Well, let's take our Bibles and look in Galatians chapter one. We finished up our study in second Corinthians the last time. And so now the Lord willing, we're going to study through Paul's epistle to the Galatians. And this I've entitled the gospel of God. A lot of times people use that term gospel, but there is only one gospel, and that is the gospel of God. And we're going to see what that means. So this is how Paul introduces this letter to the Galatians. He says, Paul, an apostle, not of men, neither by man, but by Jesus Christ, and God the Father, who raised him from the dead. And all the brethren which are with me under the churches of Galatia, grace be to you and peace from God the Father and from our Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins, that he might deliver us from this present evil world according to the will of God and our Father, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen. So that's my text as we introduce this epistle of Paul to the Galatians. You notice with what precision Paul writes this greeting to them. He's not writing to exalt himself as a preacher. And he declares that if he is an apostle, that word means one cent of Christ, that it wasn't of men, neither by man, neither by his own will and choosing. Had God simply waited for Paul to turn to Christ, he never would have, such as our case. God isn't up there waiting for sinners to make their decision for Jesus and therefore then he can save them. That's foreign to scripture. That's not even the God of scripture. And anybody you hear reasoning that way, they've never been taught of God. That's just nothing but an exaltation of man and his will. But you can see here in the greeting how, first of all, Paul gives God all the glory with regard to the message that he has been given to declare. And that's what a preacher sent of God will do, give God all the glory. He begins with Paul. the way these letters were written in scrolls and rolled up, the greeting or the name of the writer was put at the beginning so that they didn't have to undo all the scroll to get to see who it is. In our manner of writing letters, we typically sign our name at the end, but we're not sending scrolls. It might be a two or three page letter, You can go down to the end and see, well, who wrote the letter. So he begins with his name because there were those that questioned Paul's apostleship, questioned whether or not he should even be an apostle. And it was primarily because they were angry at him that he being a Jew and a former Judaizer now being converted was taking the message of the old Testament scriptures to the nations, to the Gentiles. If you wanted to start a fight with the Jews of the day, just mention the word world or nations or Gentiles. Those are fighting terms for the Jews. And they considered themselves to be the owners of the kingdom of God. And yet Paul here is going to declare that the gospel of God doesn't belong to any man and it doesn't belong to any denomination. I hear people all the time talking about what their confession of faith is and they fall back on it, their denomination. Well, that ought to tell you right there, it's not of God because The gospel of God doesn't belong to any man, just as Paul declared here. So when he says Paul, look how simple an emphasis it is. The word Paul, the name Paul actually means little, and I don't know if it had to do with his stature. He was obviously named, it's the Greek name for the word Hebrew Saul. But every time he would say his name, he would have to consider how little he was. Now, men tend to elevate preachers and exalt them above measure, but Paul's not seeking that here. He simply is declaring that who he is and what he is, is all because of God and therefore the gospel of God. We don't know exactly when he would have written this letter to the Galatians in the first century. There's all kinds of dates that are being proposed. Some say in the forties and fifties and others as late as the sixties. But it does seem that Paul wrote this letter before the Jerusalem council that is mentioned in Acts chapter 15. As we go through these epistles, you have to go back to the book of Acts and see the historic context. But it appears that it would have been written before that council because although he mentioned several trips to Jerusalem, he doesn't make any mention of the council because the Jerusalem council in Acts 15 dealt with the exact issues that Paul is writing about here. And that is, is there anything that man must do in order to be saved? The Jews of the day, even those that profess to believe the gospel of Christ were saying that yes, Christ fulfilled it all, except in order to truly be saved, it was necessary that these Gentiles that were coming into the church had to be circumcised. And here, as we go down through this particular chapter, we see where Paul already deals with this, particularly because of those that were attacking him for preaching the free gospel of God's grace in Christ, without conditions, without anything man contributing. That's why People today even get upset when you declare the gospel of God in simplicity and purity without any contribution of man. Men get upset because they like to think that somehow they had something to contribute to their salvation. And as we get down through here, it's gonna be clear that there's nothing. that we have done or could do that could ever contribute to our salvation. And so Paul writing to these Galatians, this would have