Faith Alone; The
Barrier; Gal. 1:6-10
Even though these Galatians
had deserted God, God had not deserted them. They were given salvation as a
permanent gift although they had no longer understood the grace of Christ. There
are two ways in which the gospel generally or God’s plan is attacked. Number
one is at salvation something is always added: faith plus. But whenever you
have faith plus anything it equals nothing. You destroy faith when you add
anything to it. There is always this attempt to add good works, baptism, church
attendance, that somehow we are going to impress God. But Jesus does it all;
all we have to do is accept it by faith, which is a non-meritorious response.
Faith is non-meritorious because faith in and of itself has no merit. Anybody
can believe. It is faith alone in Christ alone. The second way God’s plan is
attacked is an outgrowth of the gospel. In many passages the gospel includes
more than simple salvation, it also includes the Christian life. In the
Christian life there is the process of sanctification and the attack is the
idea that somehow our spiritual life is the result of works. We will get to
that is the second half of this epistle. But Paul is writing to say that God
does all the work. The issue is salvation and in the Christian life is always
faith alone; it is not by performing works. It is not up to us, it is not the
work of the flesh that is what produces our spiritual growth; it is the grace
provision of God and all of the assets that He gives us at the moment of
salvation.
A central passage to
understand the gospel is 1 Corinthians 15:1, 2 NASB “Now I make
known to you, brethren, the gospel which I preached to you, which also you
received, in which also you stand,
That is the gospel. Two
elements are recorded: a) Christ’s death as a substitute for our sins; b) the
bodily resurrection of Christ. That is the same message—the emphasis on
Christ’s substitutionary atonement and the resurrection—that Paul proclaimed in
Acts 13 on his first missionary journey when he went to the Gentiles in
Galatia. That makes the gospel very clear and we always have to emphasise that
grace means that it is a free gift; we do nothing to earn or deserve it. Revelation
Galatians 1:6, 7 NASB
“I am amazed that you are so quickly deserting Him who called you by the grace
of Christ, for a different gospel; which
is {really} not another; only there are some who are disturbing you and want to
distort the gospel of Christ.” The Greek word for “different” is heteros [e(teroj]; the Greek word for “another” is allos [a)lloj]. They have slightly different meanings; sometimes
they are almost synonymous. But in passages where the two are used together
there is a difference. heteros
tends to emphasise something that
is another of a different kind; allos
means another of the same kind. So what we find here is the statement that “you
have deserted him who called you by the grace of Christ for a gospel of a
radically different kind.” E.g. accepting Christ as your saviour is not
synonymous with inviting Jesus into your heart, which is a misapplication of Revelation
3:20. The Scripture says that He is the one who invites you—“Him who called
you.”
There is always a disruptive
crowd in any local church at one time or another because Satan is always out to
destroy the gospel. That is his number one mission, to keep unbelievers from
hearing the gospel—so he is going to block the gospel, distort it, distract—and
keep believers from understanding the implications of the gospel for their
spiritual life in pursuing spiritual maturity. As part of this Satan uses his people
to try to disrupt and distract local congregations that are teaching the truth.
The ones “disturbing,” tarasso [tarassw], present active participle. The present tense means
that it is basically an extending from the past present. That means it is referring
to action that started in the past and is continuing through the present time
of writing. It is an active voice, which means the subject is performing the
action of the participle. In this case it is the Judaizers
who are performing the action. These are a group of Jews who are emphasizing
works as part of salvation; the works of the Law. So they are adding the works
of the Law to salvation. They are disturbing, stirring up trouble.
With the word “wishing” we
have another participle. It is the present active participle of thelontes [qelontej] from the main verb thelo
[qelw] which means to will, or to want to do something.
This verb emphasises their volition. They have an agenda. They specifically
have a goal and that is to distract people from the truth. Their negative
volition has rejected the gospel of grace, yet they are probably talking about
grace. Some groups talk about grace but they restrict its meaning and say you
have to earn the grace. All kinds of people talk about grace but very few understand
grace.
