Pleasing God or Man

Sovereign Grace Family Church iconSovereign Grace Family Church

5 views

0 comments

00:00
It is good to see you all again.
00:02
Again, sorry for being out for the past few weeks, but I have been missing you.
00:06
I'm looking forward again to being in our study.
00:09
You can open up your Bibles to Galatians chapter 1.
00:14
We started our study of Galatians several weeks ago, and I have given you the overall context of the book.
00:24
Paul is concerned for the Galatians because false teachers have come in among them and have begun to add to the Gospel message that Paul preached.
00:39
Paul preached a Gospel that was salvation by grace through faith alone, and no work could be added to that grace.
00:52
No work could be added to that faith to make it functional, that you cannot add to the work of Christ.
01:03
And yet, there had been people who had crept in among the Galatians who we identified as the Judaizers.
01:12
Those were the ones who came in and said that unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved.
01:26
We see this in Acts 15.
01:29
We see them moving into where Paul was teaching this message.
01:34
Paul rebuked them, he argued with them, and they ultimately went to Jerusalem and had a council with the disciples, the early apostles, James and Peter, and they discussed with them this issue, and it was resolved at the council of Jerusalem in Acts 15 that a converted Gentile does not have to be circumcised.
02:04
And that is a major change in the New Covenant because in the Old Covenant, if you were not circumcised, you were not part of the covenant.
02:15
You were not part of the people of God unless you were circumcised.
02:21
But now that has changed.
02:23
And in the New Covenant, there is no requirement for circumcision.
02:27
And also, we'll come along with that as we will see, there is really no requirement to keep what we would call the ritual laws of the Old Covenant, which are the dietary restrictions and other such laws.
02:44
The sacrificial restrictions have been done away with because they have been fulfilled in Christ.
02:52
There's no reason to sacrifice lambs anymore because God's Lamb has come.
02:57
There's no reason to go out and sacrifice a goat or anything else for our sins because the once for all sacrifice, which is Christ, has been made and it does not need to be repeated.
03:14
The Bible says in the book of Hebrews, He has for all time saved those or provided the sacrifice for those who are being sanctified.
03:24
Those who are being saved have received their salvation in Him.
03:29
They do not need to try to add to it by adding a new sacrifice or by adding some other action, some other work.
03:40
And so, we read in verse 6.
03:43
We're going to pick up at verse 6, but today we're going to focus on verse 10.
03:46
I just want to pick up the context in verse 6 and we're going to stop at the end of verse 10.
03:54
I'm going to read and then I'm going to say a short prayer.
03:58
Paul says in verse 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.
04:09
Not that there is another one, but there are some who trouble you and want to distort the Gospel of Christ.
04:17
But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a Gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed.
04:26
As we have said before, so now I say again, if anyone is preaching to you a Gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed.
04:37
For am I now seeking the approval of man or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ.
04:52
Let's pray.
04:54
Father in heaven, I thank You for Your Word.
04:57
I pray even now, Lord, that You would fill me with Your Spirit to preach Your Word.
05:03
And I pray that You would keep me from error.
05:06
For I am a fallible man and I am capable of preaching error and I do not want to do that.
05:13
First for the sake of Your name, then for the sake of these men, and also for the sake of my own soul.
05:22
Lord, please keep me from error.
05:25
And Father, also, I pray that You would open up hearts today and that Your Holy Spirit would take the words that are being preached, that they would make it into the ear, down and through the mind, and into the heart, and that they would rattle the souls of these men.
05:41
And Lord, if there are those here today who are seeking to be men-pleasers, Lord, that they would repent and that they would seek to be God-pleasers.
05:52
For Lord, that we would understand that to be right with You is often to be at enmity with the world.
05:59
And to be right with the world is often to be at enmity with You.
06:03
Lord, may it be that we understand this and apply it in Christ's name.
06:10
Amen.
06:13
In verses 6-9 which we studied almost a month ago now, Paul is making the statement that there is no other Gospel.
06:25
He has come and he has already preached the Gospel to these people.
06:29
He has already given them the truth.
06:31
And he says very clearly, if anyone preaches something different than what you have heard, if anyone preaches something different than what you have been given, let them be anathema.
06:43
That is the Greek word there.
06:45
And it means to be separated from God.
06:48
It means to be cursed by God.
06:51
It literally, in our modern vernacular, would mean to be damned.
