All right, Galatians chapter
4. Galatians chapter 4. We can begin our reading again in
verse 13. Verse 13. The apostle says, you know how through
the infirmity of the flesh I preached the gospel unto you at first.
and my temptation which was in my flesh you despised not nor
rejected but received me as an angel of God even as Christ Jesus. Where then is this blessedness
you speak of? I bear you record that if it
had been possible you would have plucked out your own eyes and
given them to me. Am I therefore become your enemy
because I tell you the truth? They zealously affect you but
not well. Yea, they would exclude you that
you might affect them. But it is good to be zealously
affected always in a good thing, and not only when I am present
with you." Now, the Apostle here is going to warn these brethren
again of the seduction of false teachers. That's going to be
my first point. I've entitled this message, The
Effect of Zeal. And the first thing I notice
here is the seduction of these teachers. Now the word of God
often refers to us who are believers as sheep. It refers to us as
sheep. We were chosen sheep. We were chosen and given to Christ
who was to be our one and only shepherd. And the Lord Jesus
Christ said, I am the good shepherd, and the good shepherd giveth
his life for the sheep. We recognize and know that Jesus
Christ is our shepherd, the great shepherd, that by his blood he
redeemed us. He redeemed us. As a matter of
fact, chapter 3, verse 13 says, He redeemed us from the curse
of the law being made a curse for us. And therefore, His sheep,
Christ said, will follow Him. Those that were chosen of God,
those that were redeemed by His blood, He swears, My sheep hear
My voice. I know them and I give unto them
eternal life and they follow Me. We follow Him. And so the
result, this is always the result of the spiritual call, isn't
it? The spiritual call is this, that we believe on Him, we follow
Him. He raises us from the dead. Our
Lord said, there's a day coming, and now is, when the dead shall
hear the voice of the Son of God. And they that hear shall
live. Have you heard the voice of the
Son of God? Have you heard his voice? Have you been raised from
the dead? I don't know. I don't feel like I've been raised
from the dead. I feel guilt. I feel the guilt
of my soul, the shame of my sin. But I cannot feel my love for
God in my faith, if you want to call it. That is so weak.
So low, it's often mixed with doubt and fear. I often feel
more dead than alive. Do you believe on Christ? Do
you believe on Christ? Do you trust His righteousness
and blood are sufficient to satisfy the justice? Do you believe that?
Do you believe Him? Listen, faith is the evidence
of life, not your feeling of it. Isn't that wonderful? Not
how you feel about it. Do you believe on the Son of
God? The scripture says, if we believe in the Lord Jesus Christ,
thou shalt be saved. Is that beautiful? That's glorious,
isn't it? And so faith then is what? Faith
is the evidence of this, that we are his sheep, that we are
his children. We believe on Christ alone. And
you that believe, what was the means that God chose by which
you should believe? It was preaching. the preaching
of the gospel of Jesus Christ. That's what Paul tells him. He
said, wasn't Christ evidently set forth among you? He's even
going to call him here to remember when he came. He said, remember
when I came to you and I didn't, boy, I was physically a mess
or I was, something was wrong with him. He says temptation. We don't know exactly what it
was, what physical or probably most likely a very spiritual
malady. But he was in a mess and he said,
look, when I came and preached Christ to you, you didn't pay
any attention to that. You received this gospel with
such love and affection that you would have plucked out your
own eyes and given them to me. That's how much you love me.
You received me even as Christ. If he came, he would have got
no better reception than I got. That's what he's saying. That
was a reception. And so we who hear the gospel,
this is what happened to us. Whosoever shall call upon the
name of the Lord shall be saved. How shall they call on him in
whom they have not what? Heard. And how shall they hear
without a preacher? And how shall they preach except
they be sent? As it is written, how beautiful
are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace and bring
glad tidings of great things. That's what we do. We bring glad
tidings of great things to you. And so then what's the conclusion?
