help us to praise father all
glorious or all victorious come and reign over us ancient of
days jesus our lord scatter our enemies and make
them fall let thy almighty aid our sure defense be made our
souls on thee we say Lord, hear our call. Come Thou incarnate Word, gird
on Thy mighty sword, our prayers attend. Come and Thy people bless,
and give thy word success, Spirit of holiness, on us descend. Come, Holy Comforter, thy sacred
witness bear, in this glad hour. Thou who almighty art, now rule
in every heart, and there from us depart spirit of power. To the Great One in Three Eternal
Praises be His evermore His Sovereign Majesty May we in glory see And
to eternity love and adore. Amen, we pray that be so. Turn
now if we will back to hymn number 15 in the Gatsby. Hymn number 15. How shall I praise the Eternal
God, that infinite, infinite unknown? Who can ascend His high above,
Or venture near His throne? Heaven's brightest lamps with
Him compared, How mean they look and dim! The holy angels have
no spots, Yet can't compare to Him Holy is He in all His works
And truth is His delight But sinners and their wicked ways
Shall perish from His sight None but his favorites may draw near,
Who stand in Christ complete. Those holy ones shall all appear,
And worship at his feet. In Jesus' image shining bright,
with rapture they adore the holy, holy, holy Lord in glory evermore. Right. Anybody have a song that
you'd like to sing in the hymn book? 42 in the middle book. 42 in the
blue. 42. Here's my hope and consolation. 42. In myself I have no merit Nothing
good have I to give That a holy, just, and perfect God could ever
let me live Sin defiles my best performance Guilty, violent,
ruined I am Yet my heart breaks in repentance By God's grace
I see the Lamb See the Lamb of God our Savior Bearing all our
sin and shame By eternal love and favor Jesus died bearing
our blame. Bruised and wounded and forsaken,
as our substitute he died. It is finished and forgiven. Justice now is satisfied. Here's my hope and consolation
Jesus died for sinners' sake Trusting Him I have salvation
And the cup of blessing take All is well, I cannot doubt it
God who gave his Son for me Rules this world and all things in
it For my good eternally So I'll trust my God and Savior Though
my joy is mixed with pain He is worthy, worthy ever, that
in me His peace should reign. Faith in such a great Redeemer
gives my soul a blessed calm. Christ is near, He's my protector. He will keep me from all harm. All right, does anybody else
have one that you'd like to sing? All right, how about hymn number 11? We'll sing that. That'll be the
last. Sounds like my voice is not going
to hang on very long. hymn number 11 in the Gatsby,
I'm sorry, in the Gatsby book. Hymn number 11, sing this to
the tune of How Far My Foundation. Thy mercy, my God, is the theme
of my song. The joy of my heart and the boast
of my tongue, Thy free grace alone, from the first to the
last, Has won my affections and bound my soul fast. Thy mercy in Jesus exempts me
from hell. Its glories I'll sing and its
wonders I'll tell. T'was Jesus my friend when he
hung on the tree. You opened the channel of mercy
for me. Without Thy sweet mercy, I could
not live here. Sin soon would reduce me to utter
despair. But through thy free goodness
my spirit's revived, And he that first made me still keeps me
alive. Thy mercy is more than a match
for my heart, which wanders to feel its own hardness depart. Dissolved by thy goodness I fall
to the ground And weep to the praise of the mercy I found The
door of thy mercy He stands open all day to the poor and the needy
who knock by the way. No sinner shall ever be empty,
sent back Who comes seeking mercy for Jesus' sake. Great Father of mercies, thy
goodness I own, and the covenant love Of thy crucified Son All
praise to the Spirit Whose whisper divine Steals mercy and pardon
And righteousness mine That's what we talked about. All right. Back in Galatians chapter four,
slowly, but surely working our way through this letter. Galatians chapter four. We're
going to be still in the same passages, scriptures that we've
been looking at for the last two or three weeks. We're going to continue looking
and pick up where we left off last week about looking at this
law and how it is the, excuse me, that is the, uh, elements
of this world, of the rudiments and the elements of this world. The elements that hold us in
bondage. And we'll continue to look at
the law. I mentioned last week at the
end of the message that this week I wanted to look and go
through, at least starting in the New Testament, we can go
back to the Old Testament and look at a few things as well.
But mainly here in the New Testament, we read of Of course, a lot of
this stuff was revealed or made manifest after the New Covenant
was sealed by Christ's blood. And we begin to read of more revealed
understanding of God's work of salvation and his purpose and
plan in the New Testament. And so whenever we go back and
read the Old Testament, although we get a lot of understanding
and knowledge It's definitely God's Word. I don't slight the
Old Testament. I will be honest, I probably
spend more time studying in the New Testament than I do in the
Old Testament. But the Old Testament is nowhere near inferior to the
New Testament in the regards that it's God's Word. It's God's
Word all the way through and is equally important. The Bible
says all scripture is given by inspiration of God and it's profitable.
So we need the Old Testament as well. However, for what we
are looking at today and have been looking at the last few
weeks, we want to see that New Testament understanding of what
that Old Testament law was given to us for and find out what our
understanding is. How are we as the children of
God, if we are Christ's children, if we are the elect of God, if
we are children of grace, What is our relationship to the law
now? That mosaic law, the Old Testament
law that God had given, all however many there was there, 600, 700
or whatever there was. What is our relation to that
as children of grace? Whenever we have been preached
the gospel that God has given us repentance and faith, and
we have been converted from our old way of thinking of self-righteousness
for God's acceptance, to seeing that Christ has given us a righteousness,
that he has done everything for us and on our behalf, and that
he has called and given us faith to believe on that for our salvation,
to believe on that as our salvation, not to get our salvation. We
don't ever believe to get salvation. We believe because we have been
saved. And we believe on him as our
salvation. He has done it all for us. And
so there is a difference between that. One is a act of works and
the other is a part of faith that Christ has given us, is
to look away from ourselves and our self-righteousness and our
law keeping. So as we looked last week, we
began to see that as immature or as children, we have a We have an understanding that
is still governed by, as the Bible says here, being in bondage
to the elements of this world, to the rudimentary, the elementary
things of knowledge. Okay. The Bible says that the
child of grace is going to grow in the grace and the knowledge
of the Lord Jesus Christ, that the Holy Spirit is going to be
our teacher and he is given to lead us into all knowledge. and
all understanding of the word of God. It's vastness is there
and listen, you know, as long as I've been studying the Bible,
I'm still learning things. I'm still growing in my understanding
of God's word and things that I thought I knew I find that
I was wrong in and how I have to be corrected by God's word
or thankfully by brothers and sisters who may love me enough
to pull me aside and say, hey, have you taken a look at this?