The Greek word for “distort”
is metastrepho [metastrefw] which means to change or transform. They want to
transform the gospel from the gospel of grace into a gospel of works. The word thelo emphasises that they are
responsible for this, it is their volition that is
involved. Ultimately behind them is Satan. 2 Corinthians 4:4 NASB
“in whose case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving
so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who
is the image of God.” This is Satan’s agenda.
Hoe does Satan blind men
today? One way is through religion. True biblical Christianity is not a
religion. A religion means that man does the work and then God blesses it,
whereas Christianity is a relationship with God because it is based upon the
fact that Jesus Christ did the work—God does all the work and man simply
accepts it. One the basis of the work of Christ man is able to have a personal
relationship with God that is not based on a series of rituals, a series of
commandments, or a series of taboos. What man always wants to do is somehow
come up with rituals or some kind of legalistic rules and regulations in order
to impress God and have some kind of assurance of eternal destiny.
A second way Satan blinds men
is through rationalism, through reason. This is what happened in the 19th
century Protestant liberalism. The idea was that if man’s intellectual powers
are so great then we can then evaluate the Bible to find out what is false just
on the basis of our intellect.
Third, and very prominent
today, Satan distracts people from the gospel through emotionalism, especially
through the subjectivity of a lot of mysticism—How do
you know God? Because I feel it. We know Him through
the Word, not because of our feelings.
Satan uses all the details of
life—materialism details, the details of work, the details of relationships,
the details of pleasure. All of these things get in the way when people are
more consumed with living their lives, enjoying their lives and the pleasures,
and dealing with the problems, their adversities, their heartaches, their
careers. They don’t have time for God.
“the
gospel of Christ” – here we have a genitive of source. Jesus Christ is the one
who provided salvation at the cross. When he went to the cross every sin in
human history was poured out upon Him and judged.
Galatians 1:8 NASB
“But even if we, or an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel
contrary to what we have preached to you, he is to be accursed!” He uses a
figure of speech here called hyperbole, which means exaggeration. He is going
to go to the farthest extent, the greatest use of exaggeration to make his
point. He doesn’t mean by this that an angel is ever going to proclaim the gospel, that would be a false concept to derive from this.
He is saying that even if this were the case, even the most extreme case that
could ever be imagined, even under those circumstances if they were to hear the
gospel from angels or anyone else other than what we proclaim to you then it
would be a false gospel. What Paul has been proclaiming to them is the absolute
truth. The Greek word for “accursed” is anathema
[a)naqema], an
incredibly strong word for cursing. This is serious. The gospel is the most
important issue in life.
Man was created in the garden of Eden and was given a test of his volition. That
test was very simply and it involved a tree—the fruit of the tree of the
knowledge of good and evil. This issue was whether man would obey God and not
eat from the tree or whether he would disobey God. At that time there was
harmonious rapport between God and man. However long the man and the woman
lived in the garden they continued to obey God. Then Satan came along and
tempted the woman first, perceiving that she was the weak link on the chain,
and she succumbed to the temptation and ate of the fruit. She tempted the man
and he succumbed and they went negative to God, disobeyed Him, and a barrier
was erected between God and man. So when God came to walk in the garden with
the man and the woman, as He did every day, the man and the woman ran and hid.
The barrier
This barrier that is erected
is comprised of several different ingredients which we will just call bricks. The
first is the problem of sin itself. Romans
The next brick in the barrier
has to do with the penalty of sin, which is spiritual death. Romans
The third brick in the
barrier has to do with our physical birth. We are born in Adam. Adam was both
our federal head, i.e. he is a representative—“In Adam all die”—and our genetic
head, so that we are physically, biologically related to Adam so that the
consequences of sin which affected everything in nature make us all guilty of
Adam’s sin, both federally and spiritually. Genesis 2:17; Romans 5:12;
Ephesians 2:1, “being born dead in our trespasses and sins. So the problem is
that in our physical birth we are born spiritually dead. Isaiah 64:6a; Romans
The fourth brick in the
barrier is relative righteousness. As far as the Word of God is concerned there
is not a single human being who can measure up to the perfect righteous
standard of God. God is both perfect righteousness and perfect justice. The
righteousness of God is His absolute standard; the justice of God is the
application of that standard. Whatever the righteousness of God demands the
justice of God provides. What the righteousness of God rejects the justice of
God condemns, but the love of God provides a solution through the grace of God.
