Just to go a little deeper into the conflict arising in the Book of Galatians, we need to remember when Paul started writing to the church at Galatia, how the church in Jerusalem was central to all of the Old Testament. As the beginning church took root, the central authority of the apostles was once again in Jerusalem. One of the questions facing the beginning church was’ would Jerusalem be the ‘mother’ church, and would Israel continue to have the privileged existence it had enjoyed for thousands of years?’

    Would the Gospel of Christ eliminate its heritage or stay true to the covenant established with Abraham? If we closely examine the Gospel we can start to see three principles taking shape.

    Salvation comes from Christ alone, we are accepted by God solely by faith, and the gospel is for anyone who believed.

     The problem with that in Paul’s day was three fold. First, all their history, became only history. Secondly, the Jewish faith had been filled with sacrifices and circumcision, which were no longer needed. Thirdly, to be accepted by God in the Old Testament you were required to become a Jew. Now anyone could be accepted by God. (through Jesus) Being Jewish no longer was necessary.

     If we boil this down to the core issue it becomes are we saved through faith alone or are we saved through faith plus works. (In Paul’s day becoming Jewish, primarily circumcision.)

     We just like Paul, and countless other have to make a decision. Are we saved by faith alone, or faith plus some type of works?

     Martin Luther sat in his monk’s cell and discovered God’s grace had become so clouded by the darkness of medieval teachings of the church. Imagine going to church, week after week, day after day, and listening to the priest, stand and deliver the message in Latin. A language very few common people, if any, understood. Now, imagine being the priest who many times memorized the words in Latin but had real understanding either of the words coming out of his mouth. Martin Luther sat in his cell and realized the travesty he was a part of. When he announced his discoveries he was called before the leaders to see if he would recant or be label a heretic, here is his answer:

Your imperial Majesty and Your Lordship demand a simple answer. Here it is, plain and unvarnished.

Unless I am convicted of error by the testimony of Scripture, (since I put no trust in the supported authority of pope or councils, since it is plain that they have often contradicted themselves) I stand convicted by Scripture and my conscience is taken captive by God’s Word.

I cannot and will not recant anything! For to act against our conscience is neither safe not open to us. On this I take my stand. I can do no other – God help me. (Excerpt taken from ‘The Documents of the Christian Church’)

Martin Luther took his stand on the Gospel message. As we must.

     In Galatians 1:13-15 Paul begins to tell his story, how he came to Christ. Who was he before? If you read those verses you see some powerful words to describe his relationship with people who followed Christ:

Persecuted, violently, destroy it, extremely zealous.

     Paul not only hated Christians he took an active role in destroying their lives on several levels. We can never forget that the power of Gospel changes lives. The power of our own story grabs people’s attention and hearts, giving us the opportunity to share the Gospel in a way that isn’t offensive.

     Our testimonies or stories are huge! Rev. 12:11 tells us we have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and the word of their testimony for they loved not their own lives even unto death. Look at what that verse is telling us, we overcome Satan by the blood of Jesus, salvation and the word of our testimony. The question I immediately asked myself is do I know my own testimony is such a way I could share it in about 6-8 sentences?

               I was a very trouble young woman. I choose behavior after behavior that brought nothing but more pain to my life. When I was 20 I had Meghan, I sat in a hospital bed and cried because I wanted her life to turn out different than mine. But I had no idea how. I was invited to a revival at a church-the preacher listed off sins-which I could check off. He said sinners went to hell, I had no trouble believing that. Then he shared how Jesus came so that we could be washed clean-a new creation in Christ. “New” is what caught my heart, I went forward and gave Jesus my life. They suggested I read the book of John. I fell in love with His word and I have devoted my life to helping others do the same.

     The power of our testimonies is they are ours. What is your testimony? Think it through, write it, remind yourself of what Christ did for YOU.

Our belief in Jesus saves us. Our testimonies, give us courage to stand. I’d love to read yours!

As I looked up at my friend, I realized she was on the verge of tears. Within seconds the first tear rolled down her cheek. Stress was overwhelming her.

A message came in and within a few lines my heart was heavy at all the stress she is under. She is wondering how a woman who feels she has so much faith in the Lord and constantly seeking His perfect will struggles so when she goes for an interview. Where is the job He has for her?

A lady in our food pantry said she had never been to a food pantry until last year. She can’t imagine this is going to be her life from here on out.

A status went out ‘the hits just keep on coming’ from a friend.

My own house we has seen the same struggles, maybe your house too?

All of these friends have been on my mind constantly. I’ve been asking God to speak to us and encourage us.

I picked Lauren up Friday, and as I was sitting in the dreaded pick-up line, I was frustrated because I didn’t know what to say to my friends, or my own heart.

I called Laura to see if the she was available to record a teaching session on the 28^th in the morning. She was. All I have ever known to do with those kinds of feelings are to turn to God’s Word for an answer. I tried to tell her what I was thinking so she could do a graphic, and I was struggling to put into words what I was feeling. Bless her heart, she said she would work on it, even though I know I didn’t make a whole lot of sense.

I checked my mail late yesterday and I must get more religious junk mail than anyone on the earth. (Can you call religious mail junk mail??)

