Billy Ritchie (00:00:07) - Brilliant. As we walk through the book of Acts, reading the story of the early church, we discover step by step the spread of the gospel. We see the establishment of Jesus communities in towns and villages across the known world. And, at the same time, in tandem, Dr. Luke, who wrote the Book of Acts, gives us a window into this sort of resistance and the persecution, those early sort of pioneers, those believers faced as this dual thing. We see the incredible advance of the gospel, but at the same time, we discover that the gospel was met with opposition very like today. Yes? No real, no real difference. But rather than stopping the advancement of the gospel, persecution, as we read time and time again in God's word, opposition and persecution didn't stop the gospel, it actually turbocharged it. We've seen it like just move like wildfire fire and even our world today, when we hear about places like maybe China or that have experienced, believers experienced great, great opposition, it seems like the church of Jesus Christ just goes on to, you're looking at me weird again.
Billy Ritchie (00:01:42) - Yeah. You've heard stories like that. Yes. Yes. And, it happened time and time again as Dr. Luke steps us through the book of Acts, and probably no more so than when Stephen was martyred, the fast martyr in the Christian Church, the believers were scattered. but as they scattered, they took the gospel with them. It was like, Hey, the devil wants to break all this thing up. We're gonna kill Steven. If we kill Steven, we're gonna stop this thing from moving.
Billy Ritchie (00:02:18) - Kill Steven. What happens? Bang, the church scatters because they are running for their life. But as they run for their life, they'll bring the life of Jesus with them didn't just go into hiding and disappear. They went into everyday life, into other lands, into other countries, into other towns, into other villages with the Gospel. That's, that's what they did. Then as we discover, this is what the early believers did continually, and some of them went to a place called Antioch. It's about 300 miles north of Jerusalem. It's like going from Milton Keynes to Edinburgh, to Scotland to the Promised Land, sorry, no, it's, it's on the Syrian border, not far from Aleppo, where all this stuff's going on at the minute. Yes. An incredible church was grown there. You know, it's without even the leaders in Jerusalem deciding they wanted to do it.
Billy Ritchie (00:03:26) - They had no great plan for church planting. They didn't have a special organisation that took over the church planting of the church. They never planned it. They never sent anybody there, there wasn't a team They put together, let's go to Northampton and start the church. The believers just went there, spread the gospel. People joined the kingdom of Jesus, and communities were formed. You know what I mean? To the annoyance of all the apostles in Jerusalem. God was working without them. Isn't it funny how God can work without us? He just works and things happen because the spirit of God is in his people. So what do they do? When church leaders see something that they don't like or not sure about, or they're suspicious about? They send somebody to investigate. So they send Barnabas off to Antioch to find out what the heck is going on in this place because it wasn't something that they had done.
Billy Ritchie (00:04:26) - But when he got there, Barnabas finds an incredible church full of people that were fully devoted followers of Jesus, living for God, living in the power of the Holy Spirit. And he stayed there for a year. I love this slow pace of everything in the Bible, you know what I mean? We rush around so quick, don't we, we can't wait to get to the next thing. It's always like, move, move, move. And it's like Barnabas goes to do an investigation and he decides to stay for a year. It's great, isn't it? And also he finds that place and he sees its sort of a safe place. So he gets Saul, who was like the big persecutor. You remember he was nearby when Stephen was getting stoned. He gets saved, but everybody's suspicious because he's still like, and so the church of Jerusalem wasn't sure about him, but Barnabas finds a safe place far from Jerusalem that he finds his great church.
Billy Ritchie (00:05:27) - This church has been formed just by people moving there. And he brings Saul there and they spend time together, a safe place where, that they could be. And here, the interesting thing as well is that, here is the first place that the word Christian was used. And I love it because it's not something that they called themselves. They didn't say, I'm a Christian. Everybody outside of the kingdom looked at them and said, they're Christlike. And, I get sort of a bit fed up now that the word Christian, we tend to sort of, people don't tend to use it as much nowadays because it's been tainted with lots of things. So they call themselves a Jesus follower. And I get that. But ultimately we need to be Christlike. And when we call ourselves Christians, we are saying that we want to be Christlike.
