2^nd Sunday after Pentecost – June 6, 2010

Paul, an apostle—sent not from men nor by man, but by Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised him from the dead— ² and all the brothers with me, To the churches in Galatia: ³ Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, ⁴ who gave himself for our sins to rescue us from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father, ⁵ to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen. ⁶ I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you by the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel— ⁷ which is really no gospel at all. Evidently some people are throwing you into confusion and are trying to pervert the gospel of Christ. ⁸ But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let him be eternally condemned! ⁹ As we have already said, so now I say again: If anybody is preaching to you a gospel other than what you accepted, let him be eternally condemned! ¹⁰ Am I now trying to win the approval of men, or of God? Or am I trying to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a servant of Christ.

There he was at the front door, trying to sell a subscription to a weekly newspaper, and he was very persuasive. “It only costs a quarter a week,” he said, “and the best thing about this newspaper is that it prints only the good news!” In a world filled with trouble, it is becoming more and more difficult to find any “good news.” But for the person who trusts Christ as Savior, the real “Good News” is the Gospel: that “Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures...he was buried…[and] he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures” (1 Cor. 15:3–4). This is the Good News that sinners can be forgiven and go to heaven because of what Jesus Christ did on the cross.

The Good News of salvation through faith in Christ is the most important message in the world. This message had changed Paul’s life. It had changed the lives of others. But now this message was being attacked. Some false teachers had invaded the churches of Galatia, churches Paul had founded, and were teaching a different message from that which Paul had taught. And as you begin to read Paul’s letter to the Galatian Christians, you can immediately notice that something is radically wrong. Instead of his usual section of praise and thanksgiving that we find in his other letters, he launches into a rebuke, “I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting…” This was serious and urgent. There was no time to waste. The Gospel needed to be defended. It was a matter of life or death.

So, what was happening in this church that was so serious? Well, from Paul’s defense of the Gospel in this letter, we see that false teachers had come in and were teaching the people that faith alone couldn’t save them, but they had to do certain works too. Perhaps it was something similar to what we hear in Acts 15, “Some men came down from Judea to Antioch and were teaching the brothers: ‘Unless you are circumcised, according to the custom taught by Moses, you cannot be saved’” (Acts 15:1). The core of what the false teachers were saying was this: “We believe in Jesus Christ, but we have something wonderful to add to what you already believe, and you need it in order to be saved.” Simply put, they were teaching work-righteousness – the idea that a person must do something to be saved. And worst of all, the Christians were buying into it!

So Paul responds without mixing words, “I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you by the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel— ⁷ which is really no gospel at all. Evidently some people are throwing you into confusion and are trying to pervert the gospel of Christ.” Paul couldn’t believe it! How could they, who had received salvation by grace, so easily be persuaded to abandon the peace of forgiveness found in Christ alone just so they could be placed under a burden? How could they exchange freedom in Christ for bondage under the Law? This teaching of salvation by works was NO gospel at all! It wasn’t going to bring spiritual life! It would produce spiritual death! They were guilty of desertion, a Greek word used to describe a military revolt; and not just the desertion of a teaching – they were deserting a person.

That is why the error of work-righteousness is so destructive. If a person believes they are saved by what they do, they desert God - and anyone who deserts God, deserts the forgiveness won for them by Christ Jesus! And anyone who deserts the forgiveness won for them in Christ Jesus, deserts heaven!

The same holds true for us! Yes, that’s right; there is right now an ongoing battle that is raging before us and in us which is a matter of life or death. It is a battle against the false teaching of work-righteousness; a battle to defend the gospel. You see, false teaching lurks around us everywhere, and at the core of these false teachings is the thought that people must do something to be saved. If you don’t believe me just listen to some of the things false teachers are saying about the way to be saved. “Jesus died for you, now you need to prove that you are worthy. You must pay him back.” “Humans are responsible for what they are, they must save themselves.” “True saving faith comes only when you move from a point of moral neutrality to deciding to actually put your trust in him.” These are real teachings of real people in our real world. And no, not just some out of the way, fly by night organization. These are mainstream religions. The teaching of work-righteousness is what stands behind the rejection of infant baptism! It’s what stands behind the thought that most everyone will be in heaven, all you have to do is do your best! Oh the horror of it all! It is constantly bombarding us on the television, through friends, on college campuses – everywhere. And we cannot take this false doctrine lightly, as far too many are in the habit of doing today when they say, “Oh at least they are going to church;” “They’re such good people.” To hold to work-righteousness is not simply changing religion or changing churches, it is abandoning the very grace of God. That’s why it is so destructive. To believe that works are necessary for salvation is to call the work of Christ insufficient, and to call the work of Christ insufficient is to reject the one thing that makes us acceptable to God.

