WEBVTT 00:00:00.640 --> 00:00:01.280 Amen. 00:00:01.919 --> 00:00:04.559 Well, we're doing seven weeks in the book of Galatians. 00:00:04.639 --> 00:00:09.519 It's uh six chapters in Galatians, but we're gonna be doing seven weeks, and uh we're on week three. 00:00:09.599 --> 00:00:16.879 I I don't want to just jump in the middle because I I know some of you maybe you're just uh here for the first time, and I I don't want to just jump in the middle of the conversation. 00:00:17.039 --> 00:00:23.519 And for some of you, even if you've been here, uh there's been a lot that's happened since last Sunday, so let me kind of recalibrate all of us. 00:00:23.679 --> 00:00:27.120 The um the book of Galatians is written by the Apostle Paul. 00:00:27.199 --> 00:00:36.240 Uh he writes it as one of his letters that he writes in the churches that he plants in the uh book of Acts, uh all around the Mediterranean rim. 00:00:36.560 --> 00:00:40.799 He then communicates through epistles or letters that he writes back and forth. 00:00:41.039 --> 00:00:45.439 The Galatians are a group of people he was very, very familiar with. 00:00:45.600 --> 00:00:53.119 Uh, in fact, uh Dustin Poole mentioned last week when he was speaking that they really bonded actually over Paul having being sick. 00:00:53.280 --> 00:01:00.640 He got sick and he needed somebody to nurse him back to health, and so the Galatians circled the wagons and they supported him and they helped him to get healthy again. 00:01:00.799 --> 00:01:09.040 And if you've ever been there where somebody was there for you in your time of need, or you were there for them in their time of need, uh you know often that will bond you in a deep way. 00:01:09.120 --> 00:01:12.959 And so that, you know, he had a familiarity uh with the Galatians. 00:01:13.120 --> 00:01:21.760 But when you read Galatians uh one through six, you find pretty quickly there's a lot of sort of provocative, intense language, and it's just all over. 00:01:21.840 --> 00:01:27.280 Um, you know, he uses very strong terms, and uh, you know, there's there's kind of a couple things going on there. 00:01:27.359 --> 00:01:29.760 One is clearly he feels strongly, right? 00:01:29.920 --> 00:01:40.719 So if we feel uh emotional, we feel um, you know, we feel something's very important, often we'll reach into our vocabulary and find some of our most intense language. 00:01:40.879 --> 00:01:43.920 Uh but uh aside from that was just a rhetorical device. 00:01:44.000 --> 00:01:49.519 So you think about rhetoric, which is, you know, could be persuasive writing or speech. 00:01:49.680 --> 00:02:02.000 Um there were there are different styles and things that were used uh in that time, particularly first century Jewish uh writers or or thinkers would use um diatribe as rhetoric. 00:02:02.159 --> 00:02:14.479 And so within diatribe you have hyperbole, so you have a lot of exaggeration, very intense things that are said, and again, it's it's it's not meant to always be taken literally, it's meant to emphasize a point. 00:02:14.719 --> 00:02:22.719 And then also another tactic is they'll take the tone or the voice of the person and play it back in their face, play it back to them. 00:02:22.960 --> 00:02:43.520 So uh Paul is writing to this group of people called the Judaizers, they're people that are essentially have gone from um, you know, right righteousness or justification by grace through faith, and and and they're moving to now we have to be perfected or completed by our ability to keep the law. 00:02:43.840 --> 00:02:52.879 And so uh when Paul's uh writing to them, he's talking to a group of people who have become very rigid and legalistic, and so he's playing their voice back to them. 00:02:53.120 --> 00:03:00.960 He's not in he's he's saying, Hey, I I wish that you he would say, I wish you would be cut off, or he's saying, uh let you be cursed. 00:03:01.120 --> 00:03:03.439 All right, which again is is is emphatic language. 00:03:03.599 --> 00:03:04.479 Is he cursing them? 00:03:04.639 --> 00:03:06.719 Is he is he wishing for their demise? 00:03:06.879 --> 00:03:07.520 Absolutely not. 00:03:07.680 --> 00:03:12.879 What he's doing is he's saying, This is what you're doing and saying to the Gentiles by your words and actions. 00:03:12.960 --> 00:03:17.280 And so I'm gonna feed it back to you and give you a taste of your own medicine. 00:03:17.439 --> 00:03:25.520 And so a lot of again that it was a fairly common way to you know perform rhetoric in that way. 00:03:25.759 --> 00:03:28.400 And so, uh, but but again, the point remains. 00:03:28.560 --> 00:03:37.039 Paul is is is serious about what he's talking about, and so we're trying to really you know squeeze this sponge out and get everything uh out of it that we possibly can. 00:03:37.199 --> 00:03:41.599 Uh in uh Galatians 2, I'm gonna start reading in verse 11. 00:03:42.719 --> 00:03:50.879 Um, Paul is describing, depending on your translation, you may see the name Cephas, C-E-P-H-A-S. 00:03:51.120 --> 00:03:56.479 That's just Peter, uh the apostle Peter, and he's going to describe a conflict that they have. 00:03:56.560 --> 00:04:06.400 So it says in Galatians 2.11, it says, But when Peter came to Antioch, I had to oppose him to his face, for what he did was very wrong. 00:04:07.039 --> 00:04:12.479 When he first arrived, he ate with the Gentile believers who were not circumcised. 00:04:12.800 --> 00:04:18.319 But afterward, when some friends of James came, Peter wouldn't eat with the Gentiles anymore. 00:04:18.399 --> 00:04:28.720 So when you see friends of James, think of people from Jerusalem, and these would have been your more straight-laced, rigid, legalistic, by the book, by the law people. 