A Counterfeit Gospel
Galatians 1:6-10
Chenoa Baptist Church
Pastor Jefferson M. Williams
02-02-2020
Versace?
A few years ago, I led a mission trip to New York City with 15 teenagers and several other adults. We went into Times Square and we were all overwhelmed by the lights, sounds, and mass of humanity that calls NYC home.
I had always wanted to buy Maxine something expensive, like a Dooney and Bourke purse. These purses can run $300 to $500 dollars.
As we were in walking through Time Square, I noticed a nice gentleman waving to me. He had a table with all kinds of purses - Versace, Louie Vuitton, and Dooney and Bourke! I could buy Maxine a really expensive purse for between $25 and $50 dollars. What a deal!
But when I inspected the purses closely, the patterns seemed a little off. It looked a lot like a Dooney and Bourke purse but, in the end, alas it was a fake, a counterfeit.
There are a lot of counterfeits in this world. God creates and satan counterfeits. Sadly, collectors are telling people to be very wary of buying Kobe Bryant memorabilia because the counterfeiters are out in full force after a tragedy happens.
We are going to discover that there was a counterfeit gospel being shopped in the churches of Galatia. And Paul wasn’t going to stand for it for one minute.
So Far
Last week, we began our series on the book of Galatians called, “Dance Lessons.” We considered the first five verses that comprise the introduction or salutation of the letter.
We answered the questions:
“Who wrote the letter?”
The Apostle Paul
“Who was the letter written to?”
The baby Christians in the churches of Galatia, which includes Perga, Iconium, Derbe, Antioch Pisidia, and Lystra. These churches were planted by Paul and Barnabas on their first missionary journey through what is now southern Turkey.
Why did he write the letter?
After he returned to Antioch in Syria, he received a message that there was a group of Pharisees from Jerusalem that claimed authority from James. They questioned Paul’s authority as an apostle and were teaching these new believers that they had to be circumcised, follow the Old Testament dietary rules, and the ceremonial laws of Moses. In Acts, at the Jerusalem council they demanded:
“The Gentiles must be circumcised and required to keep the law of Moses.” (Acts 15:5)
But Paul emphatically wrote to the Galatians in chapter 5:
“For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any value. The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love.” (Gal 5:6)
These new believers were confused about who, and what to believe.
What was Paul’s message?
Paul immediately asserts his authority as an apostle of Jesus Christ. He had not be commissioned by a committee or appointed by a leader like Peter or James. His mission was given to him directly in an encounter with the risen Christ on the Damascus road.
He know the Gospel and his spiritual children’s souls are at stake so he begins his letter with a summary of the true Gospel:
Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins to rescue us from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father, to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.
The true Gospel is a rescue mission. Jesus Christ, willingly died on the cross, in our place, to take the penalty of our sins and to open the way back to a relationship with God.
This was done according to the will of the Father and out of sheer grace. We did nothing to earn it. We didn’t deserve it. We could never hop high enough for God’s holiness. But “while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” (Rom 5:8)
I love the fact that Scott Sauls says that there is “no cover charge in heaven because Jesus already paid it!”
Patrick Mohomes will start tonight as quarterback of the Kansas City Chiefs. He is a strong born-again evangelical Christian.
Recently, he was eating dinner with his wife at a pizza place. Everyone saw it was Patrick but not one person asked for an autograph or picture. When he went to leave he asked for everyones attention. He said, “Thank you for letting my wife and I eat dinner in peace. This is why I love KC”.
After they left, everyone learned that he had paid the bill of every customer there!
We are saved by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone to the glory of God alone!
Charles Spurgeon said that the “only thing we bring to salvation is the sin that nailed Jesus to the cross.”
When we try to add anything to the Gospel, we actually end up with something completely different from the Gospel.
We when understand this, truly understand this, it sets us free to dance to the rhythm of grace, joy, and freedom. And remember, “those who dance are thought crazy by those who cannot hear the music.”
Paul’s Astonishment
After the introduction, Paul usually thanks God for these believers. He tells them how much he prays for them and that he longs to see them again.
