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Clarifying the Revelation of the Gospel, Galatians 1:1 - 24

 Monday, August 11 –

A good Monday morning to you.  We are returning to our readings thru the New Testament in a Year, and this morning we begin a new letter – Paul’s letter to the Galatians.  If you want to do a little test to see the progress you’ve made, pick up your Bible and hold your finger at Galatians 1. Then go back to Matthew 1.  Look at the amount of progress you’ve made in reading. 
This morning we’ll read Galatians 1:1 – 24.  I invite you to come back, and we’ll take a second look with some background information also for more bits of help. Thank You.

 

Galatia is an area in the central part of today’s Turkey.  Then it was Galatia in the Asia portion of the Roman Empire.  You’ll probably remember that this area was on the first missionary journey Paul and Barnabas went to in Acts 13 – 14; and, Paul took Silas along with him on his second missionary journey beginning in Galatia before the Spirit of God led him to Macedonia (15:16 – 16:10).  It was on his first journey that Paul preached the gospel with grave consequences as he was driven from various cities in Galatia.  At one point, Paul was beaten and stoned – to the point that some thought he died (Acts 14:19). 

It was after Paul left Asia and, because of the vision, sailed to Macedonia, where eventually he went south to Athens and Corinth (for the first time), that he received word of some Jewish agitators who had followed him into Galatia and began to preach a false gospel in the various cities where Paul had established churches.  They attacked Paul (Gal. 4:17) and preached a gospel that proclaimed for a Gentile to become a Christian, they first had to become Jews – i.e., be circumcised.  Evidentially, at some point, Paul heard about the trouble they were creating.  Paul sat down, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, and penned this letter to the Galatian churches, which, almost universally is agreed upon, is considered to be the first letter written of the New Testament, (the exception might be that the Gospel of Mark preceded it).

The letter to the Galatians is not addressed to one church, but to multiple churches – “Paul, an apostle—not from men nor through man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised him from the dead—  and all the brothers who are with me, To the churches of Galatia” (1:1-2).
His opening is typical as he names himself as the sender, and the Galatian churches as his recipients.  He reminds them that his authority to write to them is his commission as an Apostle - which came from Jesus Christ and God the Father.  Apostles were unique in the church.  They were few because of the qualifications:  they had to have been eyewitnesses of the resurrected Christ (look at 1 Corinthians 1:9), and as well, they had unique power in signs, wonders, and miracles (2 Cor. 12:12).  Finally, and most importantly, they had to be hand-selected by the Lord Jesus (Acts 1:21-26).

Paul wastes no time in getting at the fundamental issue concerning the Gospel –
“Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ,  who gave himself for our sins to deliver us from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father,  to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen.”
This is the Gospel – Jesus Christ gave himself for our sins to deliver us from our Sin (the present evil age).  There it is in a nutshell – Jesus died as a perfect sacrifice and paid the debt of our sin, and His resurrection proved it was complete.  That’s why Paul proclaims a doxology of glory to God.  Jesus’ work on the cross is a “finished” work. “It is finished” was more than a statement of Jesus on the cross as He was dying.  It was also a declaration of God’s satisfaction in all that Christ Jesus did.  With this simplicity, it’s hard to think anyone would not want to receive Christ.

The Gospel is so pure that Paul wastes no time in admonishing them for thinking it needed something more –
“I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel – not that there is another one, but there are some who trouble you and want to distort the gospel of Christ.  But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed.  As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed” (1:3-9). 
The word is stark – “deserting” – which means they turned away from the Gospel to one that was no gospel at all.  “Different” – as you may remember – from the Greek word “heteros” was not something that was the same, but something completely different than the real message.  Paul does not appease the false gospel, but curses it, pronouncing an invective that makes “anyone” (1:9) who claims it is the gospel be eternally damned! 

What is at stake is people’s souls, not just their religious preferences.  Paul is not arguing about organs versus guitars, or pews versus chairs, or hymnals versus songs projected on a screen.  He knows that if this false gospel takes root, it will destroy the church and the salvation that comes from believing in Christ alone for salvation.  To this end, Paul takes his stand on the absoluteness of the Gospel message, even if it cost him friendships and popularity –
“For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ.  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” (1:10-12).  
The Gospel is not an invention of human reasoning, and it was not received by a man telling him about it, as well, it was not taught to him by another human – three “nots” that together define the authenticity of the Gospel as a revelation from Jesus Christ. 

