Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_00Hey everybody, it's Matt. This is the 10-minute Bible hour podcast where we're working our way through the book of Galatians right now, and we're making really nice progress. We got through two chapters. It's a pretty contentious book. The Apostle Paul, it's the guy who wrote it. He's upset justifiably about some stuff. And we're turning the page now into chapter three, where he gets into the heart of his argument. And this part reminds me of a thing that happened when my kids were little. We'd be on a road trip and we'd want to give them the illusion of choice, of input on where we were going to eat. I already knew where we were going to eat. We're going to eat it in an outburger because it's delicious, obviously. But I wanted them to feel like they got to pick. So I'd give them options. I'd be like, all right, kids, it's time to make a decision on where we're going to eat. The option number one is Crazy Louis jars of fermented farts. No. Gross, Dad. No. Okay, whoa, settle down, guys. Hear me out. Here are all the options first. Option number two is gonna be Slumpy Shauna's slippy stink pickles. No. Gross. I hate stink pickles. I know, no, settle down. You don't have to pick that one. You have options. Option number three is gonna be in and out burger. Okay, we'll do that. Walked right into my trap. We're getting in and out burger again. And there's, I mean, the point of all of this was just to mess with him because that is my job as a dad. And also the point of it was to get to make up horrifying restaurant names, which I kind of miss because they're not really into that game anymore. But also, the point was to kind of make a joke about how sometimes the illusion of choice is really no choice at all. You know, one of those little micro life lessons. Paul, likewise, is doing the exact same thing with the Galatian church here in Galatians chapter three. He's been drawing this contrast. I mean, come on, you're smart, you're socially smart, you're interpretively smart. You've been seeing what he's doing all along. Now he's gonna spell it out even more clearly. He's been saying that you got the two options. And option number one is the equivalent of stinky Shauna's, what did I say? Slippy stink pickles. It's awful. It's no option at all. Yes, it is technically listed as an option, but it's not gonna work. You do not want that. Option number two is just insert whatever thing you think is delicious and fantastic number here. So option one for Paul is of course, you know, you can get right standing with God by doing stuff. Works of the law, works of the flesh, human effort. And uh the idea is that everybody's supposed to be like, oh, gross. No, we don't want that. That'll never work. Paul, come on, no, no, hold on. Let's talk about the other option you get to pick here. Option number two would be you gain right standing before God by believing in Jesus, by faith in Christ. Oh, okay, we'll go with that. We want that one. But it's meant to be that glaringly obvious as he's bringing this up. He's painted that picture through chapters one and two. And now I think there's a really a comedic moment, much like me torturing my kids, that happens here in Galatians chapter three, as Paul introduces the next movement of this letter where he draws a contrast between picking something that is really desirable and something that is really, really not desirable. He starts with the desirable thing. I'll set it up with the question. Go back to the beginning of Galatians 3. Here you go. You foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you before your very eyes? Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified. I would like to learn just one thing from you. Did you receive the Spirit by observing the law or by believing what you heard? Are you so foolish? After beginning with the Spirit, are you now trying to attain your goal by human effort? Have you suffered so much for nothing? If it really was for nothing? Does God give you his spirit and work miracles among you because you let me paraphrase this here? One, observe the law, or two, because you believe what you heard. Now he's gonna flesh out that contrast I've been selling you on here even more. Consider Abraham. Ah, okay, so this is gonna be the good option. He believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness. Understand then that those who believe are children of Abraham. The scripture foresaw that God would justify the Gentiles by faith and announce the gospel in advance to Abraham. Quote, all nations will be blessed through you, unquote. So those who have faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith. But now he's gonna go on and he's gonna give you the stinky Shirley's slippy stink pickle, gross dead. No, we don't want that, it's awful. Option. Here we go. Paul continues, but all who rely on observing the law are under a curse, for it is written, cursed is everyone who does not continue to do everything written in the book of the law. Clearly, no one is justified before God by the law, because, quote, the righteous will live by faith. You see what he's doing? I mean, this is unbelievably thick, slathering on, and yeah, I'm I'm doing like little voice shtick and stuff to make it hit a bit harder. But these two options are meant to be so contrasting, so one is absurdly good and the other is absurdly horrible, that they really aren't two options at all. You're meant to hear this and be like, okay, there's really only one option here, and it's In N Out Burger, because nobody wants to eat it. What was the first one? Uncle Chunky Uncle Carl's jar of fermented farts or whatever it was. I don't know, I've made up so many of these over the years that uh they all start to run together in my brain. Clearly, you're not gonna pick that one. It's jars of fermented farts. It's no place for family to eat. It's revolting. There's no full bellies on the other end of that. Obviously, we're gonna pick In N Out Burger, which is clean and wholesome and has quality help and fresh food, accurate orders every single time. This episode not brought to you by In N Out Burger, but it should have been. And to sweeten the pot just a little bit, or I should say maybe a lot here, Paul is making the case that the good option, the only option here, is connected to one of the greatest heroes of the faith ever. And what's more, he's a really relatable hero of the faith. Now, probably most of the people in the audience knew a fair amount about the story of Abraham. Certainly people who'd been around Judaism a little bit longer, like the Godfearers or some of the Jewish Christians in the room, they would have known this better, but everybody knew stuff about Abraham, and everybody