Introduction:
Friday at quitting time, Jim said,
‘Boss, have you got any extra work I can do tonight?’
Sure do but I can’t pay you overtime.
That’s okay, I just don’t want to go home.
Why not?
Well, I’ve been in the doghouse since last night.
I see...Why? What did you do to deserve that?
I still don’t know, it must be one of those woman things.
I was minding my own business relaxing in front of the TV.
My wife enters the room and asks, "What’s on the TV?"
And honestly, I swear all I said was, "Dust!"
She’s been mad ever since!
The wife found fault with her husband’s grace/truthfulness and it forfeited her companionship.
The churches in Galatia were heirs to a promise but we find them here rejecting that promise. They were forfeiting their companionship with God because they were turning to a perverted gospel. It was a doctrine that was not from the throne room of heaven but rather straight from the bowels of Hell. They were like thousands of others that down through the ages have failed to understand that you cannot turn to the world without turning away from God.
There was a promise that God had made many years ago to His servant Abraham. It was a promise that would be available to all that would receive Jesus as their Savior and become joint heirs with Him. It was a promise of blessing.
Listen to Hebrews 6:13-14; 17-19a
13For when God made a promise to Abraham, because He could swear by no one greater, He swore by Himself, 14saying, “Surely blessing I will bless you, and multiplying I will multiply you.”
17Thus God, determining to show more abundantly to the heirs of promise the immutability of His counsel, confirmed it by an oath, 18that by two immutable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we might have strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold of the hope set before us.
19This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast,
I fear that today many that once turned to Jesus as their Savior and were heirs of that promise of blessing have turned to the world. As a result not only have they lost that promise of blessing but they have lost that close companionship with the very Son of God.
Lets examine this dilemma beginning with the first chapter of Galatians.
I. The Galatians Were Just Like Us. They Were Living In “A Present Evil Age” (1:1-1:5)
II. They Had Changed From Walking With Christ To Walking Without Him. (1:6-10)
A. They had rejected the promise of blessing that God was trying to give them through His grace.
B. They were listening to other “forms of Godliness” that had no power. They were being led away from God.
Consider II Timothy 3:1-5
1But know this, that in the last days perilous times will come: 2For men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, 3unloving, unforgiving, slanderers, without self-control, brutal, despisers of good, 4traitors, headstrong, haughty, lovers of pleasure rather
than lovers of God, 5having a form of godliness but denying its power. And from such people turn away!
C. When they rejected the promise they ceased pleasing God and started pleasing man.
III. They Were Living In The Flesh. They Needed To Be Walking By Faith. (2:11-21)
A. They had went from freedom to bondage.
B. They had turned from faith and had accepted the spoils of Satan.
1. Satan always appeals to us by offering tangible things
2. It’s the very same thing he offered Jesus.
Remember Matthew 4:1-11
1Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. 2And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterward He was hungry. 3Now when the tempter came to Him, he said, “If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.”
4But He answered and said, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.’
5Then the devil took Him up into the holy city, set Him on the pinnacle of the temple, 6and said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down. For it is written: ‘He shall give His angels charge over you,’ and, ‘In their hands they shall bear you up, Lest you dash your foot against a stone.’ 7Jesus said to him, “It is written again, ‘You shall not tempt the LORD your God.’
8Again, the devil took Him up on an exceedingly high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. 9And he said to Him, “All these things I will give You if You will fall down and worship me.”
10Then Jesus said to him, “Away with you, Satan! For it is written, ‘You shall worship the LORD your God, and Him only you shall serve.’
11Then the devil left Him, and behold, angels came and ministered to Him.
3. Isn’t it amazing that he always offers the temporal and never the eternal.
IV. They Had Willfully Chosen To Be Disobedient (3:1-9)
A. They had forgotten The Way, The Truth and The Life.
B. They were trying to fellowship with the Father without going through the Son.
C. They had begun in the Spirit but now they were relying on the flesh. (v. 3)
D. They are reminded that only faithful believers will receive the promise. (v. 7-9)
V. They Had Moved Out From Under The Umbrella Of God’s Grace And Had Placed Upon Themselves The Curse Of The Law. (3:10-14)
A. This is what happens when we turn away from God. (v. 10)
B. We cannot be justified in the world for it is written that “the just shall live by faith”
C. Always remember that Christ paid the sin debt for us so that we could be blessed and receive the promise.
Application:
Where do you stand today? To turn to the world is to turn away from Christ. The promise of blessing is available. You have a choice to either reject it or receive it.
