Galatians chapter one and verse
17. Neither went I up to Jerusalem,
the apostle Paul is speaking, neither went I up to Jerusalem
to them which were apostles before me, but I went into Arabia and
returned again into Damascus. Then after three years I went
up to Jerusalem to see Peter, and abode with him fifteen days.
But other of the apostles saw I none, save James the Lord's
brother. Now the things which I write
unto you, behold, before God I lie not. Afterwards I came
into the regions of Syria and Cilicia, and was unknown by face
unto the churches of Judea, which were in Christ. but they had
heard only that he which persecuted us in times past now preacheth
the faith which once he destroyed and they glorified God in me. Amen. May the Lord bless to us
this reading from his word. As we study the scriptures and
especially perhaps the New Testament, it is worth us noting and remembering
how blessed we are to possess these apostolic epistles. Often as they were written to
address problems that had arisen in the churches. A false teacher
had encroached on a young congregation or an error had crept in or some
misunderstanding had gained a foothold or simply two members of a fellowship
couldn't get along. And Paul or Peter or John or
Jude or James writes a letter and we have an epistle in our scriptures
today. Simply by one of these men dropping
a line, as it were, to redress the matter in hand. And we bless
the Holy Spirit for supplying these superb corrective letters
to congregations and individuals 2,000 years ago that continue
to bless us today. They furnish the Lord's people
with gospel wisdom. They provide for us sound doctrine. They illuminate us with facts
and history and information. and they give us the precious
revelations of heavenly truth in the wonderful person of the
Lord Jesus Christ and all his works. In such ways has the Holy
Spirit provided these blessed epistles for us. And this is
an example. Here is a letter to the churches
of Galatia inspired at least to some extent by an attack from
false teachers. And the Apostle Paul is compelled
to write, we might say sharply, certainly earnestly, to correct
the errors that were being taught So that thanks to the Galatians'
folly, we learn of the apostle's calling, we learn of his early
ministry that is not recorded anywhere else in scripture. We
learn some distinguishing features of a true believing congregation. And the Apostle goes to great
lengths here, in a relatively short summary, to insist that
his Gospel, the Gospel he preached, the Gospel of Grace, was directly
revealed to him by the Lord Jesus Christ personally. And I don't
know exactly what were the accusations of these troublers in Galatia,
but clearly they were trying to undermine Paul's authority
and thereby his message. So here's a few lessons that
I think we can learn from the verses before us today. The first
one is this. that with respect to, or the
first one is with respect to divine authority and the divine
authority of Paul's gospel. We learn how, upon his conversion,
Paul did not go to Jerusalem to spend time with the apostles
and to learn the gospel from them. Indeed, he relates to the
Galatians that it was not until some three years after his Damascus
Road experience that Paul spent a mere 15 days and that was not
all the time of those 15 days because we're told that he went
in and out and preached the gospel and contended with the Grecians
and was engaged in the temple and was engaged in debating.
So it wasn't that he spent 15 consecutive days with Peter,
that he went up to Jerusalem for 15 days and there he met
Peter. And we're told that he also briefly
met with James. Nor, he adds, had he learned
his gospel from other churches in Judea. The apostle's point
is to insist that the gospel he preached was by divine inspiration
and it came by direct revelation from the Lord Jesus Christ himself. So that these intruders, these
interlopers were attacking the gospel by attacking Paul and
his authority and his credibility as a preacher. And so vigorously
does Paul insist that his message and his authority is directly
from Christ that he attaches a solemn oath to his statement. And he says, now the things which
I write unto you, behold, before God I lie not. And that's an oath that he is
taking there. And I want to underscore this
emphasis from the apostle. He clearly felt burdened by this. This was a key issue for him. This gospel, this New Testament
revelation, the faith that we believe is of divine origin. When our faith gets attacked,
when people say, well, that's your opinion, or they ask us,
how do you know that you're right and they're wrong? Or when the
gospel comes under fire, or when people tell us, well, that was
then and now's now, and we need a different message for today
because this is a different age. Our answer is always going to
be, thus saith the Lord. Thus saith the Lord. And whether that's from the prophets
of the Old Testament or the apostles of the New, we receive this message
as of the Lord. having been preached to us according
to what God has spoken in his word. And as the Holy Spirit
gives us faith to believe. Some clever people, some wits,
they speak about Calvinism and Arminianism and Baxterism and
Fullerism and even Gillism. Well, I know where my allegiances
lie, and it's good if you do too. But with all due respect,
it is the revelation of Jesus Christ that we insist upon, and
we say with Isaiah, if they speak not according to this word, it
is because there is no light in them. Free, sovereign grace
was Paul's gospel, that the purpose of God according to election
might stand, not of him, not of works, but of him that calleth. And just a little aside here,
the fact that the Apostle Paul uses this phrase, before God
I lie, I lie not, shows us that solemn oaths are acceptable on
suitable occasions. and God may be called upon to
witness and affirm the veracity of a testimony. Some Christian
groups say that we shouldn't take oaths and we shouldn't swear
before God. Well, the Apostle Paul appeared
to do so here, and I think that we can take that as a good example. So that's the first thing that
I wanted just to leave with you, if I may, is the fact that Paul
is insistent on the divine authority of his message. The second thing
that we can think about is the power and effect of conversion. And again, we can see that in
Paul's own testimony here. The Apostles already told us
in verse 13 that beyond measure I persecuted the church of God
and wasted it. And now he repeats in verse 23
how he persecuted and tried to destroy the church and the faith. However, the Lord Jesus Christ
arrested him on the Damascus Road on his way to perpetrate
these very offences. And by the saving grace of God,
Saul of Tarsus became Paul the Apostle. Paul had moved from
persecuting the faith to preaching the faith and what a change the
gospel brings to a sinner's life. What transformation it makes
to a person's conduct. Let us never underestimate the
power of God to save and to convert even those we might characterise
as the most dangerous and vilest of people, because truly Saul
of Tarsus was that man. and yet here is the surprising
grace of God at work in an individual like Paul. And let us hold it
to be true that no one is too sinful as to be beyond the reach
of efficacious grace and the power of the gospel to save.