would have known that Abraham's a really relatable hero of the faith, because the guy did stupid stuff and the guy did good stuff. He was sort of Peter like in a lot of ways, except Peter's problem was maybe overconfidence in himself and his own knowledge, kind of he was more done in Krugery, whereas Abraham he was a little more likely to weasel and be afraid. I don't know, they're they're a little bit different, but they're both big characters in the Bible who cast long shadows in terms of their example and what they accomplish and what they contribute, but also they're people who aren't so perfect that they're unrelatable. Abraham gets stuff wrong. He doesn't trust God all the time. But yet, it was never with Abraham about all the things that he would do or how much he brought to the table. Everybody knows that the deal with Abraham from the beginning is a different deal than the deal with, say, Moses in the Old Testament. And just to clarify, this is what I'm talking about. God made a covenant, a deal with Moses. Moses came after Abraham in the Old Testament, hundreds of years after Abraham, but he's descended from Abraham. And the deal that God made with Moses, that is outlined in Exodus and reiterated in Deuteronomy, is the deal goes like this I'm gonna be your God, and you are going to be my people. And if you obey me, I'm gonna bless you so hard as a nation that all the other people of the world are gonna know that I'm the one true God and that you're my people. But if you screw around and you stupid crap and you disobey me, you don't do the things that I say, worship other gods and idiot stuff like that, I am gonna punish you so hard in front of everybody that everybody will still know that I am the one true God and that you are my people. So it's a very conditional deal, right? I mean, God is saying, either way, everybody's gonna know that I'm the one true God and you're my people. How we communicate that is entirely up to you, Moses and the Hebrews, the Israelite people. So it's a it's a conditional deal, right? It has terms and the the people, the recipients of the covenant, they have to do something. Whereas the deal with Abraham wasn't like that. It was an unconditional deal by which God said, I pick you, Abraham. There's no indication in the Bible that God picked Abraham because he was better than everybody else, or the perfect guy, or that he would get everything right forever. God chose Abraham. He was the dude. And then he makes this deal with Abraham that gets spelled out in a couple of different places, and the deal is, all right, Abraham, we're making a deal. And the deal goes like this you are gonna have to do nothing. I am going to make you a great name and a great nation with a ton of descendants, and I'm going to give you a land that I provide for you, and this one's very important for Galatians and how the rest of the Bible plays out, and all the nations will be blessed through you, through your descendants. I'll say that's an unconditional deal, because even if Abraham does something stupid, and he does, God's still gonna hold up his end of the bargain. That's what God's gonna do. I mean, really, what God is spelling out to Abraham is my redemptive plan is gonna be joined at the hip to your descendants. And when God made this promise to Abraham, Abraham had no descendants. Yeah, he had no kids, all the more bold on God's part to make such a promise and to pick such a guy. Well, everybody having this letter to the Galatian churches read to them would have known who Abraham was. Some of these people would have known those stories about Abraham, like the back of their hands, they would have known about the covenant, the deal that God made with Abraham. They could have reeled it off. Other people in the crowd were gonna need to brush up on this a little bit and maybe would have looked around like, yeah, yeah, I totally I I know all of this stuff. I completely have it down, but maybe real discreetly, they were doing whatever the equivalent is of Googling underneath the desk while the letter was being read. Okay, ancient version of Google. Who is Abraham? Summarize the story quickly. Uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh. Because I would have needed to brush up. No shame in that. There's a lot of stuff in the Bible. Nobody knows all of it or remembers all of it off the top of their head. But we're gonna need to brush up on the Abraham thing a little bit to understand all the fullness of this example that Paul is holding out as the good example. Because remember, there's only two options here, guys. You can eat at Fat Louie's Rotten Eel Pie Shop or In N Out Burger. And you're supposed to want in and out of those two. In this case, the Abraham is the in-and-out burger. He believed God. Galatians 3, 6. Consider Abraham, he believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness. Abraham is the first and most obvious example of what it is to have right standing before God because of the work of God. There is life at the end of belief in God. There is hope at the end of belief in God. This is how it works. The other alternative is lousy and it smells bad and it sounds gross. And anyone who picks that one is under a curse. So we're gonna get into all the under the curse part of that when we get to that part here in a little bit, but we're gonna focus right now on these three verses about Abraham, what the scriptures say about Abraham, what God did through Abraham. We're gonna look at some stuff around the Old Testament that Paul was drawing on when he said, All nations will be blessed through you. He's got that quote right there that's in quotes in Galatians 3, 8. And like I said a second ago, that is hyper important for everything that's going on here in Galatians and everything about this question of how the message of Jesus going out to the larger world and the non-Jewish world was going to work. I mean, this is huge, center cut, important stuff that Paul is tapping into here, and he's making it abundantly evident to everybody who's within earshot of this letter that this is the only viable option, that the model of Abraham who believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness, is the only way forward, the only viable option, the metaphorical in-and-out burger of the contrasts that I have drawn over the course of this episode. Sorry for the names of all those fake restaurants. I know they were gross, and some of you probably threw up a tiny bit in your mouth. My bad. Matt, this is a 10-minute Bible hour podcast. Let's do this again soon. Dad, that's not even a real restaurant. I think it is, guys. I just I heard the jingle on the radio. Hang on, I think it's right here. Dad, you sang that. I could see your mouth moving.