Galatians chapter 1. I titled this message, Only One Gospel. There's only one gospel. Now there are many so-called
gospels being preached that are not the Gospel. And I thank God, and I do believe
this, and I believe this according to the Word of God, that we have
the Gospel here. I'll tell you why later on. But
we do have it. Paul writes to the churches of
Galatia concerning their departure from the gospel. Remember, it's
far different letter than the one he wrote to the church at
Thessalonica. He commended them. He said, you
are an example. You have become an example. I
don't even have to tell people about you. You are our epistle
known and read, he says, of all men. You've departed from your
idols. You worship the Lord Jesus Christ. The gospel came to you in such
power And what a different letter than here in Galatia. He says, you have departed from
the gospel to a, and I like the way the Amplified puts it. The
Amplified calls it a renegade gospel. And that's exactly what
it is. Another gospel is a renegade
gospel. And it's astounding how this
can happen. But it can. You know, the Lord allowed this
to happen. And I was thinking about this
as I was preparing this. This is a young church. You know, this is as far as what
we are. We know now for 2000 years, its
church is in its infancy there. And they didn't have what you
and I have. We have the complete word of
God. They didn't have that. And they had so soon, Paul was
so marveled at this, they so soon removed from the gospel.
They left the gospel. And it's a marvel to us when
we consider that the apostle Paul, the apostle to the Gentiles,
preached the gospel to them, the churches were established,
and no doubt there were miracles and signs done by him. seen by
these churches. But after he left, and he warned
of this in his other epistles, he said certain brethren will
enter in. They'll enter in. Satan is not quiet very long. Not quiet very long. It's like
when Todd asked me how things were going here when I first
came here. Todd said, how are things going? I said, great.
He said, well, it won't last. I said, you pessimistic rascal.
It has lasted. But I understand what he's saying.
You're going to have conflict. Satan's not quiet for long. He hates when the gospel is preached
and God gets the glory and sinners are saved. They're taken from
His kingdom and translated and delivered into the kingdom of
God's dear Son. He hates that. The Pharisees
were a good example of that. Every time the Lord healed somebody,
if He did it on a Sabbath day, they hated Him for it. Can you
imagine hating someone for giving sight to a person? and able the
lame to walk, the blind to see. You know when the Lord raised
Lazarus from the dead? You know later on they wanted
to kill him? They wanted to kill him because the Lord Jesus Christ
got so much attention over that. They wanted to kill Lazarus.
They were upset with Lazarus. If they can't get to Christ,
we'll get to his servants, his messengers. So Paul here, he's
just writing about them departing from the gospel to a renegade
gospel. Now the first verse in this epistle,
it's of the utmost importance. For if Paul is not an apostle,
which was one of the charges laid against him by those Judaizers,
that he was not a real apostle because he didn't walk with the
Lord when the others did, He didn't have their approval. In
other words, Simon and all those others, they didn't say, Paul
is an apostle. And so they charged, they laid
these charges against Paul that he was just a phony, a phony. And so for the first part of
this letter, Paul has to defend his apostleship, that it's of
God and not of men. And so he says here, Paul, an
apostle, not of men. I did not receive my apostleship
from men. Those false Judaizers, they claimed
that there were some who came and claimed to be apostles, and
they claimed that they had the approval of the apostles. Well,
Paul says, my approval is not of men. It doesn't matter. It
doesn't matter. My approval is of God and of
Jesus Christ. My credentials are from Him.
Not from anyone else. He didn't try to lay claim. You
know, he wasn't name-dropping. You know how people like to name-drop
when they go somewhere? Well, I know so-and-so, and we're
friends, and all this, that, and the other. He wasn't in the name-dropping.
I tell you, the names he dropped is God Almighty and Jesus Christ. And I pray that it's so that
I'm here Not because, not really, not because you called me, though
you did, but not because you called me, but because God did. God put me here. God put me here. So that's why this is so important. He said, I am an apostle. I'm
an apostle. He sets forth his apostleship
as being from the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the Mediator,
the Lord, and God the Father, which shows their agreement.
He's showing that they are in agreement over His apostleship. You know, it's sad that Paul
has to establish this all over again. It's sad that he's got
to do this. But one of the very tactics of
Satan is to discredit a man's character. You just destroy his character.
That's what politicians do. Don't you hate it when it starts
coming around to time to vote? All these ads on television.
Couldn't I? I mean, it's just mudslinging,
slandering, digging up dirt. as if they didn't have as much
dirt as the rest of them. The whole human race is dirty.