been on the map, an area, it's not a town or a city. Galatians had to do with a region that we would identify today as Turkey. So Paul went throughout this region as God sent him to preach this gospel of the free grace of God in Christ, but everywhere he went, there were Judaizers because they had their synagogues and other places of worship spread throughout this area, having been scattered by two things, one, persecution in Jerusalem, but secondly, even from Rome, where the emperor had given a decree to chase all of the Jews out of Rome. And so they scattered throughout this region and joined together. And this is where God sent the apostle Paul. But the emphasis here on Paul's apostolic credentials is important. because Paul had strong words for these Galatians and they had to understand that he wrote with authority. Even our Lord Jesus Christ, when the religious Jews of the day sent their Hussians to go arrest him and they came back empty-handed and the religious leaders asked them, well, why didn't you seize him? They said, never a man spake as this man. The simple authority of the Lord Jesus Christ by his word is sufficient to stop any man. That's different from what you hear today that God really wants to save sinners, but he can't do anything unless you let him. What kind of God is that? That's not the God of the Bible. And so even as Christ is the word of God and speaks the word, with authority. His word is the authority. So those that he raises up and sends out, they speak with authority. I know people will question you because you are so dogmatic. I've heard that so many times. You just seem to be so dogmatic. Well, I want to be dogmatic where Christ has declared the truth because God is not revealing Christ in the hearts of sinners by a side door or sneaking it in. If you have that thought that I'm going to sit down with somebody with a cup of coffee and I'm just going to try to ease them into, you know, believing the gospel, you're down the wrong track. There's nothing but the clear declaration of Christ. And ask yourself if the Lord's taught you, how was it that you were taught? It wasn't some smooth talking preacher that got you to believe on Christ. You know, if that was the case and you think that somehow that decision you made is what brought you to him, then you've got to go back to ground zero, start over because God does not reveal the truth that way. It is with authority. And that's why Paul here establishes this apostolic authority. And not that he expected necessarily that the naysayers would accept his authority, they never will. They'll never be satisfied, so quit trying to please them. But he's writing to these here that he believes the Lord has done a work of grace in, and therefore, by establishing his authority as an apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ, that they would be encouraged and to know that even though this was a message by which they themselves were being persecuted, just as Paul, yet they would be encouraged by the strength and authority of Paul sending them this message. The word apostle, as Paul uses it here, doesn't merely refer to one who has a message to announce, but to an appointed representative with an official status who is provided with the credentials of his office. And I believe that any, that the Lord raises up when they asked by what authority do you speak? I know people today talk about being called of God. One man told me he said he was on his tractor one day and looking up in the clouds and all of a sudden felt the call of God. And he hopped off his tractor, parked it where it was and went to preach it. Well, my question to him was, well, what are you preaching? Because if you're not declaring Christ as he's revealed in these scriptures, then that was a delusion. You may have heard some noise, but it's not the call of God. With respect to those that preach, what is their authority? What is my authority standing here? It's not my knowledge or intelligence or education. It's the fact that it pleased God to reveal Christ in me. And I'll tell you when he did, the last thing I felt I needed to do was to preach. In fact, I had trained to be a preacher and I had gone out to Africa to be a so-called pioneer missionary. That was kind of my egotistical desire to be established and known as a pioneer missionary someplace in the remote parts of Africa. Little did I know at that time back in 1984, that it would be there, that God would lay me low so low. and keep me in darkness over my sin and sinfulness through the scriptures, Isaiah chapter six, that I felt I could do nothing but just come back to the United States and find a job and go to work. I did not feel that I needed to be preaching. And it took the Lord convincing me, reading the scriptures. It took others that I had been preaching for to tell me, well, if you go back to the States and you take the light with you, where does that leave us? And so there were many agonizing days and nights in which I weighed prayerfully and carefully whether I ought to even open my mouth. And that's been now over 40 years ago. And I thank God for establishing me and keeping me and enabling me to this day to continue to declare with authority this gospel of Christ. I don't put myself in the place of Paul as being an apostle because that was a special appointment, one who had seen the resurrected Lord. Now I've seen him in the word, but he saw him on the road to Damascus and therefore was qualified. He himself said as an