Galatians 1:13-24 | The Testimony of Paul's Conversion Pt. 1 | Sovereign Election

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Pastor Jeff Rice, July 5, 2020 at Covenant Reformed Baptist Church, in Tullahoma, Tennessee

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So we have been going through the book of Galatians. We are in Galatians chapter 1, 13 through 14.
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Excuse me. My notes are on the wrong thing. Galatians 1, 13 through 24.
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I title this message, The Testimony of Paul's Conversion, Part 1. The Testimony of Paul's Conversion, Part 1.
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Galatians 13 through 24. Pray with me.
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Follow me. We thank you, that you are God, that you have refilled yourself to us, that you have refilled your son to us.
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We stand here today because of your amazing grace. Lord, we love you.
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We stand here today because we love you, and as your scriptures tell us, that we only love you because you first loved us.
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So help us to absorb that truth into our life, Lord. Help us to know that you love us as we worship you today in that grace that you have given to us through Christ Jesus.
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Be with me as I speak forth your word. God, I pray that you will use me this day to proclaim your truth, and I pray these things in the name of Jesus Christ.
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Amen. Sorry, I'm still a little emotional.
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To open up in dealing with the book of Galatians, we see Paul up in arms over his apostleship.
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Remember, as we've been going through the book of Galatians, Paul is up in arms over his apostleship and the gospel of Jesus Christ, both because he is being attacked in both.
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If you can prove Paul's authority unlawful, then you can prove his apostleship to be a lie.
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So if you can prove his authority to be unlawful, you can prove his apostleship and the gospel that he's preaching to be a lie.
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So before we begin, I want to look at what is the gospel that Jesus preached.
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So Paul came proclaiming grace and peace to you, the gospel of justification by faith alone and Christ alone.
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Did Christ preach this same gospel? We spoke last week about how
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Paul, the gospel that Paul preaches, is the measuring rod by which all other
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Gospels are to be judged by. But if we're honest, we have to say that the gospel that Christ preached is the measuring stick that Paul's gospel is to be judged by.
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So let's look briefly at two passages. One is very familiar to even non -Christians,
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John 3, 16, and the other is Luke 24, 44, and 49.
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Now in John 3, 16, we have Nicodemus, just to give you some context,
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Nicodemus coming to Christ, Christ telling him some things that a person must do in order to be born again.
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We will not dig into the context because of time, but one of the things that he did say is this.
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He said, For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life.
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Now digging into the Greek, I think a better translation of this verse would be this.
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For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, in order that the believing one would not perish, but have eternal life.
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The Greek specifies that it's the believing one, not whoever or whosoever believes.
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Just to stay true to the text, but before we move further and not trip over this verse,
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I want to look at the word world here. The word world here is kosmos in the
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Greek. It basically means all of earth. The totality of earth, kosmos, for God so loved all the earth that he gave his
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Son. There's another Greek word for world in the Bible that's used, it's called okoumene.
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Okoumene means just a small piece of land. It was known as the Roman region, the known world.
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So every word that the Rome had conquered at that time would be known as okoumene.
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Okoumene, and right here in John 3 16, it does not say for God so loved okoumene, a small piece of land.
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It says that God so loved the world, all of earth. For God so loved the world, meaning not just the
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Jews. Hearing this in the first century, a first century Jew would have been up in arms because they believed that God was only for the
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Jews. That God was only for the Jews. And now we have a rabbi speaking up,
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Jesus of Nazareth, saying that God loves the world, not just a piece of land off the
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Mediterranean Sea. Not just a piece of land.
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Off of the Mediterranean Sea. And by believing in this, this
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Jesus, for God so loved the world, and He gave His only Son, Jesus Christ, and by believing in Him, you will have eternal life.
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By believing in Him, faith, believing in Him, if you believe in Him, faith in Christ, you will have eternal life.
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That eternal life begins at the moment you believe. The eternal life does not begin when you die.
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It begins when you believe. On the road to Emmaus, there were some disciples walking.
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Jesus had been crucified. His tomb is empty.
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They're not sure what happened to His body. There's rumors that some have saw, that some ladies have saw.