Not with the believers at Galatia. Paul’s tone is sharp, angry at times, his words strong, and his message crystal clear. He is absolutely dumbfounded by these believer’s behavior:
“I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you to live in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel— which is really no gospel at all.” (Gal 1:6-7a)
Paul is astonished. This is a strong Greek word that denotes the look on someone’s face after they had witnessed a miracle of God. Imagine the look on all the Israelites faces when the water from the Red piled up and they walked through on dry land. (See Exodus 14) Or when the disciples witnessed Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead. (See John 11)
He is bewildered, dumbfounded, gobsmacked. I like that word. It’s a British term which means “to slap your hand over your mouth in amazement.”
Today, we might say it like this, “I am absolutely blown away by your behavior.”
What is he so upset about? That this had happened so quickly . He was just there! He was throwing his hands up and saying, “How could you do this so soon after I had been there and taught you the truth?”
What had happened so quickly? They were “deserting the one who had called you to live in the grace of Christ.”
The word “desert” is another strong Greek word. It means to “transfer one’s allegiances” - it would be like a Bears fan wearing a Cheesehead. It could also mean “to be a traitor, a turncoat, a Benedict Arnold.” These Galatian Christians were going AWOL and turning to a different gospel.
Paul may have remembered that Moses had the same experience in Exodus 32. Moses was on the mountain with God and the people were down below with Aaron. When Moses didn’t come down for a long time, the people grew impatient and asked Aaron to make them gods to follow.
“Then the Lord said to Moses, “Go down, because your people, whom you brought up out of Egypt, have become corrupt. They have been quick to turn away from what I commanded them and have made themselves an idol cast in the shape of a calf. They have bowed down to it and sacrificed to it and have said, ‘These are your gods, Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt.’” (Exodus 32:7-8)
The only good news in this situation is that the word “deserting” is in the continuous present tense. They are in the process of turning from the truth. It’s not too late. There’s still time for Paul to set them back on the right path.
Notice that Paul didn’t say that they were abandoning a philosophy or a set of theological thoughts. No, to reject the Gospel was to reject the one who called them to dance to the rhythm of grace in Jesus Christ.
In fact, he clarifies his position and writes that the “different gospel” that the Judiazers are promoting is “really no Gospel at all.”
Chuck Swindoll writes that this other gospel was different from the true Gospel like “night is different from day, like fire is different from water, like a lie is different from the truth, like death is different from life.”
Aaron Rodgers grew up in church but he saw it as just a bunch of rules. But in high school, he discovered Young Life. He loved the welcoming atmosphere at Young Life and said it was so different than the church attended.
At Young Life it was “come as you are,” but at church you had to dress a certain way and talk a certain way to be accepted.
In Young Life, he went on several mission trips and built houses for people in Mexico and he said that was very meaningful for him.
But in 2008, after a chapel service he met Rob Bell, then pastor at Mars Hill in Michigan. Rob wrote several books, including the best seller “Love Wins,’ in which he teaches that hell doesn’t exist and that, in the end, everyone will be at home with God. Soon after that, Rob left Mars Hill and become a “film maker” and now hangs out with Oprah.
In an interview with his girlfriend, Danica Patrick, you can hear Rob Bell’s influence on his thinking about God:
“i don’t know how you can believe in a God who wants to condemn most of the planet to a fiery hell. What type of loving, sensitive, omnipresent, omnipotent, being wants to condemn most of his beautiful creation to a fiery hell?”
As I watched that video this week, I was so sad. At Young Life, Aaron was taught the truth of the Gospel - that God doesn’t want anyone to perish and He loves us so much that He sent his only Son to make a way for us to go to heaven. Despite what Rob Bell teaches, “love does win” but it was on a bloody cross that Christ won the victory for us!
It reminded me that often the greatest threat to Gospel doesn’t come from outside the church but from people inside the church.
Aaron has deserted the true Gospel. But as long as he’s still breathing, there is still hope for him to turn back.
Paul’s Adversaries
“Evidently some people are throwing you into confusion and are trying to pervert the gospel of Christ.” (Gal 1:7b)
The Judiazers were Jewish-Christians from Jerusalem who claimed their authority from James, the half brother of Jesus and the leader of the church.
These false teachers questioned Paul’s authority. Their teaching went something like this:
Listen, we agree that faith in Christ is important but there’s just more to it. Paul, whoever he is, watered it down for you so you would accept his message.
Jesus? Yes. But you also need to be circumcised and follow the Mosaic dietary laws. In other words, you Gentiles need to become Jewish first.
Paul writes that they were “throwing them into confusion.” This means to “shake or agitate.”
