Sermon Tone Analysis

What do you do when you are trying to reach out to someone who needs help and they seemingly wont listen?

In the Christian life we have probably been in situations where we have tried to help and call others to correction but sometimes to no avail.

I know at our church we have had to excommunicate some members because of unrepentant sin and we as a church have had to go after members and call them to repentance to no avail.

I know that it can be discouraging and it is hard to find the next steps into what to do because you have seemingly tried to do all that you can do.

What do you do with people who seemingly wont listen?

What do you do when you have tried everything you can do?

This is where Paul finds himself now sharing more his genuine love and affection of the people.

We

Church family, Paul finds himself in a similar situation where he has been fighting to persuade the Galatian church to turn away from the false teachings that he has been battling against the whole book.

He too, can seem stunned and not knowing what to do at times but we can take encouragement at Paul’s concern for the people and his persistence in loving them and trusting in the Lord.

The goal for us today, is that as we look at Paul’s concern for the church we can grow in our perseverence to love our church and to continue to trust in the Lord throughout it all.

BE KNOWN BY GOD []

Text Summary

Throughout the book of Galatians, Paul has strong words and rebuke for the churches of Galatia for their wavering of the faith and following of false teaching of the Judaizers.

It seems now that Paul is seemingly losing hope in the people he shared the gospel to previously.

He is probably saying “how many times do I have to warn you?, how many times do I have to point you to Christ to actually go to Christ instead of the teachings of the Judaizers?”.

Paul in v.8-11 warns the churches of their observing of special days, months, seasons, years.

This is a general reference to a broad range of jewish festivals, events, and celebrations.

Thus letting us know the influence the Judaizers have on the people.

Remember these people were not Jewish and Paul shares to them the gospel, they initially believe, but now are now so influenced by Judaizers that they are keeping Old Testament commands and rules.

Paul is so distressed at the condition of the churches in Galatia that he wonders whether all the labor that he did in sharing the gospel, the suffering he endured along the way, the discipling of the members was in vain.

[SLAVERY]

Paul references back to the slavery of sin that they have been freed from.

A question that we might have, is how is a keeping of OT laws considered slavery to Paul?

Paul reminds the church, that when they didnt know God they were in fact slaves by to the worship of idols, but Paul knows that idols and false gods do not actually exist.

So they are in fact worshipping satan in the worship of false idols.

These idols were not genuine, but still beghind them are demonic powers, even though they are not gods, they still hold control over people, and enslaves them.

Paul thought that they have been saved by trusting in Christ, but they are now following OT commands and laws.

These people think that they once worshipped false gods, but in their obedience to OT laws they have stopped worshipping the true God, and thus have returned back to the worship of false gods.

[LEGALISM = IDOL WORSHIP]

A key concept that the Galatians did not understand and that we need to understand for us as a church is that Paul equates Legalism [the following of the law for salvation] as the same as the idol worship that the people of the churches of Galatia formerly worshipped before they converted to Christianity.

Thus earning one’s own salvation through biblical morality and religion is just as much enslavement to idols as outright paganism and all of its immoral practices.

Thus Paul is astonished, they were once slaves, and had experienced the freedom that one has in following and trusting in Christ, and now are wanting to go back to slavery.

Following after things that lead to destruction, knowing that those who trust in the law are cut off from Christ.

Why hold to these events, these days, why hold to circumcision, when all you need to do is follow Christ.

Paul notes that whether you were a pagan worshipping false idols, or a religious person trying to earn your salvation, it leads to the same fate which is being cut off from Christ.

[Story of the Prodigal Son]

Remember the story of the Prodigal son, the immoral son who left his father and his home and decided to live for himself.

He doesn’t find satisfaction in living for himself and decides to go back to his father, but in that same story we have the brother who followed the commands of the father faithfully and religiously for years, and he got angry because of the father’s mercy to the younger brother.

In this story, we have the Galatian churches.

They used to be like the younger brother, pagans living for themselves or other gods, and now they are the older brother, religious and trying to find purpose and saving in the things that they do and Paul reminds them that both roads lead back to slavery.

Tim Keller even states that the slavery of religion is far worse than the slavery of irreligion.

He says it is because it is less obvious.

“The irreligious person knows he is far away from god, but the religious person does not”

We need to see that working for your salvation and trusting in your morality and religion is the same as idol worship because it CREATES IDOLS.

It produces false saviors that we believe in that are not CHRIST.

[LEGALISM FOR CHRISTIANS TODAY]

Church family, we can fall into the same line of thinking as the Galatians being persuaded by the Judaizers.

Think about the things we focus on in the Christian life; church attendance, singing of songs, reading of God’s word, obedience to God’s law; if we do any of these things thinking that it is by doing these things that we will earn God’s favor, then we are no different than the churches of Galatia.

If your Christianity is a check off box in order to make you feel good about yourself before God, you will not feel good about yourself at the day of judgment.