So then faith cometh by what? Hearing and hearing by the word
of God. And so then we know the only
shepherd is Christ. He's my shepherd. I keep telling
you about J.D. Farmer. That's the night he heard
the gospel. I preached the message about
Christ being our shepherd. And he said that to me. He said,
that night, he said, I heard my shepherd's voice. He said,
I didn't hear you. I heard him. That's great. That's what we all desire as
we preach the gospel. We know Christ's our shepherd.
We know that he is our Lord, that he is our Savior, and that
God has sent his men his men to care for his flock. The apostle
was sent to the church of Galatia, and he's relying on this. He's
stirring up their affection again. He's causing them to remember
how affectionate they were toward him, because he was the one God
chose to preach the gospel to them. And they adored the message. Remember when you believed and
how wonderful it was? And so we who believe know this,
that God sends his men, that God has done as he promised.
He gives them pastors after his own heart. Isn't that what he
promised? You know, this is what he gave to the church. He gave
some apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors
and teachers. That's what we are. We're pastors
and teachers. I'm not an apostle, not a prophet. I'm not an evangelist. What am I? I'm a pastor and teacher.
For what? For the edification, the feeding of the flock. That's
what he sends us for. And so like Paul was sent to
this church of Galatia, he was responsible to feed them with
what? The gospel, the gospel of Jesus
Christ. We are to watch by their souls. We are to preach Christ to them. Always desiring your growth and
safety. And so then, when we see people
in our flock, in the midst, that go astray, it is our heart's desire always
that they come back. That's always our heart's desire
as a pastor, is to guide them again to hear the same gospel
they love so much at first. We are sent to point out the
wolves. That's what we're here to do.
We point out the wolves. And we do this by teaching sound
doctrine. so that you should not be deceived
by seducing teachers." Friends, the theology of false religion
often sounds to us silly. It sounds ridiculous. But make
no mistake, it is very seductive to the flesh. It is very seductive. Go to Acts chapter 20. Go to
Acts chapter 20. Now Paul's at the Church of Ephesus
here. Now, have you ever read a better
letter than Ephesians? A more sound theological letter
than Ephesians? He begins with the sovereign
election of God at the very beginning of that book. He doesn't begin
any other book that way. These were sound men. Sound in doctrine. And yet notice
his warning of them. Acts chapter 20 verse 28. Now
he's talking to preachers. Now I want you to understand
this. He's not just talking to, he's not talking to the flock,
he's talking to the elders. What's the first thing he said
to the elders? He said, take heed therefore unto yourselves. What does that mean? That means
we are capable of being seduced. You better take heed to yourselves.
And to what? Not only ourselves, but to the
flock, over which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers. Now, what are we to do? How are
we to watch over you? What is the means that we're
to watch over you and take care of ourselves? I don't know what
he's saying. Feed the church of God. What's our food? Which he hath
purchased with his own blood. There's the food. It is the cross
of Jesus Christ. This is how we take heed to ourselves,
is we constantly perpetually, continually preach Jesus Christ
and Him crucified. It is the sum and substance of
our message. It is the sum and substance of
our theology. It is the sum and substance of
our safety and care for you to constantly exalt the Lord Jesus
Christ. It is the responsibility of every
pastor to preach the Word of God. Remember what he said to
Timothy? I charge you, in the sight of God, to do what? Preach the Word. Preach the Word. When? When it's
popular and when it's not. In season and out of season. What do we do when we preach
the Word? We reprove, we rebuke, we exhort. with all long-suffering
and doctrine. He's telling us our attitude
as pastors, how we are to reprove, rebuke, exhort, with what? Long-suffering. Don't be short-tempered. Don't be quick. That guy's a
heretic. He left, look at him go. No,
that's not our business. What? Long-suffering with them.
Why? Because we are just as prone
to leave as they are. We have to be careful. We reprove
with long-suffering. Be long-suffering to them as
we preach the gospel. Do it constantly. And with doctrine. Go to 1 Corinthians chapter 1.