What are you talking about? The tactics haven't changed. They've not changed. They've
not changed. But he says here he's an apostle of the Lord Jesus
Christ. He's a special messenger, a son
of God. You know that the Lord is called
an apostle? over in Hebrews 3.1. He's called the Jesus Christ,
our Apostle and High Priest. He's called an Apostle. First
of all, there's no office in the church He does not hold and
He's not the head of. No office. And secondly, He was
sent by the Father. Jesus Christ was sent by the
Father and He received His message from God the Father. Did He not
say, as I hear, I speak? As I hear, I speak." You know,
Paul received his message from the Lord Jesus Christ. He didn't
just sit down and just write things out. He received his message
from the Lord. And so Paul makes it very clear
that he is an apostle, regardless of what they say. You know, if
a man... and here's something I want to
throw out here. If God calls a man to the ministry, as a pastor,
evangelist, missionary, we are to be very careful how we speak
about that man. Very careful. He's God's anointed
man to the church. We don't put him on a pedestal
and worship him, but we do speak well of him, and we are aware
of the position the man holds because God put him there. Remember
David? David would not touch Saul. Remember
when he had him in the cave? David had him. David could have
cut his throat and ended it right there. He could have took care
of his enemy right there. But he cut off his skirt and
he took it with him and he stood up on the hill and he showed
it to him. And they wanted him, the people that was with him,
they wanted him to kill him. He wanted David to kill him. But
you know what David said? He said, it's not right to touch
the Lord's anointed. Paraphrase. It's not right to
touch the Lord's anointed. He's your enemy, but I don't
care. God put him there. God put him there. You know,
Paul apologized for calling the high priest a whited wall. And
they slapped Paul, and they said, don't you know he's the high
priest? And Paul apologized. He apologized. He said, I didn't
know that. And he says this, for it is written, thou shalt
not speak evil of the ruler of thy people, even though he might
be an evil man. You know, the word of God says
this, and it takes a lifetime to learn it. Speak evil of no
man. Boy, that keeps down a lot of
trouble. Speak evil of no man, even though he may deserve it.
He said, speak evil of no man. We've lost this kind of respect
in our day. We've lost it. We've lost it. And I admit that those in authority
bring a lot of it on themselves, but we don't have to be like
them. We respect the office that God
set up. We respect it. Brits of God. Now in verse 2, Paul includes
the brethren that are with him, showing their solidarity in the
gospel. You know, if I was going to write
someone, I'd write one of these other pastors, I'd say, the church
here at Bethel says hello. They send their love. I can't
tell you how many times I go everywhere I preach and they
say, we send our love back to the church. Tell the church we
love them. I get that all the time. Tell
them we love them. The apostle Paul was not a glory
hog. He says, now they weren't helping him write the epistle,
he wrote this himself. God moved him by, you know, he
was moved by the Holy Spirit. But he includes the brethren
to show their solidarity. And then in verse three, Paul
invokes the grace and peace of God to them before he takes them
to task. Isn't this a way to handle a
situation? Boy, I mean, This is how we ought to handle
a tough situation. Before he takes them to task,
before he really brings it to their attention how wicked what
they're doing is, he says, grace and peace to you. He shows no
animosity. In correcting them, He's showing
no animosity toward them. He's not calling them names.
He's not telling them how stupid it is. He's just saying, Grace,
in peace to you, because first of all, if grace is not at work
here, this is going to fall on deaf ears. This correction is
going to fall on deaf ears. Grace and peace from God the
Father and the Lord Jesus Christ through whom they come. Grace
and peace comes to us through Him. We are saved by grace. The
Scripture says, "...by grace are ye saved." We are saved by
grace. We are kept by grace. We live
throughout this world by grace, and we enter into glory by grace.
It's always by grace. See, they left grace. They left
it. He tells us that later on in
the chapter. You have fallen from grace. It's always by grace. Never leave
grace. It is through the grace of Christ
that His righteousness reigns. His righteousness reigns to us
through His grace. And Paul sets the tone of this
letter by first mentioning grace and peace before he corrects
them. But notice how Paul lays the groundwork here in dealing
with this problem. He says, grace and peace be to
you from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ to whom grace
and peace comes to you. And he lays just briefly here. This is so powerful. This is
so powerful. You know, I realize in reading
the scripture sometimes how we could read over things so many
times that's so powerful. who gave Himself for us, who gave Himself for our sins,
that He might deliver us from this present evil world according
to the will of God and our Father. Paul briefly lays out the gospel
substitution again that he preached to them so ably. And he briefly lays it out in
this. who gave himself for our sins. They're gone. So why add anything
to it? Why would we add anything to
the gospel of substitution? He gave himself for our sins
and now they're gone. They're gone. We don't need to
add anything to the gospel. It's enough. It's enough. And he says this also here, who
gave himself for our sins, he's saying this also is this. This
is the gospel you are leaving. You're leaving it. You're turning
away from it. Christ gave himself for our sins. Don't you ever leave the gospel
of substitution. It's the foundation of our hope.