00:04:29.279 --> 00:04:29.600 Okay? 00:04:30.079 --> 00:04:34.160 They would have observed the law to the letter as best that they could. 00:04:34.319 --> 00:04:43.839 And so what he's describing here is uh in Antioch, when Peter was with Gentiles, he was fine with Gentiles. 00:04:43.920 --> 00:04:47.439 He would sit at a table with them, he would eat with them, he would connect with them. 00:04:47.519 --> 00:04:58.480 One of the things we we need to understand contextually in first century Judaism is that table fellowship was much more intense of a of a statement and a symbol than it would be for us. 00:04:58.639 --> 00:05:09.360 So, for example, we eat with whoever, okay, it's a meal, yes, you're having a conversation and all of that, but it's really no big deal for two people to pull up to a table, open up their lunch, and eat. 00:05:09.439 --> 00:05:11.439 There's not really some huge statement. 00:05:11.600 --> 00:05:17.680 Um, in that day, especially in first century Judaism, that was seen as full acceptance of a person. 00:05:17.759 --> 00:05:28.160 Uh, and of course, when when when it came to eating with Gentiles, um, this was they saw Gentiles as the food that they ate was unclean, therefore it made them unclean. 00:05:28.240 --> 00:05:32.160 And if I am interacting with someone who's unclean, it makes me unclean. 00:05:32.319 --> 00:05:34.000 And so this was forbidden. 00:05:34.240 --> 00:05:53.759 If you go back again, we've looked at this before, but Acts chapter 10, when we have Peter who has this defining moment in Acts 10, where he has a vision from heaven of a sheet that opens up, and all of this unclean food is in front of him, and a voice from heaven says, kill and eat. 00:05:54.319 --> 00:05:57.680 And he's so, he's like, What? 00:05:57.920 --> 00:05:59.680 Like that cannot be God. 00:06:00.240 --> 00:06:17.360 Because in his mind, the the the Torah and the the kosher eating and the food uh sacrifices, eating uh appropriate food, clean food, was it it was as right and as true as two plus two equals four. 00:06:17.839 --> 00:06:19.040 Maybe more so. 00:06:19.360 --> 00:06:20.800 True than uh gravity. 00:06:20.879 --> 00:06:21.920 What goes up comes down. 00:06:22.000 --> 00:06:23.600 He's like, this is the truest thing. 00:06:23.839 --> 00:06:25.839 God does not want me to do this. 00:06:26.079 --> 00:06:37.279 So when he hears God seemingly contradicting something that he believes God to have said, he says, the voice says, kill and eat, and he says, No. 00:06:38.399 --> 00:06:39.920 We've talked about this before, man. 00:06:40.000 --> 00:06:43.920 You gotta be pretty rooted in your belief to tell an audible voice from heaven no. 00:06:44.319 --> 00:06:46.240 I mean, you gotta be pretty locked in. 00:06:46.319 --> 00:06:47.680 You gotta be sure you're right. 00:06:47.839 --> 00:06:51.680 If you hear an audible voice from heaven telling you to do something, you're like, I don't think so, man. 00:06:51.759 --> 00:06:53.120 I'm gonna do it my way. 00:06:53.360 --> 00:06:54.560 So he says no. 00:06:54.720 --> 00:06:59.680 Again, this just shows how sure he was that he was seeing this the right way. 00:06:59.759 --> 00:07:04.000 And of course, the whole vision in Acts 10 has nothing to do with the food. 00:07:04.160 --> 00:07:06.319 It has everything to do with people. 00:07:06.720 --> 00:07:09.519 He's saying ultimately this is a defining moment. 00:07:09.920 --> 00:07:24.160 And and and I'm I'm leading you uh to take people that you thought were unclean and a whole mindset, and now I want to take um God's will and God's word into the ends of the earth, and this is gonna require you to change your thinking. 00:07:24.319 --> 00:07:39.040 So you have Peter, okay, who uh is still like let's be honest, even when you have like clarity of thought or you feel like God's telling you to do something and you feel strongly about it, we're human beings and we have a tendency to revert. 00:07:39.199 --> 00:07:42.079 Sometimes we we take two steps forward and one step back. 00:07:42.160 --> 00:07:46.319 It's not always up and to the right uh in some fairy tale process. 00:07:46.480 --> 00:07:51.040 A lot of times, you know, we're still struggling with something we believe here, getting all the way to here. 00:07:51.120 --> 00:07:52.399 It still felt wrong to him. 00:07:52.639 --> 00:07:56.240 So when he was in Antioch, he did a hypocritical thing. 00:07:56.480 --> 00:08:08.720 He was he he would accept the Gentiles when it was just the Gentiles, but then when the people of James, okay, the people from Jerusalem uh came, it says he would not eat with the Gentiles anymore. 00:08:09.040 --> 00:08:09.680 Look at this. 00:08:09.839 --> 00:08:16.240 He was afraid of the criticism from these people who insisted on the necessity of circumcision. 00:08:16.800 --> 00:08:24.639 And as a result, other Jewish believers followed Peter's hypocrisy, even Barnabas was led astray by their hypocrisy. 00:08:24.879 --> 00:08:31.360 So even seasoned veterans, even people who knew better, good people, were being swept up in this hypocrisy. 00:08:31.519 --> 00:08:37.039 And he said, When I saw that they were not following the truth of the gospel message, and I'll pause there. 00:08:38.080 --> 00:08:42.799 Okay, let's let's take a look at what's going on here. 00:08:42.960 --> 00:08:46.879 Um I want to go a little bit deeper in this idea of unclean. 00:08:46.960 --> 00:08:50.720 I if you when you study the Bible, you know that there are two divisions of the Bible. 00:08:50.799 --> 00:08:53.279 So you have the Old Testament and then you have the New Testament. 