they will bear to Him is that they will
be marked. But the true Israel of God will
be marked. They'll be marked by remarkable
things, won't they? They'll be marked by the wounds
that they suffer. They'll be marked by the grieving
and lamenting that they feel. They'll be marked by the sadness
of this Gospel being so near and yet so far from them. And the Israel of God will, in
the midst of the persecution, preach on. There is an Israel
of God. It's a great comfort, isn't it?
That God had an Israel before the foundation of the world.
They are Israelites indeed. They are circumcised not in the
flesh but in the heart, not in the spirit and not in the letter,
whose praise. It's a lovely description of
the people of God, isn't it? The mark from on high in Romans
2.29. The circumcision of the heart
whose praise is not of men. Men will not praise the circumcised
of heart, but God will. Simon said out of Psalm 149,
it's the honour of God's people both to proclaim the Gospel and
to bear witness to the holiness of our God. in judging justly,
he will be a just God and a saviour." But there is an Israelite, aren't
there? There are Israelites scattered throughout this world. It's the
right confidence of preachers, isn't it? That the Israelites
of God will be called to hear and to see the Master." I love
how the Lord Jesus spoke of Nathanael. Philip, in John chapter 1, Philip
found Nathanael and said unto him, we have found him, we have
found him, of whom Moses in the law and the prophets did write,
Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph. And Nathanael said unto
him, can there any good thing come out of Nazareth? And Philip
said to him, these glorious words, isn't it? And then we have this remarkable
interaction between the Lord Jesus and Nathanael. Jesus saw
Nathanael coming to him and said of him, Behold an Israelite,
in whom is no guile. What a lovely description, what
a lovely mark of the children of God. Behold an Israelite indeed. Behold this is truthfully an
Israelite. Here's the Lord's description
of a true Israelite. in whom there is no guile." That
word guile is the word that's used for deceit or bait for a
fish. You know, when we're catching
fish, we actually deceive the fish to catch them, don't we?
We say to them, here is food and in it is a hook to catch
with a bait. Such is the nature of men, isn't
it? That we want to catch with a
bait. We want people to esteem us by
things being said about us which are profoundly untrue before
God. False teachers want to catch
people with a bait. The Galatian false teachers had
gone all the way up there to entrap them. A true Israelite
in whom there is no guile. The same word is used to describe
the Lord Jesus in prophecy in Isaiah 53. He made his grave
with the wicked and with the rich in his death because he
had done no violence. Neither was any deceit in his
mouth. The Lord Jesus goes on to say
something else about the marks of the Lord's children. He said
to Nathanael, Nathanael said to him, How do you know me? And
Jesus answered and said unto him, Before that Philip called
you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you. And Nathanael
answered and said unto him, Rabbi, thou art the Son of God, thou
art the King of Israel. Jesus answered and said unto
him, Because I said unto thee, I saw thee under the fig tree,
believest thou? Thou shalt see greater things
than these. And he saith unto him, Verily,
verily, I say unto you, Hereafter you shall see heaven open. and
the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man. The true Israelites are Israelites
who are the faith children of Abraham and the faith children
of Isaac and the faith children of Jacob and the Lord Jesus is
referring to that meeting that Jacob had. We spoke about it
last week. Jacob came to that place and
the great blessing, the great mark of the children of God is
that they see him face to face and their lives are preserved. God's children, the Israel of
God, are marked people. They are set aside by God. They are marked. I just love
how Galatians has gone In the midst of all of this persecution
we have the most remarkable descriptions of the children of God. We have
the most clear and unmistakable descriptions of the false teachers. But in the middle, the one that
divides them all, we have the most glorious depictions of the
Lord Jesus Christ in His glory. how thankful we ought to be for
the marks of Paul that have given us such a remarkable letter. See the Israel of God, the marked
children of God, they are in verse Chapter 1, they are the
recipients of grace and peace from God the Father and from
our Lord Jesus Christ. See, Paul and the believers and
the Lord Jesus are one, aren't they? They are those for whom
He died in verse 4. He's given Himself for our sins
that He might deliver us from this present evil world according
to the will of God and our Father to whom be glory forever. They
are in verse 5, called into the grace of God. Sorry, verse 6. In verse 8, they are those to
whom the Gospel is preached. They are those, in verse 15,
as Paul describes himself, and in a way as a pattern of all
believers, they are those in whom the Lord Jesus dwells. He marks His own by indwelling
them and is revealed as dwelling in them in the new birth. He
revealed His Son in me, verse 16. They are, in chapter 3 verse
15, they are the children of Abraham, the faith children of
Abraham, 3 verse 7. They are those who are redeemed
in 3.13 from the curse of the law. They are the recipients
of the promise of the Spirit. through faith. They are the inheritors,
they are heirs and joint heirs with Christ. They are in 3.26,
they are the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus. They are, in 3.29, those who
belong to Christ and their Abraham seed, and their heirs according
to promise. They are sons, in verse 6 of
chapter 4, and because you are sons, God has sent forth the
Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father. Because they are God's children,
the Spirit of God will enter their hearts and they will cry.
