All Nations Blessed
Galatians 3:1-14
God is faithful, and has demonstrated His faithfulness to us through the generations. That is largely what Paul is proclaiming today in our text.
Today we’ll be in Galatians 3:1-14.
The title of the message is “All Nations Blessed”
The Seven Stages of Influence: Stages 3, 4, and 5
You’ll remember that we mentioned previously the seven concentric circles of concern, and the seven stages of influence.
Today I want us to extend our consideration to stages 3, 4, and 5.
Stage 3:
Earley says that prayer is not just a warm up exercise, but a continuous posture of intimate fellowship with a Holy God.
Did you hear that? What does that mean?
It means that we pray without ceasing…and we work with God through prayer doesn’t mean that we bend His will. We hear and see where He is working, and that is amplified as we seek fellowship with Him. And we join Him in it.
As we approach our day, we approach it in prayer, and He engineers circumstances for us to step through doors of opportunity and He draws people to Jesus.
Stage 4:
Earley talks about how as we pray for those people in our concentric areas of concern, we will begin to recognize those who do not have a saving relationship with Jesus Christ. What does this practically look like?
Let others know where you stand:
“But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin” (1 John 1:7).
One does not need to preach sermons to have their personnel/co-workers/neighbors know what they believe, and there are advantages to them understanding where you stand. When your people know about your faith, it not only contributes to keeping you accountable by challenging you to maintain your integrity, it also helps them to understand the basis for your decisions and behavior.
Stage 5:
Show God’s love by meeting needs.
Earley says “when you show God’s love to a needy world, it becomes visual evidence that He is working in your heart to love people.”
You have opportunities every day to express the love of Christ, and that choice leads to relationships and conversations.
Not just with your close family, but with your friends, co-workers, neighbors, and complete strangers.
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1 foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? It was before your eyes that Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified. 2 Let me ask you only this: Did you receive the Spirit by works of the law or by hearing with faith? 3 Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh? 4 Did you suffer so many things in vain—if indeed it was in vain? 5 Does he who supplies the Spirit to you and works miracles among you do so by works of the law, or by hearing with faith— 6 just as Abraham “believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness”?
7 Know then that it is those of faith who are the sons of Abraham. 8 And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying, “In you shall all the nations be blessed.” 9 So then, those who are of faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith. 10 For all who rely on works of the law are under a curse; for it is written, “Cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the Book of the Law, and do them.” 11 Now it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law, for “The righteous shall live by faith.” 12 But the law is not of faith, rather “The one who does them shall live by them.” 13 Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us—for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree”— 14 so that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, so that we might receive the promised Spirit through faith.
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10 foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? It was before your eyes that Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified.
Have you ever watched something or someone and perceived the outcome before it happens?
We must remember as we read this text that Paul has a deep love for the churches in Galatia, and like a parent who is watching their child getting ready to do something that will hurt them…he is warning them.
He has witnessed the impact of false teaching and the divergent path that it leads the church down. As we have been saying since the beginning of our study of Galatians, the Gospel plus or minus anything is a false gospel.
So anyone perpetuating a false gospel, or willing to sit and listen to the false gospel is like someone who has been swayed by pagan magic.
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He goes on to say, It was before your eyes that Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified.
Let’s be careful not to read into Paul’s words here. We could read this and perceive that the members of the Galatian church were eyewitnesses to the crucifixion of Jesus. This is not the case. There may have been a select few who were there…but look at the map.
Where was Jesus Crucified? Jerusalem. Where is Galatia? Southwestern Asia.
Galatia is roughly 448 miles from Jerusalem. So how could they have been eyewitnesses?
In other words, Paul and others have publicly stated that Jesus was crucified. The Galatians received the true Gospel, and there are false teachers who have infiltrated the church and are teaching that one must add to the effectiveness of the Gospel.
This is a LIE! Paul in true Pauline fashion begins to incite thought with a list of rhetorical questions.
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Look at verses 2-6:
2 Let me ask you only this: Did you receive the Spirit by works of the law or by hearing with faith? 3 Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh? 4 Did you suffer so many things in vain—if indeed it was in vain? 5 Does he who supplies the Spirit to you and works miracles among you do so by works of the law, or by hearing with faith— 6 just as Abraham “believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness”?
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We know how the Spirit was received. That is an obvious answer in the experience of a believer, but also explicitly stated in the word.
Romans 5:1-5 says:
2Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. 2 Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. 3 Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, 4 and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, 5 and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.
Having been justified by faith and peace with Him through Jesus we now receive the Spirit.