We have no hope if we leave this foundation. We have none. Christ
did not give silver and gold, He gave Himself for our sins. He died for our sins. They are
gone. And that's the only way they
are gone. It's the only way. It says in Hebrews 1 that He
by Himself purged us from our sins. They are gone. And this being so, we don't need
to add anything to it. Not only did He purge us from
our sins, listen, He did this that He might deliver us from
this present evil world. I never saw the world as evil. I saw some evil in it. I saw some evil in it. I saw
some evil people in it. I saw some people in it that
were doing wicked. And when God saved me, I saw
myself in the mirror, that I was part of it. That I was just as
much a part of it as anyone on this earth. I was a part of the
evil. That's so. That's so. And I saw it. I saw it. But now here's what I see. I
see that the world as a whole is evil. Now, the world doesn't
want to hear that. People don't want to hear that.
But you can't deny the Word of God, and of course, you know,
you who believe, you don't deny the experience of it. God made it known to you. That He might deliver us from
this present evil world, this world's evil to the core. The
only way to escape it is through the Lord Jesus Christ, Christ
and Him crucified. That's the only way to escape
by His power, by His blood, and by His righteousness. We can
escape this present evil world. It says over in Colossians 1
that He delivered us from the kingdom of darkness into the
kingdom of His dear Son. We live in another kingdom, a
spiritual kingdom, a very real kingdom, very real. It's one of the things I was
talking to my two grandkids that was over to the house this past
couple weeks. One of the things we were talking
is that this world, this spiritual world, is very real. You know,
especially when you're young and you're growing up, you just
don't see anything else existing but this one. You don't see,
you know, scientists out, are there aliens out there? Are there
people on, is there another planet out there? I'll tell you what's
out there. A spiritual world. A spiritual world, and it's very
real. Just as real as this one. Just as real. And the Lord Jesus
Christ is over all of it. He's over all of it. He's over
all the evil spirits, and they're very real. And he's over all
the angels, the elect angels. He's over it. Thank God he's
over it. It's not like there's a battle,
you know, shooting at each other and trying to win. The battle's
over, he's already won it. I think I put that in a bulletin.
It's one of the great encouragement of a soldier of Christ is this.
The battle has already been won before the first shot was fired. but he's gonna deliver us from
this present evil world. If you and I could really see,
if we could really see into that world right now, we
would want out of this one. If the doctor said, you got cancer,
you got six months to live, you'd say, that's too long. I honestly
think you would. You'd say, that's just too long
to live in this world. If you and I could really see,
We have glimpses of it in the Word of God. You go and read
Revelation 21, no more sorrow, no more tears, no more pain. God will be their God. It's a
perfect world, and it's very real. Very real. And He delivered us from this
present evil world, and that being so means He's delivered
us into that world. We're not in purgatory. There
ain't no purgatory. We're either in this one or that
one. And this deliverance is according
to the will of God. Our salvation in Christ is according
to the will of God. It's not of him that willeth
nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy. Of God that showeth mercy. It's
according to the will of God. Now, to turn from Christ is to
turn from the will of God. To turn from the gospel is to
turn from the will of God. And it's to turn on God. Serious
matter. It can't be any more serious
than what Paul's dealing with right here. And he says, to whom
be glory forever and ever. All glory belongs to God, and
to turn from the gospel that He sent to you is to turn from
His glory to your own glory. And boy, we by nature are good
at that. We are good at glorifying ourselves.
Just give somebody five minutes. And you'll find out. Just give
us five minutes. You'll find out what we really
glory in, apart from the gospel, apart from Christ. But now here's
the problem. I marvel, he says, I marvel,
I'm astonished, I'm bewildered that you're so soon, so soon
removed from Him that called you into the grace of Christ
to another gospel. How quickly things can change.
This is why it is so important that when you have a body of
believers like this, you have a pastor. I know a place right
now that does not have one. And I was telling the young man
who was talking to me about it, I said, you've got to have a
pastor. You've got to have a pastor.