apostle born out of due season. But I do identify with him as being one cent of God and having this appointed place of being a preacher of the gospel. But again, as Paul says here, not from men, not of men, neither by man, but through Jesus Christ and or even God the Father. It's not that you have Jesus Christ and then over here you've got God the Father. Christ is the complete fulfillment of all that God the Father is and the Spirit is. The whole Godhead dwells in him bodily. That's when he came to this earth. And so you can't address the Father except you address him through the Lord Jesus Christ. And you can't know the Father or the Lord Jesus Christ except the Spirit of God reveal him in you. So Paul's establishing here as an apostle, he says clearly was not from man, nor was it through man. You might say, well, isn't that saying the same thing? No, not from man means it didn't originate with him. And not through man means that he's not the one maintaining it. And we can say that concerning our knowledge of Christ in the gospel. We didn't get it from man. Nor our own reasoning, nor is it maintained through man. It originated with God because God's the one that has purposed to reveal himself and his son in whom he will. And so Paul received it directly from God. Now in his case, we know it was while he was on the road to Damascus back there in Acts chapter nine, that the Lord met him and laid him low. He thought he had an understanding of God, but when Christ addressed him, his first question was, who are you Lord? He found out he hadn't known God at all. And I know that was my case, even though I had had training and had a certain knowledge of what I thought was God. I had to cry out myself, who are you Lord? Who is this God that is sovereign overall and holy and just and cannot accept anything from the hand of any center, but must himself do all that's necessary in order for that center to be justified, declared righteous before him. And that's why he sent his son. That's why here the connection you see, but by Jesus Christ and God, the father who raised him from the dead. When you see raised from the dead, what does that presume? Death. But he didn't die to remain dead, he died for a cause. And the cause is that he might pay the sin debt, that horrible sin debt of that people that the father gave him, and then raising him from the dead, having declared them righteous or justified because of his completed work. That's the sum and total of the gospel of God. It's of God as the source, it's of God as pertains to its content and subject, and it's of God as pertains to the glory of it. And so his standing here as an apostle, it wasn't based on opinion polls, nor did it come from any sort of human counsel. See, that's how organizations work today, religious organizations. I grew up with this. Almost every time there was a meeting and I'm not going to call it worship because it wasn't yes, we gathered and called it worship, but almost every time there was always a impression made upon particularly young people that at the end they would come down front and they would dedicate their lives and then they'd get sent off to some preacher school somewhere. And it was an organization attempting to fill the fields, the world is a field, to fill the fields with preachers and with those that would somehow go out and win the world. That's not how the Lord does his work. In fact, when he told his disciples that the fields are white under harvest, but he said the laborers are few, that wasn't a complaint that he was making. He was just declaring how it is he purposed to do his work. It would be through few. When I consider how many are going out today under the guise of being missionaries or preachers and pastors, and they're being sent out by their organizations, by the hundreds of thousands. I'll tell you the airline industry likes it because they're packing airplanes and flying people all around the world for these supposed mission trips. But something ought to tell you that that's not the work of God because Christ said it would be by few. And that was true in his day. It was true in the apostle Paul's day. And I'll tell you, it's the same today. You could take 99%, 99.999% perhaps of those that have gone out into the world under the name of even Christianity today, and God hadn't sent them. They're running on their own. You say, well, how can you say that? Well, listen to their message. They're not declaring the message of Christ. They're not declaring what Paul says here, a message or a gospel that is not of men nor by men, but by Jesus Christ. They're going out there with their little tracts, the four spiritual laws. That's what I cut my teeth on. These are the things that you must believe and say. And then at the end, you sign your name as a testimony. If you truly believe it, then you can be saved. It's all of men. That's not the gospel. Here, Paul is declaring in no uncertain terms that his being an apostle, his being a preacher of the gospel of Christ, is by divine authority. And I know that's my case. I wouldn't be preaching for you today. This message, were it not that God himself had been pleased to reveal his son in me, because this is not a popular message. I don't know of anybody that reads what's written here in the scriptures. Like, Oh, I feel like persecution today. I think I'm going to go out there and just have some fun. No, This is a message that lays you low, first of all, as a sinner and having been laid low, knowing that