and I hope that as you're with me over these next 14 or 15 weeks as we look into the book of Galatians that you'll have opportunity to consider the weight of the letter that Paul will write to the Galatian believers and the opportunity that we have to be able to take the message that is being given and apply it to us within the 21st century. Many of you know that back in the fall of 2015, Pastor Ryan, in fact, did the book of Galatians. And so one of the things I'll encourage you to do is to go back, look at your notes, have the opportunity to also come up to the sermon series itself. And as I go through my study, you'll see that one of my sources is his teaching period so where there's opportunity to reinforce some of the lessons that he's given to us and application that he's given to us we can do. If anyone has been with me teaching before, you know there is normally a song that I have that we're going to hold with throughout the time that we're together. So this morning, not allowing you to sit, I'm gonna ask you to stand. We're gonna sing together A Mighty Fortress Is Our God. Anyone who sings A Mighty Fortress Is Our God, if in fact you mumble it, you know that you have done it wrong. This is a wonderful, powerful message to us. So let's sing together. A mighty fortress is our God, a bulkward never failing. Our helper He amid the flood of mortals' ills prevailing. For still our ancient foe does seek to work us woe. His craft and power are great and armed with cruel hate. On earth is not his equal. Did we in our own strength confide our striving would be losing? Were not the right man on our side the man of God so choosing? Dost ask who that may be? Christ Jesus, it is He, Lord Sabbath, His name, from age to age the same, and we must win the battle. And though this world with devil's filth should threaten to undo us, we will not fear, for God hath willed his truth to triumph through us. The prince of darkness, grim, We tremble not for Him, His rage we can endure, For lo, His doom is sure, One little work shall fail Him. That word above all earthly powers, God thanks to them abided. The Spirit and the gifts are ours through Him who with us sided. Let goods and kindred go, this mortal life also. The body they may kill. God's truth abided still. His kingdom is forever. May I hear an amen? Now while you're standing up, would you greet one another for a moment and then sit down in about 30 seconds. Okay, here we go. You are in fall 2018, and we are going to open up the book of Galatians. Now, I'm gonna be very careful sometimes in regards to what I talk about in regards to how we're approaching Galatians. Normally, if you have sat under my teaching, you know I do a very inductive style. For some of you, one point in time, as I was giving you handouts in homework, you looked at me and said, Ron, you don't need to do that. You can just teach. And so I'm going to do that. And we're going to look at Galatians, but as we do this study, it is really a study in Galatians because we're going to be taking out and spending a little bit more time with some passages than others. We will cover each, but We will go deep. Now that is who I am. You got about 10 seconds to look at that in the upper right hand corner is my bride and that's Diane and I'm very thankful that she is with me today and I am an elder at Grace Fabius Chapel. Been here for about nine years now. And at the end of it, the most important thing for you to know is that I was born on the 27th of December in 1952. That means I'm reaching 66 years of age and I am the elder elder of Grace Baptist Chapel. And if by chance you decide you want to give birthday cards or presents, there is my address. So don't send me an email card. Actually send me something. Chocolate pies, chocolate cookies, or such things would be great since I'm on a restricted diet now and the restriction has been imposed by Diane. So I need all the food in the category of chocolate that I can get. We want to welcome you and enjoy this study in Galatians. And this is my granddaughter. Some of you know who she is, Magdalene. And so let's see that if the smile that she can put in your face is one that will continue as we go through Galatians. So, welcome and let's enjoy together the book of Galatians. Though it be a book that Paul will come and very quickly he will speak to a problem and the effects of that problem within the church. Now, there are 149 verses in Galatians. I've given to you the chapter. I'm asking you for next week to read one chapter, 24 verses. more than once, so that as you come into the study, you have got that. And I'm asking that if you have never read through the book of Galatians, you read through the book of Galatians, so you've got a context in regards to where we may go. It also may prompt you to come to me and say, hey, Ron, are you going to cover this? And oh, by the way, I really would like this answered. Now Jeremiah would say, Your words were found and I ate them, and Your words became for me a joy and the delight of my heart. For I have been called by Your name, O Lord God of hosts. If you are in Christ, you have been called by His name. And the words should be precious to each of us. And so I am hoping that as we read together and study together Galatians, that