Again, we're looking at what pastors are supposed to do. What
this pastor at Galatia did is what we're to do. We're to preach
Christ. Look at Corinthians chapter 1
and verse 17. Now, this church had a problem
with pastors. They were exalting one pastor
above another. They liked preachers. They liked
them so much that they exalted one above another. And so they
say, well, I was baptized to this guy. Paul said, listen,
Christ sent me not to baptize. Now, is baptism important? Yes,
it is. Our Lord commanded it. If you
believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, you should be baptized because
that is a commandment of our Lord Jesus Christ. Would you
not, if he is not your king, would you not gladly submit to
that ordinance? That's a great ordinance. It's
a gospel message in itself. But listen, as a pastor, I'm
not sent to baptize. Paul said, I'm grateful I didn't
baptize but a couple of you. He sent me not to baptize. What
did he send me to do? To preach the gospel. How? Not with wisdom of words, lest
the cross of Christ should be made of none effect. If I preach
according to the philosophy and the science of this world, what
have I done? I've made the cross of Christ
of none effect. I preach not the wisdom of men,
the wisdom of the world. We preach Christ. This is the
sum and substance of our message. We must do so for only by the
gospel of God's grace in Christ are men fed. If I'm to feed you,
I only have one food for you. It is the gospel of Jesus Christ. And this gospel that we have,
it encourages you. Doesn't the gospel encourage
you? You don't need a celebrity standing up here telling you
his life story to encourage you, do you? You don't need an inspirational
story from some storyteller. No, the gospel encourages me.
Why? I'm accepted. I'm accepted of
God. Christ has bore all my sins away
and I am made holy and perfect in the eyes of God. Though I have this old man still
weighing down on me, he is perpetually forgiving me of my sins. Does
that not encourage you? It does me. It encourages us,
it strengthens us, it exhorts us, it rebukes us, doesn't it?
That gospel rebukes me. You don't need a pastor up here
pointing his finger at you all the time. Why? That gospel rebukes
me. When I see what my Savior did
for my sin, and then I look at my sin, it rebukes my soul. It comforts me, it gives me hope,
gives me confidence. It makes me understand my standing
before God. Because everything seems to be
against what the gospel says. How I feel, the circumstances
surrounding me, they all speak as though God hates me. But that's not true, is it? No,
he loves him. He said so. You know, he said
so, he proved it. He sent his son into this world
to save me. So that feeds us, that comforts
us. Preaching constantly and plainly and continually, this
is our purpose, to preach the gospel. To preach the word. This is the same gospel, and
truth is revealed. The light shines out of darkness,
so then no false teacher can prevail. This is why we do it.
Why we continually preach Christ to you, so that as long as the
light is shining, the darkness can't prevail. So as long as we're preaching
Christ to you, there's no way they can creep in. If we start
preaching works and how to do this and don't do that, they're
easy to creep in on that. But if we're always shining the
light, darkness can't prevail. No false gospel can abide where
the light of the gospel shines. These foolish Galatians, they
had turned aside by these Judaizers, they were turned aside to the
law which is a snare of the devil to prevent the gospel. That's
what the law was doing when they injected the law into the gospel
of grace. All it did was nullify the gospel. It didn't add to the gospel like
they were telling it would. And so by superimposing the law
onto the gospel, Paul said, you've made the cross of Christ of none
effect. None effect. In fact, he said
they were preaching another gospel. Another gospel had crept in.
These self-righteous teachers came in and turned the heads
of these saints. How? Flattery. Flattery. These zealous, by zealous
exclusion, Zealous exclusion. Notice they said that in our
text. He said, he said, they zealously affect you, but not
well, yea, they would exclude you that you might affect them. Exclusion. Nobody likes to be
excluded, do they? Nobody likes to be on the outside
of anything. These guys come in, there's a group of them together,
and they said, man, those guys, they look, boy, they're zealous. Look at me. Man, I'm not zealous
at all. I want to be in that group. I
want to be with that church. They're on fire for the Lord,
and I'm just moping around. Man, I want to be like them.