Have you thought about this? and gently corrected and came
to me in love by telling me the right thing to look at in God's
word. And so we grow as, when we first
come into the knowledge of Christ and we are as like children in
the knowledge of Christ, as we begin to grow, we begin to put
away that childish understanding and we begin to take on a mature
understanding of God's word. And that is what Paul is conveying
here. He's conveyed that knowledge, as I mentioned last week, into
the Corinthian church as it pertained to the spiritual gifts or the,
should I say, the special gifts that God had given to the church
for a certain purpose and a certain amount of time in establishing
the New Testament church. And so Paul has used this language
before of a child, But let's read our passages then, we'll
read verse one, and we're gonna read down to verse nine. It says, now I say that the heir,
as long as he is a child, differeth nothing from a servant, though
he be lord of all. But as under tutors and governors
until the time appointed of the father, even so we, when we were
children, were in bondage under the elements of the world. Now
see that where it says even so, he's making a comparison there.
He said, in the natural understanding of things, children are not anything
different than servants. They're under tutors and governors.
These children of mine, the Lord has given them to me for a certain
amount of time. Then at some point, the Lord
may take them out to be married and to start a family of their
own. Until then, they're under my headship. They're in my family,
and it's my responsibility to care for them, to nurture them,
and admonish them in the things of the Lord. And so that is my
responsibility to do and to teach them and to discipline them. That's part of the growing process. That's part of the maturing process
is to discipline children. Sometimes my children don't obey.
I have to discipline them. We have to do something to discipline
them, whether it's spanking them or taking something away that
they like whatever the case might be, there has to be discipline
there. And that discipline reminds them
whenever I spank my child, now they're all older now and it's,
you know, it's a, I don't do much spank, we don't do much
spanking anymore. It's more like taking Fortnite
away. That hurts them worse than spanking does. But anyway, the
discipline, whenever we discipline the child, whether it's spanking
or whatever it is, That is to remind you that you did not keep
the rules, right? Every time that child was spanked,
he was reminded, this was the rule, you broke the rule, you
didn't keep the rule, you must be punished. The law of God was
given so that it might show us, and we'll see that today in some
verses that we'll read, the law of God was never given to make
us obedient. The law that was given to my
kids, even though that law is something that I desired for
them to do, that I wanted for them to do, I know that because
my children are children, they are going to disobey. If any
parent thinks that their children has the capacity to not disobey,
they are madly mistaken. Children will disobey because
they are sinners by nature. They are sinners by nature and
they are going to disobey. People will sin against God because
our natures are sinful. And they will break God's laws. There is nothing that we can
do to stop that. Nobody can keep themselves from
sinning. The Bible says it's impossible.
And so, what is the purpose then of the law? Well, we've seen
that the purpose of the law has been given to manifest that sin
that we have, to show us How sinful we are. To show us that
in all your efforts, if you break, at the very least one, which
we've broken many, at the very least broken one, you're guilty
of breaking every commandment that God has ever given, and
that your sentence is death. The wages of sin is death. If
you sin one sin, that's your sentence is death. If Jesus does
not save you, that is your sentence. And so the law is there to show
us, to prove us that we did not keep the law and that punishment
is coming. Okay? The gospel is for the child
of grace because nobody can understand or receive the gospel except
that they be born from above, that they have the spirit of
God in them. the spirit that has given them the ability to
understand spiritual things. And whenever it's there and it
grants repentance and faith to understand that that law is pressing
down in condemnation against me, then they look towards Christ
for salvation. They look to Him for mercy. They look to Him for grace. They
look to Him as their salvation. And so the law for the child
of grace is a schoolmaster that pushes them or teaches them or
reveals to them their need for Christ. And so that's the purpose
of the law. The law was never made or given
to make anybody righteous, to never cause anybody to be justified. You know, if Adam would have
continued to, you know, if he wouldn't have ate that tree right
then, which there's no way he could not have because that was
God's ordaining thing for Adam. But if Adam would have obeyed
that and he continued to live forever, he still would not have
been saved. Because God had ordained that
man be made by nature to be of the earth earthy, to be incapable. And Adam would have failed, period.
He would have failed into sin and death eventually because
that was God's ordained pattern, ordained purpose. in bringing
many sons to glory through the redemption which is in Christ
Jesus. So, let's look. Even so, we, when we were children,
were in bondage under the elements of the world, under the rudimentary
things. And we've seen that last week in talking about the law.
But when the fullness of the time was come, God sent forth
his son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them
that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption
of sons. So he was made under the law.