indeed you will find that they are a joy and a delight. though there are some very difficult messages that are there. Now, I don't know what exactly my title is going to be, and so one of the things that I'm doing, I've been studying over the past summer, and I have worked through a form of outline, but I'm not going to give you my map that is there. But I've got a working title, and that working title may change. The working title is the Gospel of Free Grace. The free grace of God in Christ, received by faith, was the great theme of Luther's famous lectures on Galatians, which he began by saying, I do not seek my own act of righteousness. I ought to have and perform it, but I declare even if I did have it and perform it, I cannot trust in it or stand up before the judgment of a God on the basis of it. Thus, I embrace only the righteousness of Christ, which we do not perform but receive, which we do not have but accept when God the Father grants it to us through Christ Jesus. Now, I'm gonna walk you through very quickly Some references that I'm using and some books that you may want to consider. The reason why I've got a narrative there, these slides will go into the archives of Greg's. That means you can pull them up or others can pull them up. And I also will have them posted so that before the study is over with, as we're going through some of these sections, you can do it. Some wonderful books. Just absolutely wonderful. And I would encourage you to look at John Stott's The Message of Galatian. And then, of course, we have Martin Luther. And in Martin Luther in 1535, he would put his lectures into place. There is, as you know very much, a loving relationship with Martin Luther in regards to Galatians. For the Reformers, Galatians would be that which would free them from the bondage that the organized church had put upon them, that they would no longer, in fact, go through all the rituals and the ceremonies and just the painful things that what others thought would bring them right with God. And so that is absolutely wonderful, and I encourage you to look at that. You can get up online Calvin's Commentaries. And so there are a number of places, and if you haven't found all the reform places on the Internet, I'm sure there are many that I have not, you ought to go get with me and others that actively go through and look. And in Calvin's commentary, you've got them written right there, and they're a great resource to have. You will find that one of the reform commentaries that are now out on the street, and this is the first in a series of commentaries that are really being done by sound reformed theologian in the 21st century. And so I would encourage you to look at Rikens' book, Philip Rikens, and I will in fact use that book as one of my references as I have the others. You've got F.F. Bruce, and if you have never had the opportunity to in fact read F.F. Brooke, it is just wonderful. One of the first times I was exposed to him was in his book, The Training of the Twelve. And oh, how masterful he was in regards to that. And so it's an excellent volume. It's a phrase by phrase exegesis of that. Don't get frightened by that name. In fact, rejoice that there are others that can do that and have that talent and have the ability to bring it to life. And it really puts it, I think, very carefully within its historical aspect. This book, Pastor Ryan, I was talking to him, asking about some resources to look at as he talked to me about the center of Galatians that we'll look at in chapters three and chapter four. He said, Ron, if you have not read the distinctiveness of Baptist covenant theology, you should. Well, I had not. And I'm reading it, and I guess that I'm gonna spend more time around the supper table with my pastor as we look at this, but I will tell you, wonderful book. if you sometimes have been a Presbyterian background, wonderful book to really help you put things into a framework that really will talk in regards to our Baptist covenant theology. And that'll be referenced quite a bit by me as well. John MacArthur has written a series of books. If you remember back in the mid-1980s, he did a book called The Gospel According to Jesus. If you've not read that, you should. There's another that is out, The Gospel According to the Apostles. And this book, which I got last year at the 500th anniversary of Reformation, The Gospel According to Paul by John MacArthur. I'm going to stop just for a moment because you're going to see in terms of fact the way that this beginning introduction goes, deals very much in regards to understanding the seriousness of why Paul would write this letter to the Ephesians. But I love this quote, remove the reality of sin and you've taken away the possibility of repentance. Abolish the doctrine of human depravity and you void the divine plan of salvation. Erase the notion of personal guilt and you eliminate the need for a savior. Obliterate the human conscious and you will raise an amoral and unredeemable generation. The church cannot join hands with the world in such a grossly satanic enterprise. To do so is to overthrow the very gospel that we are to proclaim. As I have been a student under John MacArthur in terms of over the course of my lifetime, in fact, staying engaged