So having received the Spirit by Faith in Jesus, what can we add to our salvation? Nothing! Pauls exact words related to the one who attempts this is “anayatos”.
1. not understood, unintelligible;
2. generally active, not understanding, unwise, foolish
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After the rhetorical questions, Paul goes to the father of faithfulness, Abraham.
He says Just as Abraham “believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness”.
Did Abraham have his own righteousness? Like Paul’s, his righteousness was as filthy rags before a holy God. But Abraham BELIEVED GOD! And that is His righteousness.
It is interesting that Paul goes to Abraham here.
Verses 7-9 says:
7 Know then that it is those of faith who are the sons of Abraham. 8 And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying, “In you shall all the nations be blessed.” 9 So then, those who are of faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith.
Verse 7, if you are of faith, you are an heir to the promise (as a son of Abraham).
Paul says the “Scriptures forseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the Gospel beforehand to Abraham saying, “in you shall all the nations be blessed.”
This is so important. The Gospel of Jesus Christ is the story of the Bible. Abraham would be the father of the lineage that leads to the birth of Christ who is the Son of God and came to save the world, Jews first and then the Greeks.
Paul says in Romans 1:16:
For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.
Romans 10:12-17 says:
12 For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same Lord is Lord of all, bestowing his riches on all who call on him. 13 For “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”
14 How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? 15 And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!” 16 But they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Isaiah says, “Lord, who has believed what he has heard from us?” 17 So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.
In Genesis 12:3 The Lord says to Abraham:
I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”
So we who have believed are adopted sons and daughters of the Living God. Because someone with beautiful feet has come across our path, and the Lord used them to present to us the saving message of the Gospel of Jesus. All because of the Gospel…our firm foundation.
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Galatians 3:10-11 says:
10 For all who rely on works of the law are under a curse; for it is written, “Cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the Book of the Law, and do them.” 11 Now it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law, for “The righteous shall live by faith.”
Here Paul has transitioned from those that are standing in faith to those who are burdened and under the curse of the law.
Our problem is that everyone born after the fall is born into sin…and condemned apart from the Grace of God extended through His son’s life.
This means that you are burdened and can never overcome that burden by “Things you do”. Abraham believed, had faith in God, and His promise, and it was counted to him as righteousness.
John 1:17 says:
For the Law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.
So verses 12-13 of our text says
10 But the law is not of faith, rather “The one who does them shall live by them.” 13 Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us—for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree”—
Isaiah 53:4-5:
5 Surely he has borne our griefs
and carried our sorrows;
yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted.
5 But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities;
upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed.
God Accomplished this prophecy in the person of His son Jesus Christ.
Jesus came to fulfill the law.
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Verse 14 says:
so that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, so that we might receive the promised Spirit through faith.
God’s love spans to all nations, and that His promises hold true, because apart from Him…we are lost.
The Holy Spirit resides with us who know Christ, and is a re-assurance of our faith in God.
He guides us to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus, not only with our lives, and the way we conduct ourselves…but with our mouths and the message we deliver.
Psalm 33:11-12 says:
11 The counsel of the Lord stands forever, the plans of his heart to all generations.
12 Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord, the people whom he has chosen as his heritage!
We have been praying that in our lifetime we would see Japan become a Christian nation.
How does a nation become Christian?
One person at a time.
Brothers and sisters, you have a rich heritage as a follower of Christ. We pray that all nations would turn to Him, but that is too lofty a goal for us. Our task is not to see the nations come to God, ours is to present the Gospel to the people, or person, in the nation to which we are called.
We are to be the hands and feet of Christ.
Let’s continue to stand firm on our foundation of Jesus Christ.
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Discussion Questions:
Are you overwhelmed by the thought of taking the Gospel to the Nations? When you hear that charge, do you see a nation before you, or one person?
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Have you relied on working your way to God, or is it your joy to do your work in His name, knowing from what and to whom you have been redeemed?
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- As you survey your relationships, who is one person in those six outer concentric circles of concern, with whom God might be leading you to share the gospel?
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Resources:
1. https://www.whosyourone.com
2. Share Jesus Without Fear (by William Fay)
3. And You Will Be My Witnesses (by Matt Queen)
4. Evangelism Is (by Dave Earley)
5. Officer Christian Fellowship Article on Living your faith in the Military.
https://www.ocfusa.org/2010/08/officers-toolbox/?fbclid=IwAR0pT8fdITYjjaIeQVdgXllOGJF4jjl3-Ooazc7sEWg72RuWN4nsVGZECVc
