The Bible Provocateur
The Bible Provocateur
LIVE DISCUSSION: The MARKS of Grace (Part 1 of 4)
What if the most persuasive credential for gospel truth isn’t a platform but a scar? We close our journey through Galatians with Paul’s stark line: “From now on let no man trouble me, for I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus.” That sentence becomes a doorway into the whole letter’s heartbeat—justification by faith alone—and a mirror for our age of spiritual performance and online skirmishes.
We share why Paul refuses to negotiate with Judaizers while pleading fiercely with believers who are wavering. The contrast matters: he invests where hearts are tender to grace, urging the church to resist “Jesus and” religion that trades freedom for status. Along the way, we revisit Galatians 2:15–16 and pair it with 2 Corinthians 4:7–12 to show how weakness, suffering, and perseverance display Christ’s life in fragile people. The “marks of Jesus” are not metaphors for vibes; they’re the visible receipts of fidelity—stripes, stones, and the quiet ache of watching friends drift from the truth they once embraced.
You’ll hear honest reflection on restraint and rebuke, the challenge of speaking hard truths without crushing bruised reeds, and the practical boundary in Paul’s words: “let no man trouble me.” That line isn’t bitterness; it’s freedom from manipulative voices so he can keep serving the flock. We ask where “Jesus and” pressures show up today—cultural badges, legalistic ladders, or the endless need to prove holiness—and how to answer them by holding fast to Christ’s finished work.
If this conversation steadies your grip on grace, share it with a friend, subscribe for more deep dives through Scripture, and leave a review with one takeaway that challenged you. Your reflections help others find the show and keep this community anchored in the gospel.
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Christians, good evening. How are you all on this Friday night? I hope you're doing well. And I hope and trust that you will have a good weekend and a enjoyable, reflective, introspective Lord's Day when it gets here. Tonight I'm going to complete and conclude the exposition on the book of Galatians with the last two chapters or the last two verses of the last chapter. And I have to say, I felt that it has been a very worthwhile endeavor to go through this book. And I hope that many of you have gotten as much out of it as I have gotten out of it studying it. And I hope that many of you have gotten as much out of it as I have gotten out of it studying it half, as well as mine. So it's important that we understand that being a Bible-believing Christian, it's important that we endeavor to be as precise in our understanding of the Word of God as possible. Now, in the book of Galatians, as I have said in the past, so shall I say again. And that is that the significance of this book has been for Paul to delineate between justification by the works of the law and justification by grace or justification by faith. Justification by the law or justification by faith. This is the situation that is being revealed to us in the book of Galatians. And the Apostle Paul is speaking to people of whom he has had significant interest in because he is the one who brought these folks to faith. He brought them to faith. He fathered them in the faith. Now, we've gone through the first five chapters. We've completed almost all of the last chapter, and now what we have left is chapters six and the last two verses. And here's something that I'm hoping that you will all understand. And what I want you to focus on as we embark upon these last two verses of this book is I want you to understand the heart of this apostle. And I want you to put yourself in the place of this apostle so that you can have some semblance of understanding as to what it was that was going on in his soul for these people that he labored over and that he is responding to in this book. Because even after all that he's done for them, they've given themselves, made themselves victims to the Judaizers. To the Judaizers who want to make a fair show of them. To the Judaizers who want to use them to be the grounds for which they may boast to the Judaizers who are above them. And those who could be responsible for their persecution if they don't bring proselytes under the Jewish Judaizing program. Let me say this. Paul back then, the Apostle Paul back then dealt with a lot. What he had to endure was inestimable. It was immeasurable in every aspect. We can't begin to fathom what this apostle went through. We can't begin to understand. Can't begin. The modern Christian cannot begin to understand what this apostle went through. The modern Christian is soft. Soft. But we think we are something when we are nothing. We think we are something when we are nothing. We believe we are warriors when we are not. And I hope that we would become such as those who had the heart of this apostle in particular. Christianity today is comfortable. Comfortable. Not prepared for battle. Their idea of battle and going to war is behaving like brats on social media. And so, you know, my feelings on these last verses, these last two verses of Galatians, of the book of Galatians, there's so much that I wanted to say. So much that I wanted to say that I will not say. Because I have a wife who has been instrumental in my in my in helping me manage my own temperament. And so some of the things that I really wanted to say tonight, I'm not going to say. Because I think that it would be too harsh for the tender ears that exist in the Christian community today. So soft. So I'm going to relinquish myself from committing to saying what my true heart in this matter really is. For fear that I may wound some of you. And I don't want to do that. I don't want to do that.