Billy Ritchie (00:06:30) - And so when we reach Acts 13, Luke, Dr. Luke gives us a ringside seat at one of the most defining prayer meetings in the whole of the New Testament. It's probably about 11 years since Jesus was crucified and rose again. And, they're there north of Jerusalem and Barnabas, Simeon, Lucius, I can't say that name, Lucius, whatever that other name is. And so they were all praying together. They were praying together. They called them prophets and teachers. I like that. I liked that they were called prophets and teachers, not leaders. They were prophets and teachers. That's what they did. That was the main thing about them. And, what were they doing? What were the prophets and the teachers doing? They were worshipping and fasting. And when they worship and fast fasted, what happened? They heard the voice of the Holy Spirit speaking to them. You know, we can get so busy sometimes in our lives working for Jesus, doing things for Jesus, thinking of the next plan. That's me. I'm always like, what's the next thing? What can we do next? Always thinking about strategy. And maybe God just wants to say into our lives, don't think about the next thing.
Billy Ritchie (00:07:59) - Just pause, take a year out like Barnabas, don't be in a rush. We've got eternity, by the way. You know what I mean? There's no need for rushing. God's in control. Pause, take a breath. Worship, pray and fast. Not a popular message nowadays. So that, what did they do? And maybe when we just pause, take a moment, worship and fast, maybe we can hear the voice of the Holy Spirit. That's what we are talking about today. In some ways, Pentecost Sunday, when the Holy Spirit was poured out in the church in a way that it had never been been before, and the Holy Spirit speaks to us, you know what I mean? It's so much better to hear the voice of the Holy Spirit than the voice of a pastor.
Billy Ritchie (00:08:58) - And here, out of this prayer meeting, missions was born because the Holy Spirit said, set aside these guys, Barnabas and Saul, and I want them to take the message of the gospel out into the world. And, they set off on what's now called Paul's first missionary journey. Suggests maybe he had at least three recorded in the New Testament, but I suspect he had a few more other than that as well. , and they went to Cyprus, I'd of stayed there cuz it's quite nice there. And then they arrived in a, in a region called Galatia. We're getting towards, I'm finally getting towards Galatians, okay? You with me? Modern day Turkey. And they visited another place called Antioch, Iconium Lira and Derbe. That's not the one just up the road north where Derby County play, but a different one. And we meet the Galatian people, the people that were from Galatia for the first time.
Billy Ritchie (00:09:59) - It was a region. It wasn't a particular church that he wrote to. It was a number of churches he was writing to. And you know, Galatia was a one of them. Those crazy rollercoaster rides for Paul and Barnabas. I mean, like, anything that could have happened happened on the first journey. It was like, it was like God was saying, you're on your first missionary journey. You're gonna get everything you can experience all at once in this whole place. And, and, and so the first thing that happened was one of the team backed out, John Mark says, right? It just mentions it as moving through. One of the teams saw, you know, like we, we set out as a team and like on day one, wait a minute, I'm not sure I'm up for this, I'm off. So they, they get deserted by one of the team members on day one.
Billy Ritchie (00:10:46) - Acts 13:42. It says, as they went out, people into Galatia and into the towns, people begged that these things might be told to them next Sabbath. The people begged them to teach them the word of God. Verse 44, the next Sabbath, almost the whole city. This is going great. Yes, the whole city gathered to hear the word of the Lord. Verse 48. And when the Gentiles heard this, they began rejoicing and glorifying the word of the Lord. As many who were appointed to eternal life believed all going great. Yes, taught in the, in the synagogue. One week next week, the whole city turns up. This is revival. This is even better than, what was that place called? Avery? Asbury, whatever it was in the States, the whole city turns up. , and then 49, verse 49. The word of the Lord was spreading throughout the whole region.
Billy Ritchie (00:11:51) - So the Jews, then the whole city and then the whole regional district. But who knows when God moves, the devil wants to do something. So it says in verse 40, but the Jews, they starred up persecution against Paul and Barnabas and drove them out of their district. We then find that in the next city they were stoned. That doesn't mean they were high on drugs. They were literally stoned with big rocks. And, in Lystra the next city, next town, the Holy spirit healed a man. And they went from being stoned to being treated like Gods because the people thought it was them that was doing the healing. So, and then they go from being treated like gods to being stoned again.
