Introduction
What is the Gospel – the good news of Jesus Christ? Even among Christians only 60% could answer the question correctly. Paul describes it in one of my favourite verses in Romans 1:16-17. “It is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew and then for the Gentile. For in the gospel a righteousness from God is revealed; a righteousness that is by faith from first to last”.
The Gospel is the power of God, it is nothing to do with anything we do. It is to do with God forgiving us through Jesus taking our punishment and death on the cross and the Holy Spirit raising us to new life with Christ. Totally God. Not us. The Gospel brings salvation for everyone who believes it. Salvation means to be rescued or freed. We are freed to live the lives God designed us to live, no longer having to do what sin demands of us, but having a choice to do God’s will. When this happens we are made righteous. That means we are put into proper relationships: with God, with each other and with ourselves. We know who we are and are people of peace. All this, especially our righteousness, comes from faith – total belief and trust in the Gospel, in what God has done for us. Again it does not involve us doing anything except accepting the free gift of new life.
But there are some who say you have to do more to receive your salvation and righteousness. This is what the Galatians faced, but it is not unique to them, it goes on today.
Eddie Cooney was in his twenties when two JW’s knocked on his door. They were pleasant and Eddie was interested in what they had to say. He studied the literature they gave him and in the end, as he was Catholic, he invited a priest to come round to discuss the Bible with them. Eddie says, “I’m afraid they just tore him to shreds quoting scriptures at him and the priest ended up storming out. It wasn’t pleasant.”
“So, after that”, Eddie says, “I started going to the Kingdom Hall. I was welcomed and I felt they were living as Christians. They were zealous, sacrificial and didn’t make money out of it. I got rid of my insurance policies – after all I would not need them in paradise would I? I gave up my full time job so I had time to fit in the 80 hours a month knocking on doors which they demanded of me. Whenever I did see any of the family, which I was encouraged to do less of, I drove them crackers trying to convert them.
“But after a while the initial sense of freedom and love disappeared as more demands were made that I make myself a true follower. By then I was trapped. I had a tremendous sense of guilt; no JW can ever work hard enough to pay God back. I had to attend meetings, had Watchtower material to read, door-to-door work to do. I gave up my freedom of choice, freedom of thought. I learned not to trust other people: we were constantly being told not to trust anyone “of the world” which was totally evil. A great deal of time was spent discussing who was “weak”. One lady had to leave early to get her last bus home but it was regarded as weakness of faith”.
In the end Eddie’s wife made the break. Eddie was shocked but he began to question the elders about the movement and what the real Gospel is. They were reluctant to answer. The final confrontation came when he and two others met with the elders to discuss various Biblical interpretations. This time it was the elders who stormed out as the priest had done ten years earlier. Eddie left the JW’s and discovered the truth about those verses Paul wrote in Romans 1: “The gospel is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew and then for the Gentile. For in the gospel a righteousness from God is revealed; a righteousness that is by faith from first to last”.
The JW’s teach that your salvation is not complete until you do this, that and the other. Let’s be clear, so does every other religion. There is even a danger when we observe something like Lent that we see it as something we have to do to complete our salvation. It is not. If we choose to give up our job, evangelise others, fast or pray it is something which comes from our faith in God and in thankfulness that God has saved us. There is no need to do these things out of guilt because we have been told we won’t go to heaven or have eternal life if we don’t. That simply isn’t true. These things don’t get us to God, only Jesus does that. This is the Gospel. It was the Gospel Paul taught and others tried to corrupt. It is the Gospel Eddie discovered after others tried to deceive him and use him. “It is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew and then for the Gentile. For in the gospel a righteousness from God is revealed; a righteousness that is by faith from first to last”.
The Desertion of the Gospel (Verse 6)
Paul's expression of astonishment is actually a stinging rebuke: I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you by the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel.”
The present tense of the verb deserting tells us that the Galatian Christians had not yet decisively carried out their desertion. They were just starting to turn around and leave. Paul's letter was designed to arrest them before they had gone too far. The one they were deserting was the one who had called them by the grace of Christ. While this may be read as a reference to Paul himself, similar references to God's call by his grace in Paul's life (1:15) and in the Galatians' experience (5:8) indicate that the reference is to God. It is God who calls us, not any one individual. Paul is stunned that people who had just recently experienced so much of God's miraculous power by his Spirit in their lives (3:1-5) would now turn away from him. They are turning their backs on God in order to follow a different gospel.
The content of this different gospel will become evident as we read the letter, so I won’t go into it now. But it is clear already that this gospel was not God-centred. It was drawing people away from God to focus on themselves. It was preoccupation with racial identity, religious observance and ceremonial rituals which was robbing them of their experience of God's grace expressed in Christ. The irony and tragedy of the situation was that in their pious pursuit of spiritual perfection (3:3) they were actually turning away from God.
We too can spend so much time arguing more about how we do things, which churches are the best, do we do Lent or not, that we are distracted from God. Knowing God is what matters. Having faith in the God who freed us is what matters. Knowing that nothing we do can change that brings such freedom. God is God, not the church, nor is how we are baptised, nor is Holy Communion or in the Galatians case, whether we follow Jewish rituals. None of these are God. Make sure you focus is with him and anything he asks you to do after that will be out of thankfulness for his love for you and not any other motive.
The Galatian tragedy is a warning for us that not every quest for spirituality is in reality a quest for God. We must remember that the Galatian Christians were trapped by a message that promised spiritual perfection but turned them away from God when it all became more important to them than Him.