And it isn’t just the outside forces at work against us, there is an inside one as well. You see, we were born with this natural religion of work-righteousness. That’s what makes this false teaching so appealing to us. The heart with which we entered the world doesn’t know the love of God in Jesus, but instead thinks that each individual must bear the burden of their sin and make themselves right with God. It’s this sinful nature we still carry with us today that leads us to be tempted to think that we have met God’s requirements just because we go to church each Sunday, or because we think our life is better in comparison to others, or simply because I am a member of a church. It is this sinful nature that tempts us to measure our worth and value by what we do instead of what Jesus has done for us. But we must always, always struggle against this thought, because if we think that we play even a small part in our salvation, we revolt against the grace of Christ and set ourselves up for either condemning sinful pride or hopeless despair.

You see, taking pride in contributing to salvation is the opposite of faith in Christ. It declares that we desire to find our salvation in what we do rather than in what Christ has done. Paul warns of the awful results of such spiritual pride. “You who are trying to be justified by law have been alienated from Christ; you have fallen away from grace” (Galatians 5:4).

There is an opposite problem as well. Thinking that our salvation depends on us can lead us to despair. As soon as anyone begins to believe that salvation depends on any human effort, doubts arise. After all, if we are going to be saved by what we do, then we are obligated to obey the whole law. If we take that law of God seriously, it will lead us to see we’ve been anything but perfect. Then we have to wonder—will God accept me? Or say, there’s no way that God would accept me! One will wonder if they have done enough to please God. There will be no peace in their heart.

The gospel is not “follow Christ and imitate his life.” There is no place in the heart of a believer to believe that salvation is attained by keeping the law. Rather, the gospel is “receive Christ by faith and allow him to set you free.” The believer depends on God to meet his needs. That is exactly what Paul pointed the Galatian Christians to at the outset of his letter. “Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, ⁴ who gave himself for our sins to rescue us from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father.”

Here is the heart and soul of the good news. Our salvation is centered on a person, but that person is not ourselves! That person is Jesus, the Son of God. That person is Jesus, the sinless Savior. And Jesus paid a price for us - the price of himself! The price he paid was his voluntary death on the cross. Christ paid that price in order that he might achieve a purpose – rescuing sinners from the power of sin. To pay for our guilt! To win our salvation! Christ died to set us free. Now we are free – free from sin and its power; Satan and his accusations; death and its grip. Free from the wrath of God because Jesus satisfied God’s righteous demands against us and reconciled us to God. Nothing more is needed.

This good news doesn’t focus on what we do, but focuses on the cross. The Lord of heaven and earth gave himself for your sins. That’s how our rescue was accomplished. Christ is your substitute. That’s how precious you and I are to God. Then God made our salvation sure by raising Jesus from the dead. This message was so important that Jesus made sure that it would become known throughout the world. So he called Paul, “an apostle—sent not from men nor by man, but by Jesus Christ and God the Father.” Because what Paul wrote is directly from Jesus, you can count on it. When you and I can count on it, we can count on our salvation. Nothing needs to be added to it. We do not need to desert it for another so-called gospel. We have all we need right here. Here is grace and peace from God our Father! Here is how God feels about us! Here we are led to look away from ourselves and focus on this: The Father chose to rescue us. The Son gave himself for us. The Spirit inspired the apostles to record this message. We don’t deserve God’s favor. But the gospel announces that God looks on us with favor. Isn’t this the truth the centurion of our Gospel lesson knew. He recognized his own unworthiness to stand before the Lord. Instead, he humbly trusted in his Lord’s undeserved grace.

“To oppose God’s wrath with our good works is like trying to extinguish a fire by throwing straw on it” (Martin Luther). It just doesn’t work. No, the answer to God’s wrath is the “good news” that we are forgiven and can go to heaven because of what Jesus Christ did for us. This good news is found in the gospel in God’s Word. Therefore, let us hold dearly to and defend the true Gospel. And with the Holy Spirit’s, help struggle to always trust in the Word of God! It is, after all, a matter of life or death. Amen.