Billy Ritchie (00:12:47) - You know what I mean? Paul's left either dead or next to dead. And then we read in, chapter 14 verse 20, but when the disciples gathered around him about him, he rose up. So I'm not even sure if he, if he rose from the dead or, but at least there was some sort of healing going on. He rose up and entered the city, and on the next day he went with Barnabas to Derbe. When they had preached the gospel to that city and had made many disciples, many disciples, they returned to Lystra and to Iconium and to Antioch. So they circled back around. And what did they do when they circled back around? They strengthened the souls of the disciples, encouraging them to continue in the faith and saying, now listen that through many tribulations, we must enter the kingdom of God. They encourage them because, through many tribulations, they must enter the kingdom of God.
Billy Ritchie (00:13:54) - Honestly, I think sometimes in the modern church, we've sold a version of Christianity that is just too comfortable and too easy. Come to Jesus and he will solve every problem that you've ever had. The truth is come to Jesus and all hell wants to come against you. That's the truth. So you inherit a whole load of other problems and other things, and we need encouraging. Yes. And Paul encouraged the believers and we must encourage each other even in the things that we face. Verse 23 and when they had appointed elders for them in every church with what, prayer and fasting, we find that, again, prayer and fasting. They committed them to the Lord in whom they had believed. In verse 26, they get home, they get home to Antioch, and they, they were where, sorry? Where they had been commended to the grace of God for the work that they had fulfilled. And when they arrived and gathered the church together, they deceared all that God had done with them, all that God had done with them. You know what it's like?
Billy Ritchie (00:15:17) - There was no TikTok or Facebook, you, you know what I mean? In, in the day they couldn't, like in, when they arrive in Antioch Psidia, they can't get the, you know, I mean, by the way, guys, look, we've got revival today. The whole city's turned up, you know, I mean, probably today if we were able to, to do that, we would show the whole city turning up, but we wouldn't put on the highlight reels getting stoned. Do you know what I mean? We're, we're obsessed with showing everything that's successful either in our lives or whatever. We can't show other people that we're struggling and we got problems. But he, he says that he told them everything. He told them everything that God had done. He told them about the high points. He told them about the low points. He told, told them about the sad points of Mark walking out on them.
Billy Ritchie (00:16:08) - He told them everything and they declared all that God had done for him and now opened a door of faith to the Gentiles. This is what he was all about. Paul and his friends opening a door into a whole new world of people that needed Jesus. And they remained with them back in Antioch no little time with the disciples. Job done in a sense. Yes. Well, it was only the start of a job, you know. And persecution hadn't stopped the Gospel. Disciples were made, it says, disciples were made. I like that word. Disciples were made better than believers were made. I don't wanna make too big of a difference, but even the devil believes in Jesus. But we're not called to make believers. We're called to make disciples. And when you are a disciple, you walk in the way of the person who is being, you're a disciple of.
Billy Ritchie (00:17:14) - And we are a disciple of Jesus. So we walk in his way. We don't just believe with our heads, we walk and talk with our hearts and body and everything that the Holy Spirit is here and everything is changed in our lives. So we're no longer just believers, we're disciples. And that affects every single day of our life and every action and reaction that we have and everybody we come in contact. So we are a disciple and disciples were made. You know, Live no Lies (previous series) we said that the devil's main aim was to stop the spread of the Gospel, the good news of Jesus. And no matter what he tried, he failed. I mean, he threw the kitchen sink at the early church. Anything he could do, he tried and every attempt seemed to not only stop the Gospel, it turbocharged it, it spread it further than he could ever hope.
Billy Ritchie (00:18:14) - But then he changes tact. And this is where we're starting to get to. This is, by the way, we're going to be studying Galatians for about three months. Okay? So take your time, relax. And this is just a bit of an introduction. Is that okay? Yes. So here we've got, we are getting towards here now. And, he decides to change the way he's working rather than attacking them from the outside. He decides that he's going to cause some internal difficulties, internal discussions, internal differences. And you know, the devil stumbled upon his old time, most successful weapon against the church. Create an integral and internal dialogue. You know, so many of our differences are not central, are not core to the Gospel. So many of the things that we can fall out over are not worth falling out over.
Billy Ritchie (00:19:30) - So many of them are liturgical. What do I mean by that? Well,if I take you back a thousand years, there was a huge schism, it's called the great schism in the church between the Western Rome church and the Eastern Byzantine Church. And up until that a thousand years ago, the church was together and you've got the Roman Catholic Western Church, which became Protestant church. But then on the other side you've got the Byzantine Church, the Orthodox Church, which would be Greek, and Russian Orthodox. Yes, they'll have candles and swinging things. Anyway. And, and we were together and we fell out. Now, there was a few things that we fell out about, but one of the things that we fell out about was whether we used leaven bread or unleavened bread in communion.
