For Man or for God

Inversion

Charlie Munger was vice-chariman of Berkshire Hathaway from 1978 until his death in 2023

Best friends with Warren Buffet

Both super savvy investors

Munger Quote: “All I want to know is where I am going to die so I can avoid going there.”

Charlie Munger talks about inversion when deciding on investment opportunities

Not “what would make this company a success?”

But you invert that: “what would destroy this company?”

If you find that these items are difficult or unlikely

Then if you can get a quality company at a solid price (intrinsic value), then buy it and hold it for the long-term.

Coca-Cola example

If looking to see if you want to buy part of Coca Cola, the first question you ask is not “how will they be successful in the next decade?”

Ask “how can they be destroyed in the next decade?

Charlie Munger would say the

Change the formula and therefore the taste

Lose trademark

Those are extremely unlikely, especially given the New Coke debacle in the mid-80’s, so that is a company that is a safe bet.

This is why you see Coca-Cola, Sees Candy, etc on the tables near them each time they speak at the annual shareholder meetings

Or in Warren Buffet’s case, Cherry Coke

Pastors don’t just read theology or watch/listen to church history podcasts…

The enemy prowls around acting under the concept of inversion

What would it take to destroy the Gospel?

And he is a sly one in how he attempts this

Robert talked about Jesus + last week

Judaizers adding things to the gospel

The gospel is JESUS

This week, we will look at the inverse of Jesus +: Jesus -

Jesus - is when you take something away from the gospel or skew it to an extent that it is now false.

Ironically, this is the accusation that the Judaizers are hurling back at Paul

They are basically saying, “what gives you the right? You heard this from other men just like we did.

Judaizers: How are you any different than us? What makes you so special?”

Gentiles: You are just giving a gospel so that you can receive man’s approval.

Paul’s Reply: This is not man’s gospel?

Galatians 1:11–12 “For I would have you know, brothers, that the gospel that was preached by me is not man’s gospel. For I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ.”

And he gives three alibis to justify Apostleship and the truth of the gospel he is preaching

Alibi #1: I didn’t make this up

Paul goes forward to make the case that he is just as much of an apostle as any of the others and he did not make this up.

Paul says he persecuted and tried to destroy (INVERSION) God’s church

How do you destroy the gospel? Saul and others thought, incorrectly: find the Christians and make an example out of them.

And he was very successful at doing this; he was hunting them down and on his way to Damascus

And on that journey to arrest and bind Chrsitians, Paul says, “he called me! He revealed his Son to me so that I might preach to the Gentiles”

Galatians 1:15–16 “But when he who had set me apart before I was born, and who called me by his grace, was pleased to reveal his Son to me, in order that I might preach him among the Gentiles,

While he was trying to destroy, God had other plans…

He who set me apart before I was born… it was he who called me

BEFORE PAUL WAS BORN

BEFORE ADVANCING IN JUDAISM BEYOND MANY OF HIS OWN AGE

BEFORE HE WAS ZEALOUS TO DESTROY GOD’S CHURCH

God set him apart and knew he would be called TO HIS GRACE

Instead of going to learn from the Apostles in Jerusalem, he went to Arabia for three years!

Alibi # 2: No person or even Apostle handed this to me

Galatians 1:16–17 “I did not immediately consult with anyone; nor did I go up to Jerusalem to those who were apostles before me, but I went away into Arabia, and returned again to Damascus.” “

He is making the case that this is not a gospel from man and I wasn’t called by man

This is God’s gospel I proclaim and I was called by our creator himself

I did not learn this from anyone, not even an apostle

God revealed his Son to me and, like the apostles who spent three years in ministry after their call, I went to Arabia and spent time with the Lord for three years, as well.

Can only imagine the drastic change between persecutor to God’s evangelist and theologian to all the nations.

We don’t know a lot about his time in Arabia, but at a minimum we can imagine that after that conversion experience he wanted to spend time in prayer, Scriptures, and the Holy Spirit to prepare for his ministry.

After the three years, I did indeed go to Jerusalem to visit Peter for an entire two weeks (15 days), but I only saw Peter and James.

Galatians 1:18–20 “Then after three years I went up to Jerusalem to visit Cephas and remained with him fifteen days. But I saw none of the other apostles except James the Lord’s brother. (In what I am writing to you, before God, I do not lie!)”

I AIN’T LYIN’!

Alibi #3: I didn’t receive any instruction

I was with them for just two weeks and a day

Nobody taught me this stuff.

Everybody down there didn’t know me, but they knew my reputation

Galatians 1:23–24 “They only were hearing it said, “He who used to persecute us is now preaching the faith he once tried to destroy.” And they glorified God because of me.”

