May it please God to bless us
together this evening as we continue our meditation in the epistle
of Paul to the Galatians. And this evening we'll turn to
chapter 3 and we'll just read the first verse. The first verse
in the third chapter of Paul's epistle to the Galatians. The Apostle says, O foolish Galatians,
who hath bewitched you that ye should not obey the truth before
whose eyes Jesus Christ hath been evidently set forth crucified
among you. So the Apostle continues this
letter to the Galatians in order to establish them and encourage
them in the truth of God, and not to be found wanting, and
not to be left to just rely upon their own religion, their old
Jewish ceremonial law, but to be found seeking for that great
and glorious righteousness which was not of theirs, but which
is of Christ's. and how needful and necessary
it is for all of us to possess the righteousness of Christ.
No sinner will ever get to glory unless he receives the righteousness
of Christ. True religion, as you may remember,
A book which says, real religion is more than notion. It's not
just a figment of our imagination. It's not just following some
creed. It is, to be found, desiring
to know that we are clothed with the righteousness of Christ. And of course, in order for that
to occur, we must believe in what the Lord Jesus Christ has
done. So here, the apostle is chiding
the Galatians in this way. telling them, O foolish Galatians.
He's really saying, well, what you lack is the right understanding,
and yet you've been told so many times of the great truths, and
yet, you see, have not actually obeyed and heard the greatest
truth of the gospel. You may remember when The Lord
Jesus Christ was about to depart from this life in the last chapter
in the Gospel of Luke. The Apostle speaks to us in these
words, and he says, Then he said unto them, O fools, and slow
of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken. And
then he goes on, speaking, of course, to those two who were
on that journey to Emmaus. They'd been discussing what had
happened. And what had happened, of course,
was in accordance with those prophecies in the Old Testament
concerning the Lord Jesus Christ, those things which had to come
to pass. And now the Lord has listened
to what they've said. And now he comes and speaks in
this way, O fools and slow of heart to believe all that the
prophets have spoken. Perhaps that's true of us today.
Perhaps we've been like this. Perhaps we are foolish. Perhaps we are like this, fools
and slow of heart. The Lord, as you may remember,
goes on to say to these two people, Ought not Christ to have suffered
these things, and to enter into his glory? And beginning at Moses
and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the Scriptures
the things concerning himself. The Old Testament The Lord spoke
of all the things in all the Scriptures, the things concerning
himself. There was a wonderful evidence
of the Lord Jesus Christ coming into this world to deliver his
church from that wrath which they deserved because of their
sin. And the apostle really, in a
similar vein, picks up that theme by directing us here to this
situation. O foolish Galatians, who hath
bewitched you? Who's turned us aside? Who's
stopped us believing the great truth of God's word? Well, we
know. We know that the devil is very
anxious. and continues to, if possible, to deceive us with
regard to the truth of God, to make us doubt the truth of God,
to make us turn away from the truth of God. What a blessing
it is when the Lord gives us faith, as we read in this chapter,
faith, to believe the great truth of God's Word. And as we read
the Word of God, to not doubt it, and to not just read it in
a casual way, because it is a matter of life and death. eternal life
and eternal death for our souls. It's not something that we can
trivialise. It's not something that we can
think of little importance and concentrate so much on the poor
old things of life. One of our brethren spoke about
Solomon and all the riches he had and yet what was he proving? It was all a vanity. It was of
no real lasting good. It was no eternal benefit. Everything he would have to leave
and therefore he was able to speak in those firm words and
to tell us all his vanity and vexation of spirit. And so the
Apostle here you see is concerned for the Galatians and really
it addresses the whole Church of God. We're blessed today with
such an account, such a letter, such direction. We should not
think, well, of course that was just to the Galatians, you know,
years and years ago and therefore it doesn't have any effect to
me. Because the Apostle, in this
instance, when he addressed there, he said, and all the brethren
which are with me, unto the churches of Galatia, all the brethren. And that refers to all the church
of God today. And so may we listen to these
words, the word of God, and may it speak to us as he says, that
we are foolish and we are bewitched. But he says that ye should not
obey the truth. That's what we are finding. We're being foolish. We're being
bewitched. by the devil who's telling us,
no, you needn't obey the truth. You needn't obey the word of
God. You can follow in your own way. You can walk your own path. Well, we have the word of God.
