Father, I'm grateful for the opportunity for us all to be here this morning. I do pray that you would use your word to speak to your people. Lord, thank you for your graciousness in that. Thank you that it's not dependent upon a faulty messenger, Lord, but that you are desiring to speak to us so that we would know more about the great things that you've done for us in Christ. Lord, help us to rejoice in that as we think about it and learn more about it this morning. It's in Jesus' name that we pray. Amen. If you would please turn in your Bibles to Galatians chapter 4. In Galatians 4, we're not going to leave our theme. That we are saved by grace, through faith, and not of ourselves. That we are a people who are dealing with a God that is holy. And we are not, and we need to be rescued. And we are not dealing with a God who requires us to keep a law that would match his perfection so that we could go to be within his presence because we're unable to do that. But in Galatians chapter four as we go through this we're going to continue a thought from three and we're going to see that Paul uses the word law a little less. The theme doesn't change but he's going to get more personal as we go through this he's going to speak specifically to the Galatians as he has dealt with them in a personal way. When we look at the first verse of chapter four, he starts it out by saying, I mean that an heir, as long as he is a child, is no different from a slave. So if he's telling us what he means, then we should go back at least a verse or two and remind ourselves of what we looked at last time. We looked at the freedom in Christ, the equality that Christ gives between Jews and Gentiles and males and females and slaves and free. And then the last verse of chapter three says, if we're Christ, if we're in Christ, then we are Abraham's offspring, that we are heirs according to the promise. And what that means to mean to us is that The only offspring that are Abraham's, this is what I want you to get today. The only offspring that are according to God's promise that he made to Abraham that he was going to bless all nations through him, that he was going to bring salvation through him, that he was going to bring even a savior through his line, all of those things, all of those promises when we come through Abraham All of that is in Christ. all of that is in Christ and you say well that's a no brainer, no I understand that. We are going to explore that a little bit as we come through Galatians 4 because that concept is really important. The reason that in Christ is important, the reason that we experience the promises in Christ, the reason that we are not responsible for keeping the law but we use the law in the way that it was intended to show us our need for Christ, all of those things It all points to the Lord Jesus Christ. And in fact, God the Father does everything because of the Lord Jesus Christ. Everything is done in him, everything is done through him, and everything is done for him. And the reason that that is so important is that if we miss that, then we are more susceptible to false gospels, which is what this book is about. We're more susceptible to false gospels, and here is how. If we have a group of people that say they're Jewish people, and they're nice people, and we like them, and they use the old part of our Bible, but we still think they're probably going to be okay, because after all, they call God by the same name. They just don't believe in Christ. And we tend to want to get, sometimes with some of these folks, and not just them, but others that use the name of God, that use the name of Christ, we tend to want to get really soft and say, well, you know, they're using a lot of the same terminology. It's the same thing. They just believe a little different than I do. Well, certainly we don't need everyone to believe every point exactly like we do, but the gospel has to be the gospel. And if we change who Christ is and what he's done, and if we change who God says that we are in it, then we've missed the whole thing and we are open to a false gospel. We're susceptible to it. And really what happens is, in our minds, is that we probably think, yeah, we're being taught it right. and we're being taught well and we understand it not perfectly but God has been gracious to us and these other folks they just don't understand it quite as well but they're still okay. It's not about mental understanding but there is an irreducible point for the gospel at which you cannot go any lower and one of those things is that it's all in Christ and so when we see in Galatians that what these Judaizers were coming into the Galatian church and doing, they were coming in and they were saying, yeah, believe in Jesus, have faith, but you're not going to be saved that way and you're not going to progress that way unless you keep the Jewish law, unless you keep the Mosaic law and the ceremonial law and those things, unless you do that. That's the way to become perfect. Now, I think many in our day would look at that and think, Yeah, I don't come out in the same place. But these folks are still OK. They just have another understanding. And of course, we know that there are movements today, even within our community, that do believe those things. And I'm sure, by God's grace, that there are brothers and sisters in that movement. But I will also say that that's dangerous. It's another gospel. It's what the books of Galatians was written about. And if we try to get, here's your word for the day, if we try to get too ecumenical, if we try to say, you know, you're okay, and I'm okay, and we're all using the same kind of language, and why can't we just all be friends? That situation puts you in the place of getting ready to swallow a false gospel. And we don't need to be harsh about those things and we don't need to be snobbish and think we're better than other people because we're