And so what they do is say, well, be like us. You got to do this,
got to do that, got to do this. Well, sure, that sounds good.
Nothing wrong with any of those things. Don't cheat, don't lie,
don't steal. Well, those sound good. Well,
I've done that. Well, then you're a part of our
group. Come on up here. Be with us. By zealous exclusion. They say, you want to be a better
Christian? You want to be a super saint? You want to become holier
and more accepted with God? Then you need to do this. We'll
get some discipleship classes together and we'll tell you what
to do. That's how we'll do it, and you'll be a better Christian. Nobody wants to be excluded from
that. I mean, in all honesty, I say it kind of off, you know,
kind of spitting at it, but in all honesty, who doesn't want
to be a better Christian? You want to be a worse Christian?
Well, nobody wants to be a worse Christian. You don't want to
be less righteous, do you? You want to have a holier life,
don't you? Well, of course you do. All of
that sounds good. But in order to do that, what
do they do? They superimpose law onto the gospel to achieve
it. That's how they do it. And by
doing so, listen, they nullify the gospel. They're not saying it. They're
saying the gospel is good. It has its place. It has its
place. If you want a new convert, that's
what you gotta do. You gotta preach the gospel to get new
converts. But once you got them, they need
to start doing this stuff over here. And you grow up. Let me tell you how to grow up.
A, B, C, D. Grow up. That's how you grow
in the spirit. You pray more, you read more,
you study more, you'll grow up. I'm sorry, that's the Spirit's
job, that's not your job. I know the Spirit uses these
things, but that doesn't mean necessarily that He'll cause
you to grow. It's His business. And so these men lift up their
good works, They thought that their works
and their obedience could supplement the free grace of God, that they
could add to or assist in this salvation of the souls of men. They foolishly received and became
subject to the doctrine of will worship. They became subject
to carnal ordinances. obedience to the law instead
of being subject to the law of Christ. What is the law of Christ?
We have a law. You that are believers, we have
a law. What is it? Love and faith. Faith and love. There's our law.
That's our law. This is the law of faith and
the law of love. That's our law, not the law of
Moses. Not the law of Moses. So in the
Apostle Paul, Being a faithful pastor of the saints, he sharply
rebukes them of this. And this is done, this is what
he has done and what he is doing in our text. He's preaching the
gospel of Christ without the law. That any mixture of the
law and grace is no gospel at all. It's no gospel at all. But rather than loving him, Now
you'd think that this is his heart, this is the heart of the
Apostle Paul, is that they would reject this foolish notion of
adding the law and see what great benefits. He showed them the
great benefits they have. They're not servants, they're
sons. They're not just sons, they're full grown sons. They're
received, they're heirs of everything in Jesus Christ. And I remember
we preached last Sunday concerning what we've inherited. And after
all that, Paul says, you know, you think they'd say, man, Paul,
you know, you're right. I'm oh, man, I've been horrible. But instead of that, the Church
of Glacier did something you wouldn't think they did. They
saw him as an enemy. They saw him as an enemy. And so Paul, in loving these
people, instead of thanking him, he became their enemy. He said
that in verse 16. He said, therefore, I become
an enemy because I tell you the truth. Just telling you the truth,
why would that make me an enemy? Yet Paul did not let this hatred
hinder him in his service to Christ. and to these brethren. But he
presses on in love for Christ and for the souls of these men.
So in loving rebuke, he reminds them of their profession. This is verses 8 through 16.
He reminds them again of how they received this gospel. You
remember? You remember how I preached to you and how you loved this
message once? how they were by nature ignorant
of God. He said in verse 8, He said,
you know, there was a time where you were just a pagan. You remember
that? You remember when you was bound down to wood and stone
idols? Remember that? And how God in
His mercy came to you and opened your understanding so that you
might know God He says, wherefore they were
in verse eight, how be it you knew not God, you did serve them,
which by nature know God, but now after you've known God, isn't
that wonderful? God lets you know who he is.