Billy Ritchie (00:20:30) - Really. It's like, are we gonna fall out whether we use them stupid wafers we've got nowadays that you can't get into them. I mean, that's what's fallen out about, isn't it? , Oh gee. I mean the stuff we fall out about, I mean, and in my lifetime, you know, I mean in the eighties, well the come around all the time we had the 'worship wars', whether you could sing a chorus of a, what was it called, an overhead projector or a hymn book. I mean, wars were fought over that. So much of our stuff is about something that's not central and not worth fighting about. But what they were talking about here, or Paul was going to talk about in Galatians, was the core of the Christian faith. It caused Peter and Paul to have one of them stand up in your face arguments. Can you imagine Peter and Paul, like, you know, like some of them football players, sometimes they go with a head? I think it was a bit like that. Both of 'em, like any in each others faces standing up having a right ding-dong.
Billy Ritchie (00:21:45) - And it almost split the fledgling movement of the church way back then. And it, and it was that simply put, Jesus was not enough for salvation. That's what was being said. And that's what we are going to read about, that Jesus, or at least that's what the false doctrine was, that Jesus was not enough for salvation. And being a fully devoted follower of Christ was not enough. That to be a believer and disciple, you had to fully embrace the law of Moses and all that came with that. And so they sent people off to Jerusalem. There was this big powwow with all the important people in the church there in Jerusalem. And they reached an agreement, I call it agreement, I actually believe it's a compromise, but they said in I think it's 15:28, "for it has seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us..."
Billy Ritchie (00:22:45) - , and and I'll come back to this in a second, but cuz I do believe that what's said next is a bit of a compromise. , but sometimes we like to dress up what we want to happen. Like it being God, "God told me" you ever had that. God seems to change his mind an awful lot. But God, God, it seemed good to God and to us, but I'm just not sure it was good to God, "to lay no greater burden than these requirements." So we're talking about Jesus is enough for everything and a lot of people want to get the whole Mosaic law, and you've gotta do all this other stuff to be so, you've gotta be, it's not enough to believe in Jesus. You've gotta believe in Jesus, but you've gotta be circumcised. And all the men said, no chance.
Billy Ritchie (00:23:33) - Yes. Amen. And so to no, no greater burden. You can have Jesus. But also, and this is why it's a compromise, that you also abstain from what has been sacrificed to idols. That's from the Mosaic law. Yes. And if you read your Bible, you find that Paul writes a whole chapter on being able to eat food. That's you with me? Yeah. So this is a compromise, "and from blood and from, what has been strangled and maybe the next one's a better one, but, and from sexual immorality, if you keep yourselves from these, you will do well. Farewell."
Billy Ritchie (00:24:18) - I just think that reeks of compromise sounds like Jesus plus to me. So he's like Jesus, you can have Jesus, but you need all this other stuff. And you know, compromise seldom works in the long term. So after they have this big powwow, a few years later, a few people arrive in Galatia as the teachers representing bigwig James, the brother of Jesus who's important in Jerusalem. They supposedly are representing him to come to these believers in Galatia to put them right, because their believing in Jesus is enough. But they've got to put them right. It's interesting that Paul has a little dig. Go, go home and read it today. It's in Galatians 2:6. He says, he says something like, no matter how important other people think they are, they're not more important than the Gospel. He's digging. He's having a little side dig, I think anyway, at, at James because... So that takes us to tthe Church of Galatia.
Billy Ritchie (00:25:34) - And if you can sum up the whole letter that Paul was writing, it's basically saying Christ is enough. We sung today, he's all I want, he's all I need. Amen. Amen. Whatever we think needs to be added to our faith in Christ, be it a special theology, an experience, a ritual, a denomination, a special pastor, all of that results in questioning the adequacy of Christ in our lives. And that's why we've got this book. It's probably the first book or letter that Paul wrote out of his 13 or 14 letters. And then, in some ways, to be honest with you, it seems a character to him. Man, Peter's coming. I've got no chance. Where am I gonna go with this? Give me a couple more seconds, Peter. It seems, seems like a character because Paul usually in the rest of his letters are, is very loving and kind and emotional towards the people around him.