not. We don't have the corner on truth and wisdom. It wasn't born with us and it didn't die with us. And there are a lot of things that even as I look at the way that we operate not only in my own life but as a church that I think biblically we need to look at. But the gospel itself we have to get that right because if we don't get that right nothing else works. And where we're at then is a nice little club of people who do good things for folks. It doesn't mean much. Galatians 4 I mean that the heir, as long as he is a child, is no different from a slave, though he is the owner of everything. But he is under guardians and managers until the date set by his father. In the same way, we also, when we were children, were enslaved to the elementary principles of the world. But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those that were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. And because you are sons, God has sent the spirit of his son into our hearts, crying, Abba, father. So you are no longer a slave, but a son. And if a son, then an heir through God. Let's look at this portion first, and then we will move on from here. We probably don't understand this the same way culturally as the Galatians would have understood it, but it's close enough. So the reality is, is that you have a six-year-old child who is the son or the daughter of a millionaire. Well, is that six-year-old child a millionaire? No, right? He's not a millionaire. He may gain privilege in some respects because of his father or mother's wealth, but he's not, right? If you're six years old, it doesn't matter whether your parents have millions or not. The reality is that you still have people who tell you what to do and you have to do it. I mean, you still have people you don't get to, when you're six, you can be in the poorest household or the most wealthy household, and when somebody tells you to go to bed, that you have to go to bed, because they're big enough to make you, if nothing else, right? So the thing is that what Paul is telling us is that this wealth for a six-year-old child that's not even an adult yet, that doesn't have this inheritance yet, even though it's promised, it's like in one sense, they're no better than a slave. And it doesn't mean, well, they're a slave like we would think of that out in the field necessarily. What it means is that when you are a child, you are governed by things that are outside of you, And you're required to live a certain way whether you want to or not. And that's a good thing because we need to do that. There needs to be that structure for children. When Paul then tells us that he's under guardians and managers until the date set by his father in verse 2, what he's saying is, if we're using this example, You've heard of trust, right? That wealthy people would leave their children trust. And in a trust, you can set that up to where you get a certain amount of money at a certain age, where you get a certain amount of property at a certain age. But until you reach that age, we've hired other people to manage that. So it doesn't do you any good, even though you're going to get it. If you're going to inherit a great deal of money and property when you're 21 years old, that's a good thing. But if you're 11, you got a ways to go yet. You got a decade to go. You don't get it yet. That's the thing. And so the managers that have been set over that estate still have control over it and you don't and you don't well this is an example so that when we get to verse three it says in the same way we also when we were children were enslaved to the elementary principles of the world And what does that mean, the elementary principles of the world? In this case, and I'm going to prove this to you later, but I'm going to tell it, I'm going to tell you it now, because I think it will help us in understanding. Some people take this, well the elementary principles of the world, we know that the world is this evil system that is against God, and maybe there's some part of the meaning in that, but really the elementary principles of the world in this case, are more talking about religious rules. That's what it's talking about. Paul makes an assumption in this statement. We're going to prove this later on because he uses the statement again. He makes an assumption in this statement and it's really not an assumption. It's just a truth and we need to grab onto it. And it is this. Everyone is part of a religion of some kind. All people worship All people worship. Right. So that may be a formal religion like Buddhism or Judaism or whatever it is so that the rules are set up how you are to worship and conduct yourself. You may be a secular humanist and in that case you're going to worship yourself. You're going to worship pleasures you're going to follow your own lusts and you're going to get as much out of those things as you can. But the reality is is that there in every one of these systems. though there are variances, there is a set way that people behave to get to whatever it is that they want. Most of the time it's happiness, self-fulfillment, either in this life or the one to come, depending on how they believe. And these elementary principles of the world, what he's saying is that you guys were under the law until Christ came. We all were. And you tried to make yourself happy, to get the most out of life, by following whatever rules had been deemed the right ones to follow so that you could do that. In these folks' cases, we're talking about pagan gods, right? They were worshiping idols. In some of our cases, we have Buddhism, Hinduism, The problem is that even in Christianity, a lot of times what happens is that folks are raised in it, bound up in its quote-unquote rules and culture without ever meeting the Christ that's in the front of the Word. Paul is saying, you guys were bound up in these principles, in this religious stuff. In verse