SPEAKER_03:Do it anyway.
SPEAKER_04:No, brother, I'm not gonna do it.
SPEAKER_00:I mean, that's what I was thinking too, encouraging, because I got the problem today. It's that fluffy, duffy, rainbow, softy, cuddly. Why not why not keep it real? If they have the Holy Spirit, then they should not be offended. And if it's the truth and they're following the truth, then let them be offended, brother.
SPEAKER_02:Listen to me. I need to be seriously. I need to be offended right now.
SPEAKER_00:We follow the truth. Maybe something you say does affect us. Maybe it makes us look at something a little bit more in-depth, then we might not be looking at it.
SPEAKER_02:That's right. Nope. Nope. Too many people. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Love is truth. Be you, and be who God called you to be, brother. You're here for a reason and a purpose, and God has a plan for what your purpose is here for.
SPEAKER_02:I have behaved like a horse's rear man this week, and I need somebody to lay it on some truth on me, whether I like it or not, whether I need to hear it or not, whether it fits me or not. I need to hear truth. Don't be afraid to speak it. Speak what the Holy Spirit tells you to say. Now I'm done.
SPEAKER_04:So our dream will have and feel still left as well. So let me put it this way. If you got a bunch of noise in the background, please mute your phone. Um so let me deal with what the apostle is talking about. In Galatians chapter two, Paul says in verse fifteen, he says that we who are Jews by nature and not sinners of the Gentiles, knowing, verse sixteen, knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but he is justified by the faith of Jesus Christ. Even we have believed in Jesus Christ that we might be justified by the faith of Christ. Not by works of the law. For by the works of the law, no flesh, no flesh shall be justified. No flesh. This is probably the last time that I will say this in this context of our discussion regarding the exposition of Galatians, but you may hear it again in other areas. But here's a reality, and that is this no man can be justified by any works of any law. Any who are justified are justified by the faith of Jesus Christ and by that faith alone. And so, as I have maintained throughout this exposition, I will I will so say it again, and that is this this is not only the heart. It is not only the heart of the book of Galatians. It is the heart of the gospel. The heart of the gospel. We are justified by faith.
SPEAKER_03:I don't know why.
SPEAKER_04:This is so hard to believe. But I do remember that it was something at one point in my life. I do not understand. I'm sorry, folks. Bear with me. I don't know why I'm being affected this way. In Galatians chapter six, chapter six. In Galatians chapter six, our last two verses. Let me read them. Paul says, From henceforth, from now on, let no man trouble me. Let no man trouble me. For I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus Christ. From now on, let no man trouble me, for I bear in my own body the marks of the Lord Jesus. And he says in verse eighteen, Brethren, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit.
SPEAKER_03:Amen. Notice. I know I'm a blubbering idiot right now, I don't know why.
SPEAKER_04:In verse seventeen, Paul says, from henceforth, from now on, let no man trouble me. And remember, he's talking to the Galatian church. Those folks whom he brought to the faith. The Galatian church. It is they to whom he is making his appeals. Six chapters in his letter that he wrote. Now listen, I want to say something. And I'm going to bring this up over throughout this message tonight. Paul was talking to those of whom he understood to be convinced of the truth, which is that justification was by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and him alone. Notice we know what was going on with the Galatian church. They were being influenced and being spiritually oppressed by the Judaizers. But Paul wasn't arguing and debating and fighting and going to war with the Judaizers. No. He was going and going in and dealing with his brethren. Believers. He wasn't wasting his time with those who did not believe the truth. He wasn't trying to convince people who believed in modalism or who believed in Sabellianism or who believed in SDAs or who believed in Mormonism. He wasn't dealing with them. He was dealing with the believers who were in being influenced by these false believers. Someone some of you, all of you may know, on this platform. And I I believe that part of what is making me feel the way I do tonight is some of the things that I had to tell and say to this person. I don't regret one word of what I said. Although I may regret and begrudge my own self for perhaps the way in which I may have conveyed it. And I say this because my wife made me to see that perhaps that was the case. That's why God gives us men a good wife. But what I what I did say, I stand on one hundred percent. I will not apologize for what I said. But if I crush any one of my brethren, nothing would dishearten me more. If you know me, you would understand that. And I'm saying this by way of transparency. Because I believe that to some degree, to some small degree, I understand what this apostle is going through to a small degree. I am certainly the least of the least of those who got to stand in the presence of our Lord. But I get a glimmer, a small fragment, a sliver, a splinter, of what it must have felt like to see people that