06:57
So Paul says if anyone is preaching a Gospel that is contrary to the one that you have been given, let him be damned.
07:05
And then he doubles that by saying, as I said before, so I say again.
07:11
If anyone preaches another Gospel, let him be damned.
07:18
This is the context which leads into the next sentence.
07:24
Paul has in this statement in verse 10 a question and an answer.
07:32
And that is how we are going to study it.
07:34
We are going to study it in two parts.
07:36
First, we see the question.
07:40
He says, For am I now seeking the approval of man or of God, or am I trying to please man? That is all a question.
07:51
And then the answer is, if I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ.
08:00
That is the answer to the question.
08:03
It is actually an answer of a conditional statement which we will look at more in a moment how that functions.
08:10
But for now, I want to deal with the question.
08:13
Paul says, For am I now seeking the approval of man or of God? Why would he ask this question? Why is this the immediate question that follows the preceding statement? Remember the preceding statement.
08:34
If anyone preaches a gospel other than what has been preached, let him be damned.
08:39
For am I now seeking the approval of man or of God? Why in the world would he ask this question? Well, John MacArthur says this.
08:54
He says he is referring back to the strong anathemas that he has given in the previous two verses and he is asking, does this sound like I am the type of person who seeks to please people? Think about what he just said.
09:10
He said, if you preach a different gospel than the one that has been preached, let you be damned.
09:17
Now, does that sound like the type of man who seeks to please people? No.
09:25
Does that sound like the type of man who is worried about ruffling a few feathers? Does that sound like a man who is worried about hurting a few feelings? No.
09:35
You say, but why in the world does he even bring this up? Well, I believe and I think that the evidence of the book points this out.
09:46
I believe that these people that have crept in have accused Paul of watering down his message.
09:56
I want you to imagine this.
09:59
Paul comes to the region of Galatia, to the churches of Iconia, Lystra and Derbe and he preaches salvation by grace through faith alone.
10:10
And then he moves on.
10:12
Someone else, this group of Judaizers, come in and they say, whoa, whoa, whoa! Paul said salvation is by grace through faith alone.
10:25
But we have to tell you, that's not the whole story.
10:30
The whole story is this, yes, we're saved by grace, but you've got to be circumcised before grace can have effect.
10:44
Yes, you're saved by faith, but you've got to be circumcised before that faith can really take hold.
10:53
Paul didn't tell you this because Paul didn't want to turn you away.
11:01
He didn't tell you the whole story because he didn't want you to be turned off by his Gospel.
11:09
But we're here to tell you.
11:11
We're here to tell you the whole truth.
11:14
Paul was seeking to please you.
11:18
But we're going to tell you the rest of the story.
11:23
Now do you get the idea? Now again, I'm assuming this, I'm basing this off what Paul said.
11:29
Why would Paul immediately defend the integrity of his message? Because someone's challenging the integrity of his message.
11:38
In fact, the next several verses we're going to study over the next several weeks all the way down to the end of chapter 1 and end of chapter 2 is Paul defending the integrity of his own apostleship.
11:49
These guys have come into town and they've said, man, Paul preached to you Jesus, but he didn't give you the whole story.
11:58
There's a lot of people out there that are like that.
12:01
Saturday mornings, they come wrapping on your chamber door dressed in their nice suits, carrying their awake magazine, or maybe the watchtower, and they'll say, yes, you believe in Jesus, but you don't have the whole story.
12:25
There's more to it.
12:27
You haven't been given the real interpretation.
12:33
Isn't that the Jehovah's Witness motto? You might know a little, but you don't know a right.
12:39
And we're going to correct you.
12:41
If you would like, we'll come back and do a Bible study with you.
12:44
We'll bring a couple of people with us and we'll bring some literature.
12:47
And we'll lay it out on your coffee table and you'll make coffee and we'll sit around and we'll talk about why Jesus isn't God in the flesh.
12:54
And we'll talk about why He wasn't really crucified on a cross, but on a stake.
12:58
And we'll talk about why that matters.
13:03
You see, we look back at Paul's time.
13:07
We don't have modern Judaizers today.
13:08
Actually, we do.
13:10
We have the Hebrew Roots Movement.
13:12
We have the black Hebrew Israelites.
13:15
We have several groups that today try to impose the Old Testament onto the New Testament.
13:22
The Old Covenant commands onto the New Covenant Christian.