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Jesus approaches some guys, but they did not recognize Him, and He began to walk with them.
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Eventually, He reveals Himself to them, just to give you some context. Eventually, He reveals
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Himself to them, and He says these words, Luke 24, 44 through 49.
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Then He said to them, These are the words that I've spoken to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the
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Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled. Then He opened their minds to understand the
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Scriptures and said to them, Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer, and on the third day rage from the dead, and that repentance for the forgiveness of sin, repentance for the forgiveness of sin, should be proclaimed in His name in all the nations, beginning in Jerusalem.
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You are my witnesses of these things, and behold, I am sending the promise of my
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Father upon you. But stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high.
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Now, we can't touch on everything in the context. We just don't have the time to do that, but we will focus on the
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Gospel, which He just declared to them. He said that in the
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Old Testament, it makes it clear, the Old Testament makes it clear, that everything written in the
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Law of Moses, the Prophets, and the Psalms must be fulfilled. It has to be fulfilled.
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Quote, Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer, and on the third day rage from the dead, and that repentance for the forgiveness of sin should be proclaimed in His name to all the nations, beginning in Jerusalem.
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Now listen, that repentance for the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed, not a
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Jewish sacrificial system, not the
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Jewish sacrificial system. Repentance should be proclaimed, not sacrificing a lamb, not being circumcised.
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That repentance should be proclaimed in His name. Repentance is a spiritual medicine made up of six special ingredients.
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We will not go through these six this week, but next week, we will focus on these six ingredients that I'm about to lay out to you.
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One, sight of sin. Two, sorrow for sin.
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Three, confession of sin. Four, shame for sin.
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Five, hatred for sin. Six, turning from sin.
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This is the special ingredients that's involved with repentance.
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Notice it did not say killing an animal, being circumcised, going under the rituals of Moses.
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It does not say those things. So the gospel that Christ preached is faith and repentance.
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And next week, we'll go through two more passages. I'll kind of push on this a little further.
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Faith and repentance. What did Paul preach? It's the same gospel.
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It's the same gospel. So it was proclaimed in all the nations, beginning in Jerusalem, not just Jerusalem.
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The Greek word here for nations is interchangeable with the word Gentiles. So anywhere that you see the word nations, you can put
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Gentiles. It probably won't make sense in the context. But the word, the same word is
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Gentiles as it is for nation. Whenever you see nations, you can use the word
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Gentiles and wherever you see Gentiles, you can use the word nations.
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So it's clear that the gospel is to be proclaimed among the nations, the
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Gentiles, but it must first begin in Jerusalem. And isn't that what we see in Scripture?
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Isn't that what we see? Isn't that what Paul was doing? Our theme today is the testimony of Paul's conversion.
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Our timeless truth, what I want you to meditate on is that salvation is from the
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Lord. That salvation is from the Lord. And let me ask you this, does your salvation point to yourself or does it point to Christ?
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So as we're walking through this text today, understand that we're talking about Paul's conversion and understand that salvation is from the
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Lord and ask yourself, does your salvation point to yourself or does it point to Christ?
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Our outline today is pre -conversion, conversion, and post -conversion.
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So we're going to be looking at Paul pre -conversion, conversion, and post -conversion.
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Today we will only cover two. Pre -conversion is our outline for today.
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Let's read Galatians 1, 13 -24.
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Before I was born, and he called me by his grace, was pleased to reveal his son to me in order that I might preach him among the
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Gentiles, I did not immediately consult with anyone, nor did
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I go to Jerusalem to those who were apostles before me. But I went away to Arabia, and then
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I returned to Damascus. And then after three years, I went up to Jerusalem to visit
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Cephas, and remained with him for 15 days. But I saw none other of the apostles except for James, the
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Lord's brother, in which I am writing to you before God, I am not lying.
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Then I went to the region of Syria and Cilicia, and I was still unknown in person to the churches of Judea that are in Christ.
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They only were hearing that he who used to persecute us is now preaching the faith he once tried to destroy, and they glorified
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God because of me. So again, our outline, pre -conversion, conversion, and post -conversion.
