By Faith or Works?
Notes
Transcript
Columbo
Columbo
And yet the structure here isn’t entirely Paul asking sincere questions that he wants answers to. Rather, he is asking questions that he wants them ponder and realize their own error. He’s asking them questions that they might realize the ideas that they hold do not hold up.
Do any of you remember Columbo? That might seem like a weird question from me since it’s a little before my time… But for those who are unfamiliar
Columbo was a TV show that started airing in the 70’s. The main character, Columbo, was a police detective - had this trench coat and a short stubby cigar. A bit goofy in his appearance. But the reason I mention this character is his method of solving cases.
He would continue to questions gathering as much evidence as possible until he would get a confession out of the guilty party. And often times these questions would drive the person he was interrogating crazy.
Now I learned about Columbo in seminary. We read a book called Tactics that introduces evangelism methods. One of them is called the Columbo method. The method is described by asking “carefully selected questions to disarm the other person and push the conversation along.” You get into a conversation with someone and as time goes on you ask “well why do you believe that?” “I don’t know.” “Well it doesn’t seem to be wise to believe something without reason.” And the whole goal is through the questioning is for the other person to realize that their worldview is faulty and then present them with the good news of Jesus without them getting overly defensive.
So Paul’s questions are sort of like that here… except that Paul is more so talking to them like a disappointed parent than an inquisitive detective. And I think we all know that “I’m disappointed in you!” is that parental sentence that cuts to the bone. Though Paul’s language is still a bit stronger than a disappointed parent - though an extremely angry disappointed parent who has just learned of their kids crashing the brand new family car might match.
Paul’s Tone
Paul’s Tone
He isn’t concerned with them being defensive or torn down - he wants them to realize the error of their theology that they might repent.
However, before we move to what Paul is saying taking note of how Paul is speaking. I said before that this is the angriest of Paul’s letters, and the language in Paul’s text demonstrates that. Just look at how he calls them foolish twice. Which is also interesting given the nature of the nature of Paul’s letter to the Corinthians. The nature of Paul’s letter to the corinthians is that a man has been sexually immoral and taken his step mom, and the church hasn’t handled it properly and Paul is perplexed - but here in Galatians he is angry because of heresy - because of false teaching. And I think this should really lead us to stop and ask - What makes you this angry?
What causes you to be righteously angry?
I asked this because it shows your priorities. Many will be quick to get angry over minor inconveniences, and then shrug your shoulders at the television preacher who is breathing our heretical lies, and using the name of Jesus to get rich.
You get upset when you are driving down in the valley and someone nearly hits your car as they cut you off - because we all know they drive worse there. You already don’t want to be there - no one knows you there, you’re in the car by yourself and what do you say? Please don’t answer that out loud - like Paul’s questions here that’s rhetorical. Now is that anger from that minor inconvenience on par with Paul’s anger here? is it as justified?
Many people get really upset about politics - and there’s plenty of reason to - but do you get equally upset when your side misuses the Scriptures for their benefit as the other side does? We get angry when the president recognized “Transgender Visibility Day” and ignores Easter - even though he’s supposed to be Super Catholic… but do we also get angry when on the other you have those claiming to be “Christian Nationalists” when they show no sign of even being Christian - as demonstrated by their affairs, divorces, and sexual immorality. By their actions they blaspheme as they use the name of Jesus to garner votes. We should be angry at all of that - but also mourn, and pray for their repentance. These people are lost and desperately need Christ - though they are taking his name in vain.
And my goal isn’t to “get political” but this is right in front of us. But really provoke the question of what causes us to get angry - and does that match Paul’s righteous anger here.
Paul shows a white hot anger toward this church over their adding works to the gospel. Paul is angry over false teaching.
In other words, are you more zealous for the purity of the gospel as you are for minor interruptions and inconveniences in life?
Paul is not being nice. The Bible is not nice. In our culture we have something that many people have deemed the “11th Commandment” though shalt be nice. Well nice people don’t say things like “O foolish Galatians! who has bewitched you?” But Paul is more concerned with their eternal souls than he is their feelings.
Paul is calling a spade a spade. They have so quickly departed from the gospel that was proclaimed among them - and now Paul is addressing them as is. Paul has no tolerance for false teaching.
