Forever, thy word is settled in heaven. Psalm 119, verse 89. I'm Stu Epperston. Welcome to the special Wednesday in the Word Leader podcast, where we prepare and equip our leaders of this special Bible study outreach breakfast every week to teach through the Scriptures. 13 Dario locations.
There's a men's group meeting, and several of the locations host the women on Thursday morning. Stay tuned, be encouraged as we jump into this week's Wednesday in the Word. Happy Pastors Appreciation Month! If you haven't figured it out by now, this late in October, it is a special month. There's a ministry called Energized Ministries, headed up by a guy named Andy Bowersox, who all he does.
He drives this giant bus that says "Pray for your pastor," and he goes and he encourages pastors, sends them to a NASCAR race, sends them up to their big mountain retreat, Martinsville. He loves on our pastors. We need to pray for our pastors. But what better passage, Doctor Sam Horn, to deal with? Oh my!
On this month, toward the end of October, than this passage in the middle, right in the middle of Galatians 4, where we see into the heart and the pain. Of a pastor who poured out body and soul for these dear saints in Galatia, and he has to remind them of this, Doctor Horn, because they were there for him just like he was there for them. It was revival; they were coming to Christ, being baptized on this first missionary journey, and even on the second one, but then. They were beguiled and bewitched, and they're being lured away by these these Judaizers who wouldn't dare do anything for them other than seduce them back right into the old ways, Doctor Horn.
So we see Pastor Paul's heart. This guy was—he, you're a pastor. Was it like to look at a portrait of Pastor like this, Sam Horn?
Well, Stu.
Well, thank you first of all for always a blessing to be on a podcast with you like this, and I really hope it's a blessing to all our leaders and those who who listen, and and particularly those who are going to be sitting under our leaders. And it's a good reminder that when we minister the word of God to God's people, there is always an enemy. Who takes note and comes against us and never fights fair, and we're warned that he's the accuser of the brethren, and he accuses us to God, he accuses us to ourselves in our own conscience, and then frequently he accuses us to one another, and that's exactly what I see happening here. You have people that. Paul loved dearly and had sacrificed immensely for, physically, just personally.
What what happened to him in bringing the gospel? I think most of us would have been absolutely stunned if we had seen the physical appearance of the apostle Paul, because of what he suffered to bring the gospel to places like Galatia. And then we we know from this passage that they responded to him. It wasn't just him loving them; it was them loving him. And in the middle of this comes these teachers that are imme immensely popular and engaging, and they come in and they do something underhanded.
They woo the heart. Of these people away from the one who brought the gospel to them, and and that happens. That happens pretty consistently in in ministry. I I think all of us who minister the word have found ourselves in a place. Where we have labored in much in much travail in deep sincerity with a heart of love for the people that we served, and something drew their heart away from us.
Maybe it was a detractor that came in and wanted to steal their attention. Maybe it was.
Somebody in that congregation or in that circle of ministry feeling like they were losing influence and they were losing status because of they they saw the hearts of the people to to the minister right and and so that that really became uh you know we we've got to do something to keep the heart of the people from going there but often it happens when you have to say hard things to people. For their own good, and that's what's happening here in this text. Paul has to say some really hard things to them because of the spiritual jeopardy that they're putting themselves in as they as they give attention and are attracted to the false gospel that is being presented by these Judaizers. And that happens today, by the way. Yeah, it happens today, and it's it's full on in in Galatia.
And it's interesting in this text, Doctor Horn, where the verses we're covering today are Galatians chapter four, verses eight through twenty.
Next time we'll get to the son of the of the slave or the son of the bondwoman and the son of the free woman. That's next time. It's this being a son of promise. Versus the Son of Bodies, and then last time we got these first seven verses, which were brilliant. In the fullness of time, God sent His Son.
Quit going backwards in time, go forwards. This this passage, Paul just takes this, goes personal with him, and is interesting. He he is interesting, Doctor Horne, in in in one of these verses, I think sixteen, he's like, he's like, he's like. How this how how is the one who told you the truth becoming the enemy? You know he he says he says you you were willing to pluck your eyes out for me.
You were willing to lay it down for me, your lives and all that for your pastor. And now because I'm bringing you the truth, you're you know you're upset with me and and I'm the bad guy. When these Judaizers have nothing in your good planned whatsoever, except for your fall back into. The law, yeah, Doctor Horn.
So looking at these verses, you know, we've kind of, I mean, the context and the the the the review of these past weeks has kind of been set. It's it's this this this ongoing thing. I think we we have seen the message of the Judaizers.