Paul’s argument

I persecuted Christians and wanted to destroy them

God set me apart before I was born

God called me by his grace

God revealed his son to me

Here are my three alibis:

1) I did not make this up

2) I did not get this gospel from any man

3) I did not receive instruction from other Apostles

God called me to proclaim the gospel to the Gentiles

God used my previous life, my conversion, and this calling so that others will glorify him because of my life

In fact, the gospel was revealed to me by the Lord and I was called by the Lord

I am an apostle (we see Paul having to justify this in almost every letter as opposed to Peter)

He set me apart before I was born and called me to preach the gospel

What I say is the revealed Gospel and is faithful teaching

Paul is not a secondary apostle or just a great theologian

He is not someone one can discard because you don’t like his style or his bluntness

Many people today have a hard time listening to Paul because of past church hurt and past preachers who try to use Paul in an angry, screaming, yelling at the top of their lungs that you aren’t acting right kind of way; handing out pamphlets and saying you must conform to their idea of the Bible

I know that hurt is real, but guess what: they aren’t Paul!!!

Don’t let someone spouting off Jesus + of Jesus - skew your view of the Apostle Paul

We proclaim the gospel as faithfully handed down to us.

We don’t add anything (Jesus +) and we do not take away anything (Jesus -)

We do not rank books of Scripture, we do not rank God’s apostles, we do not get to pick and choose the bits of Scripture that we like or discard some apostles because we don’t think they are as qualified, loving, cuddly, etc.

To say any of this is true is Jesus -

To say that we need more than that is Jesus +

I like this part of Scripture, but that part is too harsh

I like reading the Apostle John, but Paul was kind of a jerk.

Scripture is the Word of God or it isn’t

An Apostle was called by God to be so, or he wasn’t.

God is the same God yesterday, today, and forever; what he said then matters to us today.

His Word does not change and he didn’t make a mistake in his calling on the Apostles or only chose them because they were relevant to the first century, but now we have progressed such that they can be discarded in future generations.

He knew before creation who the Apostles would be, He knew what time the Apostles would live, He knew what location the Aposltes would live, and He knew that we today need to hear his revleation just as much as those in the first century needed it.

How amazing is it that God used people in a variety of personalities and giftings to continue his work and shepherd his people!

Paul makes clear in our passage about each of the apostles: he set them apart before they were born and called them by his grace.

They do not proclaim Jesus + and they don’t proclaim Jesus -: They proclaim Jesus! This is the Gospel! This is God’s grace. It is all about grace, but we have cheapened what Biblical grace means today.

Grace

Joel Pugh in a sermon once said we can remember what grace is by this mneumonic:

God’s Riches at Christ’s Expense

We intellectually know this: how grateful we are to Christ for what he did for us on that cross.

Here is a question: Have we truly assented to this?

The gospel gives us an indication that we have not fully assented to this.

We will fully understand, comprehend this on the day of Judgement

We will give a full account of our lives

Everything we have ever done. Even though we have received the Holy Spirit and are ready to receive our inheritance as his sons and daughters, we still must stand before the throne.

And Christ is right there to say, “I know you. Well done good and faithful servant! Enter the eternal kingdom of our presence”

But remember, the enemy wants to destroy the gospel.

He attempts this by adding to Scripture: Jesus + (as we saw last week)

He attempts this by subtracting from Scripture: Jesus -

For instance, one of the most effective ways of attempting Jesus — is by trying to skew our theology

Let’s try this logic that seems to be prevalent today…

God is a loving God: YES, this is true and is gospel

God cares for you: YES, this is true and is gospel

God has taken your sins upon himself through his Son who died on a cross for you and rose from the grave and conquered death: YES, this is true and is gospel

Therefore, you will not be judged on judgement day and you will not have to give an account because he loves you and that would just be cruel.

The same line of thinking goes: Judgement Day is a horrible and awful day. It is only something for the bad people, the people who don’t know Christ., the Gentiles, the unbelievers. While we can feel horrible for those people, praise God we get to go straight in and play our harps and sit on clouds…

See how easy that is? That isn’t in Scripture y’all.

There is the theological fallacy.

Satan uses the truth and twists it just enough for our pride to twist His Word

We have never seen this before, right? See page three in your Bible…

We have to keep all of Scripture as a whole; to do skew it is to cheapen it (Jesus —)

And when we keep all of God’s Word as a whole, we find out what true grace is

Again, it is the Bonhoeffer cheap grace v. costly grace

God’s riches at Christ’s expense

Grace requires accountability; it came at cost. You can’t understand it without it.

It came at a cost. And until we fully realize that, we do not fully realize grace.

So, what does God’s Word actually say on this topic?