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13 and 14 again. Well, you have heard of my former life in Judaism, how
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I persecuted the church of God violently and tried to destroy it. And I was invented in Judaism beyond many of my own people.
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So extremely zealous was I for the traditions of my father. Pre -conversion, meaning here
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Paul speaking about him still being a Jew. As a practicing
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Jew, Paul mentions two aspects of his own regenerate days. One, his persecution of the church.
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Two, his being zealous for the traditions of his father. Verse 13, again,
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I want to read verse 13 by itself. I just want you to understand what it's getting at.
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Verse 13, For have you not heard of my former life in Judaism, how
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I persecuted the church of God violently and tried to destroy it.
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He says to them, have you not heard? Have you not heard? This could mean that when
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Paul was planting these churches in Galatia, that he gave them his testimony.
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So Paul could be, when he's planting the churches in Galatia, told him about his life and the life he lived.
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But it is well known that Paul was a persecutor of the church. Maybe Paul didn't have to say anything.
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It was well known that he would persecute violently, he violently tried to destroy the church.
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Before Paul's conversion, we read in Acts chapter 8, verse 3. But Saul was raging against the church and entering house after house.
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He dragged off men and women and committed them to prison. So we have
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Paul before his conversion, it says that he would go into house after house and find
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Christians, drag them off, kicking and screaming, if you can picture it, dragging
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Christians off and putting them into prison. Paul, after his conversion, when he himself is being persecuted, he stands before King Agrippa in Acts chapter 26, verse 10, and he says this.
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So this is Paul, after his conversion, telling King Agrippa a story of something that happened.
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And I did so in Jerusalem, Paul says, and not only locked many of the saints up in prison.
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Notice he's calling them saints now. Locked many of the saints up in prison after receiving the authority from the chief priests.
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But when they were put to death, I casted my vote against them. So Paul says that when the
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Christians were put to death, I casted my vote against them. Paul slash
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Saul was no friend of the church. He was no friend of the church. At this time, he believed that the followers of the way were against the one true
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God of Judaism. So to him, those who claimed to be followers of Christ were nothing more than an enemy.
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They were nothing more than an enemy. Remember in the first sermon that I preached, how
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I presented to you Saul, that he was nothing more than a terrorist.
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I even brought to mind for you, Osama bin Laden, and asked you to imagine
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Osama bin Laden becoming a Christian and how would we receive
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Osama bin Laden into the faith? Paul, at this time, was a terrorist to the
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Christian church. Probably worse than we could imagine. Probably worse than Osama bin
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Laden. He was no friend of the church. He violently tried to destroy them.
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Remember verse 13, he violently tried to destroy them. He wanted the conversation of the way to stop.
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Unvisited, no signs of life, Christianity must end. That's what he wanted.
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So he violently tried to destroy it. I believe his hate, listen to this,
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I believe his hate for the church stems from him being extremely zealous for the tradition of Judaism.
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For the traditions of his father. And that his zeal and advancement in Judaism is what led him to persecute the church.
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Before his conversion, he advanced in Judaism beyond many of his own age.
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Look at verse 14. As I was advancing in Judaism beyond many of my own age among my people, so extremely zealous, was
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I for the traditions of my father. For Paul, persecuting the church was nothing more than a byproduct of his being extremely zealous for the traditions of his father.
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He was rabid. He was mad, crazy. This man was fanatical on his best day.
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The Greek word, listen to this, the Greek word for advancing, the Greek word for advancing is to chomp a head.
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If you can imagine someone with a machete going through a field with weeds and they're chomping the weeds out of their way to make themself a path.
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This is what the Greek word is pushing when it says advancing. So in his life, he was a madman, rabid, fanatical with a machete chomping everyone out of his way to make a path for himself.
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Because Paul loved himself. Paul was clearing the way for his life.
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Last week, we looked at what Paul said about his zeal. I believe
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I want to, I believe we should revisit it. It was Philippians 3, 6. It says this, as for zeal, a persecutor of the church.
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So as for his zeal, he was a persecutor of the church. As to righteousness, under the law, blameless.