He wasn't a piece of wood or a piece of stone. He's the God
of heaven and earth and that he sent his son and rather this,
not just you knew God, he knew you. Speaking of their election
and there is electing grace. And then he asks this question,
why are you going to turn back to the weak and beggarly elements? You know, the law, he's telling
them this, the law is going to do you just about as much as
those idols did. The law is going to help you
just as much as those weak and beggarly idols did. She said, why are you turning
back again to bondage? You're just exchanging one bondage
for another. The bondage of idols for the
bondage of the law. Why would you do that? So in love. He tells them that this always
ends in apostasy. He said, you observe days and
months and years. And he said, I'm afraid of you,
lest I have bestowed upon you labor in vain. He's telling them where this
ends, friend. This is a heart of a loving pastor
who preaches the gospel, because I'm going to tell you the end
of all works, religion, apostasy. It's where it goes. It always ends in apostasy. Therefore, in verse 12, he still,
as a loving pastor, he still calls them this, brethren. He
said, I know where this ends, but I'm still hopeful. You see
how long-suffering he is with them? He didn't cut them off. He didn't write them off as heretics
yet. He's saying brethren. He's still calling them brethren. He's treating them as he would
a wayward son. And so Paul walks with them with
the same heart that he walked with the Church of Corinth. He's
walking in love. And this is what the job of a
pastor is. It's to walk in long suffering
with those who err. Those who err. Those who turn
aside. Why? I'm just going to take them
at their word until they prove otherwise. Why? Because I hope and I long for
them to return. I long for them to come back,
those who leave. Look what Paul says in 2 Corinthians.
Look at 2 Corinthians. This is the same kind of heart
he has for the church of Galatia. 2 Corinthians chapter 11. Look at verse 2. No, that's 1 Corinthians. That's
not going to do me any good. 2 Corinthians 11 verse 2, he says,
For I am jealous over you with a godly jealousy. For I have
espoused you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste
virgin to Christ. He said, I've showed you that
there's only one husband, it's Christ. I'm jealous over you. I want you to come to Christ
so that, look, you should be holy and without blame before
Him. But I fear. I fear lest by any
means as the serpent beguiled Eve. How did the serpent beguiled
Eve? He says through this word subtility,
which means it's crafty seduction. It was seducing. He said, I fear lest somebody
come in and do the same to you. So your mind should be corrupted
from what? The simplicity that is in Christ.
The word simplicity doesn't mean simple. It means singular. I've told you our message is
constantly what? Jesus Christ in Christ. Jesus Christ in Christ.
Constantly. I was talking to Eric today and
I said as we hold up the gospel it's like a diamond as you hold
up to the sun and the light. You turn it one way and it shines
a brilliant color. You turn it another way and it
shines a different color. It's beautiful. You turn it again
and the colors change and it just becomes more glorious. Same
diamond, right? Yet this is how we do Christ.