6 I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel—
Paul’s Questions
Paul’s Questions
To further demonstrate the degree to which Paul is upset, but also perplexed, this first question “Who has bewitched you?” That word for bewitched is only used here in the entire new testament. And it means exactly as it sounds - “to cast a spell over”. Paul is asserting that the Galatians have become the victim of a nefarious supernatural ploy to deceive them. They have been deceived by the spell of these false teachers.
And false teaching certainly can be like witchcraft - it pulls you in, it is alluring, hard to resist if someone, like Paul, or something, like the word of God, doesn’t break you out of the stupor.
Paul gives the reason for why he is so angry/perplexed - it’s because Christ was publicly proclaimed among them. Paul is referring back to when he was physically in front of them in Galatia, during his first missionary journey preaching the gospel to them. But it’s not only that, it’s also that Paul was among them suffering for the gospel.
Verse 2:
You might wonder what Paul means when he writes “let me ask you only this” in verse 2 when he asks 5 questions between 1 and 6. It might sound a little like Columbo’s “Just one more thing” except that this isn’t the end of Paul’s statement.
And Paul’s not asking them only one thing. But the essence of what Paul is trying to say is: I want to learn one thing from you. But he’s also not really trying to learn from them - he knows the real answer to the question. Though if they answer in correctly it will reveal a lot about their beliefs.
And thus the question he asks is How did you receive the Holy Spirit. Did you earn it by your works, or did you receive it as a gift by hearing with faith?
Unless they were completely bewitched and turned around by these false teachers they would have no reason to answer that it was by works of the law. The Spirt is a gift received, not a wage earned.
The very language of gift implies that we cannot earn it. And though Paul does not use the language of gift here.
The book of Acts regularly states that the Holy Spirit is a gift.
Acts 2:38, 8:15, 10:45, 11:17.
Thus to put this argument back into the overall context of Galatians Paul is showing them that they cannot earn the Spirit that they were given upon salvation by circumcision, dietary restrictions, or obedience to the works of the law. And thus connecting this back to last Sunday - Paul is further pressing the theology of justification coming from faith by hearing, not through achievement.
As I’ve quoted before, Jonathan Edwards said, “The only thing we bring to our salvation is the sin that makes it necessary.”
And Paul in verse 5 asks a very similar question.
But in between those questions in Gal 3:3
3 Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh?
In verse 3, Paul again calls them foolish. This repetition should really point us to how serious Paul takes this issue. As I mentioned last week the doctrine of justification by faith is key to the protestant reformation - and yet at times it can maybe feel like we assume, or maybe take that doctrine for granted. We know that we are saved by faith and not by works - and so either we abuse that by thinking to ourselves “what’s a little sin? grace will cover it.” That’s the opposite end of the issue - which is also foolish. While this is the opposite, it’s what’s called antinomianism. The key word in that is nomos… meaning law. So anti-law. It means that those subscribing to this reject God’s law and seek to embrace grace. Thus emphasizing grace and diminishing obedience to God’s commands. Paul addresses this in Romans, as does John in 1 John.
I say this as it seems that we all have the tendency to swing on a pendulum between antinomianism and legalism. We’re either rest too much on grace and undermining God’s call for us to be obedient, or we’re trusting too much in our own deeds.
And yet in Paul’s question he’s asking them about something that is impossible.
The flesh does not and cannot finish/make perfect what the spirit started. v. 3.
Paul similarly says as much in Phil 1:6.
6 And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.
While we don’t know what they suffered as implied by verse 4, we can assume that they suffered something. Their conversion to Christianity did not cost them nothing. Yet it seems that their adoption of circumcision would lessen the brunt of their conversion.
But also by the statement made by Paul here. Suffering is not meaningless. They only reason their suffering would be in vain is if they suffered for their faith only to backpedal and reject that faith. But in suffering the Christian is refined, discipled, and further brought to maturity. In suffering the gospel is proclaimed. Romans 5:3–5 “Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, 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.”
The question that Paul asks in verse 5 is also very similar to this question in verse 2.
The Gospel of Abraham
The Gospel of Abraham
The conclusion again being that God provided the Spirit to them by hearing with faith - not by their own works. Yet here Paul then later connects his statement to Abraham. And this is significant for many reasons.
