Morning. Take your Bibles and turn to
Galatians chapter one. Galatians chapter one. Now through
my years I've heard people say things to the effect that it
doesn't matter what your religion is as long as you're religious
or it doesn't matter how you're trying to come to God as you're
trying to come to Him, or you gotta just believe in something,
they'll say, and it sounds so gracious, it sounds so kind and
so non-judgmental, but they're words of flesh at best, and really
what it is is a burp from the belly of hell, really, it's a
lie, it's a damning lie, it's destructive, and it's not the
truth. Our enemy, that lion that seeks
to devour whom he may, he doesn't care if you're religious. That
doesn't bother him at all. He's happy with people being
religious, so long as they continue to grope in darkness, as long
as they never come to a knowledge of Christ. so long as they're
ever learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the
truth. And so those who speak like that,
when you hear that, they have no authority to say that. They
have no authority to speak in the name of God and say, God's
fine for you to come however you want to come. Who are they
to speak like that? Who are they to say that God
is pleased with the flesh of man just doing the best that
he can? Really, that's contradicting the Word of God. The Word of
God tells us that there is one way. The Word of God declares
that there's one name under heaven given among men whereby we must
be saved. If we're to be saved of God,
it's through the Lord Jesus Christ. And the spirit that our God gives
us testifies to our spirit that Christ is salvation. and that
we're His and His alone. It's only by His grace, by the
blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. Paul said of them in 2 Corinthians
11, in verse 13-15, he called them false apostles, deceitful
workers, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ,
and no marvel, for Satan himself is transformed into an angel
of light. Therefore it is no great thing
if his ministers also be transformed as the ministers of righteousness,
whose end shall be according to their works." The things that
are coming out of their mouth are destruction, and they shall
come to that same end, destruction. They'll be destroyed by the Lord. And so Paul says to the churches
in verses 8 and 9, Galatians 1, 8, and 9. But though we or
an angel from heaven preach any other gospel unto you than that
which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed. As we said
before, so say I now again, if any man preach any other gospel
unto you than that ye have received, let him be accursed. And that's
as true for us as it was for them then. And there's churches,
so-called, that have a rich history, historically, that have had many
hundreds, if not thousands of years, being in existence. And they expect their people
to hold their traditions. And people trust in those things,
catechisms and creeds and confessions. But when those things deviate
from the word of God, and they speak contrary to the word of
God, just because that's what you received, that doesn't mean
that's the gospel that was delivered unto the churches by the apostles,
and by Christ, and by his prophets. We are built not upon the words
of man, but upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets,
Jesus Christ himself being the chief cornerstone. And so Paul,
having said those strong words, says in verse 10 and 11, do I
now persuade men or God? Am I now trying to tickle your
ear and make you feel good? Or am I preaching the truth,
that which we must hear, that which God speaks to His people? We are rebuked in the flesh by
the Lord. We're taught by the Lord. We're
corrected by the Lord. And blessed are they who are
not offended in me, Christ said. Blessed are they who hear the
word and aren't offended and bow before our God. We're His. He's God. He can do with us what He wills. And blessed are they that are
not offended by Him. And so the Gospel puts this flesh
low in the dust. And there we remain until the
Spirit of God come and lift us up. Until the Spirit of God lifts
up your head and put your eyes upon the Lord Jesus Christ to
behold Him and to see all your hope, your confidence, Your glory. your salvation in the Lord Jesus
Christ. That's by the resurrection power
of the Lord who does that. Men don't do that for men. Men
don't do that for themselves. The Lord Jesus Christ saves His
people and He sends His Spirit in sovereign, almighty power
and grace and He raises the dead to life. He gives those that
are spiritually dead spiritual life and so The Church is called
to preach the blood, the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, the
effectual, wonder-working blood of Jesus Christ who delivers
us from the condemnation and the damnation of our own sins
and gives us life and hope and liberty in the blood of Christ. We preach Him because His blood
purges us from all sins. He is our mediator between God