13:25
They're still there today, but again, this applies in many other areas.
13:29
People who come and say grace alone is not enough.
13:35
Faith alone is not enough.
13:38
You have not heard the whole truth.
13:44
And the only reason why people preach to you grace alone through faith alone is because they're trying to please you.
13:51
So Paul's response, am I now seeking to please God or man? Or actually, he says it the other way.
14:01
Seeking to please man or God.
14:04
Now do you understand why he's asking the question? Because he's being accused of being a man pleaser.
14:09
He's being accused of being one who preaches with a feather and tickling the ear.
14:16
And I like the fact that he uses the word now.
14:19
Why? Because later in the answer he says if I were still trying to please men.
14:26
And he says in the first part, am I now seeking to please man? You know why I'm pointing that out is because Paul is talking about his current condition, but there was a time when he was seeking to please men.
14:41
There was a time when he was seeking to be a man pleaser.
14:44
When Paul was a Pharisee, Phariseeism was all about man pleasing.
14:52
Pharisees stood among men as the religious elite.
14:58
They had all of the accoutrements of the religious people.
15:03
They had the outfits.
15:05
They had the attitude.
15:06
They had the recognition.
15:09
When they walked down the street, people got out of their way almost like the president walking by and snapping a salute.
15:15
They saw the Pharisees as the religious men and that's what they wanted.
15:20
What did Jesus say? They wanted the recognition of men.
15:25
They wanted the recognition of people.
15:28
And Paul says, I was that.
15:30
I know what it's like to want men to love you.
15:33
I know what it's like to want men to recognize you.
15:38
I know what it's like to want men to respect you.
15:42
I know what that's like and that's what I was.
15:45
But that's not what I am.
15:48
So he asks, am I now seeking to please man? I was.
15:53
I used to.
15:55
But not now.
15:57
Am I now seeking to please man or God? Rather seeking the approval of man or God, am I trying to please man? Again, Paul is defending his integrity.
16:16
Paul has been challenged by preaching grace and he is asking the question, is this what you really think of me? Do you really think I'm here to please man? Now, I want to say something about this.
16:33
In fact, this may seem like I'm taking a left turn, so forgive me and I hope you can track what I'm going to say.
16:41
There are some people who would argue that Paul contradicts himself because here he says ultimately he's not seeking to please man.
16:57
But there are other passages where it seems like he does seek to please men.
17:03
I want to show you a couple.
17:04
If you have your Bibles, turn with me to 1 Corinthians 9.
17:30
Go to verse 19.
17:39
Verse 19, he says this, For though I am free from all men, I have made myself a slave to all so that I might win more.
17:48
To the Jews I became as a Jew so that I might win Jews.
17:52
To those who are under the law as under the law, though not myself being under the law so that I might win those who are under the law.
18:01
To those who are without law as without law, though not being without the law of God, but under the law of Christ so that I might win those who are without law.
18:10
To the weak I became weak that I might win the weak.
18:13
I become all things to all men so that I might by all means save some.
18:20
Stop right there just for a second.
18:23
Some people say, well here look, Paul says in his own words, he has sought to please men.
18:33
When he's with the Jews, he acts like a Jew.
18:36
When he's with the Gentiles, he acts like a Gentile.
18:40
When he's with the weak, he feigns weakness.
18:44
He is going to do whatever it takes to win souls.
18:50
So right there, somebody would say, see, he's a people pleaser.
18:54
He's going to do whatever it takes to win souls.
18:58
Now let's challenge that.
19:00
Because again, that's a challenge from the unbeliever or somebody who's saying, see, Paul is a man pleaser.
19:07
Right here in the text.
19:08
He says, I'm going to please.
19:10
If I'm with the Jews, I'm going to please the Jews.
19:11
When I'm with the Gentiles, I'm going to please the Gentiles.
19:16
Is Paul contradicting himself? No.
19:19
Well yeah, verse 23 really does give the answer.
19:23
He says, I do all things for the sake of the Gospel so that I might become a fellow partaker of it.
19:29
Again, why does Paul say these things in 1 Corinthians 9? And he says it again in chapter 10.
19:35
He says, I try to please everyone and everything.
19:39
You say, but you just said you're not a man pleaser.
19:42
And now you're saying in chapter 10, look at chapter 10, verse 33.
19:45
Verse 33.
19:47
He says, just as I also please all men and all things, not seeking my own profit, but the profit of the many, so that they may be saved.