Have you ever done laundry at a laundromat? I remember doing that as a a college student. I would sit and watch the clothes tumble and it was almost hypnotic.
The believers in Galatia were in a state of turmoil. The Jews that had come to Christ had left the law behind. Paul taught that Jesus had fulfilled the law and that it is by grace that they were saved, not from keeping the law.
The Gentiles were at a total loss. They didn’t even understand what was going on. Why would we need to get circumcised? They were adult males. Every guy in here just instinctively crossed their legs.
Paul wrote that these false teachers were “perverting the Gospel of Christ.”
The word “pervert” means to “turn upside down and inside out.” It denotes a radical change, like water into blood or daylight to darkness.
Remember the equation - Jesus + Nothing = Everything!
If you add anything to the free gift of grace found in the Gospel, it stops being the gospel.
If you say that you have to be circumcised for God to accept you, you are reversing the gospel. In this way of thinking, you obey therefore you are accepted. Remember, the Gospel says you are accepted therefore you obey. The first is out of fear. The second out of love.
There are many people who hear the gospel and think it’s too easy. There’s got to be something more. We need to add something to it.
Paul told young Titus that they must be silenced:
For there are many rebellious people, full of meaningless talk and deception, especially those of the circumcision group. They must be silenced, because they are disrupting whole households by teaching things they ought not to teach—and that for the sake of dishonest gain. (Titus 1:10-11)
This is one of the ways the gospel “perverted” today.
Adding to the Gospel
When I was young, my parents attended a church that taught that you had to be baptized to be saved.
I asked my mom one time, what would happen if someone gave their life to Jesus and then had a heart attack walking down the aisle to get baptized. I asked her if he would still go to heaven. She just shook her head and said, “I don’t think so.”
No! It’s not Jesus + Baptism = Salvation
When I worked at Red Lobster in North Carolina, I worked with several young men who went to a local Bible college. They told me that a person had to speak in tongues to be saved.
No! It’s not Jesus + tongues = Salvation.
Weakening the Gospel
The church I served in for many years, had an Easter experience that highlighted this one.
They had a combined service for Easter and the other church’s pastor preached the message. He began the sermon with these words, “We all know that the resurrection is a myth. But it’s a beautiful legend that can teach us a lot.”
Our church members were mortified. They didn’t know what to do. Many of them felt like they needed to get up and walk out. They didn’t but we never ever had another joint service with that other church again!
Diluting the Gospel
I recently talked to a friend who goes to a church in a very liberal denomination. He told me that he was excited because there was a discussion among the leaders about whether sex before marriage was really sinful or not. He said that he believed it is unrealistic to teach that sex before marriage was wrong.
Distorting the Gospel
When a pastor preaches that God wants to bless you with health and wealth, they are distorting the gospel. This false teaching is spreading like wildfire in Africa. How ridiculous when people under a tree are praying for a BMW.
In Paul’s charge to his young mentee Timothy, he says these words that sounds like it could be said today:
“Preach the word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction. For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths. But you, keep your head in all situations, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, discharge all the duties of your ministry.” (2 Tim 4:2-5)
Joel Osteen’s church in Houston has over 52,000 attendees.each weekend. He has no theological education and never wanted to be a pastor. In fact, he doesn’t like the term pastor and calls himself a “life coach” that focuses on God’s love and how to achieve all the blessing that God wants to bless them if they just have a positive mindset and find their “Best Life Now."
Every week, he downplays the gospel, the cross, and sin. He tickles the ears of his listeners with a big grin on his face.
Paul isn’t going to let these false teachers get away with perverting the gospel. If you thought he was angry before, you ain’t seen nothing yet!
Paul’s Anathema
“But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let them be under God’s curse! As we have already said, so now I say again: If anybody is preaching to you a gospel other than what you accepted, let them be under God’s curse!” (Gal 1:8-9)
Whoa! Is Paul just losing it? Is this just a holy temper-tantrum from an angry apostle?
No! Paul understand that the very glory of Christ and His Gospel is at stake and asserts his authority over this false teachers.
Look at verse 8. Paul puts forth a hypothetical situation to the Galatians. Even if he or Barnabas, or even an angel, came back through their region and preached a different Gospel than the one Paul originally preached to them, he writes they should be under God’s curse.
The curse is universal. He includes even himself.