with his teachings as he comes into his old age, there is no doubt in my mind His heart is so pressed in regards to desiring that there be a purity of the gospel and that we understand the gospel that has been given to us. He has a Galatian sermon series. John MacArthur is one teacher that if you go back and read his commentary from the 1980s in Galatians, and you listen to his series that he's just about finished up, I think, in 2018, what you are going to find are some pretty significant doctrinal changes that occurred. very reformed in its thinking, a wonderful relationship that he had with R.C. Sproul when R.C. Sproul was alive. And so one of the things that I would tell you, if you, regardless of the teacher, always look at the dates of when they're preaching, because we hope that our men of God are continuing to mature. And as they mature, either giving stronger a defense of the position that has been held by them, or in fact coming to a point of saying, I didn't get this one quite right. And it's encouraging to me when a man of God like John MacArthur has more than once said, I got that one wrong. Let's readdress it. There's the J. Ryan Davison's Galatian sermon series. I happen to have an email or a series of emails that he gave me so I can push those to you. And I know they're in the church archives, at least if you consider Ryan the church archives. But I don't think they're on sermon audio because they're just a little bit too old to be there. So let's get to today's lesson. Here's the message. To an enclave of young converts in Asia Minor. They were tucked away and Paul writes what is perhaps one of the oldest documents in the New Testament. Scholars will tell us today that this is perhaps the first writing of Paul, the first letter that he will give. Within the context of the New Testament, the only letter that many believe is older than that of Galatians is that of James. So a very wonderful thing when you think in terms of the fact of James being able to give to the churches the ability to read James and to understand that it is not about works, but works without faith is dead. Okay, it's all about him, yes. Around 47 to 49. So, Paul wrote what is perhaps that gospel. And so, what were the problems they were facing? Because one may ask me in terms of the fact, why come back into Galatians? Well, you're gonna come back into Galatians because I am convinced that I fully do not understand this thing called the gospel and how it is lived out in my life. So often what happens as believers, we say, I got the gospel. In fact, I memorized the Apostle Creed, and that captures all the pieces of the gospel. But the gospel is living, and the gospel goes through every part of our spiritual blood as we walk in Him. How do we become more Christ-like? How is sanctification working within our life to mature us? It is the gospel that has been given to us and a life that is His. So among the various religious authorities exposing all of these types of teachings to the Galatians, how were they to know what is right? How were men and women to be put right with God? How could Christians in the middle of this pagan culture truly live lives that are pleasing to God? Now, I would submit to you, we have the same questions today, right? If you go and you talk with others that are not in Christ, at some point in time, they'll say, well, this God is a vast something. I just don't know how to approach them, how to get right with God. This season on television, I don't know what channel it is, you won't have to worry about conversations with God because there's a TV series that says, I was friended by God. And so God sent an email to this individual. And I guess through the series, we're gonna see how God works in the life of using somebody through email. Now, what is that? That's a distortion of God, a distortion of the gospel. Yet for many, they will look and say, in our technological age, isn't it possible? Well, the details of our struggles have changed since Paul's days, but the principles that he sets forth are timeless, absolutely timeless, as the Lord He exalts. Now, there are lots of titles associated with Galatians. The Magna Carta of Spiritual Liberty, the Battle Cry of the Reformation, the Christian's Declaration of Independence. It is clearly the Holy Spirit's charter of spiritual freedom for those who have received Christ as Lord and Savior. So, Galatians. It declares the truth of salvation by Christ alone and the goal of our salvation. The Epistle to the Colossians is a powerful Christian treatise designed to declare the truth of salvation by grace alone and the goal of such a salvation, namely a life of joyous freedom from sin's tyranny. on the one hand and increasing enslavement to Christ on the others. When you look in regards to what is my life look like, one who is in fact accepted the gospel and that Christ resident the Holy Spirit within our life, it looks as one as I am free from sin. And I think that some of us are still continually oppressed by the tyranny of sin. But what we have is in fact that increasing enslavement to Christ on the others that says Christ is sufficient. Period. Christ is sufficient. It is surely as one author has called it the charter of Christian liberty. It's important before