Billy Ritchie (00:26:53) - But here he seems completely uncompromising. I mean he uses things like, "Oh foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you? You are deluded fools." That's what he's saying to them. You're crazy guys. He goes on to say it in the Message. He says, I can't believe Victor Meldrew can't believe it. I can't believe how you waver, how easily you've been turned from to traitor to him who called you by his grace of Christ embracing you, embracing our alternative message. It is not a minor variation. You know, it's completely other, an alien message, no message, a lie about God. You know, I know that God is love. But for Paul in this time being uncompromising equalled love and sometimes we've gotta stand up for what is right and Paul was drawing a line in the sand and he's gone. I am. He's usually, gosh, I mean if you read these letters, it's usually, Hey, it's Paul, God is great. You are great. Jesus is great. Live this way. To the Galatians, it's, Hey, it's Paul. God is great. What the heck do you think you're doing? Read it. The first chapter, read it When you go home today.
Billy Ritchie (00:28:27) - And sometimes we have to make no compromise because he loved the Gospel. He loved the Lord of the Gospel and he cared deeply that he wasn't afraid of using non-politically correct words to describe how important it was in my last couple of seconds, let me, let me give you five reasons, ha ha five reasons why I think we should study Galatians. One. I think it helps us to understand the gospel of grace. Our temptation in church is always to think it's about our performance that puts us right before God. Let me tell you, give up now cuz it's never gonna work. Don't put performance-based things on other people. Put grace because it's in his righteousness that we stand before Him. Christ righteousness. We stand before God and we can stand with our heads held up and we don't have to give people a list of rules to abide by. That's right. The second thing, which is probably as important on our day like today, is that it helps us to recognise false teaching. That we understand what the gospel means and the cultural context that we are in at this moment in time. Third thing is
Billy Ritchie (00:30:03) - That it cultivates a spirit-led life. Today we're talking, we are talking about the Holy Spirit. You know, it's not about you being you, you have that word nowadays. Just be you. You be you. No, please don't. And you don't want me to be me, you want me to be Christ. I want you to be Christ. The spirit of God. We've talked about the spirit of God in this place (pointing to self). Yes. But when we come to Jesus, the spirit of God comes to this place. And no matter where I am, I walk with the spirit of God in this place. And the spirit of God in us creates a Christ-like character. Like fruit, again, can't be done overnight. Know Mr. Fix it slowly but surely. Letting the spirit of God rest inside us. And as he does that it produces fruit, love, patience, kindness. We have to be spirit led, each and every one of us to allow that to happen in our lives. Embracing unity in diversity is also something I think we find in here because there was a hierarchy going on. It was about the great Jewish people with everything. And they look down on these Galatians over here
Billy Ritchie (00:31:38) - And they thought they had it all together and they wanted to sort these people who didn't have it all together. There was something going on there that wasn't healthy cuz we're all brothers and sisters together in Christ. So I think there's something about that as well. And also I think there is something about experiencing freedom in Christ. Experiencing freedom in Christ. Not a freedom to live just the way we want and do gratify our own wants and desires. We've been talking the last few weeks, haven't we? About, about the flesh. It's not about its freedom, its allowing us to not live in condemnation but to live in freedom under the power of the Holy Spirit. And when we live in freedom from the power of the Holy Spirit, then something beautiful happens. So it's not just freedom to do anything we want, but to live in that place where we're not bound up and held down, but we are living with the Holy Spirit, with his righteousness on us, not having to perform every day, not having to put on masks, but to Live No Lies as we've been talking about, but to live in his spirit. Amen. Let me just pray as we finish our time is almost gone.
Billy Ritchie (00:32:58) - Father, I just ask you to continue to speak to us through the Holy Spirit over the next weeks and months. As we take time, slow down and look at your word and look at these words penned through the power of the Holy Spirit through the Apostle Paul that will help us to live spirit-led lives in a crazy world that is around us in a hostile environment. Help us to live every day in your freedom that you have given us, help us never to turn it into rules and regulations, but into a lationship of love that spurs us on to be Christlike and to be a Christian as your Word describes in Jesus name. Amen. Hey, don't forget, go to the, guest lounge if you're new. There are some people at my left to my right, they would love to pray for you if you, want to do that, or you've got any questions. But God bless you. Have a great week.