The Perversion of the Gospel (Verse 7)
The fascinating, even spellbinding teaching of some people in the Galatian churches had turned the Galatian believers away from the true gospel. Paul boldly asserts that the different gospel which is so attractive to the Galatian Christians is really no gospel at all. How is having to work harder and harder for something which you can’t achieve good news? It is a perversion of the gospel of Christ, perpetrated by some people who are trying to cause confusion in the Galatian churches.
Probably these people claimed that their message supplemented and completed Paul's message. They would not have viewed their version of the gospel as heretical. After all, they did not deny the deity of Christ, the cross of Christ or the resurrection of Christ. They subtracted nothing from Paul's message. They only added to it.
But Paul does not allow their gospel to stand as a legitimate option. He sets forth a radical antithesis, as Brian would say. The exact opposite. His gospel cannot be served alongside other gospels, buffet-style. You know the sort of thing. All the foods are laid out and you pick and choose what you fancy and leave the rest. Paul is saying you can’t pick and choose. The Gospel is the Gospel. There is no choice. There is only one true gospel of Christ. The rest of his letter defines the true gospel in antithesis – as a direct opposite to the false gospel, so that the readers will reject the false and embrace the true.
I defined the Gospel earlier as Paul did in Romans. Remember, Paul has this God-given authority so what he says goes. He has not appointed himself to say this. No man has appointed him. God himself, through the risen Lord Jesus, appointed him. Is that the Gospel you are relying on? Or are you adding bits to try and win people over?
Condemnation of Perverters of the Gospel (Verses 8-10)
Paul places all advocates of a gospel that differs from his gospel under condemnation. Adherence to the true gospel is the final test of true authority. Even the authority of a messenger from heaven or the authority of Paul himself must be tested by loyalty to the gospel. It is important to note that Paul holds himself accountable to this ultimate measure of authority. His apostolic authority is not random; it is valid only as long as he is faithful to the true gospel.
I want to talk about authority. Some persons in leadership roles attempt to exercise absolute control over the church and place themselves above any criticism; enslaved churches lack freedom to grow in faith and love. This was the condition of the Galatian churches. The intruders campaigned for the exclusive devotion of the Galatian Christians (4:17).
Leaders are accountable. And as more of us become involved in ministry – speaking up here, organising worship, helping on Kairos, leading Bible Study – we all need to be putting ourselves under God and what we speak of as the Gospel is the test of whether we are suitable people to do that. Before any of us put ourselves forward we need to use verses such as Romans 1:16-17 as a measure of our worthiness to lead others. I would ask us to do that.
The extremes of anarchy and tyranny can be avoided in the church only when we implement Paul's combination of authority and accountability. Leaders in the church should lead with authority, because God is the ultimate source for their position; but they should also lead with humility, because God has set the final standard in the truth of the gospel, by which all are judged. Leaders must be held accountable to this final standard by those who are led.
In verse 9 Paul repeats his previous instruction, which eternally condemns anybody for preaching a gospel other than what the Galatian converts had originally accepted from Paul. Paul's double condemnation sounds terribly harsh and severe in our ears. It expresses an absolute intolerance for anyone who differs from his gospel. How can we seek to maintain harmony in a context of religious pluralism, we might respond, except by showing tolerance for all religious alternatives? Doesn't Paul himself argue for a tolerant acceptance of differences in other situations?
We need to understand that Paul was willing to accommodate himself to differences in matters such as what foods to eat or what days to celebrate (Rom 14—15; 1 Cor 8—10), but when the central truth of the gospel was at stake, he drew a clear line and refused to compromise. He was unyielding in his defence of "the truth of the gospel" (2:5, 14), because he wanted to protect the freedom of God's people. Paul did teach that Christians should "live at peace with everyone" (Rom 12:18); but when anyone negated the core of the gospel, especially the significance of the cross, he did not hesitate to forcefully refute that person, as we see here in Galatians and in his other letters (see 2 Cor 11:13-15; Col 2:8). While we should seek to maintain harmony in a context of religious pluralism by showing tolerance and respect for people of other religious persuasions, this should not lead us to compromise in any way the exclusiveness of the true gospel of Christ or change it to suit them.
Of course our unwillingness to compromise the truth of the gospel will sometimes make us quite unpopular. In verse 10 Paul recognizes that his double condemnation of all who preach a gospel different from his gospel will certainly not be seen as an attempt to please people. His rhetorical questions call for a negative answer: "No, Paul, you are obviously not trying to win human approval, but God's." Perhaps Paul had been accused of trying to please people by preaching a gospel that did not require Gentiles to follow Jewish customs. But now after pronouncing judgment on all who preach a perversion of his gospel, he considers himself to be cleared of any accusation that his ambition is to please people. Such an ambition would indicate that he was not a true servant of Christ. By his loyalty to the gospel despite opposition, Paul proves his complete submission to the lordship of Christ. As a faithful servant to Christ, he is a rebuke to the Galatian believers who are so quickly deserting the One who called them and turning to a different gospel (1:6).
True servants of Christ will not win popularity contests with people who "gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear" (2 Tim 4:3). But even when they are unpopular, true servants of Christ are marked by unswerving loyalty to Christ. We can still hear the clear gospel message today because courageous men and women suffered greatly for their uncompromising defence of it in years past. They resisted immense pressure to renounce their faith in Christ, and they boldly declared, as Martin Luther did, "Here I stand. I can do no other. God help me."
Conclusion
The Unchanging Message for an Ever Changing World is the Gospel!
• The Gospel Needs No Additions.
• Distorting The Gospel Is Serious Business.
• Only the Gospel Can Save Men From Their Sins.
• Only The Gospel Produces Changed Lives.