four, but, and this is a good what, but when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his son, born of woman, born under the law. Okay, we'll take two meanings out of this. The first one is that the fullness of time, this is obviously talking about the fulfillment of prophecy in terms of history, right? So God had appointed a time when the Lord Jesus Christ would come to this earth, and it's described this way. He was born of a woman. That's important to us because that means that he came incarnate. He became a human person. Paul is real specific there. It also goes further and says he was born himself under the law. Why was that necessary? Well, up until this point God had revealed what his holy standard was and no one was able to keep it. No one even got close. But nonetheless, God had revealed that there at Mount Sinai. Jesus himself, in order to be our Savior, had to be born under the law. He had to make himself responsible to keep it as a human perfectly. Otherwise, there would be no salvation for us. And so, Jesus came born as a human person and born under the law. Why? Verse 5, to redeem those, to buy those back who were under the law. so that we could be adopted as sons and daughters. The way that Jesus came to this earth was the way that he had to come to this earth. And we don't understand that. We just think sometimes that we have, I mean, people you talk to on the street all the time, they just have this nebulous view of God that, well, maybe if I pray a little bit and try to do some good things that God's going to be happy with me. So I'll set up my own religion that way. So that way I can live my life kind of like I need to. When I feel a little guilt, I'll give some money, I'll say a prayer, I'll do something like that, but the reality is I'm going to continue on in this way and I'll set myself up a religion. I will decide who God is. I may use the same words that the Bible uses in some cases, but I'm not actually going to use the teachings in the Bible about who God is because I don't know what the Bible says. Frankly, I don't want to know what the Bible says. This is what most of the folks that you're going to deal with out. world feel like in this community anyway and many of them may have had some dealings with the church, some of them may be attending but they are still approaching this that way. So Jesus coming as a man, keeping the law perfectly so that we could be redeemed, what does that say to us? Well it says what we have been saying, that God is holy and that we are not and that we need to be rescued. And now Paul is telling us the gospel here in another way. He's saying this is the rescue plan. This is how it worked. This is how it happened that he came. Now it would have been a wonderful thing if God had come sent his son kept the law and in a sense modest backer at least took away the penalty of sin so that we didn't have to suffer for our sins eternally. That would have been a wonderful thing. And of course that happened. But it goes far deeper than that. we are adopted into his family. It would be one thing to find a slave out on the slave market in those days and to redeem that slave and buy him back and say, you're no longer a slave, you're free. That would have been a great thing. But if that master, if that moneyed person that had the ability to buy that slave not only said, I'm going to buy you so that you don't have to be a slave anymore. But then he takes that slave that he's bought home with him and says, I'm going to do the legal paperwork that's necessary to make you a part of my family. That's what God has done. And so we're adopted. We're adopted. And this is the gospel. And because we're sons, in verse 6, God said He sent the Spirit of His Son into our hearts. We'll deal with the rest of that in a moment. Praise God that not only have we been redeemed, so that if we are in Christ, if we have repented and believed and thrown ourselves upon Christ, that we have then been redeemed, we have been bought back. So we're not the slaves of sin anymore, of worldly elementary principles of religion. We're not those slaves anymore. Not only that, we have then been adopted into his family and welcomed. But the next thing is, as a guarantee of that, as a means of giving us gracious assurance in our lives that those things have occurred, God has provided his spirit. and given it to us and what does it say it says he has given us the spirit of his son into our hearts he sent the spirit of his son into our hearts we'll deal with the rest just in a minute but the assurance That comes that these things are true of my life that they're not just a sent set of facts in terms of the gospel Is that god himself in his person has come to dwell in my life through his spirit? And the issue there is that you need to look and say, do I do I sense that in my life? And that's a hard thing to define sometimes. So Paul does that for us, because sometimes folks define that is, well, I get really emotional when I hear sappy stories and start crying, and therefore I must have the spirit. No. No. Well, I understand a whole lot about the Bible and can teach it, so therefore I must have the Spirit. No. The Spirit comes into our heart crying, Abba, Father. I now have a relationship that has been bought with the blood of Christ through the gospel with Almighty God. And it is not a distant relationship, but it is a very close relationship that has been purchased not through merits of my own, but through the merit of Christ. And now I know that I belong to him because he has given me his spirit and I relate to him as my father, not just in words only, but in the totality of my being. And more and more as he works in my life, I relate to him as my father. So when there are things that please Him, there are things that bring Him joy, I have joy. And when there are things that displease Him, that sadden Him or anger Him, I'm saddened