We constantly, from one passage to another, constantly showing
you different things concerning Christ. But the object is what? It's the diamond. The object
is Christ. It is our heart's desire that
you not be moved from the singleness that is in Jesus Christ. This
is why we constantly, perpetually preach the same thing to you. It's not accidental. It's on
purpose. We preach Christ. Why? So that you should not be moved
from it. He said, For he that cometh preacheth
another Jesus, whom we have not preached, or you receive another
spirit that you have not received, or another gospel which you have
not accepted. He says, I fear that you might
bear with it. When somebody else comes preaching
another Jesus to you, another spirit, another gospel, my fear
is this, you're going to listen. That you're going to give him
space. John Gill rightly says this,
Believers ought not to connive at, indulge, or tolerate false
apostles. Don't tolerate them. That doesn't mean you go debate
them. Don't do that. You'll lose. There's no sense
in trying to debate people. Don't do that. Because debate
always requires some compromise somewhere. Right? It's why we
don't debate, it's why we preach. It's why we declare things, we
don't debate them. It's why we don't have an answer
and questions section of this. And believe me, this is what's
happening in these discipling groups, that stuff that's going
on now. Listen, it's what's happening,
a bunch of people get together, sharing their opinions. Until
one day somebody stands up and starts taking charge of that
group, and what has he done? He's made a church service out
of it. He's taken a pastorship to himself. It's not what it's
intended for. Believers, let us not be enticed
by evil seducers. Let us not be moved from the
simplicity, the singleness that is in Jesus Christ and him crucified. Paul said, he sent me not to
baptize, but do what? Preach the gospel. Why? It is the power
of God. unto salvation. What? Preaching. Preaching. Preaching. Not group
study. I'm sure that you get blessings
out of talking with each other, don't you? I think that's great.
You go over to each other's house and you talk about the gospel
and I'm sure you're blessed. I have no doubt that the Spirit
of God, Christ said two or three are gathered together, sure.
I'll be in your midst. Doesn't that happen? Doesn't
that happen? Sure it does. But this is the
means by which God saves people, through the preaching of the
gospel of Jesus Christ. That's the means. It is the power
of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth. What is it to
the world? What is what we're doing to the
world? What is this? It's foolishness. Paul said, it is foolishness
to them that perish. If this is foolishness, I want
you to understand, you're perishing. You're perishing. Preaching of the gospel is a
joy to the saints. It is a burden lifted. It's strength to my bones. Gives me courage. It gives me hope. Nothing like
the gospel to give me hope. I don't see much hope in this
world. I see sorrow, death and sickness, pain. I don't see any hope. My hope
is in Christ. Where do you hear that but the
gospel? You can't hear that anywhere else but preaching Christ. And
so let us not be enticed. And Paul says in verse 12, brethren,
I believe you, look at this and go back to your text, go back
to your text. Paul says in verse 12, brethren, notice he's calling
them brethren still, I beg you. Now Paul had a lot of authority,
didn't he? He received his message directly from the Lord Jesus
Christ. He had authority over things,
over spirits. He had authority over sickness
and different things God gave him to heal and God gave him
to do many wonderful works. And yet, listen to his heart. Please. Please. Don't go. I beg you. Listen to me, I beg
you. Be as I am. Why? Because I am as you are. These men, you gotta understand
their mindset. They wanted to be a Jew. That's
why they were being circumcised, wasn't it? These men came in
and said, you can't really be a Jew unless you're circumcised.
The gospel is good. We believe the gospel, too. We
believe salvation is by grace, too. But in order to be a real
Jew, you got to go through the ceremony of circumcision. And
Paul, being a Jew, says this. Don't be like them. Be like me. Why? Because I'm like you. What
is that? I am a sinner saved by grace. I am an heir of God through the
will and testament of God. I am an heir of God based on
what Christ has done for me. Just because you're circumcised
don't make you a Jew, a real Jew. Physically maybe, but not
spiritually. Be as I am. We must, as Paul has done throughout
this letter, constantly affirming this, that you do not mix grace
and works. You do not mix the covenant of
law with the covenant of grace. Brethren, be as I am. I am as
you are. He fears that if they continue
in this false gospel, they will be found apostates. And so he takes them at their
word, that they're brethren. And he says, be as I am, which
would you say I'm a Jew by birth, but now I am completely free
from the law. Be as I am. What? Free from the
law. I'm a Jew, but I'm free from
the law. Be as I am. Paul says in chapter
two, verse 19, for though I, but for I through the law am
dead to the law. Be as I am dead to the law. Dead
to the law. Because of Christ's perfect obedience
and offering, I am dead to the law. See how Paul, in love, desires
then unity rather than division. Unity rather than division. He
desires not to be an enemy but a brother, and yet in love, He
cannot compromise the truth to make this happen. He wants unity,
but not at the expense of the gospel. We want unity in the
church, but not at the expense or the compromise of the gospel
of Jesus Christ. So the only way we can be one
is to be in Christ together. We cannot be by the law or by
our religious deeds in unity. The only way to sever unity then
is to embrace the error of law and grace. That's the only thing
that separates us. Listen, I've listened to a lot
of debates among God's preachers, and I'm saying of God's preachers,
over extraneous doctrines that really nobody can grasp anyway.