Paul is speaking in the voice of the churches of Judea, and
he's referring to himself when he says that he persecuted us
in times past, but now he preacheth the faith that once he destroyed. And I just want to think, what
was it that Paul preached? He preached the faith he once
destroyed. And undoubtedly, the faith here
in this verse is shorthand for all those distinguishing doctrines
and truths that are revealed in scripture. It's the faith
once delivered to the saints. The faith concerning God in his
triune persons, the faith concerning the everlasting love of God,
the glory that existed with the Lord Jesus Christ before he came
into the world, the power of the Holy Spirit. It's the faith
concerning the doctrine of man and sin and the fall. It's the
faith concerning the salvation and the covenant of grace. It's the faith concerning true
worship, the coming of the Saviour, His death, His resurrection,
and all the doctrines of Holy Scripture to be received and
believed by the church and people of God. Paul preached the faith
when he preached Christ's gospel. Once he had punished and imprisoned
Christ's followers and now by saving grace he preached the
faith he once sought to destroy and he did so fully and publicly
and widely and obediently as was his calling as a follower
and preacher and apostle of Jesus Christ. And here's just another
little aside. In this passage, the apostle
discloses a number of things that we don't know. concerning
his early ministry and his evangelising labours that we don't know from
other, for example, from the book of Acts or from other accounts
of his personal testimony. Here, in this letter to the Galatians,
we know a number of things that are not recorded anywhere else
about Paul's early ministry. For example, we learn how following
his conversion, he went into Arabia. Now there are a number
of places that were known as Arabia at that time and it might
have been any one of those that he went to. We're also told that
he preached in Syria and Cilicia. Now, Cilicia was the region of
Asia Minor where Tarsus was, so he had gone back into his
own home area and spent some time there. That's where Tarsus
was located. Now, exactly where he went and
where all those places were is not known now. But what we learn
is that from the very start, Paul was ministering the gospel
wherever providence took him. And we may presume that he was
doing so with success, attended by the Holy Spirit. So that these
three years, these earliest three years of the Apostle Paul's post-conversion
experience are mentioned here and nowhere else. And it's a
good lesson for us to learn that we actually have no idea where
and how far the Lord has taken the gospel to gather his elect. But we may safely say this, that
wherever his elect are to be found, the Lord sends a preacher
so that the faith will indeed be delivered to the saints. And here's my third point and
then we're done. There's a lovely phrase in verse 22 which says,
the churches which were in Christ. The churches which were in Christ. Speaking about the churches in
Judea in that particular case. But these were the churches which
were in Christ. And that's a distinguishing phrase
that designates the congregations amongst the Jews ordinarily where
the gospel had been preached and the true faith had been believed
and where genuine spiritual worship was being made. These were churches
who received and believed in the divinity of Jesus Christ
and the substitutionary nature of his death, the atonement and
the efficacy of his cleansing blood, his resurrection, his
ascension into heaven, and his soon return. they believed the
Gospel of Jesus Christ. And I feel sure that this mark
of distinction that the Apostle Paul makes here when he calls
them the churches which were in Christ, this mark of distinction
that distinguishes them from all others still can be used
with propriety. to describe the churches which
are in Christ today. There are some churches today
that neither preach the true gospel that Paul preached, nor
promote the true faith that was once delivered to the saints.
In the final verse, we learn a feature of these churches,
these churches that are in Christ. One of the features of these
churches was that they glorified God for Paul's ministry. That is, they glorified God for
the true gospel that he preached. It was a contrast to what was
being presently entertained and tolerated amongst the Galatian
churches who were starting to get restless and wonder whether
these intruders into their company had something to say to them
that contradicted what the Apostle Paul had previously taught, this
other gospel that wasn't a real gospel at all. So let us take
on board this distinction that Paul makes about the churches
which were in Christ. And let us always endeavour to
identify with and support the churches which are in Christ.
And let us, like them, glorify God for his mercy and his grace
and for the faithful preaching of the gospel amongst us. Amen.