We're blessed with the word of God. And the word of God is to
be obeyed. And it should not be something
that we turn away from. Sometimes things are difficult. Perhaps we should say, always
things are difficult. But we should always remember,
we must not rely on our own strength. The Apostle Paul tells us that
he was relying on the strength of his God. And he said, through
Christ I can do all things that strengtheneth me. My friends,
we have a great God. Don't doubt the greatness of
God. Don't doubt the ability of God. Don't doubt the help that God
can give us. Let us not be found being foolish
and fools. But may we be concerned that
we do follow the great truths which are laid down in the Bible. That ye should not obey the truth,
says the devil. But he goes on to explain what
the truth is. And this is the truth. before
whose eyes, and my friends it must be surely true of you and
me, if we have read the Bible, if we've heard the Bible spoken
of and described and opened up to us, that ye should not obey
the truth, the devil says, before whose eyes Jesus Christ has been
evidently set forth. What a blessing it is for us
today if we've had the evidence of the Lord Jesus Christ being
set before us. What a blessing it is. And if
he's been set before us, how has he been set before us? You might ask the question, who
was it that died upon the cross? You may say, well, I know who
that was. That was Jesus. That's true. But you know that
question really needs a far greater answer than that. Because who
was it that was crucified? Who was it died upon the cross?
It was the Lord Jesus Christ. The second person in the Trinity.
The eternal, immortal Lord God. And that one who was sent down
into this world to save sinners. Who died upon the cross? That
one who came to save sinners. Now, if the Holy Spirit has convicted
us of sin, then how joyful would this news be? To realise here
is the one upon whom I can rely for my salvation. This is the
one. who has done great things, this
is the one who has given his life that I might receive life. Before whose eyes Jesus Christ
has been evidently set forth? Well, Jesus has been evidently
set forth. Have we received it? Or are we
amongst the foolish Galatians or the foolish people who have
not received and who have not obeyed the blessed, great and
glorious truth of God. And you might be asked the question,
why did Jesus die? Why did he die? Did he need to
die? Of course he needed to die. Why did he need to die? Because
that was the only way that the Holy Father would be satisfied that his holy law had been kept
and therefore the Lord Jesus Christ kept that law perfectly
and then as that perfect man died that sin atoning death to
take away all our sins. Why did Jesus die? He died to
take away our sins. Do you believe that? Is that
good news? Do you rejoice in it? Do you
bless God for it? Before whose eyes Jesus Christ
has been evidently set forth. And then, for whom did he die? Well, the question must be, did
he die for me? Did he die for me? That's what
we need to have an answer. Did he die for me? Did Jesus
come, amazing truth, to live that perfect life and die that
sinatonian death for me? We need to know it. We need to
be applied by the Spirit of God that this blessed Lord Jesus
came into this world to die, to take away our sins. You see, it was necessary, otherwise
there would be no forgiveness. And what occurred in the death
of the Saviour? He shed his blood, his most precious
blood, signifying death had occurred. And the Apostle, when he wrote
to the Romans, he said, without the shedding of blood, there
is no remission, there is no forgiveness. important tonight
to be blessed with that knowledge that we are under the blood and
therefore we are not foolish and we are not fools because
by the grace of God we believe the great truth of God's word
and we rejoice in it and what did this death accomplish then
as we read evidently set forth, crucified among you. What did this death bring about? What did it accomplish? Well,
the Lord Jesus Christ, when he was on that cross, he suffered
so greatly. His father hid his face. He endured
hell for the Church of God, for those three hours of darkness.
But what did he accomplish? He stood in our place, that place
where we were guilty before a holy God. And what did He speak? Those wonderful words, before
He gave up His life, it is finished. The Lord had accomplished that
which His Father sent Him to do. The work of salvation was
complete. To the Church of God, they are
very precious and they are very glorious words to know that Lord
Jesus Christ did not fail. We've all failed, miserably,
hopelessly. The Saviour did not fail. He died that we might live. He shed his blood that we might
be redeemed. and that therefore through this
and by his grace in due time we shall be found with him, this
great and glorious saviour in glory not for just a little time,
but for eternity. Well, what good news it is! And
so let us not be found amongst these who are classified, O foolish
Galatians, who hath bewitched you that ye should not obey the
truth? But may we have received the
blessed Spirit of God, that we are able to believe these great
and glorious truths, concerning our Lord Jesus Christ and to
believe by faith that we have an interest in that death and
the interest in that death means we are blessed with a gift of
eternal life. Reason is there not to praise
God from whom all blessings flow. Amen.