Remember that Paul is writing to the Gentiles in Galatia. Not Jews, he’s writing to Christians. Thus these are people who were not previously connected to the promise of Abraham. And yet Paul is referring back to the beginning of the Jewish people, and to the beginning of the promise to Abraham in Genesis 15. Before there even was a people what was it that qualified Abraham?
He was a pagan at the time the Lord called him. He didn’t even follow God. And yet the Lord called him out of that - and what does the text tell us about Abraham’s righteousness?
6 And he believed the Lord, and he counted it to him as righteousness.
So even going back to to Abraham there was justification by faith. Abraham wasn’t saved by his good works, or by his blood or by his circumcision - but Abraham was saved by his faith. The true mark of the covenant was not circumcision but faith.
So then in verse 7, Paul draws the conclusion that the sons of Abraham are the ones who have faith. Not just faith as an esoteric concept but faith in Christ Jesus.
Which of course leads us to the question… how did Abraham believe in Jesus?
56 Your father Abraham rejoiced that he would see my day. He saw it and was glad.”
This is where Jesus tells the Jews before “Abraham was I am.” And the Jews soon after pick up rocks to stone him, but Jesus escapes. Jesus is communicating two things. He’s speaking of his preeminence - He has no beginning and no end. There was never a time when he was not.
But in addition to that Jesus is also speaking of how his advent was not a secret, nor plan B. But intended from the beginning. Abraham longed for the Messiah, Abraham looked forward to the day when the offspring of Eve, the snake crusher, would be born and save his people. Abraham may not have known the details, but he looked to the day when God would save his people.
But also let’s look to the last two verse of this text to further answer this question.
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 8 - Paul asserts that the promise that is made to Abraham in Genesis 12:3 is that God would justify the gentiles by faith. The grafting in of the Gentiles is not because Israel failed and didn’t uphold the covenant - though that is true - God planned before he even made Abram into Abraham - before his name is changed to Abraham, meaning blessed father - before he is even a father, and before Israel is even a people - God has already planned that he would bless all nations of the earth through Abraham. Though God promises to give Abraham children, and land, Paul elevates the promise that Abraham will be made into a blessing, and that all nations will be blessed through him. And even more than that Paul is stating that the true sons of Abraham are not the ones who have his blood running through their veins, but those who believe that Jesus is the Christ, and that Jesus is the fulfillment of that promise made to Abraham. Jesus is the source by which Abraham is a blessing to all nations. Paul in Romans 11 describes the blessing of all nations with the gentiles as branches on an olive tree that have been grafted into the root (Jesus), and Jews who have rejected him are branches who have been removed.
And in addition to that Paul in Romans 9:6 makes the argument that the descendants of Abraham who reject Christ are not true Israel, but those who believe in Christ, those who have been justified by faith are the true children of Abraham. God’s people believe in God, and obey his commands.
One More Thing
One More Thing
Paul doesn’t end his argument here in verse 9. From here Paul will go on to argue that no one can keep the law and the righteous live by faith - and beyond that Jesus takes on the curse of the law for us. And it’s in next week’s text that Paul brings into full circle how in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham comes to the Gentiles. This of course he roots in the truth of the gospel and Jesus’ atoning sacrifice.
So as far as the book of Galatians goes the argument continues on as a very logical progression of statements. Though we read them only a few verses at a time and we’re interrupted by headings Paul argument continues to build. He has shown the Galatians that their adoption of this belief that they need to add works to their salvation is foolish - but rather than the goal was always faith. Paul will continue to demonstrate that “Those who believe in Jesus Christ share fully in the blessings God promised to Abraham.”
Don’t add works to the gospel.
Go tell someone about the wonderful gift of salvation that is found in Christ Jesus.
New Hampshire Baptist Confession of Faith 1833:
V. Of Justification
We believe that the great gospel blessing which Christ secures to such as believe in him is justification; that justification includes the pardon of sin, and the promise of eternal life on principles of righteousness; that it is bestowed not in consideration of any works of righteousness which we have done, but solely through faith in the Redeemer's blood; by virtue of which faith his perfect righteousness is freely imputed to us of God; that it brings us into a state of most blessed peace and favor with God, and secures every other blessing needful for time and eternity.