and I'm angry. And it's real. And it's not my head knowledge that tells me that this is the way that I am to feel about it, but it becomes a part of who I am. This is assurance that we have been redeemed and adopted. Now, Abba Father may have questions about that. Folks want to argue about this. I think it's silly. Some people say Abba Father. That Abba is an endearing term at this point in time for little kids that call their father. And the closest thing that we have is Daddy. And then what happens is people get all up in arms about that terminology because they want to say calling God Daddy. But that would be way too familiar. That would bring him down. My thing is about that is. It doesn't bring him down at all as long as we understand who he is in his word. Then it all makes perfect sense. So if you call him daddy in the same way that you called your earthly father daddy. But there was some sort of a weirdness in terms of that relationship where what happened is is that there were In all human relationships, there are weakness, but maybe there was a sickness. There was things that didn't go well there. You say, well, I can't relate to God like that because he's not like my dad. But you're missing the point if you do that. Because the point is, is that we can approach him that way because he's put his spirit in our heart and we begin to understand who he is. So the due reverence and the awe that we should have for God, if we are in his word and his spirit's in our heart, we will have that. and the due fellowship that we have with Him, and the closeness, and the reciprocal love, and even the familiarity that comes from a father and a child's relationship, when it's right, when it's perfect, that's what this talks about here. So, is it okay to say, Daddy, when I'm talking to God? Well, I would say, it depends on what you mean by that. And I think that's the crux of that. But nonetheless, we don't want to miss the point that to call Almighty God, who sits in constant bright white that would kill you in your current sense if you were anywhere around it, if you were in your current state right now, that is so holy that no human eyes can touch Him or see Him. Even angelic eyes can't look at Him. He's the creator of all things. He speaks and things happen. He puts his hand down and no one picks it up. That God has adopted you into his family as your father. As your dad. And when we view him like that, we can have the close, familiar relationship with him that takes nothing away from the awesomeness and the holiness and the beauty that he has. I think that trust between God being extremely high and Him being extremely beneath us and Christ is what makes Him different than any other God in the world. There is no God as high as our God, even perceptually. So the Buddha is actually just a dude who figured out some things, but He's not really high, nor is He really low the way that our God is because He didn't come down as far as our God came down. It proves that and it also does another thing It also means that the gospel that he has proclaimed to us about himself, that everything is about Christ and everything is in and through him and for him. proves to us that this is all we need for relationship with him. Because all of those characteristics that Jake just mentioned about God are necessary in order for us to have any sort of relationship with him. All of those things have to happen. He has to be all of those things. And we praise him because he is all of those things. now the last verse of this so you are no longer a slave but a son and if a son than an heir through God what is he saying that if you are in Christ stop trying to live like you're not Stop trying to be pleasing to God by following rules. Stop trying to read some hidden knowledge that is way beyond what it is that God has revealed about himself to you because there's enough there to keep you busy for an eternity. Don't do that. You don't need to come up with the latest greatest thing. There are people that have been teaching the book of Galatians now since it was written and probably most of them doing a better job than I am. But we will continue doing that. In your lifetime, you may hear it taught several more times. It doesn't change. We may get different angles on it at times as we get older and God reveals Himself to us, but it is the same message over and over again. No one's ever going to argue that. It's all we need. God has revealed Himself to us in this thing. It's what we need for life and godliness, for our salvation, His Word. And we're an heir. So we don't have to be a slave to, how can I be happy today? What do I need to do today so that I can be happy? Who do I need to please today? What deity, what person, what lust of my own, what steps do I have to take so that I can feel fulfilled today? These elementary principles of the world that we talked about, this religion that we all want to enter into, instead of this relationship with the Lord Jesus. We don't have to be slaves to that anymore. Because if we're in Christ, we've been adopted as children through the promise. It's a promise that we weren't asked to keep, right? So we studied that last week. It's something that we weren't, it wasn't said, well if you will do this, this, and this, then you can be a part of the promise. No, God himself made a promise that he was going to save people, that he was going to redeem people. He was going to bless all nations. And he made that promise to himself and through himself and in himself. And that gets fulfilled in Christ. And you and your works don't have anything to do with it. And you can rejoice in that or you can be mad about it because you think you're really special. And if he would let you have put some of your works in there, then he would see how good a person you are and you could be saved that way. I don't recommend that, but many of us have that tendency. Now