00:08:53.440 --> 00:08:57.200 In between the two testaments, you have what's called 400 years of silence. 00:08:57.360 --> 00:09:02.960 So, in other words, none of the books of the Bible were written that would be in like our canon of scripture. 00:09:03.840 --> 00:09:06.159 None of those books were written in that 400 years. 00:09:06.399 --> 00:09:16.159 But it's important for us to understand what was written in those 400 years that wasn't in the Bible, but affected the thinking of the audience that we're reading. 00:09:16.240 --> 00:09:21.519 So, for example, Galatians was written in the first century, uh probably in the 50s. 00:09:21.759 --> 00:09:25.200 Okay, so 50 or so AD, somewhere in there. 00:09:25.440 --> 00:09:34.320 So everything in that intertestamental period, in that 400 years that was written was part of influencing the culture of that day, even though it doesn't show up in our Bible. 00:09:34.480 --> 00:09:48.000 So I want to talk to you about a couple of those things again to help us understand why this is why this is such an issue, why Peter keeps reverting, why this was so hard for people to accept, and then uh we it I think it will make more sense. 00:09:48.159 --> 00:09:55.360 So during that time there was a book uh that was written called Jubilees, and Jubilees is known as Little Genesis. 00:09:55.519 --> 00:10:14.159 And in Jubilees and Little Genesis, what they did was they took poetic license to take the patriarchs, so Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and to add uh dialogue, uh monologues and dialogues, basically add uh language that there was stuff that doesn't show up in the in the Old Testament. 00:10:14.240 --> 00:10:17.759 It doesn't show up in Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. 00:10:17.840 --> 00:10:32.559 But it's like, hey, we're gonna take the spirit of this character, just like if you watched uh uh a movie about a Bible story, and not everything coming out of the character's mouths were in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, but it's like the spirit of this character brings the storyline to life. 00:10:32.639 --> 00:10:36.000 That's what Jubilees was with the essentially the book of Genesis. 00:10:36.240 --> 00:10:47.200 So within the story, they the um it's written that um uh there's a conversation uh between um Isaac and his son Jacob. 00:10:47.360 --> 00:11:13.679 All right, so Isaac and Jacob, and it it's in Jubilees 22, 16, and 17 um that that he gives that Isaac gives Jacob the speech, and this is what he says He says, Keep yourself separate from the Gentiles, neither eat with them, nor do according to their works, so that you may not become a sharer in sin and uncleanness. 00:11:14.159 --> 00:11:16.960 Now, was this considered part of their Hebrew Bible? 00:11:17.120 --> 00:11:20.159 No, it was considered a supportive part of their Hebrew Bible. 00:11:20.240 --> 00:11:22.879 They would have viewed this how we might read uh C.S. 00:11:23.039 --> 00:11:24.159 Lewis or something like that. 00:11:24.320 --> 00:11:27.440 We would look and say, well, that's not Bible, but it's supporting the Bible. 00:11:27.519 --> 00:11:28.960 It's in the spirit of the Bible. 00:11:29.200 --> 00:11:33.840 So this idea, and this is written about 200 years before. 00:11:34.000 --> 00:11:36.080 This is what they're talking about at the dinner table. 00:11:36.159 --> 00:11:41.840 This is what they're talking about in their conversations and their sidebars about what it means to ultimately please God. 00:11:42.320 --> 00:11:49.200 There's another book that was written in the intertestamental period around the same time, about 200 years before Galatians, before Jesus. 00:11:49.360 --> 00:12:00.799 Um, you have what's called 2nd Maccabees, and I'll spare you the full history, but they were living in a time where they were being intensely oppressed for just living their religious freedom. 00:12:00.960 --> 00:12:10.320 So to um you know, to uh uh eat kosher was illegal, and and again, they they were uh being killed over it. 00:12:10.480 --> 00:12:18.720 And so in the book of 2 Maccabees, um this this mother in in chapter 6 and 7, there's a mother who has seven sons. 00:12:18.960 --> 00:12:33.200 And this mother says to her seven sons, essentially, if they try to make you eat pig, all right, if they try to force bacon on you, all right, and some of you are like, listen, don't you dare speak against bacon. 00:12:33.279 --> 00:12:34.399 That'll be my breaking point. 00:12:34.480 --> 00:12:35.679 All right, I'm out of here. 00:12:35.919 --> 00:12:39.600 Um like I'll leave today, like I'll never come back. 00:12:40.480 --> 00:12:44.720 Okay, so but to them, again, pig was an unclean animal. 00:12:44.879 --> 00:12:47.200 And if you eat pig, you are unclean. 00:12:47.440 --> 00:12:49.840 And this is ultimately making you unclean before God. 00:12:49.919 --> 00:12:51.759 So this is how intense it is. 00:12:52.159 --> 00:13:05.759 This mother with seven sons tells her sons if they eat make you eat try to make you eat pigs, spit out the flesh, choosing the noble death rather than the defilement of life. 00:13:06.399 --> 00:13:14.799 It would be better for you to spit out the bacon and for God to still accept you. 00:13:15.120 --> 00:13:19.600 Because once that bacon goes in your system, you have now been rejected by God. 00:13:19.759 --> 00:13:32.000 She uh she urges them that if they spit out the bacon and they die right there, they're killed right there, she said, God will have mercy on you if you spit out the bacon. 00:13:32.320 --> 00:13:39.759 Okay, so this is 200 years before, you know, this Peter and Paul conflict. 00:13:39.919 --> 00:13:41.600 This is deep in the mindset. 