Sermon Tone Analysis

Reformation Study

There are many passages we could look at, as we remember God's work in the Reformation this weekend.

At the heart of what God accomplished through those men, was nothing short of a recovery of the true Gospel of Jesus Christ.

That's what we will see in our passage this morning: we're going to see a clear presentation of the Gospel from Paul - not only how it is to be understood, but how a child of God responds to it.

The Gospel - what is it?

: The news of God's gracious work to satisfy divine wrath through the death of His Son.

Some definitions:

"The good news of God's redemption of sinful humanity through the life, death and resurrection of his Son Jesus Christ."

"The joyous proclamation of God's redemptive activity in Christ Jesus on behalf of humans enslaved by sin."

v. 6: The Godly Response to the Gospel

F.F. Bruce: "In most of Paul’s letters the introductory salutation is followed by words of thanksgiving to God for some feature of the recipients’ life or faith, usually with εὐχαριστέω—’I (we) thank God …’ (; ; ; ; ; , ‘we are bound to thank God;’ ; cf.

)—and twice with the verbal adjective εὐλογητός, ‘Blessed be God …’ (; ).

Galatians is the solitary exception"

This makes sense, since the typical "thanksgiving" is always in a Gospel-reception context.

P.T. O'Brien: "Because the Galatians have departed from the gospel of Christ there can be no thanksgiving; instead, a curse is pronounced on anyone who brings another message"

Ex's:

- "First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for you all, because your faith is being proclaimed throughout the whole world."

- he says that they believed the Gospel, and then 3 verses later (summing up all he's written thus far), he says in v. 16, "I do not cease giving thanks for you"

- "I thank my God in all my remembrance of you, always in every prayer of mine for you all making my prayer with joy, because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now."

- "We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love that you have for all the saints, because of the hope laid up for you in heaven.

Of this you have heard before in the word of the truth, the gospel, which has come to you, as indeed in the whole world it is bearing fruit and increasing—as it also does among you, since the day you heard it and understood the grace of God in truth,"

- "We give thanks to God always for all of you (2)...

For we know... that he has chosen you (4), because our gospel came to you not only in word, but also in power and in the Holy Spirit and with full conviction (5)."

But here in Paul ISN'T thankful, he is astonished

θαυμάζω - "to be extraordinarily impressed or disturbed by something"

This is, over and over, what people did when they say Jesus work miracles (Mat.

15:31; )

This is what the disciples on the boat did after Jesus commanded the winds and the sea ()

What is he astonished about?

He's astonished that they are deserting God, who called them "in the grace of Christ"

He's astonished that it has happened so quickly.

We're not sure how quickly... but it's been quick.

This sort of turning can happen slowly, over time.

It can be a long-term danger for a group of believers.

, The Ephesians have been a church long enough to "toil" and "persevere," they've learned to test people, have "endured"... but they have "left their first love."

What we're seeing here is an example here, not of the long-term dangers of apathy/lethargy, but of the dangers of immaturity.

The immature in the faith are fragile; they are weak, prone to being "turned this way and that" ().

(This is why an elder is not to be a new convert ()

(This is a context for you to think in as you listen this morning, if you're someone who, when you look at yourself, you feel like you are immature in your faith, in your walk with the Lord.

This is more than just "not ok"; it's more than "an issue that you should address, sometime."

You are in danger, my friend!

There's another element of this for us to dwell on a moment longer.

We should take note of what sort of thing brings Paul to the level of being "extraordinarily disturbed."

Paul is "extraordinarily disturbed" when he hears of those who received the gospel of the grace of Christ choosing something else instead.

That's what disturbs/shocks him.

It's interesting: do you know what θαυμάζω'd the pharisees?

Not the miracles of Jesus

Turn to - when Jesus neglected to ceremonially wash his hands before a meal.

The experiences that evoke astonishment and reaction reveal things about us:

Whose honor am I concerned about?

We can tell that's in play in ; after all, whose laws are these that are being violated?

The law being violated was in the Mishnah, the oral traditions, not the law of Moses.

And here's one of those religious leaders, the guardians of that man-made law ( 'teaching as doctrine the precepts of men').

What this pharisee marvels at, is that Jesus would not behave like he wanted Jesus to behave.

No such marveling after witnessing the miraculous.

In fact in mark 3, after witnessing such a miracle, they immediately go out and begin plotting his murder.

Why?

He had challenged the authority of their rules.

Oh, those Pharisees.

How their causes for amazement and disturbance betray them.

Good thing it's not like that for us, huh?

We are constantly amazed at God's good and faithful works; we never struggle with anger when God doesn't DO what we think He should DO; we're never consumed by thoughts of our own honor, or rights, or what's "fair"; we consistently seek God's kingdom first, don't we?

Is that what your week was like last week?

We are very much like the Pharisees, because:

They were just sinful human beings, behaving as was natural for them.

Our default is NOT to marvel at the suffiiency, the beauty, the perfections of the Son of God, or the Word of God.

"By nature children of wrath" ()

But when I've claimed the name of Christ, it is INDEED disturbing to find myself in those places, because a Christian has a new nature at work within them

v. 6: The Proper Description of the Gospel

Notice the ultimatum: Paul says that they "have deserted Him who called [them] in the grace of Christ (Who is that?

God), by turning to a different gospel.

What's that tell you?

Do you hear the inseparable connection between the Gospel of Christ and an identification with God?

Our ability to identify with God hangs (it would seem!) on our response to the Gospel!

Yes, it is true that we are saved NOT by our belief, but by a PERSON - the Lord Jesus Christ.

But there's a way to overstate that, that winds up minimizing the fact that the Gospel is a Statement.

It is a claim.

It's something that can be preached (v.

8) and contradicted (v.

8-9).

When I'm faced with the Gospel, I'm faced with an Accusation from someone claiming to be the God of all the universe, and an offer of salvation, with stipulations: repent, and put all your chips on the table for this one.

Put your entire trust on someone else's work to save you.

What the Bible tells me is that I have NO identification with God, if I have not consciously identified with HIS Gospel - the Gospel of the Grace of Christ (as it's put here).

What this tells me: I'd better be sure I'm giving this an appropriate amount of my thought-life, if it's this important.

...

[ex.: last month we closed on a house; took up quite a bit of my thoughts during that time - and appropriate, because it was important.

Is there any comparison w/ the level of importance that my eternal destination holds?]

Given that level of importance, I would think that God, and his implications, should at least be at play in the background of my thinking every moment of the day.

Jerry Bridges defines Godliness and Ungodliness in that way...

This is one of the greatest casualties of our crazy-busy lifestyles; in losing the precious moments of quiet, interruption-free, "boring" time, we lose opportunities to reflect on things of this magnitude.

So let's look a bit more carefully now, at how Paul describes this gospel:

"...who called you in the grace of Christ..."

Paul means this here as a summary statement of "the Gospel" - the true Gospel, as opposed to the "other" one (6) that "is no true Gospel" (7).

This is how God called them: by announcing to them "the grace of Christ."

A very Reformation-connected idea - "Sola Gratia"

It's what Paul called it in , "the gospel of the grace of God.'

John Stott: "It is good news of a God who is gracious to undeserving sinners.

In grace He gave His Son to die for us.

In grace He calls us to Himself.

In grace He justifies us when we believe.

‘All is from God’, as Paul wrote in , meaning that ‘all is of grace’.

Nothing is due to our efforts, merits or works; everything in salvation is due to the grace of God."

These are the claims of the Gospel...