What the righteousness of God approves the justice of God blesses through the
love of God as expressed through the grace of God. So God’s righteousness is
His perfect standard. Because man cannot come up with that perfect standard of
God he stands condemned, so he has the problem of relative righteousness.
The fifth brick in the
barrier has to do with the character of God, as just explained. Because God is
perfect righteousness and perfect justice man cannot measure up to God and
therefore stands condemned.
The sixth brick is our
position in Adam. 1 Corinthians
This is our problem, the sin
barrier which is erected between God and man. God in His grace provided a
perfect solution to every aspect of the sin problem. These are the doctrines
related to salvation. The sin problem was taken care of by the doctrines of
redemption and unlimited atonement. The basic idea of redemption is that a
price is paid. Redemption means to pay a price. It translates the Greek word agorazo [a)gorazw] which has to do with buying something in the market
place. The agora was the Greek
name for the market place. Another word is exagorazo
[e)cagorazw]
which means to buy something out of the market place. Redemption passages:
Ephesians 1:7; 1 Peter 1:18, 19. Jesus Christ died on the cross for our sins
and he purchased us our of the slave market of sin. That is redemption.
Unlimited atonement means
that the extent of that redemption applies to every single human being. Jesus
Christ actually removed the problem of sin. Every sin is paid for, so the issue
is no longer is: Are you going to pay for your sins? The issue is: Are you
going to accept Jesus Christ as your personal saviour? The issue at the great
white throne judgment is not sin. God is never going to bring sins up to you or
me again at the judgment seat of Christ; at the great white throne judgment the
issue is not sin, it is human good, it is whether man’s good deeds have
measured up to the perfect righteousness of God. Jesus Christ paid the penalty
for every single sin that the human race will ever commit. 1 John 2:2 NASB
“and He Himself is the propitiation for our sins; and not for ours only, but
also for {those of} the whole world.” 2 Corinthians
The penalty of sin was taken
care of by the doctrine of expiation. Expiation means to remove a debt. We have
a debt against us because of our sin. Colossians
The problem of physical birth
is resolved by regeneration. John 3:1-18. We were born spiritually dead and at
the moment of salvation God the Holy Spirit creates a human spirit, it is
simultaneously given to us, and at that moment God the Father imputes to that
human spirit eternal life. So we have a new life in Christ.
The problem of our relative
righteousness is dealt with by the doctrine of the imputation of perfect
righteousness. Imputation means to credit or legally declare as one’s
possession perfect righteousness. 1 Corinthians 1:30; 2 Corinthians 5:21.
Because we now possess the perfect righteousness of Jesus Christ God the Father
declares us just, justified. Justification does not mean just as if I had never
sinned; it means we are justified by God, declared righteous or just because we
possess the perfect righteousness of God.
The character of God problem
is resolved by the doctrine of propitiation. Propitiation means that God the
Father is satisfied—His perfect righteousness and justice are satisfied. What
the righteousness of God rejects the justice of God condemns. But when we
possess the perfect righteousness of God—what righteousness of God approves
now, because we have His perfect righteousness—the justice of God can bless
with eternal life. Romans 3:22-26; 1 John 2:2. Verses for justification are
Romans 4:1-5; Galatians 2:16.
The problem of our position
in Adam is resolved by our new position in Christ. 1 Corinthians 15:22b NASB
“…so also in Christ all will be made alive.” At the moment we put our faith and
trust in Jesus Christ then through the baptism of the Holy Spirit we are placed
in union with Jesus Christ.
All of this is part of the
gospel. As we can see from this, so much was performed by Jesus Christ on the
cross that to think that we could add anything to it is absolutely absurd. That
is why Paul is so harsh with these Galatian
believers, because if you add anything to faith alone it destroys salvation.
Galatians 1:9 NASB
“As we have said before, so I say again now, if any man is preaching to you a gospel
contrary to what you received, he is to be accursed!” He repeats it for
emphasis. He is not being emotional, he wants to make
it very clear that they get the point.
Galatians