19:58
He says, I seek to please everyone.
20:01
So in Galatians, he says, am I trying to please men? And the implied answer is no.
20:06
And in Galatians, he says, I try to please everyone.
20:08
And you say, now here's where an atheist comes in and says, oh boy, there's the Bible.
20:12
It just contradicts itself.
20:13
Paul can't even keep his own stuff together.
20:17
Paul can't keep his own act together.
20:19
Surely the Bible contradicts itself.
20:21
Well, no.
20:25
Because both of these require a right understanding of Paul's heart.
20:32
In Galatians, Paul is referring to changing the Gospel.
20:40
How do I know that? verses 6-9 is the context.
20:44
And he says, if anyone preaches a Gospel other than the Gospel that has been preached, let him be accursed.
20:49
That's the context.
20:51
And then he says, am I seeking to please man or please God? And the answer is God by not changing the Gospel.
20:59
Then you go to 1 Corinthians 9 and 1 Corinthians 10.
21:02
He says, when I'm with the Jews, I act like a Jew.
21:04
When I'm with the Gentiles, I act like a Gentile.
21:07
And somebody says, well here, see, he's changing his message.
21:11
No! He's not changing his message.
21:15
He is adapting to the people so that he might have an audience for his message.
21:22
If I walk into a group of Jews eating a BLT, I might have a moment of disconnect.
21:35
Would you agree? If I walk in, you know, and I'm eating a plate from Bono's, a plate of good pork, they might have a little issue with me.
21:47
Even though I'm not a Jew, it might simply be offensive by its very nature.
21:53
And in 1 Corinthians 9 and in chapter 10, Paul is dealing with the issue of offense.
22:03
And he is saying basically this, if there is anything that will keep me from being able to get the message of the Gospel to a person, I'm going to seek to tear that wall down so that I can get the Gospel through.
22:19
If that means when I'm with this person, I've got to eat differently, then I'll eat differently.
22:26
If that means that when I'm with this person, I've got to dress a little differently, then I'm going to dress a little differently.
22:32
And you say, now wait a minute, that seems like he's acquiescing or that he is compromising.
22:39
Yes, he's compromising, but he's not compromising his message.
22:44
He's giving up his liberty for the sake of someone else's salvation.
22:50
I'll give you a good example.
22:52
I preach from the English Standard Version.
22:55
Today I preach from the NASB because I left my Bible on my desk.
23:00
I have my notes, but I left my Bible.
23:02
So I'm preaching from another man's Bible and that's okay, it's all the Word of God.
23:06
But when I come in, I normally preach from the ESV.
23:10
But if I were invited to a church that only used the King James Bible because there was a conviction in the heart of the people that that's the Bible that should be used, I would be a fool to go in and preach out of my ESV.
23:28
Because why would I put a block between me and those people from hearing the message of the Gospel? Especially a block that is so inconsequential.
23:39
I can preach out of the King James as well as any other translation.
23:43
It's all the Word of God.
23:45
And so if I am going to a King James Bible church and I know the people are convicted about the King James Bible, why would I put up a roadblock between myself and them? I'm going to try to be all things to all men so that I might win some.
24:02
You see now how it might apply to today.
24:07
Yes sir? Paul takes a Machiavellian approach just to position himself to say so.
24:15
Yeah, he's going in and he's seeking.
24:17
And I'm sorry, I'm unfamiliar.
24:19
Machiavellian? I've heard the term.
24:21
The end justifies the means.
24:23
Yes, but again, he never uses the means of changing the Gospel.
24:28
That's the point of this whole thing.
24:30
He would change everything to get the Gospel through, but he's not going to change the Gospel.
24:35
He's not going to change the...
24:37
He's just going to best position himself to preach the Gospel.
24:41
Yes, absolutely.
24:44
And that's the point.
24:45
So when someone says, well, Paul is contradicting himself.
24:50
I don't think Paul is contradicting himself.
24:52
I think he's speaking of two different situations.
24:55
In one situation, he would never seek to please men over God when it comes to the message of the Gospel.
25:02
But how that message gets through, there may be times when he would have to...
25:08
Again, when he's with the Jews, he knows how to be a Jew.
25:11
He grew up as a Jew.
25:12
He lived as a Jew.
25:13
He was a Pharisee.
25:13
He was a Hebrew of Hebrews.