He was under all the things that the law had prescribed, and he
kept every one of those. He did not break any law of God. He obeyed all the law of God
on our behalf, for us, so that we would receive the adoption
of sons. So the only way that we could
be considered sons or be sons is because of our union with
Christ, right? And the only way we could be
in union with Christ is if we have been set apart by God and
have been redeemed of God to have been his people, we owed
a price, he had to pay it. And so he went and paid the price
on our behalf so that God could be the just and the justifier. God cannot be just if he justifies
sinners. And we are sinners. Yes, we were
united to Christ before we ever sinned. That was our spiritual
life that was in Christ, hidden with God before the foundation
of the world. That part, that part of me, that existence of
me, that spirit life that is in Christ Jesus, that never sinned. It didn't have any sin. But this
body of flesh, it would have sinned. And God in that covenant
of grace with Christ was gonna redeem the people that would
inhabit these earthly vessels of clay that could not keep the
law of God and would break the law of God. So he in that covenant,
covenanted within the Godhead to save this people who would
be inside this body of flesh, that this old man, this Adamic
man, might be able to receive the adoption of sons that we
might be able to see. In light of the fact that we
see ourselves breaking the law over and over and over and over
again, we can count ourselves Abraham's seed, heirs according
to the promise that we might know what is freely given to
us. That is why we received the spirit
of God and the spirit of adoption. The spirit of adoption is that
spirit that comes within us that tells us that we are his children,
okay? And so we look to Christ and
he gives us that assurance by the spirit that is in us, not
by anything we do outwardly. He says, to redeem them that
were under the law that we might receive the adoption of children
because ye are sons. See, we were already sons. God
had sent forth the spirit of his son into your hearts crying
of a father. He sent the spirit into us so
that we might cry out to God as our father. Wherefore thou art no more a
servant in our understanding, but a son. And if a son, then
an heir of God through Christ, how be it then when ye knew not
God, ye did service unto them, which by nature are no gods.
But now after that ye have known God or rather are known of God,
how turn ye again to the weak and beggarly elements, whereunto
ye desire again to be in bondage. So Paul here is telling this
Galatian church or churches, he's saying, you know, whenever
you were in ignorance, whenever you were as like a servant, when
you were, when you knew not God, you did service unto them which
by nature are no God, whenever you were in ignorance, You were
running around listening to all this jive about keeping the law
for righteousness, keeping the law for salvation, all this stuff
that you were doing. He's saying, but now that you
know the gospel, you've been preached the gospel, you believe
the gospel, received that for yourself and counted yourself
children of God. How now are you wanting to turn
back to that which you were in bondage to that you've been set
free from and why are you wanting to go back in there to continue
to walk in for righteousness sake when you've learned that
righteousness doesn't come that way. Paul's saying this is really
crazy for you to do that. And so that's why I want to talk
today about what does the New Testament say about the law and
why Paul is telling him you're crazy if you think that way. You're crazy, child of grace.
to think to go back under the law is something that is going
to be good or beneficial to you. And there are so many preachers
out there today that are admonishing their churches, that are admonishing
the people of God that they have to keep these laws in order to
be right before God or to be right with God. And listen, there
may even be some that's out there, I know there are some out there,
that preach that you have to keep these laws to get saved,
to be saved. If you don't keep these laws,
you're not saved. Lordship salvation people out there teaching that
you've accepted Jesus as your savior, but you've not accepted
him as your Lord. If you're not out there and keeping
the law and being in obedience to him, then that shows that
he's really not, he's not really saved you. Otherwise you would
have this big life change to where you've becoming more and
more and more holy like Christ. And brethren, the Bible says
that we can't be, our flesh is just flesh and never will please
God. I know I've said that a million times since we started through
Galatians, but I'll probably say it a million and five more.
Okay. I'm hoping that the spirit teaches
us that, that we cannot please God through our law keeping. We have to trust on the Lord
for our law keeping. That's where our only hope is
at. is to trust, our only hope is not in our trusting, but our
hope is in the Lord and what He has done. And He's given us
the Spirit so that we can trust that. And don't let the conscience
be sullied or be clouded with the fact that you continue to
sin. Now that's, again, I have to reiterate this. That's not
saying, well, do whatever you want, go sin, any kind of thing.
you want to do, live immoral, live all this kind of stuff the
way you want, because it doesn't matter to God what you do and
all that stuff. I'm not saying that. I'm just
saying that every sin that has been ordained for you from the
time you were birthed into this world until the time you die
or Christ comes back, every sin that God has ordained for you,
that's going to take place. Everyone that God has ordained
and that Christ has died for, we're going to commit those sins
and everything. But that's on God's part. That's
what God knows. We don't know that. As far as
we understand, we're to walk and to trust in Christ Jesus,
and our desire is not to break God's laws. We love the law of
God in our mind, but we find that in our flesh dwells no good
thing, and that I am a wretched person, and that I cannot keep
the law of God in my flesh. And so that I serve the law of
God with my flesh, But praise the Lord in my mind, I keep the
law of God and that there is therefore now no condemnation
to those in Christ Jesus. So let's look this morning, if
you will, at the law and what the Bible says about the law. Why is it crazy? Why is Paul
being so fanatic about trying to teach these people about the
danger of going back and thinking that the law is something that
we have to try to keep for righteousness, for acceptance, for duty, for
whatever the case might be. And why that is dangerous, because
some may say, well, what difference? I mean, yes, we believe in sovereign
grace. Yes, we believe that Jesus paid
the price for us. Yes, we believe it was all Jesus. But shouldn't we be holy? Shouldn't
we walk holy? Doesn't God say, be ye holy for
I am holy? Doesn't he say that? Or someone
may say, well, what difference does it make if the preacher
preaches that? Aren't those good things to endeavor to? Yes, they
are good things to endeavor to in this regard, that our desire
is to please the Lord Jesus. The desire is not to be ashamed
before others and sully God's name. Okay. That might be our
thought process, but listen, brethren, When we preach the
law, it always will bring us into bondage. When we preach
the law, it brings the child of grace, or whoever's listening
there to the child of grace, it brings them into bondage because
it brings in a spirit of fear, which we shouldn't have a spirit
of fear. We have not been given a spirit of fear or bondage,
okay? We've been given a spirit of
liberty and a freedom Christ has freed us and given us liberty
and given us, taken us from condemnation of the law. The condemnation
of the law is not there. That's what I just quoted. Therefore,
there is now no condemnation to those in Christ Jesus. That
is to give us in our consciousness the knowledge that there is no
condemnation for those in Christ Jesus. Yes, God knows every sin
we're going to sin, but there is no condemnation. Every law
that is going to be broke, God knows, but there's no condemnation
because someone substituted that keeping of the law for us and
also substituted the taking of the wrath of God for the sinning
of that law, against that law. Christ took that on both accounts.