We get a glimpse into how Paul originally received the Gospel in three specific ways.  First, in 1:13-14, Paul tells of his life before Christ; then, in 1:15-16, he recalls his conversion to Christ; and lastly, in 1:17-24, he describes the years that followed his conversion until he was called to preach.  Paul was a zealous Pharisee, yet it all ended in the words, “but when he (God),” i.e., Paul’s conversion.  He was not searching, nor did he expect it would happen.  His conversion was a sovereign work of God’s grace entirely apart from Paul’s works.  God had called him before he was born and set him apart by grace for the work he was to do.  Paul had been resisting God, but God was not deterred by his misguided zeal – “God was pleased to reveal his Son to me” (1:16).  Paul was a new creation in Christ Jesus (2 Cor. 5:17), and so there was no need to consult with others on what happened to him.  Instead, after a time in Damascus with other believers, he left for Arabia – the desert.

Luke wrote in Acts 9 that Paul was in Damascus for a few days after his conversion (Acts 9:19), but then he says,  
“... I went away into Arabia and returned again to Damascus.
Then after three years, I went up to Jerusalem to visit Cephas and remained with him fifteen days” (1:17-18). 
Arabia was a wilderness area east of Damascus.  The three years he spent in Arabia were set apart for Paul by the Lord so that he might fully understand the Gospel.  He received it by revelation from Jesus himself.  The early church historian, Eusebius, described this time in the wilderness –
“In this period of withdrawal, as he meditated on the Old Testament Scriptures, on the facts of the life and death of Jesus that he already knew and on his experience of conversion, the gospel of the grace of God was revealed to him in its fullness. It has even been suggested that those three years in Arabia were a deliberate compensation for the three years of instruction which Jesus gave the other apostles, but which Paul missed. Now he had Jesus to himself, as it were, for three years of solitude in the wilderness”.[1]

When Paul finally did go to Jerusalem, it was to visit with the Apostles – Cephas is Peter.  He also visited with James, Jesus’ brother, who had been converted and was at that time leading the church in Jerusalem.  Luke reminds us in Acts that Paul began to preach the Gospel in Jerusalem but created so much of disturbance that the Apostles sent him back to his home territory (1:21-22) – Syria and Cilicia.  After a total of three years gone from Jerusalem, he returned for a total of fifteen days (Acts 9:30).  That is why Paul said, “I was still not known by sight to the churches of Christ in Judea” (1:22).  The evidence is clear.  Paul was not a Gospel lover, but a Gospel hater, until he was converted on the road to Damascus.  A few days later, Ananias visited him and told him that God was healing him.  Paul stayed a few days in Damascus, then left for the wilderness.  He was isolated from all believers for three years while he received the Gospel as a revelation from Christ.  He states it as an oath – “In what I am writing to you, before God, I do not lie!” (1:20).

There’s been some critical scholarship that denies Paul’s version of how the Gospel came to him.  Some say Paul made up the Gospel message because he was tired of being a Pharisee.  Paul said he was zealous to be a Pharisee.  Others say Paul was sharing his learned opinion of what the Gospel meant – a hybrid version of Judaism.  Paul said it was a revelation from Jesus Christ.  Others say Paul was won over by the faith of the early church and wanted to be a part of them.  Paul said he went to Damascus to arrest those who belonged to the Way.  The great New Testament scholar John R. Stott makes a true statement that should stop and make us think – “This, then, is our dilemma. Are we to accept Paul’s account of the origin of his message, supported as it is by solid historical evidence? Or shall we prefer our own theory, although supported by no historical evidence? If Paul was right in asserting that his gospel was not man’s but God’s (cf. Rom. 1:1), then to reject Paul is to reject God”.[2]Peace



[1] Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History, 2.23

[2] John R Stott, The Bible Speaks Today, The Message of Galatians, page 37.

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