25:15
He knows how to do that.
25:18
I like this text too because it says a few things.
25:20
It says when he was with the people of the law, he could behave as one under the law even though he's not under the law.
25:28
And when he was with people who didn't have the law, he was able to behave like he didn't have the law even though he did have the law of Christ.
25:35
Now that's not saying...
25:36
Here's the thing that you've got to remember.
25:37
What he's not saying is this.
25:39
He's not saying when he was with sinners, he engaged in sin.
25:43
Paul didn't go and sin.
25:45
I've heard people say this.
25:46
Well, I've got to go get drunk so I can witness to drunks.
25:48
Not a good idea.
25:51
I've got to go do drugs so that I can witness to people who do drugs.
25:56
Not a good idea.
25:59
However, there are times if you are seeking to reach somebody in that situation that you might reach into that person's condition.
26:10
It might be that you would go into a bar to talk to someone even though you yourself are not there to get drunk.
26:19
You might go into a place that you might not normally go to witness to someone.
26:25
And now we're getting into a dangerous territory, right? Because you don't want to open yourself up to sin, but you want to save them.
26:31
It's sort of like going into the pit of hell to save someone out, right? And so, this is the danger.
26:37
I've heard people say, well, I went to the bar and got drunk because I was going to get people saved.
26:41
No, you were going to get drunk.
26:43
There's a difference.
26:51
Do all to the glory of God.
27:01
That's right.
27:02
And that's the thing.
27:02
Putting a stumbling block.
27:04
I want to show you guys, that's a good point.
27:06
Go with me to Acts 16.
27:09
What happened in Acts 15? I talked about it earlier.
27:12
What happened in Acts 15? Acts 15 is a council.
27:18
What did they decide at the council? You don't have to be circumcised to be a Christian.
27:22
Right? I mean, we could read through Acts 15.
27:25
That's the ultimate decision of the council.
27:27
You do not have to be circumcised.
27:29
Now, let's go to Acts 16.
27:31
People accuse Paul of all kinds of nefarious nonsense.
27:34
But this is one of those times where something does make you sit back and say, what? Because this is really strange.
27:41
Go to Acts 16.
27:42
It says, Paul came also to Derbe and to Lystra.
27:46
Where are those places? That's Galatia, by the way.
27:49
And a disciple was there named Timothy.
27:55
Who is Timothy? Well, he's got two books written to him.
27:57
He's a young missionary, a partner of Paul.
28:01
And he is one who is going to eventually become a pastor.
28:07
It says, there was a young disciple named Timothy.
28:10
It didn't say young.
28:11
It says, a disciple was there named Timothy, the son of a Jewish woman who was a believer, but his father was a Greek.
28:17
And he was well spoken of by the brethren who were in Lystra and Iconium.
28:22
Paul wanted this man to go with him, and he took him and circumcised him because of the Jews who were in those parts, for they all knew that his father was a Greek.
28:34
Oh, my mercy.
28:36
This is huge.
28:38
This is absolutely huge.
28:40
And you say, Pastor, why are you making a big deal about this? Because Paul just went through all the effort of having an entire church council meet and argue and debate and decide that circumcision is not necessary.
28:55
The next thing, the very next chapter, he's going into Galatia.
28:59
He sees a young man who has a Jewish mother and a Greek father.
29:03
What that means is this.
29:04
Jewish mother, you are a Jew.
29:06
You are a Jew by virtue of your mother's heritage.
29:09
That's how the Jews determine whether you're Jewish.
29:12
However, his father was Greek, meaning he didn't get circumcised, which means he was not part of the Jewish community because you had to be circumcised to be part of the Jewish community.
29:22
So by birth, he's Jew, but by his lack of circumcision, not a Jew.
29:28
So this guy has a problem.
29:33
People argue, well, if Paul was consistent, he would say his circumcision doesn't matter.
29:39
But what does this text tell us? He circumcised him.
29:44
He circumcised him! This whole thing takes us back to what we just read in 1 Corinthians where Paul says, I'm going to become all things to all men.
30:01
Here's a guy who didn't have to be circumcised to be saved, but he did need to be circumcised to have an access and an audience with the community that he wanted to reach.
30:16
This guy literally got circumcised so that he could have an opportunity to preach the Gospel because they would not have listened to him otherwise.
30:31
Now that, somebody might argue, that's a man pleaser.
30:35
No.
