Each lesson has a commentary, a list of study scriptures and questions to guide your study. This study is perfect for either individual or small group Bible study. Figure about a half hour per lesson for individual study and about an hour for group. Perfect for workplace Bible studies, Sunday school or women/men's Bible study groups.
Here's the Table of Contents:
Introduction
The Gospel Distorted
The Gospel Defended
The Gospel Proven
The Gospel Proven
The Gospel of Sons and Servants
The Gospel in Action
The Gospel in Community
An Excerpt from The Law of Liberty
In his delightful book The Screwtape Letters C.S. Lewis has Screwtape, a fictional undersecretary of demons, writing letters of advice to Wormwood, a field worker who is trying to tempt a new Christian to turn away from Christ. In one of these letters, Screwtape writes, "You have practiced turning yourself into an angel of light as a parade ground exercise. Now is the time to do it in the face of the enemy." Screwtape goes on to explain that if satanic forces cannot tempt one away from the faith, the next best thing is to distort that faith.
This is the situation Paul faces when writing to the Galatians. Apparently, they accepted Christ readily and had a desire to serve Him wholeheartedly, but someone came along in the guise of a teacher of the word and distorted the simple Gospel of Salvation.
Legalism is an especially deceptive heresy, because it plays on a noble desire to live a righteous life. What legalism misses, though, is that righteousness (right standing before God) comes from the shed blood of Christ alone. We cannot earn our righteousness. Legalism says clean yourself up first and then you are worthy of Christ. The problem is that if we were able to clean ourselves up morally, we wouldn’t have needed Christ. Instead, we come to Christ in our filth and He cleans us up.
Paul addresses this heresy head on in Galatians 1.6-7. He doesn’t hesitate, nor does he back his way into this subject. He boldly attacks the doctrine. He says that they have been lured away from the "grace of Christ unto another gospel, which is not another." Paul uses a sort of pun here. The word Gospel means good news. They have been lured away from the "Good News" of grace to the "Bad News" of legalism. Therefore, even though it may be called another Gospel, it isn’t, because only Christ can bring the "Good News" of salvation through faith.
Moreover, Paul says that if anyone, even himself or an angel from heaven, preach a different "gospel" that he should be "accursed." This word accursed is the Greek word Anathema, which means to be utterly without hope of redemption, to face the most severe divine penalties. That is a serious statement, but it shows how seriously God feels about us going back under bondage to personal efforts at salvation. After all, legalism nullifies the efficacy of the Blood. If we could become righteous by our own actions, Jesus died in vain. To place one’s trust in one’s own efforts for salvation is like spitting on the cross.
Paul realizes his words are harsh, but defends them by pointing out that his life has been devoted to pleasing God first. He goes on to tell about how God taught him all things, which he passed on to others, and how He submitted his teaching and instruction to the other apostles and received the "right hand of fellowship" from them. He also tells how, though he once persecuted Christians, he now glorifies God through his ministry.
So, right in the first 24 verses of the Book of Galatians, Paul sets forth the theme for the rest of the letter. The letter is a strident defense of Salvation by grace and also a celebration of the liberty we find in Christ.
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