Satan will slip in. The more that I tell you, he'll
slip in. How quickly? Things change. And notice the seriousness of
the charge here. Removed from him. They did not change in some
doctrines. Think about this. They didn't
change the doctrines Paul preached to them. They just added to it. The Judaizers came in and they
added circumcision back in. They took some of these ceremonies
of the law and they incorporated them into Christianity, into
the gospel, into this thing of salvation. You know, it's all
right, you can believe on Christ, but now you're in trouble. I'll tell you what but is, now
you're in trouble. You're removed from Him. You
know, for me to interject anything into the gospel other than the
truth, I mean, the true gospel is to be removed from Christ.
I'm removing you from Him that called you. That's how serious
this is. They didn't see it coming. They
didn't see this happening. They didn't see anything wrong
with it. But it was death. There was poison in the potage,
in the soup. There was poison in the soup.
There was a fly in the ointment. Removed. He didn't change their
doctrine, he just added to it. And in doing so, they were removed
from Christ, the only Savior. Here's what they were removed
from. Grace alone, Christ alone, His
righteousness alone, His blood alone, faith alone. They were
removed from that. He said, well, we just added
circumcision, that's all. You just destroyed the Gospel.
You just destroyed it. We stand by the grace of God
in Jesus Christ alone. When we come up to die, it's
not believing on Christ and, you know, I went to church every
Sunday, I didn't miss at all. It might have been better for
you to miss some. So you wouldn't be relying on that, is what I'm
saying. you wouldn't be relying on your attendance. You know,
there's a lot of false gospels being preached. And that day,
the Judaizers came, and they tried to introduce circumcision,
and they tried to introduce some ceremonies that they kept at
that time. In our day, Satan knows where
you and I live. He knows where we live. So he'll
take where we live and start using that. And in our day, one
of the false gospels now, it's false. is that Jesus Christ died to
save everybody. That's false. That's false. Me and, several years ago, me
and, we were both younger. We got into a discussion. I started
witnessing the gospel to him and he started telling me, no,
that's not the way it is. He died to give everybody a chance.
I mean, that's what he's telling me. He died to give everybody
a chance. I said, no. And then I said, look, I stopped
the conversation. I said, you and I don't believe
the same gospel. We don't believe the same God. We don't believe
on the same Jesus Christ. They're not the same. And that
was the end of our discussion and we haven't talked about it
since. That's the truth. He thought
I was being too dogmatic. You know, when it comes to truth,
dogmatic or not, you cannot, there's no gray area in truth.
Truth is truth. That's the way it is. That's
just, that's how it is. And they turn to another gospel. And Paul said, which is not another?
He said, there's only one. There's only one. There's only
one gospel, and it's of God. It's of God. Now what sets the
gospel of God apart from all other supposed gospels? Why do
I believe that this is the gospel that we preach here and that
in other places, and I was taken to task Someone tried to take
me to task here not too long ago over this. Why do you believe
everybody else is wrong and you're right? Well, I don't believe
everybody else is wrong. I think if they preach the gospel,
they're right too. If they preach the gospel, they're right. But if you're preaching another
gospel, you're wrong. But let me give you this. What
sets the gospel of God apart from all other supposed gospels?
First of all, the gospel we preach here gives God all the glory
and salvation, doesn't it? I'm not preaching Christ and
then saying, now, the rest is up to you. Now, you've got to
take the next step. No, I'm preaching the salvation
of the Lord from Alpha to Omega, right? That gives God all the
glory. He's getting all the glory. One
of the ways to judge a message is who gets the glory at the
end of the message. Who are you thinking about when
you live? And then, the gospel we preach here, it tells the
truth about man. We don't sugarcoat it. We tell
the truth about man. None good, no, not one. We tell the truth here from the
Word of God. Now listen, from the Word of God, and this is
one thing I have noticed, because one conversation I had with this
one gentleman some years ago, he couldn't use any scripture. I was able to take the Word of
God, this book right here, I was able to take this Word, and I
was able to go to Genesis, Exodus, and right on through. The revelation. I could take this word and prove
to you the gospel I'm preaching. And not take it out of context.