30:38
Timothy's not trying to please men, neither is Paul.
30:41
They are trying to reach men.
30:44
And there's a difference between trying to please men and trying to reach men.
30:50
Because when you are trying to reach someone and there's a border between you and them, you will do what you need to do to break down the border.
31:00
When you are trying to reach men and there's a wall between you, you will either go over, around, or through that wall.
31:10
Imagine you have a child who's on the other side of a fence and the child is being borne down on by a giant carnivorous animal like a dog.
31:24
And this is your baby.
31:26
And what's separating you from that child is a fence.
31:30
You would eat through that fence with your teeth if you had to, to get to your baby.
31:36
Right? That wall is nothing but an obstacle that has to be overcome.
31:42
Circumcision was an obstacle that Timothy had that Paul felt needed to be overcome.
31:47
Not to save Timothy, but to save others.
31:53
Timothy's salvation was not in question.
31:58
His was not in peril, but theirs was.
32:01
So Paul said, let's do this.
32:04
Let's circumcise you, not for your sake, but for their sake.
32:10
That's not a man who wants to please men, that's a man who wants to reach men.
32:13
Now brother, you had your hand up, I'm sorry.
32:14
Yeah, well the whole time we were saying, well, that he wasn't actually weak or whatever, but then trying to answer that, they actually made himself, he wasn't due by what they call, what their standard was, so he made himself a Jew.
32:48
Like I said, they can make the argument that you're being deceitful, because you're not weak, you're not none of this or whatever, but you genuinely went, you took steps towards being those things, so that he wasn't being deceptive and therefore being a sin, you know, a lie or whatever.
33:05
Yeah, and it's true, I guess some people could argue it's being deceptive, but if I limit my freedom for your sake, we understand that's not being deceptive, that's being loving.
33:19
If you don't have the same freedom I have, and I flaunt my freedom before you, or I behave in a way that you can't in front of you, that's being aggressive toward you.
33:31
And so Paul in those times when he was weak, or the times when he was being a Jew, he's limiting the freedom that he has for their sake.
33:38
There's a passage in 1 Corinthians where Paul talks about the fact that he deserves, I think it's in chapter 9 or chapter 10, he talks about the fact that he deserves to be compensated for his work in that he says ministers who minister the Word ought to be cared for by the church.
33:59
He said, but I didn't take a dime from anybody because I didn't want anybody to say I'm doing it for the money.
34:04
Now again, this is a paraphrase, I'm paraphrasing what he said, but essentially his point is this, I had the freedom to take money, but I didn't because I didn't want anybody to say that by taking money I'm doing this to build my own self.
34:17
So Paul's point is, I had liberty that I gave up for the sake of your heart, for the sake of you.
34:28
It's a form of self-sacrifice.
34:31
I'm sacrificing my liberty, I'm sacrificing my comfort, Timothy sacrificed a part of his body.
34:40
An adult man was circumcised, that's not a small thing.
34:47
Brother, you had your hand up I think.
34:52
Yes, when he talked about limiting yourself for the sake of your brother's conscience.
34:57
Why would you by your liberty destroy your brother? So why not simply limit yourself for his sake? You know, that's the whole thing.
35:09
There's so many ways.
35:12
Again, if I had a brother that I knew was convicted not to eat pork, because for whatever reason he did not want to eat pork.
35:20
Maybe he felt like it was ungodly for him to do so.
35:23
And so I invite him over to my house for a barbecue, and I serve him a pork sandwich.
35:27
That's hateful.
35:29
It's aggressively hurtful to do something like that.
35:33
And there's other things.
35:34
Somebody who's convicted about alcohol, you serve them a drink.
35:38
You know, there's all kinds of ways that you could apply that.
35:41
Yes, sir.
35:42
He brought up a virgin, and innocent.
35:50
That's right.
35:51
That's what Jesus said.
35:52
Jesus said those words.
35:53
He said we're to be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.
35:59
And so that's the example Paul's giving.
36:03
Wisdom and innocence.
36:05
He's not lying, but he is conceding.
36:09
Yes, sir.
36:09
You had your hand up.
36:10
I was about to slide up on you.
36:35
You might be drinking a beer, or you might be drinking a Coca-Cola or something.
36:40
They'll take anything in the world to try to give that knowledge to you.
36:45
Paul has a real understanding about some real things, how people really live, though, man.
36:51
Like I said, he became weak.