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So he looked into himself for his zeal. Because of my zeal, I persecuted the church.
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I dragged them off kicking and screaming. I casted my vote against them, killed them.
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As to the law, he looked into the law of Moses and said, blameless.
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Look at his hair. It's fanatical. He's rabid.
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He's mad. He's a crazy man. We today, when we look at the wall, do we say blameless?
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No, we say broken. I'm lost. I'm all done. There's no way for me to get into the presence of God if we're just looking into the law.
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In both of his advancement in Judaism and in his persecution of the church, Paul slash
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Saul, yes, was fanatical. To the Christians at this time, there seemed to be no hope for Paul.
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And less hope for the Christians if Saul got his hands on them. Less hope for them if Saul got his hands on them.
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We all know those words, but God, right? We all love those words, but God.
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Verses 15 and 16. 16a, excuse me. Verse 15 and 16a.
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But when he who had set me apart before I was born, who called me by his grace, was pleased to reveal his son to me.
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Paul in Acts chapter 9, he gets permission, he gets these letters from the high priest to go and drag
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Christians off, kick in the street, to go and cast your vote against them, put them to death.
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Paul was given this authority by the high priest and Paul and his companions were going to do such a thing.
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Paul on a horse gets knocked off a horse. A light shines on him.
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Paul falls off the horse onto his face and he hears this, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?
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Listen to what Paul says. And he said, who are you, Lord? And he said,
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I am Jesus whom you are persecuting, but rise and enter the city and and you will be told what to do.
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So Paul gets knocked off his high horse. He falls. His light shines around him.
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He hears a voice saying, saying, why are you persecuting me? He speaks and says, who are you,
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Lord? The voice reveals that it's Jesus Christ. He says, I am
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Jesus. And then he he lays him aside. He sets Paul aside and he calls him his chosen instrument.
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He said, Paul is his chosen instrument. Right here it says to you, his chosen instrument of mine to carry my name before the
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Gentiles, which is the nations, remember, and the kings, which I read to you where he's speaking to King Agrippa, and to carry my name to the children of Israel beginning in Jerusalem.
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Paul did just that. Paul began in Jerusalem. He would go to Sagans, which was churches at that time, and preach
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Christ. He started planting churches in Galatia and all over the
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Roman Empire at that time in Asia Minor. He started planting churches, the nations.
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In his persecution, he stands before King Agrippa and witnesses Christ to them.
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He did exactly what Luke chapter 24 says that needed to be done. He didn't skip a beat.
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What we are witnessing here is Paul's conversion is God's sovereign election.
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A true miracle. God in heaven reaching into time and changing a man.
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In one moment of time Saul, the hunter became the hunted.
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A terrorist became a servant. But when he God, but God, when
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God who set him apart before he was born and called him by his grace, that was his story.
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He was the hunter who became the hunted. A terrorist who became a servant.
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And then God, but God, when God who set him apart before he was born, called him by his grace.
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This is a prime example of how you and I are saved today. It's no less extraordinary.
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It's a prime example. If you are saved today, it's nothing short of this.
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God removing a stick from the fire. God in heaven reaching into time and removing you from fire.
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That's what salvation is. That's what it is. It's God removing your heart of stone and giving you a heart of flesh.
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That's what salvation is. Let me keep going. It's your, it's your, it's
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God taking your once spiritual dead self and giving you and raising you up to a new life.
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It's, it's God doing what no man can do and that is satisfying his, his own righteous requirements.
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One thing that we cannot do is to satisfy God's righteous requirements. That's why
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Christ is our propitiation. He is our payment for what was done wrong. Christ is the propitiation for you and for me.
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He, God, Christ paid in full what our debt owed. And guess what it did?
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It satisfied the wrath of God. We cannot satisfy the wrath of God.
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God satisfied the wrath of God through Christ. He is our payment for all wrong doing.
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God speaks to Jeremiah and says this. Before I formed you in your mother's womb,
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I knew you. And before you were born, I consecrated you and appointed you a prophet to the nations.
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That's Jeremiah 1 -5. Isaiah says this about God. Listen to me,
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O coastlands, and give attention, you peoples from afar. The Lord called me from the womb and from the body of my mother.