God is a loving God: YES, this is true and is gospel

God cares for you: YES, this is true and is gospel

God has taken your sins upon himself through his Son: YES, this is true and is gospel

Unlike the twisted theology, the Day of Judgement is a great day for which we long!

Throughout the OT the Day of the Lord (a term that includes Christ’s first arrival and his second) is a day of rejoicing! A day of hope. A Day that the prophets prayed would come. In the NT, it remains a day of hope, a day we long for.

It is a day in which We, too will be judged!

It is a day in which We, too, will have to give an account

On this blessed day, our lives are indeed laid before God: the good, the bad, and the ugly.

HE ALREADY KNOWS!!!!

But in that moment…[PAUSE]

Jesus Christ, sitting at the right hand, looks at us and says: “I know you. Well done good and faithful servant. Enter the eternal kingdom of our presence”

THAT IS GRACE!!! THAT IS WHEN WE KNOW WHAT GRACE IS!!!

To stand before our creator and account for all of the things we did which wronged Him.

To look upon the face of true glory as we are… to have the one at the right hand say, “I took that upon myself. You are holy!”

Can’t we see that it takes us giving an account and falling down before the Lord for us to understand what grace is: we get God’s riches at Christ’s expense.

Until that very moment, we only have a glimpse of grace

We were set apart before we were born

We were called BY GOD’S GRACE… despite the awful sinners we are

This is grace, this is the gospel, THIS IS JESUS!!!

In that moment we will know Him and know grace fully

This isn’t Jesus +

We can do nothing to add to our salvation

or Jesus -

Where we know the Scripture, but the enemy skews it so that we do not truly understand the Gospel; he wants to destroy.

The Gospel is GRACE… why would we not pray for, desire, long for the moment in our history that would fully reveal this to us?!?!?

We can use this to help us understand Paul a little better

Paul and Grace

Paul was a persecutor

Galatians 1:13–14 “For you have heard of my former life in Judaism, how I persecuted the church of God violently and tried to destroy it. And I was advancing in Judaism beyond many of my own age among my people, so extremely zealous was I for the traditions of my fathers.”

Inversion: if you are created with giftings, that means that we will be really gifted at using those for inverse purposes.

Saul was using his giftings to do what he could to destroy the gospel

He had great zeal, he was focused, he would go to the extremes to destroy it.

The inverse, Paul is now the best person in the world, literally, to proclaim the gospel!!!

He had a mini-Judgement day experience already. He had to stand before the Lord AS A PERSECUTOR IN REAL TIME, and Christ calls Him to be an apostle to proclaim Him to the gentiles

MAKE NO MISTAKE: PAUL KNEW WHAT GRACE IS!!!

And Our Lord asked him to proclaim that to all of us so that He, our Lord, is glorified.

Us and grace

When we sin, we partake in the folly that the enemy can destroy the gospel message.

But, Satan doesn’t understand the concept of grace.

God uses our lives, our pain, our suffering, our sin even, and can use that so that others can glorify God because of us.

Our receiving grace glorifies God.

And, like Paul’s three years in Arabia, we too need to spend time constantly in prayer, reading God’s Word, and being in God’s presence…

these are not Jesus +

And to say we do not need to do these things because it is works: that is Jesus -

These are what we do to make sure we keep the glory of God in the forefront.

We are too easily swayed by those proclaiming Jesus + and Jesus -

Prayer

To have a relationship with God, to communicate with God

We Anglicans have a saying: what we pray is what we believe (Lex Orandi, Lex Credendi) Latin Maxim

Scripture

Going to Scripture and reading God’s Word, His revelation to us, keeps our focus on the one true gospel

Communion

Coming to the table each week, Holy Spirit strengthens us, unites us with Christ in that moment.

It is a foretaste of what is to come; God’s grace is showered down on us

Since page three, the enemy has tried all he can to twist out relationship with our creator to use us for his purposes:

to dishonor God and try and destroy the only gospel through our sin.

He is a tricky one, for sure

And he knows that we are sinners

Our inclination is to please man, not God.

If he can turn our heart just a little

Remember, it is true that virtue is formed by small steps developed over time

The same is true for vices and sin.

Both are habits developed over time.

Before you know it, our theology is skewed, we may let things slide, or maybe our lives are not glorifying God

But here is the true power of inversion: The one who knew no sin, took our sins upon himself, and we who deserve death, receive eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

This is not Jesus + or Jesus -: IT IS JESUS

The ultimate INVERSION

The ultimate longterm investment

The ultimate quality

It came at a great cost, but it was paid for by another

Y’all, We don’t shy away from our deaths worried about when or where: we live our lives in eager expectation because great INVERSION where we receive God’s riches and Christ’s expense.

IN THE NAME OF THE FAHTER, THE SON, and the HOLY SPIRIT. Amen