your only hope in salvation is in God's determining the fact that he chose you and that Christ died for you and that the spirit has revealed him in you. Other than that, you've got nothing to say. Nor will you ever desire to take any glory in this matter. So the bluntness here of Paul's denial of who he is and the message that he had to declare not having anything to do with man was because it was God who had established him. And it was God who was causing him to continue on through the persecution, the opposition that he was facing. And he faced a lot of it, as we saw already in second Corinthians, in perils on land and perils on the sea and perils by his Jewish brethren. Yet in all this, the Lord sustained him. So that's the first point here concerning Paul's message. The authority of the message is the gospel of God is, it is of God. Secondly, for whom the gospel is proclaimed. You'll hear people say, well, we need to get out there in the world and we need to declare the gospel to the world and we need to be busy about trying to get people into God's kingdom. You'll notice here, that's not what Paul says in verse two. Who does he write this word to? Who is the word of God addressed to? It says, and all the brethren which are with me unto the churches of Galatia. And then he says, grace be to who? To you and peace from God, the father and from our Lord, Jesus Christ. I hear some that love just after every conversation, doesn't matter who they're talking to, they'll go grace and peace, brother, grace and peace. They're clueless. We're not about casting blessings on people that God has left to their own reprobate minds. No, the gospel of God is addressed to a select people, his people, those of his choosing, those that he has declared to be vessels of mercy and not vessels of wrath, those that he has loved, in his son, the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's where Paul identifies with these in this letter. He's not trying to convince the naysayers in writing this epistle to the Galatians, but he's writing to encourage and comfort those that the Lord has already taught by his spirit. So Paul gives this greeting as being from all the brethren who are with him, but the use of I, in this letter, such as in Galatians 1.6, I, Marvel, shows that it was not really some sort of team effort. This is a team evangelist that Paul is writing here, written by Paul and his coworkers, but Paul wrote this letter and he sent the greetings from his friends as a member, as a matter of letting them know that he, he didn't stand alone. even though some may have thought that he was alone. And I will tell you there are many times as a preacher of the gospel that it is a lonesome work because you look around and wonder where are those others that the Lord has taught. And yet, as you begin to think prayerfully of different ones that the Lord has taught and continue to support you in prayer, encourage you, You can say all the brethren, which are with me. And I'm thankful that there are many throughout the world that rejoice in this gospel message. And from time to time, I hear from them out of the blue yesterday. I looked at my answer machine on my phone and I clicked on it. I didn't know whether it was spam or not, but a man called me from Florida. and said that he was just out kind of browsing around on the internet and came across one of my messages. And he had to call and tell me that he had never, ever heard a preacher preach like he had heard me preach. And he said, you know what? I've been reading the Bible for years. And he said, I knew something was wrong. But when I heard that message that you declared, he said, I had to call you. So I called him back, got his answer machine. I don't know with all the storms and everything going on, what might be that he's not able to respond, but we'll see if he's one of the Lords. I know that it wasn't by me. It's not a man, but that's the Lord's doing, but hearing the message, he rejoices. And I believe that's who Paul's talking about here. When he says all the brethren who are with me notice brethren. He's not setting himself above them as being an apostle over them and some kind of authority. Preachers like to get that sanctimonious tone, you know, bearing down and let me tell you the word of God. When you hear people talk, that's not even normal talk. Preaching is telling. And it's not putting yourself above those that, for whom you're preaching. You're not preaching to people, you're preaching for them. God's privileged you to be able to declare this gospel for the encouragement of his sheep. So he identifies with these for whom the gospel is sent forth, the brethren, but you notice also to the churches of Galatia. This wasn't written to a single church in a single city. Like in Thessalonians, it's addressed to the Church of Thessalonica in 1 Thessalonians 1, 1. But here, this is addressed to the churches, plural, of Galatia. As I said, Galatia was a wide region in what we know as Turkey today, not a city. And there were several churches among the cities of Galatia. But to bring this point home as far as for whom the gospel of God is declared, the word church, it's not talking about buildings, but it's talking about people who have been called out by the spirit of God. That's what the word church means, the called out ones. So when he's writing here to the Galatians, and the churches in Galatia, he's writing to those that have been called out already by the spirit of God to Christ through