understanding Paul and the core of his doctrine of justification by faith alone can hardly be overstated with the result that it has received a long and extensive treatment by the church. It had a tremendous impact on the Reformers including Luther who said, the epistle to the Galatians is my epistle. To Edith is as I were in wedlock. It is my Catherine. Boys commenting on its impact since the Protestant Reformation says, not many books have made such a lasting impression on men's mind as the Epistle to Paul to the Galatians, nor have many done so much to shape the history of the Western world. Why do you want to read and understand Galatians? Because. It is going to give to you an understanding that we too live in a dark world, but we have tremendous light. And the gospel which we hold is a light that we should be placing within the darkness that is around us. And we should be proclaiming it, and we should be declaring it. Yes? His wife, it is. Thank you for that. So Galatians, Galatians is our trumpet call to freedom. That means for me who is in battle, for me who has been in uniform, I know what it is to receive a trumpet call that moves me forward and moves me out. understood the gracious gospel of Galatians liberates from legalism. Now this is F.F. Bruce. Let's see what he says. When from time to time someone appeared who understood and proclaimed the genuine message of Galatians, he was liable to be denounced as a subversive character. as indeed Paul was in his day. But the letter to the Galatians, with its trumpet called to Christian freedom, has time and time again released the true gospel from the bonds in which well-meaning but misguided people have confided, so that it can once more exert its emancipating power in the life of mankind. empowering those who receive it to stand fast in the freedom which Christ has set them free. Why do we find that Sunday after Sunday from the preaching pulpit, Pastor Ryan in fact places into the gospel, the gospel, the gospel. And so let's understand how Paul really feels When having instructed, taught, shepherded these converts in Asia Minor, in these four or five churches that were clustering together, he had invested his life, he had given them the soundness of the words from God, of what the gospel was. And they were now perverting it, distorting it. adding to it, subtracting from it. Folks, we live today in a world. I started looking in terms of where are there wonderful misrepresentations of what the gospel is? And I thought for a while I would build a few slides to do that. So I started that journey. And I became, for a moment, and I had to stop and I said, God, this is so depressing. The largest church in the United States of America, the preaching pulpit, if you can call it that, is held by Joel Osteen. One of the books that you can purchase, if you so desire, is How to Be Blessed. with the same type of wonderful hair that he has. Go look up online. Every minute that Pastor Ryan has in the pulpit as the instrument of God to take the gospel and to bring it forth and to unfold it and for the Holy Spirit to take it and challenge us and to understand what it is to live the gospel and don't be caught by strange winds are very precious, but they're very few. And so there we are. Now, Galatians is relevant. If it's not relevant, then I should stop after this class. So if anyone comes to me and says, Ron, it's not relevant, try something else. I won't, but I'll thank you. Galatians deals with the important issues, law, grace, works, the gospel, Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit, our Lord's death, His resurrection, salvation, sanctification. These are all gospel related realities. And so the primary message of the book of Galatians is freedom, freedom, but it's freedom from sin, freedom from judgment, freedom from hell, freedom from all forms of spiritual bondage, and liberation into the glorious purposes and grace of God. So now we have to ask ourselves the question, have we been liberated now that we possess the truth of the gospel? Are we growing in our understanding of the gospel, or have we allowed ourself to become very lukewarm? The gospel, the reason why we sing together, the mighty fortress is our God. What does it say at the end? I give it up, everything, for Him. And so it is in regards to the gospel. And so about 20 times in the short epistle, in six chapters, we come across some form of the word bondage of freedom. So as you're looking and saying, I don't feel that free. I feel like I am in bondage, you know? We've got to ask ourselves, are we looking into the truths of God's word? Now, inductive study. an inductive study, one of the things that you do is you look at comparisons and contrasts as you're studying. If you were to unfold the book of Galatians, I would submit to you that you're going to find a number of important contrasts A different type of gospel versus the authentic gospel. Man reasoning versus God's revelation. Law versus grace. Work versus faith. The curse of death versus the blessing of life. Condemnation versus exoneration. Servants in bondage versus sons in freedom. Defeat versus victory. The Old Covenant versus the New Covenant. Living in the flesh versus walking in the Spirit. The work of the flesh versus the