He lived for us. He died for us. And the Bible
says that he rose for our justification. He rose for us. so that we could
be justified before God and that God would accept that work of
obedience and death on our behalf. And so he rose from the dead
signifying that God has accepted that which we knew he would because
Isaiah 53 tells us that he was seeing the travail of the soul
and was satisfied and by his righteous servant, the many would
be justified. But let's see. Why, Paul? Why,
Paul, don't you just encourage the people to keep the law because
it's good for them to do so? Well, I'm going to show you why.
Let's go back to Acts chapter 15. Acts chapter 15. I pray the Lord keep my voice
until we get through today. I guess if he takes the voice
away, then we are through today. Acts chapter 15, if you guys
remember when we first began our exposition in Galatians,
we went back to Acts and this Jerusalem council, uh, because
Paul had, uh, uh, he had referenced that whenever he and, uh, Barnabas
had went and talked with the Jerusalem council. And so we
went back and we looked at this passage and we kind of broke
it all down, but that's been several months ago. And let's
look at this because this kind of begins where we see this discussion
on, are we to preach the law to people? Are we, as far as
keeping the law for righteousness or acceptance or keeping us in
right standing with God, are we to preach this law? Are we
to press upon people the commands of God for law keeping? And this is kind of where it
all began. I mean, it didn't start at this time period or
in the Reformation or whenever, you know, it didn't start then.
It started with the very first church and those following churches
that begin to form as the church was scattered and began to preach
throughout the region. Look at verse one. And it says, and certain men
which came down from Judea taught the brethren and said, except
you be circumcised after the manner of Moses, ye cannot be
saved. And see, that's what the Judaizers
of today are saying. Unless you continue to keep this
law or that law or do this thing or that thing, then you cannot
be saved because surely a child of God who has been born again
is gonna keep the commands of God or wanna do the commands
of God and keep them or try to keep them, whatever they might
say, okay? Well, that's what they were saying
right here. There were some that had come down from Judea and
came in among the brethren. There were some that was in the
churches in Galatia who had come in and had began to bewitch the
Galatian churches by saying the exact same thing. We need to
be circumcised after the manner of Moses or ye cannot be saved. That means, listen, we are preaching
Jesus died for us, but you cannot be saved unless you keep the
law of Moses. be saved unless you're circumcised
after the law of Moses. Well, wait a minute. I thought
Jesus saved, not the keeping of the law. Okay, now listen,
verse two. When therefore Paul and Barnabas
had no small dissension and disputation with them, that means that the
Apostle Paul and Barnabas both disagreed with that statement,
that you have to keep that law to be saved. So the very doctrine
of keeping laws to be safe was immediately smashed at the very
beginning in the Church of Jesus Christ, the New Testament Church.
It isn't something that came along with the formulations of
doctrines of church councils, of church fathers, of Catholic
this or Catholic that or Protestant this, Protestant that, reformations,
confessions of faith, all that kind. Now, listen, it started
right here with the very apostles who heard the very words of Christ
from his lips, teach them his doctrine and his gospel. And they said, no, that is not
the doctrine of Christ. They had a no small dissension. Matter of fact, I mean, it says
no small dissension and disputation. That means it was a very a very
big dissension and disputation. That means that this was very
paramount, that they understood that that is not what Jesus Christ,
you guys coming down from Judea who is corrupting the churches
with this. This is not what Jesus said. This is not what Jesus
gave for us to preach. He was the end of the law, that
Christ is the end of the law for righteousness. There is no
righteousness in the law and keeping the law. The righteousness
comes by the work of Christ alone and the imputation of his righteousness
to us. And so Paul and Barnabas, it
says, when therefore Paul and Barnabas had no small dissension
and disputation with them, they determined that Paul and Barnabas
and certain other of them should go up to Jerusalem unto the apostles
and elders about this question, what question? The question of
whether or not they should keep the law to be saved. Specifically
circumcision, but we'll find out it wasn't just circumcision. Verse three, and being brought
on their way by the church, they pass through Phineas and Samaria,
declaring the conversion of the Gentiles, and they cause great
joy unto the brethren. Notice if you will, this is just
a side note. declaring the conversion of the Gentiles, not the saving
of the Gentiles. Their preaching was not saving
anybody, as far as legal salvation is concerned. The gospel, whenever
it's heard and preached, only saves us in the fact that if
you're a child of grace given spiritual ears, it saves us from
thinking wrongly about how righteousness is given or how righteousness
is established, and about the gospel. That's the only, it saves
us from wrong thinking of the gospel and wrong thinking about
righteousness. But as far as before God saving
us, justifying us before God, the preaching of the gospel is
not what saves us, the believing of the gospel is not what saves
us. Christ dying for us is what saved us. That's what saved us. That is objective. It is not
subjective to us and our actions. The objective work of Christ
in dying for us is what saved you. That was declared and set
in the purpose of God before the foundation of the world,
and it will not change. It's infallible. All those that
God had chosen from the foundation of the world and written in the
Lamb's Book of Life, those would be the people who would be the
recipients and will be the recipients of what Christ did. in time,
at the point in time that he did it. All those before Christ,
boom, that's thirst. All those after Christ, boom,
that's thirst. It didn't have anything to do
with the Old Testament saints doing anything. It doesn't have
anything with the New Testament saints doing anything. It all
had to do and was all based upon what Christ did himself. And that's what the eternal covenant
is based on. It's based in blood, Christ's
blood. And God would not accept anything
else. By the blood of bulls and goats or gold and silver or anything
else, God would not accept anything else as payment or as any reason
to justify a sinner except for Christ's blood. And only for
those whom Christ died will God look on as righteous because
they're the only ones who are imputed with righteousness. So
Paul here, the question that they are coming to Jerusalem
to deal with is these guys keep coming around to the churches
saying that we gotta keep preaching that we have to keep the law
for salvation and that is anti-gospel. And as we heard at the beginning
of the Galatians, any other gospel is no gospel and if anybody's
preaching another gospel, let them be cursed. Let them be an
anathema. They are not pleasers of God,
they are pleasers of men. They are not servants of God. They are servants of self. Okay. This is verse three and being
brought on their way by the church. They pass through Phineas and
Samaria declaring the conversion of the Gentiles and they cause
great joy unto all the brethren. And when they were come to Jerusalem,
they were received of the church and of the apostles and elders
and they declared all things that God had done with them.