Leave it in context. This book, the gospel we preach
here, teaches that man is depraved and he's spiritually dead. Isn't
that right? He's spiritually dead. He doesn't have an ounce
of the life of God in him. He's spiritually dead. That's
why there's no interest. You know, I want to ask anyone
who does not believe, why is it you have no interest? Can
you answer that question? Can you answer the question why
you have no interest? Can you answer the question why
you never think of God through the week? You never think of
the Lord Jesus Christ. The reason I can say this, because
that was me. God never crossed my mind. Salvation
never crossed my mind. until God saved me. I'm telling
you, there's not a day goes by I don't think of the Lord. And
I'm not trying to. I am not trying to, you know,
I've got to think of the Lord today. I'm not even trying to.
It just happens. It happens. It tells the truth. The gospel
we preach here tells the truth about Jesus Christ, who he is,
what he did, who he did it for, where he is now. It's not just saying His name,
Jesus Christ. Well, believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ. Well, tell me about Him. I mean, I could throw any name
out here and tell you to believe on Him. You'd say, well, who
is He? Isn't that what Paul said? Who is He? Who is He, Lord? No,
that's what that blind man said. Who is He, Lord? Listen, the gospel we preach
here tells how God can be a just God and a Savior. How God can
save me and you and still be God. It gives real hope to real
sinners. Do you have real hope? I do.
As sinful as I am, as sinful as I still am, I have a real
hope of standing in glory because of that man Jesus Christ. And
then it's the only gospel that will keep you saved. I know some who believe you can
be saved one day and then lost, saved, lost. It's like picking that daisy.
She loves me, she loves me not, she loves me, she loves me. You
better hope the last one is she loves you. Of course, what you
do, you pick up another daisy and keep on going until you get
it right. You get what you want out of it. But that's exactly
what it is to this thing of you can be saved and lost, saved
and lost. And eternal security is not that I accepted Christ
as my personal Savior. Eternal security is that God
chose me in Christ and accepted me in Christ. It says in Ephesians
1, He hath made us accepted in the Beloved. He did that. He
did that. And I tell you what, the gospel
we preach here agrees with the Old Testament scripture. It's
not new. It's not new. We're not saying
anything new. And as Paul says here, and I'll close, "...which
is not another, but there be some that trouble you, and would
pervert the gospel of Christ." They twist like Satan did in
the garden, and he's still doing it. He's still doing it. He's
taken the name of Jesus Christ, and he's putting a twist on it.
Putting a twist on his person, putting a twist on his work. I tell you what, it don't take
much of a twist. You know, you can have just a little bit of
a twist of something, it's not straight no more. It's not straight
any more. You don't have to have this great
big twist. Just a little. Just a little. And here's how
serious it is. But though we or an angel from
heaven preach any other gospel unto you, than that which you
have preached unto you, let him be accursed. Paul said, let him
perish. You say, that's pretty strong,
just like that man I was talking to. I mentioned a certain preacher,
a certain TV preacher. I said, that man doesn't preach
the gospel at all. He said, I wouldn't say that. Well, if you knew the
gospel, you would. If you knew the gospel, you'd
say that. It was Jimmy Swaggart I was talking about. I said,
he don't preach the gospel at all. That man wouldn't know the gospel
if he took a two-by-four and hit him with it. That's the truth. I could mention others. And he said, you can't say it.
I said, yes I can. Yes I can. And Paul says, though we are
an angel from heaven, if Gabriel came here, I'm just
using this as an example, if Gabriel came here right now and
preached another gospel, let him go to hell too. Let him be
accursed. That's what he's saying. If we
are an angel. Preach any other gospel unto you than that which
you have preached, let it be a curse. As we said before, so
say I now again, if any man preach any other gospel unto you than
that which you have received, let it be a curse. You know Satan
comes to us as an angel of light. You know what he says, any other,
or even if an angel. Satan, his ministers come to
us as ministers of righteousness. You know, I mean, in most places,
you hear most of these places, you go in here and go and preach,
and you talk about sin and wickedness. You know what they think of?
They think of the honky-tonks. They think of prostitution, drugs,
alcohol. You know what that is? That's
just men and women being who they are. The real danger is
standing in the pulpit. getting false converts, giving
them false hope and false peace, and they wake up some day and
Christ says, depart from me, I never knew you. I pray God, keep the gospel here
and keep it pure. Keep it pure. It's amazing, Paul said, I marvel,
I marvel that you are so soon removed, now listen, from Him. You've left him. You've left
him. You didn't just change a little
bit in your doctrine. You didn't just add a little
here, a little there. You left Christ. You left him, and there's
no hope. There's no hope apart from him.
We'll pick this up in Bible class next week. All right. We'll close with number 485,
the violinist's end.