we're going to switch gears a little bit. We're talking about the same things, but now he's going to talk to the Galatians specifically. He's going to say, in verse 8, he's going to say, Formally, when you did not know God, he's talking about their slavery, you were enslaved to those that by nature are not gods. You worshipped idols. You worshipped false gods. Verse 9. But now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, How can you turn back again to the weak and worthless elementary principles of the world, whose slaves you want to be once more? Boy, there's a lot packed into that, verse 9. So let's deal with that. Now that you have come to know God, or rather, to be known by God. This is important. When Jesus was on the earth, you remember, we've talked about it, it's been preached on several times, that he would have large crowds following. We believe in you. But they would believe oftentimes for false reasons, false motives, those things. And the scripture says that even when Jesus was on the earth that he knew what was in people's hearts. So he knew their interior motives, why they were doing these things. Jesus knew those things. Sometimes in our evangelical circles we get so hung up on, we want you to come to know Jesus, we want you to come to know Christ, we want you to accept Christ, we want you to do those things. And we do. But it is far more important in the grand scheme of things, not what you know, but what he knows. This is not my illustration, but I will give it so that you understand. If I walk up to the White House tomorrow morning and I say, let me in because I know the president and I should be let in, they're probably going to carry me away and put me somewhere. But if while I'm knocking on the door and saying let me in the president comes out and says I know that guy let him in I'm getting in. It's important that God knows us and he does know us because he has done everything that's necessary for our salvation both in redemptive history from the beginning of creation to the very circumstances within each of our lives bringing us to the place that we are in now. Don't think that your relationship with God is predominantly based on what you know. Oh, you need to know some things. He's revealed some things to you to know. That's great. Praise his name. But your relationship with him is based on what he knows and what he's done. And I think so Paul labors to deal with that. So he says based on that then now we're kind of in the middle of this after to be known by God. If you've come to know God How can you turn back again to the weak and worthless elementary principles of the world? Okay, back to this religious thing again. Now, we just talked about this, right? You're turning back to what you were before, Galatians. You worshipped false gods. You worshipped gods that were not real. You turn from that to follow Christ, to throw yourself on Christ. And now, what you're trying to do is to go back to that. That should shock you if you think about it. A little bit. In a couple of different ways. One that they would turn away from Christ to go back to following idols. But the thing that shocked me and honestly this verse is the reason that I decided that I wanted to teach Galatians. Because when I read it it hit me like a ton of bricks. Even though the Judaizers were coming in and they were using the Bible. And they were talking about God. They were talking about Yahweh. And they were even talking about things that were written in there. Ceremonial law, moral law, these kinds of things. And even though, and they were encouraging these Galatians, of course, to follow those things and become more Jewish. And Paul compares that to following false gods, to worshiping idols. Let me say it more clearly. Trying to become a Jew again as a Christian, trying to do all of the Jewish things and those kinds of things in order to be pleasing to God in some way, because we think that somehow that will give us more of an identity and it gives us a rule book to follow, is the same thing in Paul's mind as if you were bowing down to an idol of stone. That's what this verse teaches. It is the same thing. So what other application then can we make? Well, lots of them, right? because we can say that it would not advantage us any at all if we looked at the Christian life even as we come to this place this morning as I have to sit through about an hour of Sunday school and then we have to sit through some singing and some more teaching on the Bible and then I've done my good deed for that day and God should be happy with me and during the week I'll read my Bible a little bit and pray a couple of times and maybe give some money to someone and try to be nice and then God will be happy with me. And all of the time, I'm using the name of Jesus. I'm using God. I'm using the name prayer. I'm using the name of the Bible. I'm maybe quoting verses. I'm doing all of those things. And God said, if that's the way that you approach it, it's no different than if you're bowing down to a pagan idol. It's the same thing. And I fear that we don't look at it the same way. And because we don't look at it the same way, we are ripe, in the same way that the Galatians were, for swallowing false Gospels. To the degree that we shun these things in the same way that we would shun it if someone were to come and set a Buddha up here and ask you to bow down to it. It's that serious. This distinction is that serious. It's not a minor thing. It's everything in some respects If you can see it in one way, it's far more dangerous To use scripture and to use Christ's name and to use God and to use prayer and those things and even a quote Christian Church It's even more dangerous than if we were to set the Buddha up here Because that's like a clear-cut thing for people in our culture, right? We know we don't do that But all good Christian people go to church. And all good Christian