Welcome to the Hackberry House of Chosun. My name is Bob. I'm reading from a study of Galatians. It's my own study that I've put together and want to share with you. We're in chapter one still, verses eight and nine, and we're asking the question, what gospel did Paul preach to the Galatians? He did preach a gospel to them and he's wanting to defend it for sure, but what was that gospel? Let's read from the text. 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. As we have said before, so I again say now, if any man is preaching to you a gospel contrary to what you received, he is to be accursed. Twice in these two verses, Paul makes one of his most audacious statements ever. If someone from earth or heaven preaches anything different from what I preached, he is cursed. We, meaning I myself, Paul's already changed radically. He's not going to change again. This is the truth. Don't listen to me if I ever say anything different, or any member of my team, anyone on earth, or an angel. Obviously not an angel from Satan's side, that would be recognizable enough. Paul, you remember, rebuked a demon spirit that was advertising his gospel every day through a young slave girl. And hopefully all of us see through the Joseph Smith and Mohammed claims to have been visited by angels who gave them new revelations of truth. No, not those angels. Paul says even if an angel from heaven A good angel says something other than what he said about the gospel. That angel from heaven is to be cursed. Well, Paul was on safe ground in making such a pronouncement. He knew that no angel from heaven would ever pervert the gospel. But how to tell the perversion? How to know the difference? What exactly was the gospel that Paul preached to these Galatians? Do we have a record of it? Well, yeah, we do. We spoke in the introductory matters above about a certain missionary journey of the apostle. He was accompanied by Barnabas, remember. Both of them had been sent out by the church in Antioch of Syria Ironically, the first sermon recorded by Paul in Galatia is at a church in Antioch, again, but not Syria, but of Pisidia, a region of Galatia. That's in Acts 13. Galatians, he's saying, remember my message to you when I was there. This is the gospel. No one is to add or to subtract from it. You'll note as we walk through this Antioch message that it actually sounds a whole lot like Peter's first sermon. You've got some Jewish history, quotes from the Psalms and Prophets, the death and resurrection of Jesus pointing to David's words about it in both sermons, and then the offer of forgiveness. But I want to look a little more closely at Paul's Antioch, that is, Galatian gospel. Here's an outline of the message in Acts 13. From 16 to 22 in that chapter, Jewish history, from Egypt all the way to King David. In verses 23 to 25, Jesus, from David, comes and is announced by John the Baptist. Verses 26 to 29, the guilt of the Jews in condemning Jesus to death. Bad news before the good news. Verses 30 to 33, God raises Jesus from the dead, fulfilling God's promise. 34 to 37, proof of the resurrection using David and his words. 38 and 39, the announcement of forgiveness of sins attainable to anyone who believes. The law is excluded from this plan of salvation. Verses 40 and 41, exhortation and warning. Notice in verse 26 of that narration, Paul is addressing not only sons of Abraham's family, the Jews, but also those among you who fear God, that is, proselytes and uninterested persons who were considering the Jewish faith. They were perhaps technically Gentiles at the time. This was Paul's gospel. bad news about their sins, good news about a Savior who died, was buried, and rose again. Encouragement to believe God and be saved. Any other gospel was to be anathematized, cursed. You say, I don't like hearing about curses from God, but they're all over Scripture. whether we care for them or not. The Israelites were warned many times about actions that could bring a curse upon them. These were not curses from hell or Satan, but from heaven and God himself. And the curses fell on people, Jew and Gentile, through the centuries. Consider the flood of Noah's day. All mankind was cursed. Deuteronomy 27 and its long list of curses promised a disobedient Israel before they even disobeyed. Jeremiah 24 to 26, curses on Israel and specifically Judah and Jerusalem. Malachi 4 warns of a coming curse on the earth unless repentance comes. And this very epistle, Galatians, will warn all that to stay under the law is to be under the curse of God. Oh, the curse is universal, will soon be activated worldwide. All men are cursed. No sin ever goes unpunished. That's the bad news. But in the end of time, 2,000 years ago, one man was cursed in the place of many whom God has called to himself. That's the good news. That's the gospel of Galatians. and of Paul and Jesus and the true church through the ages. But wait, does not the Bible itself proclaim at least two different gospels? Is there not a gospel of the kingdom and Paul's gospel? I mentioned this earlier. Let's take a closer look. Some of the more modern charismatics, such as in the so-called New Apostolic Reformation, they make a big deal of this. refusing to emphasize the normal gospel, which deals with things such as salvation and the blood of Jesus, choosing instead to be in favor of what they would call a kingdom gospel, which is all about miracles and power and the kingdom now. Well, their division of gospels is disturbing on the face of it. But there is in scripture mention of a gospel of the kingdom. It's true. What is it? You'll notice that this kingdom emphasis occurs at the very beginning and the very ending of the age in which we live, A.D., Anno Domini, in the year of the Lord. When Jesus appeared, and shortly before that appearance, in the announcement of John, the people of Israel were told that some good news about their long-awaited kingdom was forthcoming. In fact, that the king had arrived. And during the tribulation, Then on the other end of things, when