Did you guys ever think that the enemy’s strategy in deceiving us is by not tempting us to do all the wrong things, but instead leading you to do all the right things with the wrong motive?

This is why Paul is so flustered and confused, He just previously talked about in the previous verses that they are adopted sons of God so why are they trying to go back to being slaves.

it’s similar to the people of Israel after being freed from slavery at the hands of Egypt grumbling to God in the wilderness wanting to go back to Egypt.

those who know they are truly free have no desire to go back to captivity.

think about the Prodigal son again.

We can understand the prodigal son after realizing that life apart from the Father was not the life he wanted, coming back to the Father and asking his dad to treat him like a slave and servant thinking that at least as a servant he gets food.

But how can anyone be as foolish if the father says you are my son, saying “no thanks, I would rather be a slave”.

Church family, do you prefer sonship over slavery?

This is the question that befuddles Paul.

Because the Christian life is a life of sons and daughters, not slavery.

It is a life that has been freed from bondage.

We are freed to love God, freed to obey God, freed to love others, not to be in bondage to the law.

Paul pleads with this people that he loves to look back at what Christ has done, and this leads us to Paul’s first desire in this text is that Paul desires for the church to be KNOWN BY GOD.

BE KNOWN BY GOD - PAUL’S FIRST DESIRE FOR THE CHURCHES OF GALATIA

Mind you, what Paul is asking for is not something that the individual can do on their own but something that is totally reliant on God to do.

Paul tells them in v. 8 “since you know God, or rather have become known by God”, because Paul knows want makes a person a Christian is not so much your knowing of God but God’s knowing of you.

Paul is saying that it isn’t so much your regard and love for God, but God’s love for you.

Church family, this is great news for us.

The fact that we are known by God.

To know someone in the bible is to enter into a personal relationship with that person.

So the fact that God knows us means that we have entered into a deep personal bond with God that was initiated by Him.

because our faith wavers church family, there are days where we feel close to God, there are days where we feel stagnant in our faith.

Our ‘knowing of God’ will rise and fall depending on many things, but God’s knowing of us absolutely fixed and sure.

the great and central basis of Christian assurance is not how much our hearts are set on God, but how unshakable God’s heart is set on us.

Paul wants to remind the churches and us that the gospel shows us we don’t need to make ourselves beautiful to God.

He already knows us, and if God knows us, and sees Christ when he looks at us, we do not need to care about what others think about you, we do not even have to worry about what we feel about ourselves, but take confidence in the fact that God knows us.

CBF APPLICATION: Paul’s desire for the church is that they would remember that they are known by God, and they need not worry about trying to improve their self-image or self-worth thus not needing to focus on doing things for the approval of God but focusing more on God’s knowing of you.

What we do as Christians to help us is to remember who we are and what God has done for us.

If we are constantly remembering that God has called us out of slavery and now has made us His sons.

We wouldn’t need to look for approval in other things but God.

So church family we need to be in God’s word.

We need God’s word reminding us who we are and what God has done for us.

As we do our bible reading, as we meditate on scripture, as we pray to God we can be reminded that we were lost and now found, we were slaves and now we are free, more important we are SONS of God, and be reminded and encouraged that not only do we know God but we are known by Him.

BECOME LIKE PAUL -PAUL’S 2ND DESIRE FOR THE CHURCHES OF GALATIA

· Paul has labored to demonstrate that believers are no longer under the Law covenant and that they live in the days when the promise given to Abraham had been fulfilled.

· However, Paul explains why he fears that his apostolic labors may be in vain.

The Galatians are relapsing back into paganism, but in a most remarkable way, for their relapse manifests itself in their desire to subject themselves to the Mosaic Law

Paul changes course in these next several verses, he starts using strong words of personal affection in writing to the church.

The apostle’s attitude reminds us that in pleading with others to repent that there must be a gentle side that we use need to use sometimes in speaking to others.

He begs his readers to hear him, he is saying to the churches “I love you so much, I am begging you to please listen to me, I am looking out for you”.

For now, Paul presents no more arguments but rather gives a heartfelt exhortation to the church, he now wants to remind the Galatians of how rich and deep their personal relationship they had previously had with him.

So in these verses Paul urges the church to become like Him.

He pleads with the church to remember previously how they accepted him before in a previous visit to the churches in the city.

So Paul previously visited the churches of Galatia before and in this previous visit it says in our text that Paul had a ‘weakness in the flesh’.

he urges the church to become like Him.

He pleads with the church to remember previously how they accepted him before in a previous visit to the churches in the city.

In this previous visit

This thorn or weakness in the flesh is a likely fight against a sickness that Paul had, and while he was in Galatia he was sick.

This sickness is not confirmed at what the specific sickness.

Scholars think that Paul might ahve contracted malaria while traveling through the low, swampy regions of Pamphylia and then decided to go to the higher and healthier regions of Galatia.