the preaching of the gospel. And we know that Paul went through this region preaching the gospel and kept moving on. And it's now as he gets word back again that some of these are being dissuaded from the very message of Christ and the exclusiveness of it that he writes to express his astonishment. We're gonna see that next time in verse six. I marvel that you're so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto another gospel, not that there is. So he's concerned about the possible apostasy that was occurring in these particular congregations, but Paul, the Lord purposed that he write this, that this letter be circulated and read in these various congregations. Paul was in Southern Galatia on his first journey. And like I said, you could go back and read in the book of Acts, if you want to put a note in your margin in Acts 13, 13 through Acts 14, 23, Acts 13, 13 to Acts 14, 23. That's where the story is told of Paul's preaching the gospel in the Southern part of this region, Galatia. Remember Luke accompanied Paul on his journeys. the physician and he's the one the Lord directed to record for us to see how the Lord had done his work. So that's the first. And then he went through Northern Galatia on his second trip. And that's where we read in Acts 16, verse six of his work there. And then he went a third time So you can see how the Lord continued to direct him in this particular region. The third time, you can put down Acts 18, 23, where Paul was brought back to this area. But in the end, it doesn't really matter if the letter was written to the Northern or Southern regions of Galatia. You have denominations today that are Northern such and such and Southern such and such. the Eastern, the Western, that's how men divide things up. We may not even be able to know and it really doesn't matter because this letter had something to say to every one of the Lord's people, brethren and churches. And that's why it's still as effectual today for us that we can come and read this and see how God purposed that this gospel, his gospel, be sent forth to these that were the Lords, the churches, the called out ones, and that with that come the blessing as you see in verse three of grace and peace. Stop and think about those words. We could not know grace or peace except it be from God the Father through our Lord Jesus Christ. So we don't use that term lightly. And yes, I do pray grace and peace continuing upon any that are the Lord's, that any that can identify with him in truth. I know this was Paul's familiar greeting and some might say, well, that's just part of the culture. You know, peace to you, brother. Grace being perhaps part of the Greek culture and peace being part of the Jewish culture, but Paul uses this exact phrase five other times in the New Testament. And he doesn't use it flippantly. When Paul uses the word grace, actually the word grace, he uses it more than a hundred times in all his writings. And among all the writers of the New Testament, all the others, it's only used 55 times if you take a concordance. So Paul truly, is establishing himself here as God's messenger to declare grace. Not as some priest does making the sign of the cross and blessing. No, but notice grace be to you and peace from God, the father, even from our Lord Jesus Christ, there is no grace apart from God granting it. And that being through the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's where Paul stands. Well thirdly, here concerning the gospel of God and this is the meat of it right down here in verse 4 and 5. And that is that the gospel of God concerns the death of the Lord Jesus Christ. It's not just about the Lord Jesus Christ and his person. You have to see that when Christ came, it was to do a work. In his life, he earned and established that righteousness necessary for God to be just and declare righteous those for whom he died. You can't say a man has preached the gospel just simply by mentioning the name of Christ. I hear so many people, well, our preacher preaches Christ. Well, tell me what he says about him. Who he is is vital as God in the flesh, but why he came is just as vital. If you're saying that he came to try to save everybody and laid his life down as a down payment for you now to come, that's not preaching Christ and him crucified. What he accomplished, he either saved or he didn't. So many believe that he died, but it's left open-ended now for man who has to appropriate it. Boy, have I heard that so many times. You have to appropriate the death of Christ to yourself. Everything God did, he appropriated. And he applied it there when Christ died. That's when salvation occurred for those that God purposed to save. And that's why if you're the Lord's today, you can rest on that sure foundation. No other foundation can be laid than that which is laid that Christ died, was buried and rose again, sent it on high. And in that is our salvation. It sure removes a lot of doubt, doesn't it? When you're looking around thinking, well, I wonder if I have enough faith. It doesn't depend on your faith. It depends on the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. Faith's object is always going to be Christ as he is in scripture. Doubt yourself, but don't doubt him. This is the record John wrote that God has given of his son, that you might believe on him, believe on the record. official legal document that we have here in the Word concerning His Son. But the gospel of God is that, it's concerning Christ and Him