things are about to be wrapped up, this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the earth. Then the end will come. But this is not the emphasis he's given to us in between times. At the endings of the synoptic gospel, Matthew, Mark, Luke, are clear directives to disciple, to teach, to baptize, to call to repentance, The kingdom is assumed. It's still coming. But there'll be nothing important in that kingdom unless the king does what he has prophesied to do, which is die for his people. The message is one. King Jesus has come. He's conquered sin and death, saved his people from their sins, and with them, he will reign forever. That's the full gospel. No one is to enter the kingdom who has not been born into it by repentance from dead works and faith in this glorious King who died for them. There's no need to separate kingdoms or gospels into two separate things. The gospel is one. Paul preached it to the Gentiles and the Jews. And anyone who dares to preach something different than what he preached, right there in Acts 13, is to be accursed. And so the letter of Galatians has been introduced. We know why Paul is writing this letter now. We know how passionate he is to save the Galatians from this error of Moses, The rest of the letter can be divided three ways. First, Paul is going to defend himself and let the Galatians know that he is a valid apostle, as opposed to false teachers subverting the gospel. Two, Paul will then explain the gospel in detail. He'll go point by point about what it means and where it came from. And then thirdly, he calls the Galatians to live the gospel via the Spirit. We've got just a little time to start that first section right now. Paul defends himself. First he describes his calling in verses 10 to 24 of chapter one. Now on what basis, next question, remember we're trying to do a question and answer thing, it doesn't always work that way, but we'll try. On what basis could Paul make such a serious affirmation as he does in verses eight and nine about the curse on anyone who preaches a different gospel. Let me just read here from verses 10 to 14, chapter one. For am I now seeking the favor of men or of God? Or am I striving to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a bondservant of Christ. For I would have you know, brethren, that the gospel which was preached by me is not according to man. For I neither received it from man, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ. You've heard of my former manner of life in Judaism, how I used to persecute the church of God beyond measure. I tried to destroy it. And I was advancing in Judaism beyond many of my contemporaries among my countrymen, being more extremely zealous for my ancestral traditions. Well, it's difficult at first to see the connection between the emotional outburst of verses 8 and 9, and this self-defensive posture in the following verses. But taken as a whole, the paragraph from verses 10 to 14 seems to bring clarity here. Paul was a rising star in Judaism, a true hero of the Jewish faith of his day. Like his ancestor, King Saul, he was head and shoulders above the crowd of Jews who might allow heresy to go unchecked, to permit the enemies of Israel simply to ride roughshod over his people. In Paul's mind, evil men and evil doings, teachings, I should say Saul's mind at this point, must be confronted with the violence that God's men had always confronted them. These Christians, they've got to go. That's why Saul of Tarsus was advancing in Judaism. That's what he says. There's no question that he believed he was serving God. But in these verses, we get the clue that he also had men in mind in his heroics. He was rising above and beyond his contemporaries. He was more zealous than they, verse 14. A look at the word religion might be helpful here, guided by some comments by Ironside. The Jews' religion, or Judaism, that's how, the Jews' religion is how KJV translates the Greek word. The modern text is simply Judaism. But religion, though not used here, is another word altogether in the book of James. The word means a worship ceremony. James says a person can have a worship or religion that is vain or meaningless because of his heart. Or when it's backed up by ministering to widows and orphans and the like, then it's pure. Religion is a neutral word. It's not good and it's not bad. It's the person that determines whether religion is good or evil, not the word itself. And so it's Improper to say in your testimony, well, once I was religious, but now I'm saved. You mean to say, once I worshiped in vain, now I worship out of a pure heart. Nothing wrong with religion, okay. Well, that's really all I'm gonna have time for this time. We'll get back to Paul's point in this verse when we come back next time. It's good to be here. So glad that you could be with me. Don't forget to look around the site, as I mentioned from time to time. Look around the blog. It's on the site now. You don't have to go to another place for the blog. Also, I am shutting down. I've just struggled with this over and over in my mind and prayed yesterday. I decided, no, YouTube has to go. So all the things that are on YouTube, in spoken form, visual form there, are already here on Sermon Audio except scarlet threads, and that you can get through a purchase of a book. There's no loss except having to look at this face, which I think is actually a plus when you won't have to do that. And just listen. It's the Word of God. Faith comes by hearing, not seeing the Word of God. But I had to get rid of YouTube, so can't go there. But you can come to our Zoom meeting, men. Send me an email, a little testimony about where you've been in the Lord. That's not large, just a little bit. I'll send you an invitation that will give you the link to our Zoom meeting. All men, men of God, we need to get men of God together. Saturdays, seven o'clock Central Standard Time. And I think that's it for today. This is the Hackberry House of Chosun. Lord willing, we get to talk again real soon. Bye-bye.