Do you know how to detect a virus-laden email? It used to be that if you received an email from someone you didn’t know and it had an obscene subject heading, chances are that email had a virus and should be deleted promptly. Nowadays virus-laden emails can come from people you know and trust. Once a virus takes over a machine it will often send itself out to everyone on the infected computer’s mailing list. Without anti-viral software it’s now virtually impossible to keep your machine virus free. While anti-viral software costs a bit of money, it’s worth it to protect your investment.
Do you know how to detect virus-laden messages that are reportedly from God? God warned us that we would be inundated with false teachers sending out such messages until Christ returns. Of course it does one no good to know such messengers exist but not know how to recognize them. In our sermon text this morning the Apostle Paul demonstrates for us the marks of a true messenger of God. A true messenger of God will both speak and defend the true gospel.
Our text is taken from the Apostle Paul’s letter to the Galatians. Paul wrote this letter to Christians living in (present day) central Turkey because false teachers, known as Judaizers, had moved in after his departure. The Judaizers taught that you needed to believe in Jesus and keep the Old Testament Ceremonial Law by being circumcised and observing the Sabbath Day to be saved. Paul, on the other hand, taught that we are saved by grace alone through faith alone. Paul denied that there was anything a person must do to be saved for God has done it all for us. The Judaizers saw this as a watered-down version of the gospel and told the Galatians that they didn’t need to listen to Paul because he wasn’t really an apostle anyway. As far as they knew, Paul had not been personally commissioned by Christ, as had the other apostles. Paul hadn’t even been sent out by the mother-church in Jerusalem but by the predominantly gentile congregation in Syrian Antioch!
Paul dealt with these attacks on his apostleship in the very first verses of his letter. He wrote, “Paul, an apostle—sent not from men nor by man, but by Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised him from the dead” (Gal. 1:1). The reality was that Jesus himself had appeared to Paul at his conversion and personally commissioned him to share the good news of salvation. Not only that, after Paul was baptized in Damascus he went to the desert region of Arabia where Jesus himself taught Paul what he needed to know and share (Gal. 1:11-24).
It’s important for us to know that Paul was indeed an apostle called and trained personally by Christ for Paul wrote thirteen of the twenty-seven books of the New Testament. Since Paul was an apostle we can be certain that what he wrote was inspired by God and not just his own opinions as is often thought. Even the Apostle Peter recognized Paul’s writings to be inspired by God. Peter wrote in his second epistle, “…our dear brother Paul also wrote you with the wisdom that God gave him. 16 He writes the same way in all his letters, speaking in them of these matters. His letters contain some things that are hard to understand, which ignorant and unstable people distort, as they do the other Scriptures, to their own destruction” (2 Pet. 3:15, 16). Since Paul wrote under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit what he tells us about Holy Communion, the role of men and women, the doctrine of fellowship are really God’s teachings, not Paul’s, and therefore demand our attention and obedience.
But now how were the Galatian Christians to know that Paul indeed was a true messenger of God? They could know this from the true gospel Paul had preached to them. Paul summarized the true gospel message in his greeting to the Galatians. Paul wrote, “Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, 4 who gave himself for our sins to rescue us from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father, 5 to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen” (Gal. 1:3-5).
The true gospel message is the good news about what God has done to save us. It’s all about how Jesus gave himself over for our sins. Like the goalie’s pads absorbing the strike of a slap shot, Jesus absorbed the punishment for our sins. Every other religion and even many Christian denominations teach, however, that we must first give ourselves to God before he will do anything for us. That’s simply not what the Bible teaches. Think back to the Garden of Eden (Gen. 3). After Adam and Eve sinned did they go running to God to confess what they had done and promise not to do it again? No! They ran away from God and when confronted with their sin blamed God for it! In spite of their sinful denial God gave himself over to Adam and Eve when he first tracked them down and then promised to send them a savior (Gen. 3:15).