00:13:41.840 --> 00:13:51.440 Even again, now it starts to make sense why in chapter 10, Peter's like, No, Lord, this is the mindset that this is the opposite of what God wants. 00:13:52.080 --> 00:14:00.799 And so this is why now, again, the rejection of table fellowship, now that within the new covenant, we're saying, hey, we're we're not right with God because of what we eat. 00:14:00.879 --> 00:14:02.639 In fact, guess who that came from? 00:14:02.960 --> 00:14:05.120 Jesus in Matthew 15. 00:14:05.200 --> 00:14:13.039 He says, It's not what goes into a person's mouth, it's not what you eat that defiles you, it's what comes out of your mouth that comes out of your heart. 00:14:13.360 --> 00:14:16.159 Okay, so they're still trying to get used to this. 00:14:16.399 --> 00:14:18.240 All right, we'll keep going with it. 00:14:18.480 --> 00:14:32.960 He says in here, uh notice the language, he says in verse 14, he said, When I saw that they were not following the truth of the gospel message, which by the way, that's what I'm gonna call this sermon the truth of the gospel message. 00:14:33.360 --> 00:14:34.879 So, what does he mean by that? 00:14:35.759 --> 00:14:37.440 So let's do this for a second. 00:14:37.919 --> 00:14:39.279 I write this word, gospel. 00:14:39.919 --> 00:14:40.320 Gospel. 00:14:40.480 --> 00:14:46.480 When I say gospel, okay, what do you what do you think of? 00:14:46.720 --> 00:14:47.039 All right? 00:14:47.120 --> 00:14:52.080 When you think of, when I say gospel, if I was to ask you what is the gospel, all right, write down the gospel. 00:14:52.159 --> 00:14:53.279 That'd be a fun little exercise. 00:14:53.360 --> 00:14:54.240 I give everybody a note card. 00:14:54.320 --> 00:14:57.840 Everybody write down what do you think the gospel is, and then we'll see how how much we agree. 00:14:58.080 --> 00:15:15.039 All right, but if I was to ask you what is the gospel, probably what you would say is something along the lines of the gospel is that we're all sinners and that Jesus died for our sin and we're made right with God because of the blood of Jesus and because of what he did on the cross, that we're that we are now accepted by God. 00:15:15.200 --> 00:15:15.519 Right? 00:15:15.919 --> 00:15:19.440 And and so so you you would be doing great, right, to say that. 00:15:19.679 --> 00:15:24.159 But let's let's let's look at what is Paul saying when he says gospel. 00:15:24.480 --> 00:15:27.440 Is that all he's saying, or is he saying more? 00:15:27.840 --> 00:15:31.279 All right, okay, let's do this in order to work our way up to this. 00:15:31.440 --> 00:15:33.360 Let's do what we love to do. 00:15:33.519 --> 00:15:36.159 Let's go back to Genesis 1 and 2. 00:15:36.399 --> 00:15:39.759 All right, so this is this is super important as you're reading the Bible. 00:15:40.000 --> 00:15:44.320 A lot of people think of Genesis 1 and 2 as just, you know, this Adam and Eve story. 00:15:44.480 --> 00:15:46.399 Um, it is way more than that. 00:15:46.559 --> 00:15:49.039 What this is doing is setting the scene in Genesis 1 and 2. 00:15:49.120 --> 00:15:55.679 You're gonna want to keep going back to Genesis 1 and 2 because it is it it is not uh it's not making scientific claims. 00:15:55.759 --> 00:16:11.519 What it's doing is giving a cosmology, in other words, a claim that God created everything, and then it's giving a theology, an understanding of what God cares about, who God is, the nature of God, and then also about what God intends for the world being in the order that he created. 00:16:11.759 --> 00:16:26.559 Alright, so so we're gonna we'll backtrack just a little bit, but what we're gonna see is that when God created the world, he created for us to be in right relationship, well, what we'll call up, in, and out. 00:16:27.519 --> 00:16:38.879 Alright, so up, first of all, right relationship with God, and I'm gonna show it to you in Genesis real quick, right relationship with ourselves, and then right relationship to the world and the people around us. 00:16:39.039 --> 00:16:40.480 So I'm gonna go through fast. 00:16:40.639 --> 00:16:45.279 Uh, Genesis 1.27 says, uh, God created human beings in his own image. 00:16:45.440 --> 00:16:48.159 In the image of God, he created them, male and female, he created them. 00:16:48.240 --> 00:16:49.679 That's Genesis 1.27. 00:16:49.759 --> 00:16:54.559 So, in other words, part of our peace with God and our peace with ourselves is we know who we are. 00:16:54.639 --> 00:16:57.039 I'm not just some collection of cells. 00:16:57.279 --> 00:16:58.639 I'm not some accident. 00:16:58.799 --> 00:17:00.080 I'm made in the image of God. 00:17:00.240 --> 00:17:01.200 That's whose image I'm in. 00:17:01.279 --> 00:17:06.720 That's ultimately who my father is, my creator, though where my origin comes from. 00:17:06.880 --> 00:17:09.519 So that's part of peace with myself, peace with God. 00:17:09.599 --> 00:17:11.200 Next is divine affirmation. 00:17:11.279 --> 00:17:17.519 It says in Genesis 1, uh throughout the book of Genesis 1, every time God makes something, he says, it's good, it's good, it's good. 00:17:17.599 --> 00:17:20.720 And then he makes human being and he says, it's very good. 00:17:20.880 --> 00:17:25.359 So that's a divine affirmation, just like if you heard from your mother or your father, hey, good job. 00:17:25.519 --> 00:17:26.960 Great, here's what I believe about you. 00:17:27.039 --> 00:17:27.359 You're good. 00:17:27.440 --> 00:17:38.240 And you know, as a parent, it's your job to see the good in your kid and to teach them how to manage their flesh so that they don't get caught up in foolishness, but you draw the greatness and the goodness out of them and you call it out with your words. 