you have been significant, a significant part of how they came to faith, how they came to understand the truth, and to see them fall prey, and to become a victim to those who would subvert everything that was planted in them that they embraced wholly and believed, and to see them become distracted. And so I have to say, I understand to some degree what Paul is expressing here. And he says in verse 17 of Galatians 6, Galatians 6, verse 17 and 18 is where we're dealing tonight. And this apostle, Paul, he says, from henceforth in verse 17, let no man trouble me. And what he is saying is that now he is, or what he's doing is he is asserting his own right to be free from the harassment, from the haranguing, and from the belittling and the condescension of false teachers. This is what he's talking about. I'm done, Paul says, I'm done with letting false teachers get under my skin. Done with that. Done with that. I'm done with letting the Judaizers impact me in a way that is spiritually not feasible for my own spiritual health. But what I do have is a craving for you to hold fast to what you have believed and understood to be significant for your salvation and for your growth and for your understanding in Jesus Christ. I've tried to convey to you these things. I've pleaded with you these truths. I taught you these truths and you believed them to the point where you said you would be giving me, you would give me your very eyes, so that I might be alleviated of this infirmity that I have physically in my own eyes. And now here I am not being able to receive those eyes, but having to write a letter with my own hand with these infirmed eyes, so that you will be assured that what I'm writing to you and conveying to you, you will know that it came from me and me directly. It wasn't a scribe who wrote down and dictated what I'm saying. I wrote this letter to you, Galatians, with my own hand. I wrote it with my own hand. Because I want you to know that I take this personally. This is personal to me. So much so that I'm gonna write to you with my own hand. You see, the apostle says, you see with how large a letter that I have written to you. And the whole purpose of which is for you to know that I wrote it. That I wrote it. Not dictation, no scribe, no secretary, no, no nobody. I wrote this letter of my own. That's how important you are to me. That's how important this subject matter is to me. It is important that you understand what I'm going through and how I want to convince you. I'm not just some elite administrator. I'm bringing myself down from the status that perhaps you see me as being, so that I can convince you, hopefully, by this personal touch, that you are going down a wrong path. You're going down a wrong path. And if you continue down this path, you should know that you are frustrating the grace of Christ and also those who are causing you to frustrate the grace of Christ, let them be accursed. If I'm not telling the truth, write back to me. Tell me. Because I'm telling you all, brethren, the truth. Listen. From henceforth, Paul says, Let no man trouble me. Let no man trouble me. And notice what he says. He says, I bear, verse 17, chapter six, Galatians, Galatians six, seventeen. Let no man trouble me. For or because I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus. I bear in my body. I bear in my physical body the works of the Lord Jesus. Now, I bear in my body the marks. All right, I'm gonna back up. I'm gonna get off my little high horse for a minute as I slowly regain my own composure, and I want to appeal to the brethren on the panel, and I want to ask the question. I want to ask the question. What does Paul mean? What does he mean when he says, I bear in the marks, I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus? Brother Jeff, man of God, what does he mean? I bear in my body the marks of the Lord. What marks is he talking?
SPEAKER_07:He's talking about all those scars for the beatings and uh the whippings and the uh let's see, well that's the main thing that would cause marks whipping and beating. I'm I'm sure if you got uh the 40 stripes times five minus one, uh I think just with one time with that you'd have some pretty good scars, but he's probably pretty scarred up. And he was stoned, and those are the marks. I mean, those are those are evidence of the cross that he's been bearing for Christ.
SPEAKER_04:Amen, brother. Absolutely. Anybody want to add to that? Because he's right in everything you said, but does anyone want to add to it?
SPEAKER_02:Well, I think anybody also talking about the emotional scars on his heart that the Galatian church is just the fact that they have fractured and well, they've broken his heart because of all that he's put into them, and now they've so quickly drifted off course by allowing the Judaizers in to add something to the message of grace that he taught them so well.
SPEAKER_04:Amen, brother. Amen. Anyone else? Sister Lisa, go ahead.
SPEAKER_05:Well, I was just um a brother in Christ in the comments just said the mark, he bears the mark of Christ, meaning he belongs to Christ. He was sealed. That's the way I take it. Um, but I thought that was yes, yes, he belongs to the Lord. He never backed down and he took those beatings in the name of the Lord. He could have at any time just recanted or it's closed his mouth, and he never did.
SPEAKER_04:Amen, sister. Dead on. Brother Brian, go ahead. Brother Brian, you there? All right, uh, how about Sister Mariah? Go ahead.