But there rose up certain, now do you see there that word certain
again? We see in verse one, there were certain men which came down.
This is speaking of a specific sect, sect, S-E-C-T, sect of
people within believers. Now notice, and I want you to
pay close attention to this because I got something to say about
this here in a minute. But there rose up certain of the sect of
Pharisees, which believed now here the word of god is telling
us that these pharisees believed they were believers and it says
they were saying that it was needful to circumcise them and
to command them to keep the law of moses here were men in the
church the first church the church that Jesus established at Jerusalem,
where all the apostles, save Paul, was still present at, still
ministering among. And they, in the Bible, God himself,
who wrote this, who spoke these words, what does it say? Those men were believers. Now that right there, I have
to submit to no matter what my feelings about that is, what
my thoughts about that is, what my wisdom seems to try to twist
and turn and figure out. It says that those men were believers
who believed in keeping the law for salvation. Now there are
a lot of us, and I include myself in this, that you will find on
Facebook, I've been guilty of this still to this day, I struggle
with this. that say that men who preach
the law are saying that the law is something that needs to be
kept for salvation cannot be believers, cannot be born of
God, or may even say they're reprobates. Well, we don't know
that. We don't know who the reprobates are. We don't know who the elect
are. But here we see, we've seen in Galatians, we just read it,
it says that we, when we were children, We're undertutors and
we believe those things about the rudimentary, elementary things
of the world. We believe those things. We thought
it was true. Okay, well, I've got to keep
the law. Well, listen, there still may be preachers who believe
that. Who preach, you've got to keep
the law. Now, do I agree with them? No. Are they preaching
the gospel? No, and if there is no repentance
granted to them and they go on their way to their deathbed,
guess what? They probably wasn't. But there
can be a time where somebody believes these things and still
be a believer. The Bible tells us that. I have
to submit to that, whether that agrees with my theology. But
in Christ's theology, there is room for people to be young in
understanding. immature in understanding and
still be a believer. And we should give them long-suffering. Now, we should try to correct.
Yes, we should be there to reprove and rebuke with the Word of God,
try to teach them in long-suffering and in meekness, praying that
God would grant to them repentance and belief in the truth. But
brethren, we can't just kick people out And with a blanket
statement say, well, if you're preaching that or teaching that,
then you're not elect or you're not a believer. Okay. Because these men were believing
that Christ died for them. They were believing that Christ
was the only way, but they still, and remember there was 2000 or
so years of ingraining in these, in these people, maybe not 2000
years, but from, from Abraham down. And especially from Moses
down, there was this ingraining of obedience. Obedience, obedience,
obedience, obedience, obedience. The law, the law, the law. Moses,
Moses. Sacrifice and sacrifice. All
this stuff was ingrained in them. Matter of fact, the Bible, whenever
it said to when you wake up, when you lie down, and whenever
you take these things and put them on your wrist and on your
forehead and all this stuff, they took that stuff literally,
some of them did. Where every morning when they
woke up, did all this reading. When they went to bed, they did
all this reading. They rolled up little scrolls and they put
them in these things on their arms and on their foreheads and
carried them around and all that kind of stuff. I mean, they took
this stuff literally. It was ingrained in them. And so these
men were no different. These were Pharisees who just
recently, a few weeks, a few days, maybe a month or two, I
don't know how long it was up to this point, but it wasn't
very long because in just a few chapters before that, we found
that that 120 turned into 3,000 on the day of Pentecost. So we
know it wasn't very long. These men were still ingrained
with the wrong teaching, the wrong thinking. And Christ, by
his spirit, begins to teach us. And one of the things is about
the law. Listen, I used to believe we
had to keep the law. I don't know more, but I used
to believe that. Was I non-elect when I didn't
believe it? No, I wasn't. Was I a believer
when I believed sovereign grace, but I still believed that there
was some part of the law that we had to keep? No, I was a believer. I believed that we were saved
by sovereign grace. But there was still this thing,
well, yeah, but God changes us and we have to start doing all
this stuff and keep the law. I was immature in my thinking.
I was a child. under the rudiments of the world,
under the teachings of the world, the elementary things that the
world thinks is what righteousness comes by is by obedience. But
now the Bible says we've been given repentance and faith. And
in that conversion, we move from that thinking and we believe
in Christ as he gives us understanding. Paul, or excuse me, the Holy
Spirit here, calls them believers. So I would encourage anybody
here and anybody watching or listening that you might, you
know, take a look at that at least. And that, you know, if
I'm wrong about what I'm saying here, I'll be glad to entertain
any rebuke or reprove by scripture, not by philosophy, but by scripture,
that how these men, could the Holy Spirit call them believers, And yet, and then still believing
that you have to keep the law and then not be considered believers.
So anyway, I digress on that, but you see here that there were
those who were saying not just to be circumcised, but to keep
the law of Moses. So it isn't just about circumcision.