and men, and He reconciles us to Holy God, declaring peace,
peace, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. So, in the rest
of chapter 1, Paul is describing what the Lord did in calling
him. and he lays out the pattern, the pattern of salvation for
all God's children. We see in the experience of Paul,
what the Lord did for Paul is the experience of our salvation,
of our grace. And when it's understood, when
we rightly see the gospel of our Lord, our eyes are turned
from that accursed way, that broad way that leadeth to destruction
and return to the Lord Jesus Christ and set by the Spirit
of God on that narrow way which leadeth unto life. And there's
few that find it, but by the grace of God that's how we find
it. That's how we're put on that
way, the way of the Lord Jesus Christ. Paul, when writing to
Timothy in that first epistle, Timothy 1.16, said, I obtained
mercy that in me first Jesus Christ might show forth all longsuffering
for a pattern. to them which should hereafter
believe on him, to life everlasting." And so that's what I've titled
this message, The Pattern of Salvation. And we'll see it from
these verses, 12 through 24, the rest of the chapter 1. So look there at verse 12. Paul
says, I neither received it. I didn't receive this gospel
of man, neither was I taught it. but by the revelation of
Jesus Christ. And so what our Lord teaches
us in salvation, it's not of man. Salvation is not wrought
by man. It's not the works of man. He
has no part in it. It's all to the glory, praise,
and honor of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ. It's all his work. It's all the work of our God.
In fact, the psalmist said in Psalm 3 8, salvation belongeth
unto the Lord. That's what Jonah said. Salvation
is of the Lord. Jonah 2 9. It's of the Lord. It's his work. He does it. Every
part of it. Now one aspect as we read Paul's
experience, there are some unique things to his experience that
are unique to him as an apostle. Christ appeared to him on the
road to Damascus. Christ appeared to him. He saw
Christ with his own eyes and was commissioned by Christ as
an apostle. We don't see Christ in the vision
that Paul saw. We're not called of Christ as
an apostle. We're his people. We're gathered
by him in grace through the preaching of the word. And so, where we
do join up in that pattern of Paul here is that, first of all,
our Lord used a man to preach Christ to Paul. He did, he appeared
to Paul, and then he sent a man to preach to Paul. And let's
see this relation of our pattern. Turn over to Acts 22. Let's look
at Acts 22 and go to verse 11. Paul is describing the details
that occurred after the Lord appeared to him on the road to
Damascus. Acts 22 verse 11, he says, And
when I could not see for the glory of that light, the light
of Christ, being led by the hand of them that were with me, I
came into Damascus. And one, Ananias, a devout man
according to the law, having a good report of all the Jews
which dwelt there, came unto me, and stood, and said unto
me, Brother Saul, receive thy sight. And the same hour I looked
up upon him. And he said, the God of our fathers
hath chosen thee, that thou shouldest know his will, and see that just
one, and shouldest hear the voice of his mouth. For thou shalt
be his witness unto all men of what thou hast seen and heard. So there's details given here
that are very specific to Paul as the apostle sent of Christ. But like Paul, it is by the preaching
of Christ, the preaching of the gospel, that the scales on our
eyes, the veil on our heart, falls off. And that veil is lifted,
and the Spirit of God turns our heart to the Lord, to the Living
God, to behold Him, to see our need of Him, and to see that
He is sufficient to save us, even filthy, vile sinners that
we are, to save us to the uttermost. And actually, you could see that
in 2 Corinthians 3. Verse 16 says, nevertheless,
I'm going to go back to 15, but even unto this day when Moses
is read, the veil is upon their heart. Nevertheless, when it,
the heart, shall turn to the Lord, the veil shall be taken
away." How is the heart turned to the Lord? Verse 17, Now the
Lord is that Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there
is liberty. It's the Spirit of God that lifts
off that veil. It's the Spirit of God that plunges
us beneath the blood of Christ and purges us of our sins and
our guilty conscience, delivering us from the enmity that is in
our nature against the true and living God. And so it's through
the preaching of Christ that men and women are set free from
the bondage of their sin and dead letter religion. It's through
the effectual working of the Spirit, every believer will hear
the voice of Christ. Our Lord said in John 10 verse
3, when he's describing himself as the good shepherd of his people,
said to him, to Christ, the porter, the Holy Spirit openeth, he opens
at heart. He delivers that heart from bondage.