00:17:38.400 --> 00:17:40.079 So that's what God does with Adam and Eve. 00:17:40.160 --> 00:17:41.599 He calls it, He says, You're very good. 00:17:41.759 --> 00:17:47.039 So it's again, right relationship with God and self, and then and then healthy relationships with others. 00:17:47.119 --> 00:17:49.039 It's it says in Genesis 2.18. 00:17:49.279 --> 00:17:52.559 Then the Lord God said it's not good for man to be alone. 00:17:52.799 --> 00:17:57.200 So you have Adam and God in connection, but God said, you know what? 00:17:57.680 --> 00:17:58.720 He's still lonely. 00:17:58.799 --> 00:18:00.480 I want to bring a person into his life. 00:18:00.559 --> 00:18:02.640 So it says, I'll make a helper who's just right for him. 00:18:02.799 --> 00:18:14.079 So you have Adam, which means mankind, you have Eve, which means life, and now uh there's more fullness that's beginning to happen with right relationship with God, and now we're going out, right? 00:18:14.240 --> 00:18:15.440 Relationship with other people. 00:18:15.599 --> 00:18:18.400 Then there's meaningful work in Genesis 2.19. 00:18:18.480 --> 00:18:23.039 It says, now the Lord God had formed out of the ground all the wild animals, all the birds of the sky. 00:18:23.279 --> 00:18:27.119 He brought them to the man to see what he would name them. 00:18:27.279 --> 00:18:30.799 And whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name. 00:18:31.039 --> 00:18:31.680 I love that. 00:18:31.839 --> 00:18:34.960 It's like it's like you're working with your kid and you go, you know what, you do this one. 00:18:35.119 --> 00:18:36.079 What do you want to call it? 00:18:36.240 --> 00:18:37.359 And you give them some authority. 00:18:37.519 --> 00:18:45.599 The only authority they have is the stuff you gave them, but but but he gave it to them and he said, Enjoy the ability to do some stuff, and we'll call it whatever you say. 00:18:45.759 --> 00:18:46.000 Right? 00:18:46.079 --> 00:18:48.160 And so you think about that's part of the greatness of life. 00:18:48.319 --> 00:18:53.599 God's given you a body, he's given you a brain, he's made you good at some stuff, and of course you're bad at some stuff. 00:18:53.680 --> 00:19:03.599 That'll keep you humble, but the good stuff is where you find your joy, and he gives you some authority to make some things and do some things and lead some things and make some calls, all in relationship, knowing whose image you're in. 00:19:03.920 --> 00:19:05.839 Whew, it's a good life. 00:19:06.319 --> 00:19:08.480 So meaningful work and then appropriate pleasure. 00:19:08.559 --> 00:19:12.000 It says in Genesis 2.9, the Lord God made all kinds of trees to grow on the ground. 00:19:12.079 --> 00:19:16.000 Look at this trees that were pleasing to the eye, aesthetically pleasing and good to the food. 00:19:16.079 --> 00:19:19.759 When it hit the taste bud, it's like, yeah, man, that's a strawberry, man. 00:19:19.839 --> 00:19:20.799 That's amazing. 00:19:20.960 --> 00:19:24.160 Um, so again, appropriate pleasure and then self-confidence. 00:19:24.400 --> 00:19:25.519 Genesis 2.25. 00:19:25.680 --> 00:19:28.960 Adam and Eve were both naked and they felt no shame. 00:19:29.359 --> 00:19:31.039 So, what is this describing? 00:19:31.279 --> 00:19:33.920 This is the way God intended it. 00:19:34.480 --> 00:19:42.480 Right relationship with him, at peace with God, fullness with God, peace with myself. 00:19:42.640 --> 00:19:44.319 I'm doing the work I'm supposed to do. 00:19:44.400 --> 00:19:46.880 I'm not walking around in insecurity. 00:19:47.519 --> 00:19:49.039 And peace with others. 00:19:49.200 --> 00:19:51.119 He was, they were in right relationship. 00:19:51.519 --> 00:19:55.920 And so so this is again what we see that then is described in Genesis 15. 00:19:56.079 --> 00:19:59.680 We introduces the word shalom, which is that that's what shalom is. 00:19:59.839 --> 00:20:02.720 It's used 250 times in the Old Testament. 00:20:03.279 --> 00:20:12.400 And so when you look at from the garden to the gospel, from the garden to the gospel, you see, as N.T. 00:20:12.559 --> 00:20:20.480 Wright says, a good creator trying to restore his creation to the good order for which he created it. 00:20:20.720 --> 00:20:21.920 That's what God is doing. 00:20:22.000 --> 00:20:25.440 So why does he create uh a covenant with Abraham? 00:20:25.599 --> 00:20:26.799 Why does he create a nation? 00:20:26.960 --> 00:20:28.160 Why does he create law? 00:20:28.480 --> 00:20:32.240 The law was on paper designed to do this. 00:20:32.799 --> 00:20:33.599 In and up. 00:20:33.680 --> 00:20:37.119 How do I have a part of the law was designed to have right relationship with God? 00:20:37.279 --> 00:20:43.440 In other words, sacrifices of gratitude, expressing gratitude to God, and also confession and repentance. 00:20:43.759 --> 00:20:48.559 So if and when I mess up, I know how to not damage this relationship. 00:20:48.720 --> 00:20:51.200 I run to his grace, I make sacrifice. 00:20:51.279 --> 00:20:55.200 And then also laws that were judicial laws and moral laws. 00:20:55.359 --> 00:20:56.799 Again, we know moral laws. 00:20:56.880 --> 00:21:04.319 When you violate your conscience or you do something you know to be wrong, not only does it hurt the person out there, it hurts the person in here. 00:21:04.640 --> 00:21:05.519 Hurts me. 00:21:05.680 --> 00:21:08.400 It's doing something internally corrupting me. 00:21:08.559 --> 00:21:12.000 So he's like, the the moral law is designed to get this right. 00:21:12.240 --> 00:21:15.920 The judicial law is when I get this wrong, how do I make it right? 