Sermon Tone Analysis

Context

The last time we were in Galatians together, we suggested that a key to valuing our salvation was to understand God’s adoption of us into His family better.

The children of God are just that: God’s children.

Members of His royal family.

If you are in Christ, you are a prince or princess of the King.

You belong to God, and while we experince hardship in the world, the world will not overcome who we are, because we are united to Christ.

The children of God are heirs of the promise.

God was faithful to Abraham to keep His promise to him and He has kept His promise to grant us all the riches of His grace in Christ, and when we are with Him upon our death or Christ’s return the promise will come to full fruition.

But the Galatian church had bought into what some false teachers were proclaiming.

That salvation from God can only be enjoyed through, and as a result of our effort.

God does His part and people do theirs and only through this cooperative effort, will we have peace with God.

They were messing with the gospel, and it broke Paul’s heart that those in the Galatian church who he had labored over and with for so long were so quickly deserting Christ who had called them out of darkness into the glorious light of the gospel.

So much of what Paul does in our text today is pleas with the Galatians to snap out of it.

He is agonizing over what is taking place in the Galatian church.

He makes it clear that he views his relationship to this church in terms of father and son.

Paul is desperate for the spiritual health of this people, and it is no small concern that they not reject Christ or His truth.

You and I need to heed what Paul urges here, but we also need to learn from his anguish today.

There is much in life that causes us pain, and while we do not seek after pain for pain’s sake, we should expect to experience this kind of pain because it reflects a right concern.

We must have this concern for the people around us, and it is this concern that really needs to be our chief concern.

Let’s see what it is.

Introduction

We all know what it is to want something.

But not just want something, but to desperately want something.

But we also know what it is to be desperate for something to happen and possess no power to make it happen.

In those moments, its like and unstoppable force (our desperate desires) meets an immovable object (our inability to do anything about it.

But what our desperate desires, and what about our methods to pursue those ends?

Perhaps we’re not seeing the problem or the plea, that is the answers to those problems the right way.

Romans 8:18–28 (ESV)

For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.

For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God.

For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God.

For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now.

And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies.

For in this hope we were saved.

Now hope that is seen is not hope.

For who hopes for what he sees?

But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.

FCF: Often Christians are overwhelmed with the wrong problems and spend their energies making the wrong pleas.

Main Idea

Christians should be consumed with only one problem and one plea.

Perhaps a statement that warrants some scrutiny.

Only one problem and one plea?

I think we face many problems, and we, in response to those problems, make many pleas to ourselves, others and God.

How is it possible all of that boils down to one problem and one plea?

Country problems and pleas

Family problems and pleas

Health problems and pleas

Financial problems and pleas

kid & grand kid problems and pleas

Marriage problems and pleas

And the list could continue for quite some time.

So again, how could it possible be that I am going to suggest that there is really only one problem and one plea for the people of God.

For everyone here who is a child of God through Christ, I am suggesting that you have only one problem and one plea.

Of course the problem has massive implications for our lives and the problem effects all of life like country, family, health, finances, kids and marriage.

But ultimately, when we see Jesus for who He is, it all boils down to one problem.

And because there is only one problem, there is only one plea.

But what particularly problematic for Christians is not seeing all of life’s challenges as ultimately rooted in the one problem.

I’m suggesting we must see and believe that the church contends with only one problem and therefore has only one plea in order to contend with life.

Main Question

What’s the problem and plea?

So, I will say upfront what I think the one problem and one plea is and then spend the rest of our time unpacking both as I see them in our text.

The problem

Rejection of Christ

The plea

Embrace Christ

Rightly understanding the seriousness of the problem prevents us from making the plea casually.

Rejection of Christ (8-11)

AQ: What does rejecting Christ look like?

Rejecting God-given freedom (8)

Pre-Christian past of the Galatian believers: enslavement to their sin

We’re not told what the slavery looked like, but the context of Galatia suggests it could have been

religions of south Galatia

Roman Imperial cult

Pagan deities of ancient Greece

Regardless, conversion to Christ meant breaking away from false beliefs, false gods and false worship

And Paul makes clear that all other gods are not gods at all.

There is only one true living God, which is Paul’s point here, and to reject the one true living God is to embrace our own slavery.

After listening to Jesus’ teaching that they would be set free by the truth He had proclaimed to them if they yield to the truth, some Jews objected to this notion of freedom because they were children of Abraham.

In other words, they were children of the promise.

They belonged to God.

They were favored by God.

Jesus responds this way:

Jesus is saying that practicing sin proves one’s enslavement to sin, and sinning enslaves one to sin.

This is the ultimate bondage to Jesus.

And slaves have no permanent place in the family, which is what Jesus references in v. 35.

The Jews thought because they were descendants of Abraham, they were favored by God.

Jesus is telling them they are just like slaves who have no permanent place in God’s family.

And then in v. 36, Jesus makes clear that He can set people free from the bondage to their sin.

And the freedom He grants is total.

And what the Galatian believers were doing were rejecting that freedom.

They were going back to their former reality in which they did not know God.

And by rejecting the freedom they were given in Christ, they were also

Reverting to slavery to sin (9)

Notice how Paul refers to the Galatians’ connection to God: now that you have come to know God...

Knowledge, in this sense is more than an intellectual understanding of the gospel (this is included), but it is also a reference to a personal intimacy with God.

To know God in this way is to be transformed by God in every way.

And what bewilders Paul - what is beyond his comprehension is why the Galatians, who know God in this way, would now turn back to the way they were before they knew God.

To turn back in v. 9 means to revert to a former condition.

What were they before they knew God? Slaves to their sin.

Upon coming to know God, they were set free.