It's about law keeping all the way around. Okay. Now look at
verse six and the apostles and elders came together to consider
this matter about keeping the law and being circumcised. to
believe or to be saved. And when there had been much
disputing, so obviously it wasn't just a agreement among everybody. I mean, this was a, you know,
I've been to a lot of Bible conferences and we get together at lunchtime
and all of us preachers and any of the other men that's around
that sit here talking doctrine and stuff like that. Sometimes
we have some disagreements how we see and understand certain
things, where the Lord has us in our understanding. And sometimes
those things, I mean, we can go back and forth and back and
forth and back and forth. Now, thankfully, I've not ran
into, at these conferences, a lot of fighting or, you know, ill
will towards each other. Now, online, you find it all
the time, but when you come into true churches and you begin to
deal with people face to face in an actual fellowship environment,
things change a little bit. There's a little more love and
kindness shown in the correction and rebuking area that whenever
you're the king behind the keyboard and you can hide behind your
monitor and your Facebook page. It says, and when there had been
much disputing, Peter rose up and said to them, men and brethren,
ye know how that a good while ago God made choice among us
that the Gentiles by my mouth should hear the word of the gospel
and believe. And God, which knoweth the hearts, bare them witness,
giving them the Holy Ghost, even as he did unto us, and put no
difference between us and them, purifying their hearts by law-keeping?"
Their hearts were purified because they kept obeying. No, it says,
purifying their hearts by faith. Now therefore, why tempt ye God?
Now look, what is preaching the law? Why tempt ye God to put
a yoke upon the neck of the disciples, which neither our fathers nor
we were able to bear?" Whenever we preach the law, that's putting
a yoke upon the neck of the disciples. But we believe that through the
grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, we shall be saved, even like
they are, as they. See, God is saving them by grace,
not law keeping because they never was under the law. God
never told them or give them a law to keep. The Gentiles never
was under that, never was given that. He saved them strictly
through the faith of the Lord Jesus Christ, the work of Christ
alone. He saved them by grace. And Paul
is saying, listen, it's no different for this Jewish church. It's
no different than us Jews. We are saved the same way he's
saving them. And he's saving them the same
way he's saving us. There's no difference. God is
not making any difference between us. He's not saving us by the
law keeping. and them by grace alone. No,
no, no, it's all the same. That's what he's saying there.
Verse 12, then all the multitude kept silent and gave audience
to Barnabas and Paul, declaring what miracles and wonders God
had wrought among the Gentiles by them. And after they had beheld
their peace, James answered saying, men and brethren, hearken unto
me. Simeon hath declared how God at the first did visit the
Gentiles to take out of them a people for his name. And to
this agree the words of the prophets, As it is written, after this
I will return and I will build again the tabernacle of David
which is fallen down and I will build again the ruins thereof
and I will set it up. Now, side note here, everybody
thinks that there's gonna be a temple rebuilt during some
millennial reign of Christ and everything. The New Testament
is shedding light on that Old Testament prophecy. That Old
Testament prophecy about the tabernacle of David being rebuilt
is talking about the gentiles being included in the salvation
by grace. That's what James is saying here.
James is saying that what he's talking about is the gentiles
are being saved apart from the law. We're being saved apart
from the law. And that is what those two peoples,
the Gentiles, the Jews becoming one people in a spiritual aspect
and being saved not by the natural things in law keeping and all
that obedience, but by grace. And what Christ has done is what
is being talked about in the rebuilding of David's tabernacle
that had fallen. That the residue of men might
seek after the Lord and all the Gentiles upon whom my name is
called, saith the Lord, who doeth all these things. Known unto
God are all his works from the beginning of the world. Wherefore,
my sentence is that we trouble not them which from among the
Gentiles are turned to God. Trouble them how? By telling
them that they have to be circumcised and keep the law of Moses. Okay? But that we write unto
them that they abstain from pollutions of idols, and from fornication
and from things strangled and from blood. Why? You're saying, well, wait a minute,
we're telling them that it's not by law keeping that they
have to keep laws, but now you're telling them to have some laws.
Well, there is a reason for this. Look at verse 21. For Moses of
old time hath in every city them that preach him being read in
the synagogues every Sabbath day. So in all these cities where
all these Jews are at and coming from that have been scattered,
okay, the Bible says that they have synagogues there and that
there has been this preaching and teaching of Moses, just as
I said a while ago, that has been read to them and preached
to them from then until now. So what's he saying? Let's not
be so harsh on some of this stuff right away because some of these
men have never heard anything any different. And if we go in
there guns a-blazin', or as probably what some people might say, caged
Calvinists, you know, although we hate that term, Calvinists,
but if we go in there guns a-blazin', it's not gonna change whether
they're saved or not, it's not gonna change whether or not they
hear the gospel or not, but what it can be, it can be an offense
to them. It can be an offense to them
on how we do that. Okay. And we don't want to be
an offense. The gospel in and of itself is an offense to those
who don't know it, but we don't want to be an offense to them.
Right. And that's what I see so often is men coming in on
conversations and we have young Christians or, or immature men
who have been taught so much. I mean, I was one of them. I've
been raised up from the time I was born until, you know, 2000,
into 2004, 2005, something like that, 2003, 2000, somewhere along
in the 2000 to 2003 area, 2004 area. It's when the Lord began
to show me sovereign grace in the scriptures. And during that
time period, listen, there was a lot of men that whenever I
was talking and saying things wrong, boom, just blasted me
right over the head. And it discouraged me. It discouraged
me. It made me upset. Made me not
want to talk to them. Maybe not want to go visit them,
go to, you know, any of their Bible conferences, you know,
that's how you're going to treat people. I mean, Hey, I'm just
not learning. Cut me some slack. I'm still trying to learn. I'm
praying to the spirit to teach me these things. Okay. And men come in a blazing, just
want to cut your brothers and sisters down. And listen, we
shouldn't be that way. He said, Simon hath declared,
or excuse me, that the residue of men might seek after the Lord,
and all the Gentiles among whom my name is called, known unto
God are all his works from the beginning of the world. Wherefore,
my sentence is that we trouble them not. We don't want to trouble
them with this law keeping, but why does he give them this law?