And I've seen them divide over it. I've seen them call each
other heretics. It's got to stop. That's just
foolish nonsense. There's some things that we can
disagree on. Think about it. If somebody's
premillennial, you're going to call them a heretic. But I know
plenty of people that are premillennial that will call me a heretic,
because I don't believe in premillennialism. I don't. So they call me a heretic. Is that the gospel? It's not
the gospel at all. I'm not going to divide with
you over something like that. What we can divide over is this.
The only thing we divide over is this. If you're mixing works
with grace, we're going to divide. We're going to divide. I'll give
you an illustration of this. Two men I knew were pastors. And one was a very, very good
friend of mine. Actually, I knew both of them. This one pastor, he was pastor
of a church, and he got sick. And his best friend, brother
in Christ, they were best friends, and he said, brother, you can
step down, and I'll take over for you as pastor until you get
better. And when you get better, I'll
step down. And you could take back over where you left off.
And they agreed to this. And when the brother got better,
the other guy did not step down. He would not step down as pastor. Effectively stole his church.
Effectively stole it. Yet I guarantee you that that
man did not reject him as a friend. He maintained his friendship
for some, I know it had been over 40 years after, and would
not say an evil word against that man, would not do it. He
loved that man regardless of what pain he put him through.
He desired, he endeavored to keep the unity in the bond of
peace. He would not let that separate
them. But one day, the man was older, The man that stole the
church, he came back to the other brother and he and him were talking
and he said, brother, there's more in the gospel than Jesus
Christ. There's more in the word of God
than Jesus Christ. At that point, my brother began
to weep and he said, I cannot walk with you anymore. It was
at that point unity must have been separated. There must have
been made a division. Even so, we must constantly,
as he did before, endeavor to keep the unity until we get to
the point where they are clear of mixing law and grace, works
and grace. It's then we can no longer walk
with them. So we beseech all brethren who
have who have been seduced. And listen, we are capable, as
I've told you at the beginning, we're all capable of being seduced
by this. Don't think you can't. Again, I showed you two examples
already. The Apostle Peter in chapter
2 of Galatians, he was seduced by it. And even worse, in Acts,
the apostle Paul was seduced by it. So much so that he donned
the robes of a Nazarite, shaved his head, was walking to the
temple, and was about to sacrifice an animal before the Lord arrested
him. So if Paul could do it, can't
we? Can we not be seduced? We can't. This is why he said, take heed
to yourselves and to the flock. How do we do this? Constantly
preaching Christ and Him crucified. That's how. So that you're not seduced. And
if you are, listen, I'm telling you, I beg you, forsake it. If you're seduced by mixing law
and grace, you should forsake it. You should be as I am, free. Free from the law. I do not desire
to be entangled again by the yoke of bondage to you. I don't
have any desire for it. And that's a gift of God's grace.
That's a gift of his spirit. Be as I am free from the law,
free from the chains of my sin, free to believe on Christ, free
to love Christ and the brethren to be redeemed. only by the merits
and blood of Christ be as I am, a full-grown son and heir of
the kingdom of God." Isn't that a wonderful thing to ask? Be
as I am. Free. And listen, because I am as you
are, I don't have any different privileges than you. I don't
have any different benefits than you. We all have the same benefits. We are alike in Christ. We are
all chosen by eternal love. We are all redeemed by the same
blood. We are all called and regenerated
by the same spirit. We are kept by the same spirit
in faith until Christ comes. We all are the same. We all have
the same reward. Isn't this wonderful? I mean, you've got to shine the
light. We've got to shine the light on that so the enemy doesn't
creep in and start talking about varying rewards. We all have the same reward.