In verse 9, he reminds them that he had already given them this warning when he was with them.
The fact that he repeats this twice shows that the curse isn’t just an outburst but a very serious condemnation from the apostle.
The Greek word he uses is “anathema.” This means “devoted to destruction.” In terms we can understand today, he says that these false teachers should be damned to hell!
If he was alive today and posted this on Twitter, he would have used all CAPS!
Why is he using such strong language? Because the glory of Christ and the salvation of sinners is at stake.
When writing about his fellow Jews in the book of Romans, he takes the same strong stand:
“I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my people, those of my own race, 4 the people of Israel.” (Rom 9:2-3)
I really wish Joseph Smith had read the book of Galatians. Jospeh Smith was the founder of Mormonism, or the Church of Jesus Christ and Latter-Day Saints.
When he was 25 years old, he had a vision in which Jesus told him that his sins were forgiven and that all the churches on the earth at the time had turned aside from the true Gospel.
Three years later, Smith was visited by an angel named Moroni, while praying one night in 1823. Smith said that this angel revealed the location of a buried book made of golden plates, as well as other artifacts, including a breastplate and a set of interpreters composed of two seer stones set in a frame, which had been hidden in a hill near his home.
Smith said he attempted to remove the plates the next morning, but was unsuccessful because the angel returned and prevented him. Smith reported that during the next four years, he made annual visits to the hill, but, until the fourth and final visit, each time he returned without the plates.
Finally, the angel allowed him to retrieve the golden tablets and translate them, resulting in the Book of Mormon.
Smith taught that after the apostles died, the church was corrupted for nearly 1800 years. It wasn’t until he came along as the next apostle that the church became pure again.
This resulted in a world-wide religion that 15 million people follow.
It teaches that God used to be a man and became a God. And you can too. Not only that, you can have your own planet to rule.
God the Father came down and had physical intercourse with Mary, resulting in twins - Jesus and Lucifer.
When they come to your door, they use terms like “Gospel” and “Jesus” but it is a cult that is a false Gospel of works.
All of this could have been avoided if people knew their Bibles! The next time mormon missionaries come to your door, ( 2 John 7 says not to let them in your house), grab your Bible and read them Galatians 1:8-9 - even if we or an angel preaches another gospel let him be sent straight to hell before he can take anyone else with them.
Paul’s Aim
Paul concludes this section with two very important questions:
“Am I now trying to win the approval of human beings, or of God? Or am I trying to please people? If I were still trying to please people, I would not be a servant of Christ.” (Gal 1:10)
The Judiazers were accusing Paul of soft-selling the Gospel because he wanted the Galatians to like him. He was watering down the Gospel.
Paul basically says, “Hey, did you read what I just wrote?” People that are trying to win friends and influence people don’t usually call down curses on people’s head.
Paul only cared about pleasing God. He said if he was “still” trying to please man, he would not be a servant of Christ.”
If his goal was admiration of men, he would have remained a Pharisee.
Rhea Miller in 1922 wrote these words that echo Paul’s heart;
“I’d rather have Jesus than man’s applause.
I’d rather be faithful to his dear cause.
I’d taster have Jesus than world-wide fame.
I’d rather be true to His holy name.”
Applications
Before we transition to communion, let’s look at three applications.
We should confront gently when dealing with someone going astray.
I have friend named Donna. She grew up in a Bible-teaching church and loved Jesus from a young age. When she was in her 20s, she went through a divorce that wrecked her emotionally. It was during this time, that some neighbors invited her to a Bible study. They were Mormons.
They were super sweet and soon Donna found herself going to church with them. She admitted that there were times during worship or the sermon that she would cock her head and say, “What?” But she was so lonely and they were so sincere.
When I asked her what was that caused her to see clearly the danger she was in, she said it was her mother’s letters.
Her mother would write her letters filled with Scripture and she would remind her what she believed. The letters weren’t condemning or angry. They were written with great love and gentleness.
Donna said that eventually she knew she couldn’t attend that church and needed to find a church that taught the true Gospel.
Paul writes later on in Galatians that “if someone is caught in a sin, you who live by the Spirit should restore that person gently. But watch yourselves, or you also may be tempted.” (Gal 6:1)
The same principle applies when someone is being led astray by false teaching. Donna’s mom did a great job of simply reminder her of the true Gospel.