And the sheep, the believers, hear Christ's voice. They hear his voice. And he calleth
his own sheep by name and leadeth them out. So that there comes
a time. In the preaching of the gospel,
in the appointed hour for some chosen sinner, God will come
upon them. He'll send his spirit and cause
them to hear, give them life, cause them to live and hear the
words of Christ, to see, I'm the sinner that he's talking
about. I need deliverance and salvation from my sins, and he's
the Savior. Lord, have mercy on me. Save
me, Lord. Help me. I need thy grace and
thy salvation. It's not that you'll audibly
hear his voice. We don't audibly hear Christ
speak, but we know he's speaking to us. We know that I'm the sinner
that he has in view. I'm the one who needs salvation. I'm the filthy sinner worthy
of death and hell. And only by your grace, Lord,
will I be delivered. Save me, Lord. Have mercy. And so the Lord used a person
to declare Christ. And he uses someone to preach
Christ to you and point you to Christ. He's the Savior. He's
the salvation God's provided. And the Lord removes that veil
and turns the heart. When Christ was speaking to that
woman at the well, and he delivered her from her bondage. It says
that she left everything and ran off to the village where
all those neighbors of hers and people that she grew up with
where they despised her for being this wicked sinner. She runs
in there and says, come, see a man which told me all things
that ever I did. Is not this the Christ? they
came and they heard Christ speak and it says in verse 42 John
4 42 they said unto the woman now we believe not because of
thy saying for we have heard him ourselves and know that this
is indeed the Christ the Savior of the world right no man can
convince you that Christ is the Savior, and that He's your Savior,
Christ convinces you that He is the Savior, and that He's
your Savior. He's the one that convinces a
person. And so I tell you the truth, salvation is revealed
to the heart of God's chosen children by the revelation of
Jesus Christ to them. He reveals Christ to His people.
It's the Spirit of God that reveals Christ to us by God's power. Through the new birth, we are
born again, raised again from that spiritual death onto spiritual
life whereby we hear the things of God. We see Christ, His salvation. We see His sufficiency and we're
given faith in our hearts whereby we believe and call upon the
Lord to save us and to deliver us. It's a new birth that He
does that bears fruit in us. of looking to the Lord. And the
child who receives that revelation of Christ, we give him all the
glory. We thank him for salvation. We
don't look at what we've done. We've done nothing worthy of
notice. We've done nothing for the Lord, nothing to save ourselves.
It's all of his grace. Any fruit we bear, Lord, it's
all your glory. It's your honor. I praise you,
Lord. We give him all the thanks and
the praise. You know, our God, we praise
Him because our God could just as easily hid it from us and
kept us from hearing Christ and kept us from seeing Christ. He could have done that. It's
His sovereign will. He could do what He wants. He's
God. We're the creature. In Matthew
11, 25, and 26, our Lord prayed. At that time, He answered and
said, I thank Thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because
Thou hast hid these things, these words of salvation, from the
wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes. Even so, Father,
for so it seemed good in Thy sight. Christ didn't come to
save religious know-it-alls. He didn't come to save the righteous,
the good people. He came to save sinners. You,
who hope in Him. Those are whom Christ saved.
You know what you are in your heart. You know what you are
in your mind. Christ came to save sinners. And He effectually
saves whom He will. We don't know how to please God,
but Christ does. He is pleasing to God. He is
the mediator God sent. And so His people confess, Lord,
You sent Your Son. You sent salvation. You did this,
Lord. and saved your people. Save me,
don't pass me by, Lord. Don't leave me. Have mercy on
me, Lord. Cleanse me with that blood."
And so, that's the very thing that Paul shows us in the pattern.