fruit of the Spirit. Falling from grace versus standing firm in grace. And the world itself is the object of boasting versus the cross of Christ. Can you believe that? And so, as students of God's Word, and in Sunday school, one of the things that I'm trying to do is to encourage you to get in there and look and say, let me lay out these contrasts that are there. And what does it say? So it gives insight to what the gospel is not and what the gospel is. If you wanted a summary of Galatians, you could reach back to Gaius Victorinus. You could go all the way back somewhere in the 300s and here it is. Perhaps one of the best summaries of Paul's letters come from the first Latin commentary written on the letter by the theologian Marius Victorinus. The Galatians are going astray because they are adding Judaism to the gospel of faith in Christ. Disturbed by these tendencies, Paul writes the letter in order that they may preserve faith in Christ alone. I was driving to church this morning and I was thinking through some of this and I was looking and I was saying, well, I really do trust in Christ alone. It is really not about me or what I can do. I can get in my conversation with God and say, God, I sinned today, and it was a sin that I said yesterday I would not commit today. I would flee from it. So I am disappointed in myself, and I'm going to keep on working toward finding a way of escape. Did I look and say, Father, I'm so thankful that you died upon the cross and you died for the sin that I did yesterday that I said that I was not going to do today. And I understand that, but I am broken and I am hurt. And I fall before you say, thank you, gracious God, that you forgive such a sinner as I. What Paul will say to the Galatian believers is it is not about you. It's about Christ. He does it all. Well, so fight the good fight. So if I'm going to go into Galatians with you, I'm going to say to you, put on the armor of God every morning for the rest of your life and recognize that you are in a battle. You are in a spiritual battle. You are in a battle with yourself. You clearly are in a battle with the world. And so you put on that armor. There are some hills that we as Christians must be prepared to die on. And the purity of God's word and the gospel is clearly one of them. If we do not have the gospel, as God provided it to us, as He preserved it over all of this time, if we are willing to courts to change it, to not engage and say, this man is speaking untruth. Now, I will tell you, as I was going through my list of what I would consider false teachers, I looked at it and said, I have a fear of man, even to y'all, to talk about in terms of the fact of how some of the most prominent men in the 21st century have taken the gospel and brought it down to such a level that it's almost like, I was sharing with Christy, my daughter, one day, and I said, you know, it's going to a church and around the church, that beautiful wooden door, you've got written, Christ lived, died upon a cross. resurrected on the third day, sitting at the right hand of the Father. And through the years, what you found is that the vines began to grow. And as they grow, they grew. He wasn't sitting at the right hand of the Father. The resurrection was gone. The crucifixion was gone. His life was gone. Just Christ. If you go today and you talk to people about the gospel, you can have a conversation about God. And as long as you talk to God in its wide sense, they're not going to be offended. But when you say there is only one way, only one way, and it is a narrow way, And it is through Christ alone you have just got that individual to say, I don't like you and what you're saying and I disagree. Hey folks, Christ alone. That means in a world that is trying to decay the gospel message, fragment it and reduce it down so that it just is sweet sounding to everyone and tickles the ear. Where are we slapping that hand away from that person's ear so that the message of the gospel can be spotted? So when Paul comes into Galatians, he comes into Galatians and what does he say? I am perplexed. How could you, having received the gospel, So quickly move away. I think it was a little bit more than perplexed or disturbed, frustrated. I think a righteous anger that was there. We must defend. So, there's an imperative. R.C. Sproul. In 2012, in the Legionnaire Conference, wrote these words. If an angel comes in here and says, wait a minute, you can't get to heaven by trusting Christ and Christ alone and having the imputation of his merit. And the angel came here and said, for you to really be justified, you have to have inherent righteousness. You have to add works to faith, merit to grace, you to Christ. If an angel from heaven came in here and said that this afternoon, I would take him by the seat of his celestial pants and kick him out of here. Paul said that if anyone teaching you any other gospel, even if it is an angel from heaven, let him be anathema, cursed. Let him be anathema. Let him be damned. If the pope, the bishop, the priest, or preacher teaches any other gospel than that which you have received, let him be anathema, because there is no other gospel. Now I'm going to share something with you, and you're going to say, Ron, you probably shouldn't have