They will cry to God their Father, Abba, Father. They will, in 429,
they will be persecuted. And they that were born after
the flesh persecuted him that was born after the Spirit, even
so it is now." Eugalation believers, Eugalations marked of God, Eugalations
who are brethren with me, Eugalations who are going to hear these words
of Paul as the very words of God and be so thankful that God
had written to them. They are going to be persecuted,
even so it is now. Paul is saying, the persecution
is that you will now suffer as these churches are divided between
those who, led by the Spirit, are faithful to the Gospel witness
of Paul and those who stand opposed to him with all sorts of intellectual
arguments and all sorts of scriptures twisted and misused. that want
to put people back under the law and back under the works.
There will be a division and there will be a separation and
the children of God, the faith children, will be persecuted
by those that are born after the flesh. It's a promise from
God. And I love the way it is, isn't
it? The children of God are never persecutors, and never have been
persecutors, and never need to be persecutors. Our weapons are
not carnal weapons. We are not fighting. earthly
wars. This is a spiritual battle, and
God will cause His servants to fight that way. And how do they
stand? In verse 5 of chapter 5, we through
the Spirit wait. We wait. We wait. Wait for the hope of righteousness
by faith. And it's faith that works through
love that avails, not works of the flesh, not works of the law.
And they will suffer persecution because they do not preach law
works. And they will not be under the
law, they'll be led of the Spirit. And they will, they will have
the fruit of the Spirit. They will be marked by love,
joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance. It's interesting because all
that fruit of the Spirit are internal things granted by God,
operated by His grace and His Spirit's work in the lives of
His people. They will be the peacemakers. They will bear one another's
burdens. They will walk in the Spirit,
as verse 25 says. They will be people who are in
Christ Jesus, and they'll have no glory, no glory in anything
other than the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ. They are the Israel
of God. They are the recipients of mercy
and peace. They are the brethren of Paul. They are those who are the recipients
of the grace of God. Brothers and sisters, the promises
of God are that we'll walk through this world, and we will have
trials, and we will have troubles, and we will walk in the footsteps
of the Lord Jesus Christ. and every step of the way he
will preserve his people in the midst of their trials and he'll
use the trials to reveal how close He is to them. He'll use
the trials and the persecution to reveal the depth of the truth
of His Word and His faithfulness. He'll use the trials to work
in the hearts of His people faith and love. He'll use the trials
to show His people that His promises are true. I've read them to you
today. He's promised those things. Now
the people that have been marked, If you read the history of the
martyrs, they used to mark, sometimes they marked them before they
were killed and sometimes they marked them that they were branded
for the rest of their lives. That stigmata, that mark of Paul,
is a reference to the marks that they put on slaves, the Romans
put it on slaves and sometimes they put it on criminals that
have a mark of thief in Roman letters written stamped on their
forehead, branded they were. And they branded the martyrs
in the days of the Reformation. They used to brand their foreheads
so that forevermore as they walked this earth, they were branded
and marked. But what an honour. to be marked as slaves of the
Lord Jesus Christ, to be marked as belonging to Him, to bear
testimony to Him in this world, to hold out before this dying
world the Gospel of God's sovereign and free grace, to hold out before
this world a Saviour who died perfectly successfully fulfilling
all that he had promised to do and clothing his people with
the very righteousness of God and their sins taken away forever. Paul called the afflictions that
he had, he called them light and momentary afflictions. He
said they're featherweight afflictions compared to what lies before
God's people. To bear the featherweight afflictions
now is the honour that God bestows on His people, counts them worthy
to suffer for His name. Let's pray.