He shows us that Christ saves sinners. Look at verses 13 and
14. If you're religious, you're going
to be saved from your religion, too. Verse 13-14 For ye have
heard of my conversation, my practices, and time past in the
Jews' religion, how that beyond measure I persecuted the church
of God, and wasted it, and profited in the Jews' religion, above
many my equals in my own nation. He was zealous. He worked hard. He labored to earn God's favor. being more exceedingly zealous
of the traditions of my fathers. But God wasn't impressed with
any of it. It was all dung in God's sight. It was all worthless. It was
all done for Paul's own glory. It was done in the flesh, for
his flesh, and it didn't please God at all. In fact, all our
works in this flesh are filthy rags. They're filthy rags. That
which we bring to God in this flesh, trusting in to justify
us and sanctify us to God, he says it's filthy. He sent the
prophet Isaiah in 64.6. Isaiah 64.6, where Isaiah declares,
we're all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses not
our iniquities, not our trespasses, not our sins, but all our righteousnesses,
our good works, our filthy rags, and we all do fade as a leaf,
and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away. So we're not called to seek to
be more religious. God's not calling you to be more
religious and more zealous in your religion and your religious
practices and ceremonies. He calls his people to seek Christ,
to seek the Savior whom he sent. Behold, my servant whom I have
sent, look to him. I'm pleased with Christ. I'm
pleased with my servant whom I sent. And I love and receive
all them who love him and believe him and trust him. That's why
it's for God's love that he sent him and why we believe on him
and trust him. It's all the working of the grace
of our God. And so we come to the Lord trusting
the blood of Christ, that His blood is sufficient to save even
a vile sinner like me. That's what pleases our God. Now, the next thing we see is
that the pattern of salvation is one of sovereign grace. It's
of sovereign grace. Everything is in the control,
in the hand, according to the will and purpose of our God. It's all according to sovereign
grace. Look at verses 15 and 16 in Galatians
1. Paul says, when it pleased God,
When God was pleased to do it, He separated me from my mother's
womb and called me by His grace to reveal His Son in me that
I might preach Him among the heathen. And then He says, immediately
I conferred not with flesh and blood. We see from this that
God is sovereign in salvation. We don't choose God. We don't
seek God first and then God says, oh, look at this. Here's someone
who's looking for salvation. No, God seeks out his lost sheep. He seeks out the wandering sheep,
doing their own thing, off in the filth and the stye and off
apart from the Lord. We're told in Romans 3, 10 and
11, it's written, there's none righteous. No, not one. There's none that understandeth.
There's none that seeketh after God. None of us are seeking God. were found of God by Him seeking
us out. Those are words, human words,
to describe Him coming to us in the appointed time of love. Instead, our God tells us that
he chooses whom he will save. He said to Moses, I will have
mercy on whom I will have mercy. I will have compassion on whom
I will have compassion. So then it's not of him that
willeth. It's not your decision or my
decision. It's not of him that runneth.
It's not our works, good or bad or otherwise. It's not our works,
but of God that showeth mercy. Romans 9, 15, and 16. And so
our Lord reveals the sufficiency of Christ. Doesn't he show you
how that Christ's blood is sufficient to save you? There is no hope.
If there's no Christ, if there's no blood of Christ, we have no
hope. We are not righteous in and of
ourselves. We don't know the true and living
God apart from the Lord Jesus Christ. He teaches us the Father. He reveals the Father to us. He leads us out of darkness and
to the Father. We come to the Lord in Christ,
in His blood, and not our own works. We come in His robe of
righteousness. We come in that precious, sweet,
savory blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, of whom our Father is
pleased with, in Him. in Him. And so, we know what
we know because the Father makes us to know it. Our God makes
us to know what we know. We're taught of God to know that
if I try to come to Him in my works to justify myself, I'm
a stinking stench in His nostrils. But if I come in the blood of
Christ, He smells a sweet savor of His Son. And He's pleased,
because He's well pleased with His Son. He delights in His Son,
and He receives all them that come to Him in His Son. Now, when we're looking at self
for some kind of assurance, when we're running and scrambling
and worried and looking to self, if you remember how you were
in religion, and maybe you're still like this, but in those
times, we look to others and try to pattern ourself off of
them, right? Well, I see, I think that person's
a Christian, so I'm gonna do my best to be just like them.