done that. In uniform, as a commander, in combat zones, there were times that I needed to make sure that the soldiers understood the urgency. They often spoke a different language than what I did and had different words than I would use. But in that, when I really wanted to get their attention, I used a vocabulary that wasn't necessarily one that I embrace. It was not my pattern, but I needed for them to understand. We have our lives on the line for one another. What do you not get? What is he saying? Listen. Do what? Teach any gospel that you received, let them be damned. Is that how we feel about people that have taken the purity of the gospel, and we listen to what they do? And what do we do? We walk away. We don't say, hey, listen, I need to share a scripture with you. You may not believe the Bible, but I believe the Bible, and this is what it says, and I want you to know what you are speaking, you should be damned. Well, the gospel threat. What's the most serious threat to the gospel? This is R.C. Ryle. It was the best capture that I got. You may spoil the gospel by substitution. You have only to withdraw from the eyes of the sinner the grand object which the Bible proposes to faith, Jesus Christ, and to substitute another object in his place, and the mischief is done. You may spoil the gospel by addition. You have only to add to Christ, the grand object of faith, some other object as equally worthy of honor and the mischief is done. You may spoil the gospel by disproportion. You have only to attach an exaggerated importance to the secondary things of Christianity and a diminished importance to the first things and the mischief is done. You say you have been born again by Christ, but have you received the second blessing of God? Have you received the baptism of the Holy Spirit with a manifestation of speaking in tongues? Well, how will you keep your salvation? We have to walk down the street to talk about baptism in terms of not a visible sign, not a means of grace, but rather in addition to the gospel. Lastly but not least, you may completely spoil the gospel by confused and contradictory directions. Confused and disorderly statements about Christianity are almost as bad as no statement at all. Religion of this sort is not evangelical. That's why it's so important, equipping the saints for the work of the ministry. The church is for us, the believers. We get good bones with good meat to be able to eat and to be nourished by God's word in the preaching of our word here, with a consistency that is there. Now, in Galatians, What we're going to find, it is an exposition. As you look at it, you're going to see that it is defense, and I love Paul, there is also the application. So, the theme of the exposition and defense and application of the gospel of God's grace runs throughout the letter. He does a strong attack in 1 6 through 9. If any man is preaching you a gospel contrary to that which you receive, let him be accursed. In chapters 1 and 2, he's going to defend his apostleship. And folks, it is important. You know what else? You need to understand the godly credentials that are given to a church that is preaching the purity of the gospel. So that when you speak, you speak not with the authority of yourself, but with the authority of God's holy word. That's why at the end of the day in evangelism, when an individual cannot come to a point of believing that God's word is authoritative, that it is inspired in life, we can have a conversation, but we're without our weapon. So we continue to proclaim. In chapters 3 and 4, he talks about, through experience and observation, the theological, if you will, to look at the gospel's accuracy and its purity. And then in chapters 5 and 6, he's going to talk about the practical implications of the gospel properly understood. This letter hangs together as a unified argument, if you will, for the gospel. Now, when Paul says that all works are excluded, that means we can't even claim that faith is the sort of work that contributes to our justification. You can't depend it either on any part. Now, the question that we face, perhaps some of you even in this room struggle with, how can I be right before God? I love the fact that I can go to God's Word and say, is anybody else asking that question over time? How can a man be in the right before God? How can I be right with God? That was Job's question. What, he was a good man? Really, the best he actually could be? God would place him into the ring with Satan. In chapter one we read, he was flameless, upright, fearing God, and turning away from evil. And it repeats exactly the same thing in chapter one, verse eight. This is a man that gets as good as he gets. Why is he asking a question in chapter nine, verse two? How can a man be right with God? Because a good man and the virtues that he has are not enough. It is Christ. His life is all that it should be, very much like the Apostle Paul, if measured by the law. But how can a man, a good man, be a good man and not be right with God? Because a good man doesn't make you right with God. Well, we look at the book of Micah. And when we look in the book of Micah, the prophet. Chapter 6 says, with what? With what shall I come before the Lord and bow myself before God on high? Shall