36:55
The way I get that, he might dress up like a homeless person.
37:00
It's like he's weak with Coca-Cola, man.
37:02
He knows he's got that bill.
37:04
He sees what you're doing, but he don't do what you do.
37:09
Well, at the same time, he's sliding the messes out.
37:11
He's throwing niggers out.
37:12
He's throwing niggers out to try to save your life.
37:15
Well, it's funny you mentioned dressing like a homeless person.
37:18
You know, if the goal was to reach people in poverty, and you dressed in a thousand dollar suit, that might automatically disconnect you from those people, wouldn't it? I mean, again, if you were going down to preach to people who were destitute, and you were wearing a thousand dollar watch, that might disconnect you.
37:43
It might get you beat up.
37:49
Yeah, it's smart.
37:51
How he was going through all kinds of obstacles just to get to you.
37:56
That's right.
37:57
He wasn't caring.
37:57
He had a hurtful feeling just to get that knowledge to you.
38:01
He didn't tell you what you wanted.
38:03
He didn't tell you what you needed.
38:04
He was trying to break all kinds of walls down.
38:07
I see that.
38:08
Paul cared about people.
38:11
That's an important insight.
38:14
He cared enough about people to do what it took to reach them, but he cared enough about God getting back to Galatians 1.
38:22
He cared enough about God to not compromise the message for the person.
38:28
Because that's what we often do.
38:31
What we often do today is in our attempt to reach people, we compromise the truth.
38:40
No, God doesn't have any problem with homosexuality.
38:44
No, God doesn't have any problem with substance abuse.
38:49
No, God doesn't have any problem with adultery.
38:52
No, God doesn't have any problem with you name it.
38:57
Why do people say that? Because they want to reach people at any cost, even at the cost of the truth.
39:11
That is cheating.
39:12
You can't change the packaging.
39:15
You can't change the message.
39:17
And that's what Paul says.
39:18
Am I now seeking to please or seek the approval of man or God? And in that, in Galatians 1, he's talking about his message.
39:28
Is my message...
39:29
Did I change this message? Did I produce the message of justification by grace through faith alone? Did I do that simply to please man? Did I do that to please men? The answer is no.
39:44
In fact, let's go to the answer because the next part of the statement, he says, if...
39:49
And that word if is a conditional statement.
39:53
And it is implied.
39:56
And most of you are familiar with this construction of language.
40:00
If I say if, I usually follow it at some point with the word then.
40:06
If you do this, then that will happen.
40:11
If you drive too fast and don't wear your seatbelt, then you're liable to get into an accident and get killed.
40:18
If you drink your whole life, you're liable to get a liver disease.
40:22
If you have promiscuous sex, then you're liable to get a sexually transmitted disease.
40:27
Right? The if and then, even if the word then is not in the statement, it's implied by the statement.
40:36
So look with me again at the statement.
40:37
He says, if I were still trying to please man, I would inject then as an implied statement, I would not be a servant of Christ.
40:49
Paul says, if I'm pleasing men, then I'm not serving Christ.
40:57
You say, well, why? Why can't you do both? Why can't I please God and men? Well, just for a few verses, if you want to write a few things down, maybe put these in your mind, Matthew 6.24, Jesus said, no man can serve two masters.
41:18
He'll either hate one and love the other or he'll love the one and despise the other.
41:22
That's Matthew 6.24.
41:25
If I'm allowing you to be my ultimate authority, and everything I do seeks to please you, then I'm going to be careful with what I say around you.
41:39
I'm going to be careful with how I behave around you, especially when it comes to messages that might offend you.
41:46
And I want to tell you this, there is nothing more offensive than the Gospel.
41:52
You say, why is the Gospel offensive? Because the Gospel says you are a dirty, rotten wretch who deserves to go to hell.
41:58
Nobody wants to hear that.
42:01
You say, that's not the Gospel.
42:03
Sure it is.
42:04
The Gospel begins with this, you deserve to go to hell.
42:08
I deserve to go to hell.
42:11
God came and rescued us through the person of Jesus Christ.
42:15
That's the good news.
42:16
But He rescued us because we deserved to go to hell.
42:21
My buddy Mike, one day I'm going to get him to come preach for you guys.
42:26
He's an open air preacher and he's an amazing man.
42:30
He has no filter.
42:32
He's very powerful when he preaches.