They say they read their Bibles in the morning, I'll read my
Bible in the morning. They say prayers before they go to bed,
I'll say my prayers before I go to bed. And they come every Sunday,
I'm gonna come every Sunday, and I'm gonna do my best to be
just like them, because if they're a Christian, then I'll be a Christian
too. See, that's looking to man. We're looking to man for our
assurance. But when the Lord God convinces
you of Christ's blood, that his blood saves to the uttermost,
And He gives you faith, He reveals in you faith, looking to the
blood of Christ. You don't need the confirmation
and affirmation of another person saying to you that you're the
Lord's. They could all turn against Christ,
but when you're convinced of Christ, you're not turning with
them. You're gonna stay right there looking to the Lord Jesus
Christ, though the whole world forsake you. It won't be easy
in the flesh, but the Lord's grace will keep you. And really,
he's merciful. Look, he's given you brethren. He's given you brethren to fellowship
with and to comfort your hearts, rejoicing in the Lord Jesus Christ. But when the Lord convinces you,
you don't need other people. You're not worried about what
other people are doing. You're looking to the Lord and
you're trusting him alone. And that's what Paul says in
verses 17 through 20. After the Lord appeared to him,
he said, neither went I up to Jerusalem. That wasn't the first
place I went. I didn't go up to see them, which were apostles
before me. I went to Arabia, where no one was. And then I
returned again unto Damascus. I didn't need a man to convince
me that Jesus is Christ. Christ convinced me that he's
Christ. I believed him. I trusted him. I heard him myself.
Then, after three years, I went up to Jerusalem to see Peter.
And I stayed with him for 15 days. And other of the apostles,
I didn't see any of them, except for James, the brother of the
Lord in the flesh. Now the things which I write
unto you, behold, before God I lie not. I'm telling you the
truth, he says. When the Lord convinces you that
he is salvation and there is no other salvation, you don't
need another to convince you. You're not worried if others
agree with you or not. You're trusting the Lord. Now
like Paul, the thing that does unite you to brethren, and the
rejoicing we do have with one another, it's in the blood of
Christ. We share the same hope as one
another. Look at verses 21 and 23, through
23. Afterwards he said, I came into
the regions of Syria and Cilicia, and was unknown by face unto
the churches of Judea which were in Christ. But they had heard
only, that he which persecuted us in times past now preacheth
the faith which he once destroyed. So we see that we have a mutual
hope, we share the same hope. We are all looking to the Lord
Jesus Christ, trusting His blood to save us, trusting that He
is our Savior, that He's delivered us from condemnation. He's delivered
us from hell. He's brought us out of death
into the light of our glorious King and have eternal life with
Him, of Him. And so it's His blood that cleanses
us from all sin. We love one another and rejoice
with one another because we're born of the same blood. Forget
about your blood birth in Adam. Forget about whether you're white,
black, if you're Asian, wherever you're from, forget about those
things. They're nothing. Those things separate men from
one another. But we're all united in the blood
of the Lord Jesus Christ. In him, we're one and we're of
the same family. And so in that, we're united
and we rejoice. The middle wall of partition
is taken down and we rejoice in our Savior's salvation. We're in His family. And therefore,
the sinner saved. You'll know when they've been
touched by the Lord and heard Him. They give Him all the glory
for their salvation. And the church gives our God
and Savior all the glory for your salvation, just as they
glory in Him for their salvation. Verse 24, and they glorified
God in me. They saw what the grace of God
had done for me and they gloried in Him. And that's what we do.
We glory in the salvation of our God. It's to the praise of
the glory of His grace wherein He hath made us accepted in the
Beloved. Ephesians 1 6. And so brethren,
that is the pattern of our salvation. I pray the Lord bless it to your
hearts. Amen. Okay, let's close in prayer,
and then we'll be dismissed for about 15 minutes Our gracious
Lord we thank you father for your grace We thank you for the
blood of your son Jesus Christ Lord, we have no hope but Him.
We have no glory but Christ. We have no covering for our sin
but the blood of Christ. And Lord, we have nothing to
glory in and of ourselves. That's all your work, your revelation,
your gift of salvation to your people according as it pleases
you. Lord, thank you. It's in the
name of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, we pray this. Amen.