crucified. That's not just a mantra, that's not just a slogan, but that's the truth. And so Paul quickly gets to that there in verse 4 where he says, who gave himself for our sins. Notice salvation is about the who. How Our sins taken away. How were they taken away? It's in the person of Christ. And so Paul praying for grace and peace to these readers, both from God, the father, and the Lord Jesus Christ, which is a reminder of the harmony between the father and the son, the father doesn't purpose one thing. And now the son attempts to do something else in the spirit, something else there's harmony in the Godhead. as to the salvation of sinners. And so here Paul is going to expand on that work of God the Son. Notice he says, our Lord Jesus Christ. He's the one savior of sinners of his church. There is no other, no other salvation. And that's why the first thing he says about the Lord Jesus is that he gave himself for our sins. Throughout this epistle, Paul is going to point the Galatians to the message of the cross, the centrality of it. And he's going to make this plain, everything that he states, not only in this epistle, but throughout all his epistles. In fact, that's true of all those that the Lord has caused to write. this inspired word, it has to do, it begins with, and it continues through, and it ends with Christ and Him crucified. Even those Old Testament prophets, Peter wrote and said, it was by the grace of God that they spoke of the suffering that Christ should endure, but also the glory that should follow. It's all about Christ. And so we find that right from the get-go here. And that's why I say when people want to talk about them being Christian and somehow believing on Jesus, well, tell me about him. Does their testimony, does your testimony line up with the testimony of God? Because this is God's gospel and it concerns his son, the Lord Jesus Christ. Here it says, who gave himself for our sins. That word to give is in the sense, not just in coming in the flesh, but giving up his life unto death without the shedding of blood, there is no remission of sin. So it's not just saying that God, the father is the giver, but notice here who gave him self. The Lord Jesus was one with the father in his will, and even as the father gave his son, so the son gave himself willingly as that sacrifice for the sin of those that the father purposed to save. The Lord Jesus gave the one thing necessary for God to be just and justified. How else could the law and justice and holiness of God be satisfied except it be through this one sacrifice? And so people might argue, well, the Lord Jesus is God's gift to the sinner. But first of all, the Lord Jesus was God's gift to the father. That's why he died, to satisfy the father. Any for whom he died are beneficiaries, just like the names written in a will and testament. They're beneficiaries of what he accomplished, but he gave himself for our sins. He came as the sin bearer, not to make us feel better, but that's what God's law and justice required. So he was God's gift to himself. that He might deliver us from this present evil world. The condemnation of this fallen state in which we were in Adam, but if Christ, the second Adam, the last Adam has come, then we're free from that present evil in the world. Doesn't mean that we're not in an evil world. It doesn't mean that we still don't have evil in this heart, but as far as the condemnation of it, the curse of it, Thank God that one death of the Lord Jesus Christ is what has delivered us. And notice it's according to the will of God and our father. Sometimes you hear people addressing a, what they call a prayer, dear God, they can't address him as father because they don't know him. He's not just father, but our father. How is it that we can even have that connection with him as our father, except it be that the Lord Jesus gave himself for our sins. My only hope, my only plea is that when Christ died, he died for me. Oh, how glorious is this gospel of God that declares salvation apart from man, holy in the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. And so glorious is that redemption and justification that any, when their eyes are open to see it, they bow in admiration, speechless, as far as how it could be me. How is it that I could be one of these for whom the Lord Jesus Christ would lay down his life? That's an amazing thing. Some might give their life, as it says there in Romans, for a good man, if you will, for a friend, but for sinners, for those that are enemies by nature, That indeed is the work of God alone. And so that's where Paul brings home the message of the gospel of God, to be delivered from ourselves, to be delivered from the curse of sin, to be delivered from the power of this present evil age. And I'm talking not just secular, but religious, that we're not swept away by everything going on in religion today, that God has separated us out But notice it says there, according to the will of our God and father, to whom be glory forever and ever. Do you realize that the primary purpose for preaching the gospel is to glorify God? It's not to get sinners saved. Like you hear people saying, no, it's to glorify God, whether men here or not, God's glorified every time he hears. the message of his son, the Lord Jesus Christ. He's going to see to it that those hear that he's purpose to hear, but we stand and declare his gospel to his glory. That's what says to whom be glory, not just for now, but forever and ever. Amen. you