people give their money. But that doesn't have anything to do with the Spirit of God giving us assurance in our hearts that we know Him in an intimate way as our Father. I don't know if that hits you like it hits me, but that's a big deal. Paul says at the end of this, you want to be these religious principle slaves in the same way that you were before. You want to go back where you were. That's what you want to do. You want to go back to doing the same thing you were before. And you see how this hurts Paul at that point in time. It would be no better for, it would have been the same difference as if I'd never preached Christ to you and you were still worshiping idols as if you were to do this. That's what he's saying. The distinction is that stark. And the consequences of dabbling in these things are that serious. What we believe particularly about Christ in the gospel means everything. And you wonder then why do we spend so much time on it. What is the gospel the gospel. Why is everything in Christ and through Christ and for Christ. Why do we continue to hammer that from all different angles that we can hammer it. It's because that is the only thing. Not just the little message that we see on a track, that's not it. The whole scripture revealing God and his desire to redeem mankind, that is the thing. And we can't... we can't shelve that. We can't just put that to the side and say, yeah, I believe that, but I want to hang on to some of these other things, too. Well, then go worship a totem pole. It's the same thing. he says verse ten you observe days and months and seasons and years what you saying you've been talked into doing all of the Jewish festivals and all of the rights that come through the Jewish calendar you've been talked into and this was this is a big thing to even today the folks that in some of the Messianic Jewish circles will say our calendar is not right it was changed and therefore your calendar needs to be changed So that you can do these festivals and feasts at the proper time because you'll miss them all of those things and Paul says I'm afraid that I labored among you in vain Gosh that's got a sting I preached the gospel to you. I labored among you in vain. I'm afraid. Why are you doing this? It's no different than if you were bowing down in these pagan temples where they had prostitutes as priests. Don't do that. You're only worth self-worth, I mean. your only means of feeling OK of having joy of being happy of recognizing purpose in your life. The only way that you get that because of how you were designed is in Christ and through Christ and for Christ as he has been revealed in the scriptures. And if at any point in your life you are deriving any of that self-worth, any of that joy, any of that I'm okay feeling from any other thing, you are worshiping an idol. And you can use all sorts of baptized language in order to justify that, but that's what it is. And it's dangerous because that's a false gospel. Verse 12, Paul calls them brothers in verse 12 after he says, I hope I haven't labored over you in vain. I'm afraid I have. He's softening his terminology. He calls them brothers, meaning to talk to the whole congregation, he could say brothers and sisters. But the issue is, this is a term of endearment. In other words, I don't think that he is so much affirming their Christianity here, is that before he was saying, oh foolish Galatians, you bunch of blockhead idiots, why are you doing this? But as he's talking to them and as he's thinking about these things, he softens that as he's pleading with them and entreating with them not to go this way, not to follow this path, but to come back to the grace and the joy that's in Christ. And this is why he's entreating them this way, and he uses that word, be as I am, for I was also become as you are. You did me no wrong. What's he mean? That one's a little hard. What's he mean? He's saying be like I am. In other words recognize that the grace of Christ relationship with the father the ability to be in his family and to serve him and love him that way is the only thing that matters to be. Be like I am. I have been like you are now. He's reminded them already. I know exactly what you're doing. I can talk to you about the Jewish religion and I know more about it than any of you. because I'm Paul the Pharisee the man who was trained under Gamaliel I know all of this I've been like you I've been down that road don't do it it's not going to work it's not good he also says you did me no wrong and I want to take something out of this you can climb on me later if you think I'm stretching the scripture a little bit but I think this is right I think this is in line with what he means and it is Sometimes when we're dealing with people we take things very personally. Particularly in discipleship relationships or in parent-child relationships where you've put a lot into something and you've sweated and you've bled and you've given of yourself and then it doesn't turn out right. Paul does not want his personality or their relationship with him to be the ultimate factor in whether or not they turn to the true gospel and get rid of all this other stuff in their relationship with Christ. We can become really offended and take people under our wing, and the only reason that they act like they act is because they're so fond of their relationship with us, but it doesn't have a great deal to do with their relationship with Christ. So Paul walks a line in this letter, right? Because he wants to remind them, and he's fixing to do it some more, of the relationship that they had with him, and how he came to them and preached the gospel, and how they responded. But he also wants to be really careful about, don't do this because I'm guilting you into it. Do it because it's true. Do it because you've experienced that it's true, if you have. And the lesson in that for us is the same. We don't want to