Well, because Moses has been preached all the time. In verse
22, then pleased it the apostles and elders with the whole church
to send chosen men of their own company to Antioch with Paul
and Barnabas, namely Judas, Sir Dane Barsavus, and Silas, chief
among the brethren. And they wrote letters by them
after this manner. The apostles and elders and brethren
send greeting unto the brethren, which are the Gentiles in Antioch
and Syria and Cilicia. For as much as we have heard
that, here's the word again, certain which went out from us
have troubled you with words, subverting your souls, saying
you must be circumcised and keep the law to whom we gave no such
command. See the apostles who had received
the gospel directly from Christ lives said we have not given
any command for anybody to to to say or to teach in the churches
not that they had the authority the apostles didn't have any
authority over these churches brethren But what he is saying
is as the ones who Christ entrusted as that first church, Jerusalem,
he entrusted them the gospel, entrusted them the delegated
authority of administering the things of the kingdom, the ordinances
of God, the preaching of the word of God, and the commission
of going out and making disciples, that was given to the local church.
And the apostles were the ones that the Bible says that christ
laid first in the church because he was they were the ones that
he brought to himself to train as a gospel preachers to thoroughly
teach them all the things of his doctrine because they would
be the ones who would be the leaders to be the shepherds of
these people at the very beginning stages and that they would know
and understand this gospel to lay that within the church, this
doctrine. And as the churches were beginning
to be populated around the region, as the gospel was spreading,
they would lay those foundations properly with doctrine. And so
that's what that's talking about here, is that, he says, we have
not given that command. See, it's not that they have
the rule over those people, it's just that they're saying, listen,
there isn't nobody from Jerusalem where Jesus began everything,
saying that you have to keep the law. That's not coming from
the gospel New Testament church. It's not coming from that. It's
coming from some of those believers that's among us that are still
influenced by their past teaching, by their past understanding,
who still has not thought rightly or been given to think rightly.
Verse 25, it seemed good unto us being assembled with one accord
to send chosen men unto you with our beloved Barnabas and Paul."
Now, this is the letter that they sent with Barnabas and Paul
to give to these churches, okay? Men that have hazarded their
lives for the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. So they're giving
confirmation, they're giving accreditation to Paul and to
Barnabas as, listen, we have heard as this first church that
Jesus actually was in with us, teaching us, we have heard their
message. Because remember, Paul and Barnabas,
they came outside. They came after what happened
with Jesus and the first apostles. They came later on down, that's
why Paul said that he was one born out of due time, okay? He
was born as an apostle, not with the other ones, but outside of
that, as a special apostle to the Gentiles. And so they are
given an accreditation, they are given a commendation. That's
like whenever we have any members here, that move and want to move
their membership to a church that is of like faith and practice.
And we see that that church is preaching the doctrine of Christ
and is keeping the ordinance of Christ within that church.
And that member seeks membership there. What do we do? We send
a letter of commendation and saying, you know, hey, we send
this person to you. This person, this member is in
good standing and believes the gospel of Jesus Christ and all
that. We send a letter of commendation.
Well, that's what's happening here. is they have sent this
letter of commendation with these men to let them know, hey, these
men are speaking with the authority of Jesus Christ because they
are speaking the doctrine and the message that Christ had given
us from the very beginning. So he said, we have sent, therefore,
Judas and Silas, who shall also tell you the same things by mouth. So Judas and Silas was also sent
to bear witness, because the Bible says in the mouth of two
or three witnesses, a thing is established. They said Judas
and Silas, that's two witnesses, and they sent this letter, that's
three witnesses, to these people that Paul and Barnabas's message
is the gospel of Jesus Christ. He says, we have sent therefore
Judas and Silas, who shall also tell you the same things by mouth,
for it seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us to lay upon you
no greater burden than these, and look at here, necessary things. It's not the commands that you
have to keep for salvation or to stay right with God, but he
said these are necessary things because these men who are in
these synagogues who have been indoctrinated for all these years
and been preaching these things for all these years and now these
other ones who are coming and trying to subvert you, it's necessary
for us to approach this thing in a way that is not going to
turn them away or be offensive to them right off the bat, that
we must have our opportunity to come in and preach because
these men may not let you in the synagogue if you're doing these things.
Because they still think these things is what matters. So we're
just telling you, stay away from the pollution of idols, from
fornications, from faint strangle, and from blood because it's necessary
that you might do those things so that you might have opportunity
to come in and to be able to preach among them and not to
offend them to the point where they say, we don't want to hear
this, go away, and therefore you have opportunity to preach
the gospel. It says, that ye abstain from
meat, soccer, and idols, and from blood, and from things strangled,
and from fornication, from which, if ye keep yourselves, ye do
well, fare ye well. So when they were dismissed,
they came to Antioch, and when they had gathered the multitude
together, they delivered the epistle. which when they had
read, they rejoiced for the consolation. The consolation about what? What
did they rejoice about? What was the consolation? The consolation that they didn't
have to keep the law for righteousness. That they didn't have to keep
the law of Moses and be circumcised for salvation. That was the consolation
that they were rejoicing. Thank goodness. Thank the Lord
that he has given us the salvation that we don't have to keep that
stuff that you guys have been doing. I mean, think of these
Gentiles. These Gentiles had lived among
these Jews. These Gentiles had lived among
and around the Jews and had seen their system of religion. They had seen that they're all
the time having to make these sacrifices, make these sacrifices,
and that God's holy law was condemning every one of them, and they all
had to come by blood, and give all this stuff, and the priest,
and the sacrificial system, and everything. They say, listen,
whew, I'm glad we don't have to be a part of that. And that it's just by grace.