42:36
It's just man, it's awesome to listen to him go.
42:41
And he has told me stories about when he's sharing the Gospel with people and they'll say, I can't believe you're saying this to me.
42:50
Because he's very straightforward.
42:54
He's very powerful.
42:57
And he'll tell them, you deserve to go to hell.
43:00
And I've heard people say, I can't believe he said that to me.
43:04
We've had people come in the church.
43:08
They're sitting in the back row and they're waiting to talk to somebody and Mike will go back and talk to them.
43:13
And they'll say, I can't believe he says these things.
43:17
And I say, well, I'm glad he does.
43:20
Because he's not telling you what you want to hear, but he's telling you what you need to hear.
43:25
His message is not sugar-coated.
43:29
And again, why? Because he loves these people enough to tell them the truth.
43:33
He's an example to me.
43:35
Because he's bolder than I am in a lot of ways.
43:37
And so when we go out witnessing, I follow him.
43:41
And I do.
43:43
He preaches, I stand there and hand out tracts.
43:46
I'm thankful for men like that.
43:48
Men that can help me.
43:51
But again, it's because of that boldness and people will say, I can't believe you're saying that to me.
43:58
The Gospel, when it's done right, it's written for compromise.
44:05
That's right, that's right.
44:06
No compromise.
44:07
You're going to feel your toes and your toes are going to be on the ground.
44:11
And that's right.
44:11
And that's what Paul's talking about here when he says pleasing man or pleasing God.
44:15
If you seek to please man, you will, by necessity, compromise pleasing God.
44:21
That's why Jesus said you can't serve two masters.
44:23
You've got to decide who's going to be the master.
44:27
Is it going to be God? Or is it going to be something else? Maybe it's money.
44:32
Maybe it's power.
44:33
Maybe it's sex.
44:34
Maybe it's drugs.
44:35
Maybe it's pleasing people.
44:38
Maybe that's your God.
44:40
You like to be liked.
44:41
You like to be loved.
44:43
You like to be respected.
44:44
So you're going to please men.
44:46
You're going to do whatever you can to gain friends, influence people, become somebody who's got a million and a half people who love them and everybody's going to cry at your funeral while you're busting hell wide open because you put men before God.
45:06
Turn in your Bibles real quick.
45:07
I want to show you a quick passage.
45:09
1 Thessalonians 2.
45:14
We're going to draw to a close soon, but I'm just pointing out a few texts just to add to what we've said.
45:21
1 Thessalonians 2.
45:38
We'll go to verse 3.
45:39
We're going to read verses 3 and 4.
45:43
Verse 3 says, For our exhortation, that means our preaching, does not come from error or impurity or by way of deceit, but just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the Gospel, so we speak, not as pleasing men, but God who examines our hearts.
46:06
For we never came with flattering speech, as you know, nor with a pretext for greed.
46:11
God is witness.
46:12
Nor did we seek glory from men, either from you or from others, even as though as apostles of Christ we might have asserted our authority.
46:19
But we proved to be gentle among you as nursing mother tenderly cares for her own children, having so fond an affection for you.
46:26
We were well pleased to impart to you not only the Gospel of God, but also our own lives because you had become very dear to us.
46:33
Notice what he says.
46:34
He says, When we came, we came not pleasing men, but God, because God examines our hearts.
46:43
That's the key to all this.
46:44
How do you know that you're trying to please God and not men? Because you know God knows your heart.
46:51
You know whether or not you care more about someone else's approval or God's approval.
46:59
So the question of today's message is really this.
47:01
Are we seeking to be people who please men or people who please God? If we are seeking to be people who please men, then we will always compromise the message of the Gospel.
47:17
If we're seeking to please God, we might at times seek inroads with men.
47:23
We might at times seek to break walls down between us and men.
47:28
But we will never compromise the truth of the Gospel.
47:33
If we do, we have stopped seeking to please God and we've started seeking to please men.
47:42
May it be that we seek to please God rather than men.
47:47
Let's pray.
47:49
Father, I thank You for Your Word.
47:51
I thank You for this one singular verse that is just so powerful and so important.
47:57
And it reminds us, Lord, that if we're seeking to please men, then we're not seeking to be servants of Christ.
48:02
Lord, may it be that we seek to serve Christ and that we allow whatever it takes to reach men, except the compromise of Your Gospel.
48:15
We pray that in Jesus' name and for His sake, Amen.