I'm an heir of God. Is there anything higher than
God? Is there anything greater than God? I'm an heir of God
and streets of gold. What? No, I'm an heir of God. What
else is there? God is all and I'm an heir of God. And so are
you. You believe on Christ. You're
an heir of God. What more you need? No varying rewards. Behold, now we are the sons of
God. But listen, if they will not
repent, we cannot compromise. We cannot compromise. If they
reject this, notice, look what Paul says, I'm going to have
to close. Look at what Paul says, be as I am, verse 12. Rather
than I beseech you, be as I am, for I am as you are. You have
not injured me at all. Listen, when they reject the
gospel, I feel pain. I feel rejected. I do, as a pastor. But Paul's explaining something
to me here. They're not rejecting me. They're
rejecting me. The superimposed works upon the
gospel of Jesus Christ. Now what I mean by this, this
idea of progressive sanctification is superimposing the law onto
grace. There's no cover for it. There's
no cover for it. There is this thing of spiritual
growth that has nothing to do with holiness. Our holiness was obtained by
the will of God, by the death of Christ, by the application
of the Spirit. We are sanctified by God. We
don't sanctify ourselves just like we don't justify ourselves.
It's like we don't make ourselves righteous by doing righteous
things. Every believer desires to live
holy and to be righteous. But my living holy and my being
righteous have nothing to do with my holiness or my righteousness. Christ is all my righteousness. And for instance, superimpose
that onto the gospel of grace. I can't compromise with it. I
won't. And so then to reject the gospel
is to reject Christ, not me. I believe he said that to Jeremiah.
He said, they have not rejected you. They rejected me. They rejected
me. We're just ambassadors. That's
all we are. We're just spokesmen for Christ.
So like Paul, we desire all to hear us. I desire that everyone
come to Christ. My heart's desire is that everyone
flee from false works, religion, that they cling to Christ. My desire is that everyone forsake
the false gospel of works, legalism for the gospel. But
I know this, if they reject it, it's not rejecting me. You've
not hurt me. You've not injured me. Why? Because I'm still an heir of
God. If you reject it or you don't,
that has nothing to do with my with my reward in Christ. It
has nothing to do with it. My inheritance is secure. You
don't injure me. I'll tell you this, you injure
yourself. You injure yourself. I think I'll stop here, but I
want to deal next with their zeal. How these false teachers
come in. And we dealt with this, and I'll
go back over what we've discussed and what I've preached to you,
that God uses preachers to do one thing, preach the word, preach
Christ. And they do this for a very,
we're called to do this for a very specific reason, so that false
religion cannot creep in. We shine the light of the gospel
of Christ so that false religion superimposing the law onto grace
cannot creep in. And when it does, when it does,
we're to constantly keep perpetually preaching Christ, being long-suffering
to those who go astray in hopes that they would return again,
in hopes that they would see the error and then come back
as Paul did. But I know this, if they continue
in that, there's only apostasy. There's only apostasy. And so
I pray that God would keep us in this, that God keep me in
the word to preach Christ to you always. That's always my
intent here, is that you should believe on Jesus Christ, that
you should look to Him, not to me. I'm not seeking you to follow
me. I want you to follow Christ.
I want you to believe on Christ. I want you to love Him, serve
Him, honor Him, magnify Him. And we do this through the preaching
of the gospel constantly. Do not be moved from the simplicity
that is in Christ. I pray God will bless it. I know
it wasn't as ordered as I want it to be, but I sure hope the
Lord will order it in your mind and heart. And I believe we'll
pick up here next meet. Let's stand and be dismissed
in prayer. Can't dismiss perfectly.