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He named my name and gave me a mouth like a sharp sword.
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And in the shadow of his hand, he hid me and he made me a polished arrow and hid me away in his quiver.
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Did you hear what it said? It said that he named my name. And we know
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Isaiah's mother and father gave him the name Isaiah. Isaiah says,
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God named my name. God named my name.
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God gave him the name Isaiah. But in time, we see that my mama and my daddy and my brother named me
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Jeffrey Dale. Don't laugh.
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Listen to me. God named my name. He put it in their hearts to name me that.
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God named my name. It was God. Do you know this
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God? Who names you? Do you know this
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God? Is this the God that you're worshiping? Look at the text again.
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15 and 16a. But when he who set me apart before I was born and who called me by his grace was pleased to reveal his son to me.
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Paul's salvation was pleasing to God. God took pleasure in revealing to him
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Jesus Christ. He took pleasure in him. God was pleased to reveal to him his son.
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God was pleased. Who revealed
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Christ to Paul? God. Who named
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Paul? God. Named Paul. Called him before he was born. Set him apart.
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This is what the scriptures is teaching. Look at the contrast between pre -conversion versus conversion.
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Notice Paul is speaking of his own accomplishments in verses 13 and 14.
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Verse 13. For you have heard of my former for you have heard of my former life in Judaism how
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I persecuted the church of God violently and tried to destroy it.
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And I was advancing in Judaism beyond many of my own age of my own people.
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So extremely zealous was I for the traditions of my father. But Christ is credited in his conversion.
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Before Christ, he credited his accomplishments to himself. In Christ, he points to God the father in Jesus Christ.
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Verse 15 and 16a. But when he who set me apart before I was born and called me by his grace was pleased to reveal his son to me.
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We have in his pre -conversion Paul saying
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I've done it all. Look what I did. This is what I am doing.
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In his conversion he's pointing to God. He's pointing to God.
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His finger, his hands are no longer pounding his chest. He's pointing to God.
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Salvation is of the Lord. Salvation is from the Lord.
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Here, listen, here I stand right now in my weakness, but I need his strength to be here.
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It's so easy to be here in time watching our own actions, watching the things that we do, watching us hand a homeless person a dollar and say look what
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I can do. Look what I just did. Here, let me let me take a picture of this good deed that I have done.
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It's so easy to be in time watching your own life play out and you make your own choices.
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I chose God. I did this. I, I, I. It's so easy to be in time and see that.
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I see that in my own self. Well, I can tell you my conversion when I received Christ and I walked out, signed a hand, signed a card, shook your hand, prayed a prayer.
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Listen, it's God. I'm here right now in weakness, trembling.
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I need him to stand. I need him. He made me.
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It's so easy to, to look at our own life and yes, you do receive Christ. You do receive
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Christ. That is reformed theology and I'll prove it. I'll prove it.
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Yes, we receive Christ. But when we read the scriptures, when we start digging into the text, we see the wizard behind the curtain.
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The one in whom our life changed. First John, excuse me,
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John 1, 11 and 13. I'm going to turn there and see this.
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John 1, 11 through 13. It says this, speaking of Christ, it says that he came to his own and his own people did not receive him.
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But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God who were born not of blood nor the will of the flesh nor the will of man, but of God.
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So in time, in time, time could be today, you can receive
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Christ. You receive Christ. It says it right there in the text. But to all who did receive him, that's reformed theology.
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You receive Christ. But then you get the wizard behind the curtain. You were not born of blood nor the will of the flesh nor the will of man, but of God.
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So yes, you receive Christ because you were born again, born from above, born of God.
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No born again, no born from above, no born of God, no receiving Christ. So in time, what we see, what we witness, what we physically walk in, what we can snap a picture and take a shot of, we can see ourselves receiving
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Christ. But it's when you open the text, it's when you dig through the scriptures and you see the wizard behind the curtain, you realize that only happened because he chose me.
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He caused me to be born again. He set me apart before my mother's womb. He called me to live this life.
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One more verse. There's a couple verses left. One more text, John 6, 37 and 40.