Because the true gospel is all about what God did, Paul could announce to the Galatians that grace and peace was theirs. That was a fact, not a wish. In the same way I can announce to all of you today that your sins are forgiven, not will be forgiven if you first live a good life, or if you will only first believe in Jesus. That’s right, whether you believe it or not your sins are forgiven. Of course if you don’t believe, then Jesus’ work of salvation is worthless to you and you will not benefit from it. It’s like the child who throws away his birthday card from Grandma with $10 in it. He loses out on the $10, not because Grandma didn’t send him any birthday money, but for whatever reason, whether carelessness or ungratefulness, he threw out what had been given to him.
If the true gospel is the message of God’s free gift of forgiveness for all people with no strings attached, why is it that true messengers of God will sometimes seem to withhold forgiveness? Why, for example, did Paul urge the Corinthian congregation to expel a man from their midst who was guilty of sexual immorality (1 Cor. 5)? Should the congregation not have simply forgiven the man? After all hadn’t God already forgiven him? Although God had forgiven that man, the man, by continuing in his sin without remorse, abused God’s forgiveness. Just as the $10 Grandma sent to her grandson for his birthday was not meant to buy illegal drugs, so God’s forgiveness is not a license for us to sin with reckless abandon. By calling for that man to be expelled from the church, Paul was only doing what Jesus had prescribed in Matthew 18. Jesus tells us that expelling those from our congregation who claim to be Christian but refuse to be sorry for and turn away from sin, is the most loving thing we can do to get these people to see that by their impenitent attitude are trampling God’s forgiveness and are therefore guilty of unbelief. We expel impenitent sinners, not because we think we are better, but because we want these people to turn from their sins and benefit again from the forgiveness that is theirs through faith in Christ.
Paul not only spoke the true gospel as a true messenger of God; he also defended it. He wrote to the Galatian Christians, “6 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— 7 which is really no gospel at all. Evidently some people are throwing you into confusion and are trying to pervert the gospel of Christ. 8 But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let him be eternally condemned!” (Gal. 1:6-8).
Paul was eager to defend the Galatian Christians against the Judaizers because he knew that their false teaching would lead to loss of faith. How were the Galtians to know that the Judaizers were false teachers? Not by their appearance. The Judaizers were no doubt nice people who may have not even meant to preach false doctrine. That still didn’t change the fact that they had added to God’s Word and were now leading believers astray. Even if the Judaizers had been a band of angels, the Galatian Christians were not to listen to them as long as they distorted God’s Word.
That’s a warning we need to heed, for the false teachers in our world often seem to be wonderful people. They may make great neighbors and be supportive friends but when they twist God’s Word in any way they become a threat to our eternal future and to their own. Paul tells us to warn such people about the false teaching they are sharing and if they won’t listen to our warnings from God’s Word, then we are to separate ourselves from them (Rom. 16:17, 18).
Defending the true gospel is not always an easy thing to do. By standing up for the truth Paul was making waves in the Galatian congregations. He was forcing the people to choose between the truth and falsehood. Was there a potential of losing members in Galatia over this? Of course there was but that wasn’t Paul’s concern. Paul said in the last verse of our text: “10 Am I now trying to win the approval of men, or of God?…If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a servant of Christ” (Gal. 1:10). As a servant of Christ Paul had been called to proclaim the truth and he would do that regardless of the feelings of others. While Paul wanted all to believe the truth he was not going to tone down God’s message for those who didn’t believe it.
In the same way when we defend the true gospel we will hurt feelings. People may leave our congregation. While our hearts goes out to such people we will not change God’s Word for them. To do so would break the First Commandment because it would show that we are more concerned about ourselves and our church’s reputation to the outside world than what God thinks about us!
Friends, while a virus-laden email can at most cost a computer system, a virus-laden doctrine can cost a spot in heaven. Are you willing to put up with false doctrine in your life or in the life of the church? As the pastor God has called to serve you with the true Word, I am not willing to let that happen. Won’t you join me then in speaking and defending the true gospel that gives eternal comfort? I know you will for this is what true messengers of God do. Amen.