See, whenever we preach freedom in Christ, because Christ has
kept the law for us. He has been our substitute. He
is our propitiation. He is our sanctification. When we preach these things,
brethren, it's a consolation to the child of grace, because
the child of grace has been given spiritual understanding to know
they cannot keep the law. These people had been born from
above and had been taught of the spirit that they cannot keep
the law, but had been left with just the law. These men were
preaching, keep the law or die, and the Spirit of God was in
them saying that you cannot keep the law. And they was bewitched
by thinking, I got to keep that for righteousness, but yet in
His hand, I know that I can't keep that. I know that I can't
keep that. And so whenever the apostles
came with the authority of Christ and the gospel of Christ, and
said this is the gospel. It said that they rejoiced for
that consolation. That's why Paul in Romans chapter
7 after he talked about that struggle with the flesh that
only can sin and the spirit inside him who wants to keep the law
of God and keeps the law of God and that consternation that's
there between those two. That's why he began 8.1 and said
thank God there is therefore now no condemnation. because
that struggle is real, that struggle is there, that wanting to keep
the law in my mind, but the inability to do it, I hate that. And if our conscience is completely
immersed in hearing, keep the law, keep the law, keep the law,
it keeps that conscience sullied and clouded. The preaching of
the gospel and the freedom of Christ from the law is what purifies,
what did we read earlier? It purifies the heart. It purifies
the mind. It purifies our conscience from
thinking that if I don't do enough that God's not going to be happy
with me or I'm not going to be right with God or I'm not going
to be accepted of God or I'm not going to make, I'm going
to lose my salvation. No, no. The law comes in and it kills. The law kills us. It kills our
conscience. It kills our right thinking about
Christ, it comes in and kills. But brother, the gospel is life
and it brings life. Now, I meant to get further than
we did today, but I didn't. I'm going to go ahead and stop
there. I think this would be a good place to stop. I was going
to go into Romans chapter three, but we will save that for next
week. Anybody got any questions or
comments? Corrections? Rejoicing in consolation. It's a wonderful thing here.
Again, I'm not trying to glorify sin or to encourage you in it,
but merely to bring the news that Christ has paid for it all.
And that there is now no condemnation of those in Christ and that your
law keeping isn't going to make you any closer to God. It's not
going to get you any more merit, any more reward. It's not going
to get anything more for you because your flesh profits nothing. What does it mean to profit?
What's profit? Huh? What's problem? You boys and
girls, you're working now. What's profit gain, right? It's something that you get over
the price that you pay. So if I bought a car for $500
and I sold it for a thousand dollars, what's my profit? $500,
right? I made another 500. I got my
500 back and I profited $500. Okay. So profit is something
that, that we gain. And so you're not going to profit
anything by law keeping as far as righteousness is concerned.
Do I love people that doesn't want to kill and doesn't want
to steal? Absolutely. Please, please neighbor. Don't
kill or steal me. Okay. Don't kill me or steal
anything from me. Okay. Do I like it when people
want to obey the gospel as far as it pertains to humanly interaction? Human interaction? Absolutely.
For morality and everything? For righteousness? No. It doesn't
gain us anything before God. The only thing that gains us
in God's eyes is Christ and His commandment. His commandment. is believe upon the Lord Jesus
Christ, trust in Christ, walk by faith in what he has done.
That's his commandment. And he has given us his spirit
to lead us into those works, those spiritual inward works
of repentance and faith and trusting and believing upon him. All right. Anybody else got anything? Father, you are most wise and
gracious God to have designed such a salvation as we have seen
in the course of the last few weeks and over the years, as
we study this word that has been so graciously given to us and
for our understanding and for our knowledge of our God and
our salvation. Father, we are so thankful for
what you've done for us in Christ Jesus. We are thankful for the
opportunity that we have. Together today, Father, we just
are grateful for what Christ has done on our behalf for all
the children of God. And Lord, I pray today that all
these that are here, I pray, Lord, that they are yours. And
if they are yours, Lord, I pray that you would bring them to
repentance and faith and to believe the gospel of Jesus Christ. And in believing the gospel of
Jesus Christ, that they might follow you uh, in, uh, that profession
of faith by being baptized, being a part of the local church. And
that Lord, you might bring others in this town that love the truth
of the gospel of Jesus Christ, that they too might come. I know
we've, we pray this each and every week, Lord, but that's
the desires of our heart for our friends and for our family
to be saved. And for others who are out there
scattered your seed that you've scattered throughout every nation,
tribe, language, and tongue, Lord, wherever they're at, in
every city, you have people, the Bible says. And Lord, we
just pray that if there's any that's out there, any sojourner,
any pilgrim, any sheep that is still wandering out there without
a place of shelter, without a place to fellowship, without a place
to receive nourishment by the preaching of the gospel, Lord,
we pray that you just might bring them to us, Lord. We ask that
you'd be with our members and our other fellow brethren that
come, Lord, that are gone for Kevin and Jacqueline and Alessandro
who are down in Guatemala. Lord, we pray that you would
not only give them a good time with their family, but Lord,
that you might keep them safe. And we look forward to seeing
them again in a few weeks. Lord, we pray for brother Ed.
And we ask, Lord, that you just might keep him safe, and that,
Lord, that you might give him the ability to be back amongst
us again soon. We pray for Beth, and we ask,
Lord, that you might be with her and Mike as they've moved.
And we pray, Lord, that you might have a church somewhere close
to where they live, where they might be able to go, and that
the gospel of Jesus Christ is being preached, and the ordinances
of Christ are being observed, and that they are sharing and
ministering in that gospel locally, Lord. So we just ask that you
would be with them for her sister, Mindy, and for the other family
of Sister Louetta, Lord. We miss her and we miss these
ladies that have come in the past. We also lift up Father,
my grandmother, and we pray, Lord, to be with her, that you
might give her strength and health. And Lord, we just ask that you
would continue to guide us and direct us here, that you might
keep us in the faith and that you might let Christ be glorified
in all that we do and all that we say for it's in his name that
we pray.