00:21:16.319 --> 00:21:17.759 How do we get justice back? 00:21:17.920 --> 00:21:21.440 And then again, the ceremonial law has me and God on the same page. 00:21:21.519 --> 00:21:32.880 And when I understand that, okay, that I've been forgiven and I've dealt with it, now I can move on from it and I can find internal shalom and peace again and fullness and security and safety and all the things in the range of meaning. 00:21:33.119 --> 00:21:34.559 Am I talking too fast? 00:21:34.799 --> 00:21:35.759 Are you all with me? 00:21:35.920 --> 00:21:36.240 Okay. 00:21:36.480 --> 00:21:38.400 So this is what God's been doing the whole time. 00:21:38.559 --> 00:21:43.359 He's been trying to do through the whole Old Testament, and what happened is it wasn't working quite well. 00:21:43.519 --> 00:21:44.720 And so he says, you know what? 00:21:44.799 --> 00:21:53.119 The same thing I promised to Abraham that I'm going to make a great nation through you, but I want to bless the world, is fulfilled in Jesus. 00:21:53.359 --> 00:21:59.759 So Jesus comes, uh dies on the cross, he comes, he takes on our sin, and now establishes a new covenant that remains. 00:22:00.240 --> 00:22:01.680 Right relationship with God. 00:22:01.839 --> 00:22:02.960 Okay, think about this. 00:22:03.119 --> 00:22:07.759 Before the law was, I'm going to try to get the law right so I can please God. 00:22:08.799 --> 00:22:11.759 Through Jesus, the gospel is what we just said. 00:22:12.000 --> 00:22:21.519 My righteousness, my justification, the healing of my relationship with God is not because I'm going to nail it all the time or you are. 00:22:21.680 --> 00:22:27.440 It's because God made he who had no sin, Jesus, to become sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God. 00:22:27.680 --> 00:22:29.279 I've been crucified with Christ. 00:22:29.359 --> 00:22:38.799 Nevertheless, I live, yet not I, but Christ lives in me, and the life I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. 00:22:39.039 --> 00:22:39.440 Alright? 00:22:39.519 --> 00:22:44.160 That God demonstrated his love toward us and that while we were sinners, Christ died for us. 00:22:44.400 --> 00:22:56.000 And so now my my my righteousness or the up, the up part of my relationship with God is not because I was able to law my way up to him. 00:22:56.400 --> 00:23:00.400 It was that Jesus came down to me and sacrificed for me. 00:23:02.240 --> 00:23:05.440 So now I understand how this takes place. 00:23:05.599 --> 00:23:09.599 And when I have the upright, of course, that's gonna affect the in. 00:23:10.079 --> 00:23:11.759 It's gonna bring me at peace with myself. 00:23:11.839 --> 00:23:15.920 It's gonna help me to make peace with my failures and my mistakes and my flesh. 00:23:16.000 --> 00:23:20.400 And I know I'm not gonna nail it, but I'm gonna run to his grace and I'm gonna keep running to his grace. 00:23:20.559 --> 00:23:33.759 And so so the reason I bring this up is because when when I say gospel, and I ask you what is the gospel, and I ask you what you think the gospel is, most of us would stop at the up and in. 00:23:35.200 --> 00:23:39.599 We think that it's all just up and in, it's just me getting right with God through Jesus. 00:23:39.839 --> 00:23:43.839 And what I would say is the gospel starts there, but it does not stop there. 00:23:44.480 --> 00:23:53.039 So as Paul is writing the Galatians, he's like, he's writing all kinds of stuff about guys, it's by grace that we've been right with God, not by our ability to keep the law. 00:23:53.200 --> 00:23:56.319 He says, Don't rebuild what you tore down. 00:23:56.640 --> 00:23:57.519 Don't do that. 00:23:57.680 --> 00:24:02.000 He said, guys, we're we're Jews, we grew up in this, we were trained in this. 00:24:02.240 --> 00:24:05.359 We we we we knew it before we could read it, we understood it. 00:24:05.440 --> 00:24:08.000 It was part of our culture and we couldn't do it. 00:24:08.160 --> 00:24:15.599 Now we're gonna take people who it's not part of their culture and try to get them to follow every letter of the law, trying to earn their way up to God. 00:24:15.759 --> 00:24:20.880 Come on, guys, look at the history books, look at our own lives, look at us. 00:24:21.039 --> 00:24:21.839 We can't do it. 00:24:22.079 --> 00:24:25.119 He's like, so now we're gonna take and we're gonna saddle them with it? 00:24:25.359 --> 00:24:29.039 He said, You're you're doing a different gospel and it's no gospel at all. 00:24:29.119 --> 00:24:36.720 And then again, he uses all the rhetoric around, you know, that you're actually creating sin and that it's gonna curse you. 00:24:36.880 --> 00:24:41.039 This thing, this Jesus came to set you free, and now you're gonna live in curse. 00:24:41.119 --> 00:24:47.519 And so so he's saying all of that about the up and in, but you cannot miss it when you read the book of Galatians. 00:24:47.680 --> 00:24:51.759 Paul is writing about community, he's writing about the out. 00:24:52.319 --> 00:24:56.880 He goes nose to nose with Peter because he goes, What are you doing, man? 00:24:57.200 --> 00:25:02.160 These people that we've been called to the ends of the earth, and now we've actually welcomed them to the table. 00:25:02.319 --> 00:25:08.640 And when you're at the table with them, you treat them like brothers, and then when these other people come in, you treat them like second-class citizens. 00:25:08.799 --> 00:25:16.079 He said, You are obstructing, you are subverting the gospel, which we would go, no, what do you mean subverting the gospel? 