Anyway, as I sorted though it I noticed a verse on one piece:

The joy of the LORD is your strength. Nehemiah 8:10 (partial NIV verse)

It was like a light bulb went off in my head, we are losing our joy. In some cases it could be our environment, cold and dreary days. It could be our focus has become warped.

But if I had to hazard a guess I would say our joy is being stolen!

So if you feeling like your joy is gone for whatever reason, then I hope you will either join us in person on January 28^th at 10 a.m. (it’s a Saturday.) or if you’re too far away we’ll have it online. But this is going to be a little different than what we have done in the past. More of a workshop, so if you can make in person, we would love for you too.

In closing I guess since God spoke through the religious junk mail I should call it inspiring junk mail?

Galatians is considered to be the “Magna Carta” of Christian liberty. It’s a book that deals with the freedom we have in Christ.

In the early 1500’s a man named Martin Luther discovered it, in the midst of moving up the career ladder in the medieval church. His eyes were opened to some of the man made traditions which had taken hold and knocked the Bible out of its rightful place.

The priest in those days either learned Latin, or memorized what to say in Latin. The common person had no idea of what was being said as they sat before the priest. Can you imagine being either? The priest or the person, who didn’t even understand what was being said, unbelievable to us, but true. The Bible was not what they were quoting either, only man, week after week, day after day.

As Martin Luther continued to study Galatians in particular, the book took hold of not only his mind but his heart! He referred to it as “my epistle” and in later years “my Kate”, after his wife. Because of what he learned, he desperately wanted people to understand that salvation was in Christ alone, nothing else.

Because of his actions he was labeled a heretic; the church’s greatest desire was for him to be killed. Martin Luther’s greatest desire was for men and women to be able to read the Bible in their own homes. With their own eyes, in their own hands, in language they understood!

He translated it into the common language of his country in Germany. Countless people died. In 1611 the King James Bible was released into the English language. From Latin to the language of regular people, a miracle brought about when Martin Luther read Galatians and let it take a hold of his heart. I pray we do the same!

(If you are interested in his life there is a great movie about his life, here is a link to the review of it. I highly recommend you watch it, especially if you have pre-teens and teens!)

As we considered the first 10 verses of Galatians, we stopped to consider what this particular verse means to us today.

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. Galatians 1:3-5 ESV

How should we live in light of being “delivered” or rescued, from the present evil age? Do you feel delivered from the evil that we see in the world? Why or why not?

Tough questions that we will continue to examine as we move through Galatians. But one thing is critical for us to realize, Paul is not only talking about being delivered from “death” but also we have been delivered by God’s power to live an energized, obedient life as a disciple of Christ, in the midst of the evil about us. The power of God has been given to us through the Holy Spirit.

In verses 6-7, we see some of the strongest language in the entire Bible!

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. Galatians 1:6-7

Paul is shocked that they are deserting the gospel of Christ. When we distort the Gospel, we change it to something that is not even the gospel. Once it’s been distorted, and is no longer the Gospel, then what we are offering people has no power to save. Sobering.

Imagine Martin Luther as he let that wash across his heart, the medieval church had so distorted the Gospel it no longer had the power to save.

Paul goes on to say even if he or an angel distorts the Gospel they shouldn’t believe it, and the one doing the distortion should be “accursed”, eternally separated from God. Paul adds that in truth if “anyone” distorts the Gospel they should be eternally condemned.

When I saw that, I immediately thought I need to have a very firm understanding of what the Gospel is. In class we took a few minutes to list what everyone considered the Gospel to be. I would encourage you to think through how you would define the “Gospel”. Narrow it down, keeping in mind the seriousness that Paul is speaking of.

One thing we are going to try to do as we study Galatians is depend on Scripture to interpret as much as we can. And we can find in Corinthians what Paul says he shared with them first, leading us to see this as the Gospel message he speaks of in Galatians.

For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. 1 Corinthians 15:3-6 ESV.

As the weeks go on we will see how the Gospel was being distorted and examine our own culture for ways it’s currently being distorted. I’m praying that when we have finished Galatians we call it “my Galatians!”

If you are coming to class(Sunday mornings between services in the fellowship hall) try to read Galatians 1:1-24, at least twice and make a note of any questions you have. If you are following along via the internet, do the same thing but shoot me an email with your question and we’ll try to answer it in next week’s post.

Today though, I would love to hear your thoughts on ways that we have been delivered, rescued from this present evil age. How is that playing out in your own life?

The next morning I was writing in my journal and one of the things I was trying to figure out was how I could find some time where I could study without being interrupted when all of a sudden our utility room flashed across my mind. I walked into utility room and saw all the junk, and realized we never use it. Ever. Like maybe twice in the last year I have been in it because it was full of junk. Junk we don't use.

Here's a little corner of what it looked like.

I moved all the junk to the garage, Chad loved that. And started painting the walls...that trip cost me about $40 in paint.

Then Chad took me to a place in Calhoun that sales carpet squares when I saw this....

LOVED IT!!!! (cost $32)

Finished painting and Chad put the squares down in less than 3 hours!

I've started moving all my piles of stuff in and I love my room!

Now I have a place I can spread all my books out, index cards with Bible verses, and tons of little scraps of paper with thoughts on them...and leave them until I am finished! Of course, it may mean I will have more time to blog which may be good or bad depending on your perspective!

I'm dying to know what you think!