build in our families, which is a discipleship relationship for all of us, or in the church, or in dealing with lost people. We don't want to build relationships where people act certain ways because they're worried that we'll think bad of them if they don't do what we think they ought to do. Because what have we done? Well now they're in the religious elementary principles of the world. And they're worshiping what a man or a woman thinks of them. And they're not engaging with the Lord Jesus Christ and who he is and what he's done for them because they're just worried about. Look I have this great relationship with this loving person if I do what they want them to do then with what they want me to do then then they'll be happy with me and I'll feel good. And we set it up all over again for them. Oh, we have to be so careful. God has made us relational people. He's made us to have feelings for one another. That's awesome. That's good. But we need to be careful that we don't use those things in a wrong way. Now he goes through this. We're going to do this quickly because we're about done. He says you know it was because of a bodily ailment that I preached the gospel to you at first. And though my condition was a trial to you you didn't scorn or despise me but received me as an angel of God as Christ Jesus. I don't know what was the matter with Paul. I think sometimes Bible scholars and people want to think too hard about that. The thing actually that made the most sense to me just so that we can put it to rest is that he may have had some similar condition to malaria. I don't know that to be true. Nobody does and it doesn't matter. We don't need to think about it. The only reason that made sense to me is because with a disease similar to malaria, what happens is that you have attacks, right? So you get very, very sick at times, and it's kind of an ugly disease. But then your body kind of heals up a little bit, and it's not that you're over it, but you can do more. You get stronger for periods of time. And if he was working in these churches there, it stands to reason, at least in my mind, that whatever this illness was, either he was preaching in a lot of pain, which was probably true, but also there may have been something to this disease where it kind of had its valleys and dips so that he was at times very, very sick and needed to be taken care of and not able to do much of anything. And at other times during the disease was then able to come out and preach the gospel. None of that really matters except for maybe if I say something like that, it will satiate the curiosity and we can get to the point. And the point is, how did you accept me as I brought the message to you, even though I was sick, and I wasn't the kind of messenger that you would think should have come? Paul could have just as easily said, I praise God that I was sicker than a dog when I came here, and that I was sick, and that I was weak. Because it was obvious that you accepted the gospel, those of you that did, as though Jesus Christ had brought it to you himself, because in fact, that's what happened. He's saying, you accepted me as Christ. In other words, he's not saying, you know, feel sorry for me because I was sick, so you gave me some money and listened to me for a while. No, God opened their hearts and he was able to preach to them. Well, 15. What has become of your blessedness? For I testify to you that if possible you would have gouged out your eyes and given them to me. Have I become your enemy by telling you the truth? Their love for Paul was indicated by not their attachment to his personality but their attachment to Christ and wanting to do him good because he was the vessel that was used to bring the gospel to them. But this last piece, and I think we'll just have time to deal with it. Have I become your enemy by telling you the truth? Let me just tell you, we may start here again this next week, but you will become more people's enemy by telling the truth than any other thing will happen. You will become the greatest blessing to some, and you will become the most hated to others if you tell the truth. And by truth we mean the gospel at this point. People don't want to hear the truth. that what they want to hear is how wonderful they are, which is not the truth. They want to hear how great they are and how God should love them because of how wonderful they are, which is not the truth. When we tell the truth, people either latch on to it because they recognize their slavery, God shows it to them through the work of His Spirit, and they want out of it, and they need redeemed, and they see the blessedness in Christ, and they want that. or they will turn against it like a rabid animal because they want to think well of themselves. They don't want to think of themselves and we'll end here as people who need to be rescued. And you can come to Christ no other way. And even after you're saved, there's a real sense in which you still approach it that way or you don't come. And the Galatians had lost that and therefore changed the gospel in the way that they approached God and it was necessary for Paul to bring correction to them. And I ask that as we think about these things, Lord, that we would be encouraged where you've done these works in our lives, where we're hanging on to Christ. And we're loving him because he has redeemed us, because we have been a part of your family and you've sealed us with your spirit and give us this assurance in that way in a relationship with you. And Lord, where we need to be convicted because we are clinging to elementary principles of the world, other things that make us feel good about ourselves, that make us feel acceptable to you, that make us feel happy in our own selves. Lord, I pray that you would convict us of those things. Lord, help us to hang on to the gospel. Help us to not be deceived. It's in Jesus' name that we pray. Amen.