SPEAKER_06:Yeah, um I had that word, and um Sister Lisa is right, and the brother in the comment was right that says that slaves and soldiers bore the name or the stamp of their master um as ownership. So in in that way, that makes sense to me because yes, we are uh servants of Christ, we are in a war as well, and you know, on on the same war, we are fellow workers or uh with Christ doing what it is that he wanted for his people to come back to his kingdom.
SPEAKER_01:Amen.
SPEAKER_04:Amen. Brother Brian, go ahead.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, as you was as he was talking, I I just it just called me back to remember uh 2 Corinthians 4.8. Anybody that's near there, when you was talking, this is this is what I heard, you know, in the spirit said it says, we are troubled on every side, yet not distressed. We are perplexed but not in despair, persecuted but not forsaken, cast down, but not destroyed, always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus Christ, that the life also of Jesus might be manifest in our body. It almost it's almost similar to what you were saying. Amen.
SPEAKER_04:Amen, brother. Appreciate that. That's that's that's that's a that's that's definitely uh apropos to what we're talking about for sure. And um that's that's a good pattern. Let me go ahead, brother. If you don't mind, read that again, please.
SPEAKER_01:Okay, it's it's starting at 2 Corinthians chapter 4. I want to start back up the verse before that, verse 7, because verse 7 is good too. It says, but we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the forgive me, I I got I got this is the King James. Some of some of these words I struggle with sometimes. It's but the excellent excellency of the power may be of God and not of us. We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed. We are perplexed but not in despair. Verse 9, persecuted but not forsaken, cast down but not destroyed, always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus Christ, that the life also of Jesus might be manifest in our body. In our body, in our body. You want me to keep going? Keep going, good, keep going. For we which live and are always delivered unto death for Jesus' sake, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh. So then death worketh in us, but life in you.
SPEAKER_03:Amen, brother. Amen.
SPEAKER_04:Man, let me tell you something. That right there, what our brother just read, is exactly what Paul's talking about. He's bearing the marks of our Lord. His his service to the Lord is being shown in the body or the marks that are on his body. He has scars. He had many scars, excuse me, many scars, physical scars. There were the result of scourging, the result of stoning, and the result of persecution. You need to understand when you when you truly understand who the apostle Paul was and how he started, and to see how this is how his life was ending, it is truly an amazing spectacle for us to view. I don't really know how many of us really understand that the man who believed and who was considered to be among the elite who persecuted God's people and was praised for it and was elevated for it, now is defending the very same gospel that he condemned and condemned the people who believe it. And now he is bearing scourging, stoning, and persecution for defending himself against what he himself used to be. Brother Jeff, man of God, go ahead.
SPEAKER_07:He said he was going to show him basically how to suffer for his sake. He warned him that this was going to happen. And uh so I'm sure he remembered that and was not surprised that the that suffering was awaiting from him. For himself, you know, he might have been thinking, too, that remember what he did before he encountered the Lord. He might have considered this, you know, uh not pay not, you know, just just desserts or anything like that, but it certainly, you know, uh, I think gave him strength to know, look, uh, other people have suffered, I'm suffering, but Christ has preached. And uh, you know, you can't, you can't, you can't emphasize this enough. I mean, the the Judaizers were trying to present Jesus and well, there's everybody they're still doing that today. Right. I mean, I even encountered a period of that back in the 90s when I went to a Bill Gothard seminar, and I don't know if you remember who he was.
SPEAKER_04:I know what Bill Gaither is, the Gaither Fantasy, the Gaither tree.
SPEAKER_07:Not Gaither, Gothard. Oh, no, okay. So Bill Gothard was a preacher, and he believed that you shouldn't go to movies, you shouldn't listen to rock music, you shouldn't do this, you shouldn't do that, because you needed to be holy. And I kind of got sucked into that, and I looked at that and I said, Are you kidding me? I'm saved. It doesn't matter whether I listen to, you know, if I want to listen to Led Zeppelin or not. You know, I try to stay away from bad things, but you know. Right. But uh it's it's still happening today. It's not always, you know, hey, it's Jesus and. Right. Jesus and no, it's not. It's Jesus only. Brother, amen.
SPEAKER_04:Amen. You know, Paul says that he bears these marks in his body, and they he says that there are marks of the Lord Jesus Christ. But what we need to understand is that they show these marks that he's talking about, they are his credentials. They are his credentials. They magnify and they show and establish his apostleship. They establish his faithfulness to Christ. Who goes through scourging and stoning and persecution unless you really believe?