I come to Him with burnt offerings? Shall I come with Him with yearning paths? Does the Lord take delight in thousands of rams and ten thousand rivers of wool? Shall I present my firstborn for my rebellious acts, the fruit of my body for the sins of my soul? In other words, shall I burn my babies like the worship mullah? How can I be made right? Who else would ask this question? The prophet Isaiah. The prophet Isaiah would, in fact, grapple with this question. In the 64th chapter of Isaiah, here's verse six and seven. For all of us have come like one who is unclean. All our righteous deeds are like a filthy garment. All of us wither like a lead and our iniquities like the wind. Take us away. There is no one who calls on your name. Who arouses himself to take hold of you? For you have hidden your face from us and have delivered us into the power of our iniquities. How can a person be right before God? It's called the gospel, the good news. It would be Paul that God would single out, that would be the primary instrument for the forming of the words and the proclamation of the gospel. and it would come from him. The gospel is called the good news because it addresses the most serious problems that you and I have as human beings and that problem is simply this. God is holy and he is just and I am not. And at the end of our lives we're going to stand before a most holy God and we are not going to be sufficient because The good news is that though we have no righteousness, we have a Jesus who has given to us our righteousness. So, I encourage you to look at this 1689. It will talk to you about it in regards to how the words and the understanding underneath with the scriptures that deal with this thing of how, justification, how can I be right with God? I love question number one of the Heidelberg Catechism, because it says, what is thy only comfort in life and death? that I with body and soul born in life and death am not my own, but belonging to my faithful Savior Jesus Christ, who with his precious blood is satisfied for all my sins and delivered me from all the power of the devil. And so preserves me that without the will of my heavenly Father, not a hair can fall from my head. Yea, that all things must be subvergent to my salvation. And therefore by his Holy Spirit, he also assures me of eternal life and makes me sincerely willing and ready henceforth to live unto him. We ought to be happy folks. We ought to be rejoicing in the midst of all of our difficulties. We are in Christ. And the gospel message permeates our very souls. So, John MacArthur would talk about a different gospel. I'll share with you that next week. I want to share this as we come to the last slide. It is not difficult to identify distortions of the gospel. But as a pastor, one of my main concerns for genuine Christians is a more subtle one, either assuming the gospel or neglecting the gospel. I have found this to be the greatest threat to the gospel in my own life. Jerry Bridges echoes this concern when he writes, the gospel is not only the most important message in all of history, it is the only essential message in all of history. Yet we allow thousands of professing Christians to live their entire lives without clearly understanding it and enjoying the joy of it. You know, as I'm praying to God, I'm having my conversations with God and I'm saying, clearly, I'm missing the joy. Because I find myself so engrossed with so many things that at the end don't matter. What matters is, He chose me. He chose us. Some of us. I don't think anybody, 20th century, 21st century. God could have placed us in any timeline He wanted. Have you asked yourself the question, why did He place me in the years that I will be alive? What was my purpose? What skills and gifts have been given to me that I can use for proclamation? Charles Spurgeon would say, abide hard by the cross and search the mystery of his wounds. You don't search the mysteries of the room until you have the ability to open up and look on the inside. I love John Scott's invitation, the cross is a blazing fire at which the flame of our love is kindled, but we have to get near enough for its sparks to fall on us. As we go through Galatians, and as we build the fire, and as the sparks come out, may you be touched by them, may you be burned by them, so that they might etch. Might there be a wood-burning instrument that the Holy Spirit can use that will take part of Galatian and the gospel and the living of the gospel and etch that upon your heart. Next week we'll look at chapter number one. There's some things that we'll talk about and then we'll move forward. Those wonderful words in Galatians 1, I encourage you to read them and I hope You'll enjoy Galatians. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for this day, the opportunity you give us. We come quickly into worship, but as we move back and forth, can we not get farther within the pew or somewhere that allows us for a few moments to think that we have now gone? from one place to another in the very presence of you as we worship together. May you be glorified and may we have great joy this day for Christ alone, faith alone, grace alone, giving to us the wonderfulness of a life that is worth living in you. In your name we pray, amen.