2. Know the Word well
When I worked at Fed Ex in college, I worked on a line that had packages coming down a conveyor belt. I had to pick them up and weigh them and see if they were over 8 oz or under 8 ozs. I got to know that weight so well that I rarely needed a scale. I know what 8 ounces felt like.
When ATF agents are trained to spot counterfeit money, they handle real money for weeks. Then, the trainer slips in a counterfeit bill which they recognize immediately. Why? Because they know the real thing so well.
In order to not fall for false teaching, we have to know the Word well. If someone would have simply read Galatians 1:6-10 to Joseph Smith, maybe we wouldn’t have 15 million people following a false teacher today.
Another false teaching that you may encounter at your door will be the Jehovah’s Witnesses. Theologically, that group is a mess. There’s so much wrong but let me focus on one thing. They deny the Trinity. They do not believe Jesus was God. This makes them what we call heretics.
A JW came to our door when I was a teenager and my mother told her to go away but my genius brother invited her in. I’ll never forget Mark challenging her with John 1:1:
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” (John 1:1)
JW have their own translation and she said that Mark needed to read out of her Bible that say that Jesus was “a god.”
Mark’s eyes immediately lit up as he ran back to his room and grabbed his Greek New Testament (he was about 15!) and read it in the Greek and then explained each word to her and proved that the Greek did not say that Jesus was a god but God.
At this, she decided she needed to leave. As she was walking down our driveway, my brother stood on the front porch and read that verse in Greek again and again.
My brother knew the Word so well that he could spot a counterfeit from a million miles away.
How about you? Most American Christians have multiple Bibles laying around the house but don’t read them enough to be able to spot false teaching.
There was a group of Christians in Berea that are great role models for us:
“Now the Berean Jews were of more noble character than those in Thessalonica, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true.” (Acts 17:11)
Todd Wilson writes that in order to avoid theological drifting, we need to “hold tenaciously to what we have been taught and let Scripture be our final authority in matters of faith.”
In 2020, let’s be a church that know the Word.
3. Seek to please God more than men.
Joseph was sold into slavery and ended up in Potifer’s house. Scripture said he was a hunk and Potifer’s wife started trying to seduce him.
Joseph’s response should serve as a powerful example:
“But he refused. “With me in charge,” he told her, “my master does not concern himself with anything in the house; everything he owns he has entrusted to my care. No one is greater in this house than I am. My master has withheld nothing from me except you, because you are his wife. How then could I do such a wicked thing and sin against God?” And though she spoke to Joseph day after day, he refused to go to bed with her or even be with her. (Gen 39:8-10)
Tim Tebow has made it very clear throughout his that he was a virgin and he was going to honor God with his purity until he gets married. He has been made fun of and mocked endlessly for this stance. But he didn’t care. He knew he wanted to honor God more than for people to think he’s cool.
Well, Tim married Demi-Leigh New Peters, former Miss South Africa and Miss Universe on two weeks ago. When asked if he made the right choice by remaining pure, he smiled and said she was worth the wait.
There will come a time when you must decide whether you will please God or men because you can’t do both.
Todd Wilson points out that people pleasers fear men, desire to please others, pretend to serve Christ but actually serve themselves, they are anxious for approval and are distraught when they don’t get it. They cave under the pressure of influential people and are often hypocrites who hide behind a mask.
Kelsea Ballerini has a new song out called, “Homecoming Queen.” Here’s the chorus:
“But what if I told you the world wouldn't end / If you started showing what's under your skin
What if you let 'em all in on the lie? / Even the homecoming queen cries”
These people don’t make very good servants of Christ.
Servants of Christ seek to please God only, they serve others out of simple one and leave the approval up to God.
Eric Liddell was favored to win the 100 meter dash at 1924 Olympics, but when the schedule was published several months in advance, he knew he couldn’t run the heats because it was on a Sunday and he said he would not run on the Sabbath. He had to withdraw from the race and he entered the 400 meters race, which he had never run.
Everyone but his coach was furious and begged him to reconsider.
On the morning of the race, one of the athletic trainers handed him a folded piece of paper. Eric opened it and it read, “He that honors me I will honor. Wishing you the best success always.”
He ran the 400 meters and broke the Olympic and World records! He later said, “I believe God made me for a purpose and He made me fast. When I run I feel His pleasure.”