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Turn there if you want to see the text. John 6, 37 through 40 says this,
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All the father gives me will come to me. I'll read that part again. All that the father gives me will come to me.
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This is Jesus speaking. All that the father gives me will come to me. And whoever comes to me,
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I will never cast out. For I've come down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me.
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And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all he has given me, but raise it up on the last day.
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For this is the will of my father, that everyone who looks to the son and believes in him should not, should have eternal life.
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And I will raise him up on the last day. All the father gives me, all that the father gives me will come.
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If you're given by the father, you will come. If you're not given by the father, you will not come because you cannot come.
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You cannot come. It's in the text. We're not making this up.
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You're coming to Christ is the door that depends on the hinges of God giving you to Christ.
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Imagine that. You have a door. I didn't want to build a door frame.
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All right. Well, just imagine you have a door. You're coming to Christ is the door and it's resting on the hinges of God giving you to Christ.
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That door does not operate unless it has hinges. In order for that door to open and shut, it has to have hinges.
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In order for you to come to Christ, you have to be given by the father.
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That's what the text says. I didn't make it up. I would not.
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I fear God. I fear teaching. I don't want to teach wrong.
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He makes it crystal clear. And with the same breath, listen, with the same breath that he makes that declaration, he says this
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John 6 40. For this is the will of my father that everyone who looks to the son and believes in him should have eternal life and I will raise him up on the last day.
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It gives you the picture of the people in the Jews at the time when they was bitten by snakes and that God told
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Moses to build a bronze serpent and raise it up on a pole. He says that all who looks at the bronze serpent that's raised up on the pole will be healed.
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Do you know that there were Jews at that time who refused to look at the bronze serpent?
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And Christ said the same thing about him in John 3 15. He says the son of man must be lifted up and all who look upon him will have eternal life.
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What's keeping people from looking upon him? Them being given to him by the father.
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It's sovereign. God is sovereign. It was the will of God to knock
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Saul off his high horse in that day. It was also the will of God that Saul would look to Christ and say who are you
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Lord? That was his will. And as we close
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I want to ask I want to ask this Who does your salvation point to?
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Who does it point to? Are you safe? Listen, when you give your testimony
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When you give your testimony, are you declaring your victories? Are you saying look what
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I've done? Or are you saying this But when he who set me apart before I was born and called me by his grace was pleased to reveal his son to me
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Is that your testimony? Are you saying do you know
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Jesus? Have you gone from from taking talking about yourself to talking about Christ are you looking to him
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As as the jews had to look to the bronze serpent to be healed or are you refusing to?
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Jesus said I must be lifted up And when I am I'll draw all men unto myself
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And he was saying this about the death that he was to die the crucifixion which enters into the gospel of Jesus Christ We look to him through the lens of the gospel
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And he's and we're safe This is something that we do in time. We look to him
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Because we're given to him by the father as I step down.
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I want you to know that I am available any time There are other men here who are available at any time
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I want you to know that that we deeply love you all We deeply love you all
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And if you have if you need to be ministered to We are here
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We are here for you we love you we want you to know
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Christ we want you to to look on him who was pierced I'll close with this verse psalm 2 verse 12
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Kiss the son Least he be angry and you perish in the way for his wrath is quickly kindled Blessed are those
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Who take refuge in him? Father we love you.
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We thank you for the lord. Jesus. We thank you that you have saved us your people
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That you have caused us to to walk in the light as you are in the light
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That through your discipline you keep us from walking in darkness Your word says that you discipline those whom you consider to be a son
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And I can recall times in my christian walk Where I would shake my fist and say why does he get to do that and I can't
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And then I recall that verse that you discipline those whom you consider to be a son
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I stand here today With my hands lifted up Saying thank you
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For saving me. Thank you for the life that you've given me. Thank you for these people. I pray that you're you're
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You're a grace follows them today I pray that if any one of them doesn't know you they they will look to christ today
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That that their testimony from now on Will be what we read in chapter chapter 1 verse 15
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But when he who set me apart before I was born and who called me by his grace
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Was pleased to reveal his son to me We love you