00:25:16.319 --> 00:25:18.319 He's not saying that they're not up, in, and up. 00:25:18.480 --> 00:25:20.319 He says, No, the problem is out. 00:25:20.720 --> 00:25:24.799 The gospel's not just up and in, the gospel's out. 00:25:25.119 --> 00:25:31.200 He says, the true gospel is not just a personal relationship with God. 00:25:31.680 --> 00:25:38.160 It starts there as a personal relationship with God and what God did for me and my right standing with God. 00:25:38.400 --> 00:25:42.480 But the full gospel goes from up and in to out. 00:25:43.039 --> 00:25:57.680 And now welcoming people different from me to the table fellowship to go, I'm not treating you as other and I'm not treating you as different, and I'm not pushing you away, but I'm I'm I'm welcoming you in. 00:25:58.000 --> 00:25:59.839 Uh let's look at some of these passages. 00:26:00.000 --> 00:26:01.519 Galatians 1, 6 and 7. 00:26:01.599 --> 00:26:09.440 He says, I'm astonished you're so quickly deserting the one who called you to live in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel. 00:26:10.160 --> 00:26:12.960 Verse 7, which is really no gospel at all. 00:26:13.359 --> 00:26:18.000 Evidently, some people are throwing you into confusion or trying to pervert the gospel of Christ. 00:26:18.319 --> 00:26:32.720 By the way, I can't tell you how many people I've talked to over the years who understand the theological logic or the answers. 00:26:33.359 --> 00:26:44.880 That have not allowed, they have not been able to have the gospel fully take root in their lives because it's still just words on a page or songs in a hymn. 00:26:45.119 --> 00:26:48.400 Uh it's it's all uh it's all speeches from a preacher. 00:26:48.720 --> 00:26:54.000 They they've never been able been at a table and feel like they could be naked and unashamed. 00:26:55.119 --> 00:27:01.839 They've not sat at a table feeling completely loved, feeling shalom, peace, security. 00:27:01.920 --> 00:27:03.200 They still have walls up. 00:27:03.839 --> 00:27:07.119 Just because you wear a cross around your neck doesn't mean I can trust you. 00:27:08.079 --> 00:27:23.119 And so he's saying this is the issue is the gospel when it's only rhetoric, when it's only speech, when it's only theological, fill-in-the-blank, when it's only belief, and it doesn't turn into the table. 00:27:23.440 --> 00:27:39.119 And I'm not talking about think of the table metaphorically, I'm saying my ability to sit with you, to receive you, to accept you, to love you as who you are, to offer the grace, to demonstrate the unbelievable grace of God. 00:27:39.279 --> 00:27:40.480 I mean, come on, let's be honest. 00:27:40.720 --> 00:27:43.440 All of us have a hard time accepting the grace of God. 00:27:43.519 --> 00:27:44.400 You're like, really? 00:27:45.680 --> 00:27:46.079 Really? 00:27:46.319 --> 00:27:47.839 Like, because I know me. 00:27:48.720 --> 00:27:50.960 I know me, and I haven't forgiven me. 00:27:51.519 --> 00:27:54.559 And you're telling me he's forgiven me, I haven't forgiven me. 00:27:55.279 --> 00:27:59.119 It's hard to accept that type of grace. 00:27:59.519 --> 00:28:08.160 And I think the fulfillment of God's grace happens when you start to see glimpses of it in somebody else. 00:28:09.039 --> 00:28:16.400 Somebody welcoming you in a way you're like, it's gonna take me a while to get comfortable with this type of love and this type of grace. 00:28:16.720 --> 00:28:20.799 I might even test you a little bit because I just I've been burned too many times. 00:28:21.119 --> 00:28:24.480 To be able to come to a table, to be able to trust at a table. 00:28:24.720 --> 00:28:29.279 The gospel starts as a personal relationship with you and God, but that's the start. 00:28:29.440 --> 00:28:31.279 It doesn't stop there, it has to go out. 00:28:31.440 --> 00:28:50.079 And in Galatians, Paul clearly is wound up, is going into his diatribe, is going into his intense energy, not around the fact that they don't just get the God's grace for them, but that it's not spilling into the community and the Gentiles. 00:28:50.319 --> 00:28:53.839 Um two more things, and I'll be done. 00:28:54.400 --> 00:29:03.759 Um So Paul Paul says he uses this really intense language in Galatians 5.12. 00:29:04.640 --> 00:29:11.920 So Galatians 5.12, he's talking about the Judaizers who who are perpetuating this legalistic mindset. 00:29:12.079 --> 00:29:19.839 And he says in Galatians 5.12, he says, as for those agitators, I wish they would go the whole way and emasculate themselves. 00:29:20.240 --> 00:29:25.119 Alright, so that's that's not normally like things we talk about in church. 00:29:25.279 --> 00:29:31.440 Uh, if you don't know what that means, uh I told you circumcision, ask your mom, but emasculate, ask your dad. 00:29:31.519 --> 00:29:34.480 All right, he can he can explain it to you. 00:29:34.640 --> 00:29:44.640 Um, but what he uses here again is is is exaggerated hype hyperbolic rhetoric, which is but you gotta look at what he's saying, right? 00:29:44.720 --> 00:29:55.200 So there's a little play on words, and that he's going, these people who are emphatically, rigidly requiring the removal of the foreskin in order to be accepted at the table. 00:29:55.279 --> 00:30:02.000 I won't accept you unless you fit my culture to a T, unless you're a proselyte, unless you you do it all, you know, then any okay. 00:30:02.160 --> 00:30:03.839 He so he's using the idea of foreskin. 00:30:04.079 --> 00:30:06.319 He's like, you know what, I wish they would just cut it all off. 00:30:06.400 --> 00:30:08.160 So he's kind of using that whole thing. 00:30:08.319 --> 00:30:19.839 But but the second part of what he's really saying is he's saying, not that I wish they would actually do that, but he's saying, you know, this attitude needs to stop making babies. 00:30:22.319 --> 00:30:31.200 This this whole way of behaving and treating people, it needs to be cut off. 00:30:32.079 --> 00:30:35.200 It needs to no longer be able to reproduce. 00:30:35.519 --> 00:30:37.920 It needs to stop with this generation. 00:30:38.640 --> 00:30:50.559 At some point, we need to come to a place where we love each other enough to be able to work our way through what really is what really is worth expelling someone from your table? 00:30:51.119 --> 00:31:06.160 Am I just taking my version of Jubilees and my version of 2nd Maccabees and all this stuff of, you know what, you'd be better spit it out and live honorable than to die defiled and going, yeah, I mean that made sense, but you know, is that really, is this really what God wants? 00:31:06.240 --> 00:31:12.880 And you know, I know I always love sermons that have this real clear answer to all of it, and we go, okay, everybody go do the same thing. 00:31:13.119 --> 00:31:15.440 The reality is this takes some real soul searching. 00:31:15.519 --> 00:31:25.279 It takes searching within God's word, it takes the Holy Spirit searching your heart to go, Lord, is there anywhere that I like, frankly, the Judaizers who were not bad people? 00:31:25.759 --> 00:31:35.200 They were people simply who were confused around what is worth unfriending and drawing lines in the sand and rejecting people over. 00:31:35.359 --> 00:31:38.559 What is what is actually corrupted character? 00:31:38.960 --> 00:31:41.039 What is actually a wolf? 00:31:41.200 --> 00:31:42.480 What is actually a snake? 00:31:42.559 --> 00:31:51.440 And what is someone whose culture or the way they behave or the way they think is different from me, and it's confusing me and it's making me uncomfortable. 00:31:52.640 --> 00:31:54.400 I'm almost done. 00:31:55.839 --> 00:32:05.359 So when I use terms like terms like gospel and apostle and evangelist, those are churchy terms. 00:32:05.599 --> 00:32:10.720 So when I'm in here, if you don't go to church, I gotta explain what gospel is, I gotta explain what apostle isn't. 00:32:11.440 --> 00:32:15.279 It's literally the opposite problem that they had in the first century. 00:32:15.519 --> 00:32:20.799 So in the first century, apostle, evangelist, and gospel were not church terms. 00:32:20.880 --> 00:32:24.160 They were Greco-Roman Empire terms. 00:32:24.559 --> 00:32:26.720 So a gospel was a Yuan Gileon. 00:32:26.960 --> 00:32:29.839 It was an announcement, a big announcement of good news. 00:32:30.079 --> 00:32:35.519 An emperor had a baby, or we just won a big war, or hey, our way of life is coming to town. 00:32:35.680 --> 00:32:37.680 Uh, good positive changes on the way. 00:32:37.759 --> 00:32:39.920 It was a it was a massive announcement. 00:32:40.160 --> 00:32:48.240 Um, an evangelist, so if you look at Yuan Gileon, it actually materialized into an evangelist, it means an evangelist was somebody that would go make the announcement. 00:32:48.559 --> 00:33:02.160 But an apostle was a delegate, an emissary, someone given the authority of the emperor to go into a community and to execute the values of the empire into that place. 00:33:02.319 --> 00:33:05.599 This isn't just good news, guys, we're here. 00:33:05.759 --> 00:33:07.359 Good news, guys, believe this. 00:33:07.599 --> 00:33:17.279 It wasn't just an announcement connected to a belief, it was the full installation of a culture and change and behavior, a way of life. 00:33:17.759 --> 00:33:20.240 So when you see the apostle Paul, this is what he's doing. 00:33:20.319 --> 00:33:23.119 He's going, guys, we've done pretty good at evangelism. 00:33:23.279 --> 00:33:26.079 We've been pretty good at making the announcement. 00:33:26.240 --> 00:33:28.559 We've been pretty good at telling everybody we're coming. 00:33:28.640 --> 00:33:40.480 We've done good at telling everybody what to believe, but he's going, as an apostle, it's incumbent upon me to not only tell people what to believe, but for us this to actually show up with grace in our community. 00:33:40.880 --> 00:33:44.720 And so this is where he is willing to go nose to nose with Peter. 00:33:44.799 --> 00:33:49.759 He's willing to confront him, he's willing uh to have that conflict. 00:33:50.160 --> 00:33:59.039 And so here's what I want to uh encourage us to do coming out of this, is I want to encourage you to take some time. 00:33:59.279 --> 00:34:01.039 And I don't think this is gonna happen like this. 00:34:01.200 --> 00:34:04.720 I think this is gonna be a sincere prayer. 00:34:04.799 --> 00:34:15.840 If you see the gospel as starting as a personal relationship, but ultimately becoming part of out how you who's at your table, right? 00:34:16.000 --> 00:34:18.239 And I I can already hear some of your questions. 00:34:18.320 --> 00:34:21.199 You're like, wait, so do we never draw the line in the sand anywhere? 00:34:21.280 --> 00:34:22.960 Is this conduct doesn't matter? 00:34:23.119 --> 00:34:23.920 Anything goes. 00:34:24.000 --> 00:34:30.559 I'm just supposed to let everybody, no matter how what they do and what they say, and what about uh bad company corrupts good character? 00:34:30.639 --> 00:34:31.440 And what about all this stuff? 00:34:31.519 --> 00:34:32.239 What are we gonna do? 00:34:32.400 --> 00:34:33.360 Stay tuned, all right? 00:34:33.440 --> 00:34:34.800 That's why we're doing seven weeks. 00:34:34.960 --> 00:34:35.920 We're doing seven weeks. 00:34:36.000 --> 00:34:36.960 We're gonna get to that. 00:34:37.119 --> 00:34:38.079 We're gonna get to that. 00:34:38.159 --> 00:34:41.519 But but but for now, for today, for today, for now. 00:34:41.599 --> 00:34:43.039 This is enough for today. 00:34:43.280 --> 00:34:57.840