Now we're seeing a method of theirs. Trying to entice the Galatians, Paul exposes them into the festives and the more glamorous things, the feast. Hey, getting these feast when we know they're trying to take them towards circumcision, right? And some of these other ceremonial things, which is kind of their deeper drive, and ultimately to take them away from the gospel, which Paul anathemized them for earlier on, you know, in chapter one.
So how do we? Structure these these verses, you know, verses eight through twenty of chapter four. As we break them down, there's a whole lot in here. Knowing God, being known by God—I mean, that's just that's ground zero for the Christian faith. In verse, you know, eight and nine, and then the language Paul uses about you know the the deep relationship they had in these next verses.
Then you have him going to say, "What happened to you guys?" And now look at where you are, and that sort of thing. Take us through these, Doctor Horn, how you structure. Yeah, so I think these verses reveal a really personal side to Paul, because, and I think maybe that's why Holy Spirit put them there, because you know we we saw Paul's credentials. I mean, there's there's the personal testimony of Paul in in chapters one and two, where he is he's laying down his authority as an apostle. And he's he's he's you know laying down his influence as an apostle, and his integrity as an apostle, and and his his unwillingness to compromise the gospel, even for a friend like Peter.
So we saw that in chapters one and two. We said in chapters five and six we're going to get into the practical applications of of why this error is so dangerous. But in in chapters three and four, we're in this doctrinal section, right? And Paul has been saying some pretty straight up things to them. And it's easy when someone is passionate.
It's easy when someone is intense, out of a deep burden for the people that are about to make a massive mistake. It's easy for that intensity to be mistaken. For anger, it's easy to lose sight of of the heart that's behind that intensity. And so, these verses from verses eighteen twenty, it's like the Holy Spirit slows everything down and gives us this window into Paul's heart in the middle of one of the more intense passages in the book. Right.
At the end of the section, he says, "I wish, I wish I could be physically with you, and change my tone." I realize I'm speaking really forcefully here. I mean, he self acknowledges that in verse 20. I wish I could be here with you and change my tone, because I'm really perplexed. I I don't understand how this happened so quickly to you. And I'm trying to pull you back from a very, very serious and devastating mistake that you aren't going to be able to pull back from.
And I wish, I wish I could be with you because you would see my heart. And I wish I could be with you because I don't understand this.
So I think that's sort of the context in which. Which Paul talks, and I've divided this out into three, you know, three little buckets.
So verses eight through eleven, Paul Paul is going to go hard at the danger of turning back to to former enslavement. Right, you're you're you're going to go back to the same kind of slavery that the gospel rescued you from. Remember, he's writing to Gentiles, and they have been freed from their idolatry. You know, we we don't see it in Galatians, but you definitely see it in Thessalonians, right? When when Paul went to the Thessalonians in Thessalonica, they turn from idols to worship the true and living God and to wait for the coming of His Son.
So that's the impact. Of Paul's preaching, well, in essence, the same thing had happened to Galatians, right? They had turned away from their idols and all of the elementary brokenness of those principles of trying to figure out how to please, how to please their gods, how to live. In ways that would draw the attention of their gods and the pleasure of their gods, and and avoid their their wrath. And and then they had found the truth.
The truth had made them free, and as they rejoice in their freedom. There's there's another danger. They're not going to go back to their old idols, but they're going to go back to another system that's just as bad. And that system is trying to earn the favor and the pleasure of the true God, just like they were trying to earn the favor and the pleasure of their false idols by doing things, by working, by by embracing a a a self earned righteousness. Just it's.
It's paganism with with a religious twist, and so Paul goes at that in verse eleven, eight through eleven, and then in verses twelve through sixteen, he gets really personal with them, as as somebody who came out of of that bondage, just like they had come out of a similar bondage. He he's going to talk to them about becoming as he is, because he has become as they are, and he's going to appeal to their relationship. And then in verses seventeen to twenty, he's going to reveal the true motive of the false teachers and contrast it with his own.
So so that's in essence how I I divide this up.
So it's a great breakdown, and all of this so important that we recognize, you know, and just how appropriate Pastors Appreciation Month. We're kind of capping the month off in our last October message in Galatians to all our pastors that are part of this outreach. And so many, everyone listening has a pastor, or you are a pastor, right? Or you're connected to a pastor, or a pastor has had an impact on your life. But this, Paul was the real deal, Doctor Horn.
I mean, when you could say to people, "Hey, you need to become like me." I mean, that is not—he's not one of these prosperity guys, right? Saying, "Here, touch my prayer cloth, and you know, everything's going to get work out in your life." Paul is saying, maybe, like he said in two Corinthians one, you know, chapter eleven, verse one, he said, "Follow me as I follow Christ." How profound is that? Like the question that my college pastor asked. Like forty years ago, in in when he preached Sunday morning, he said, "Do you have the kind of integrity in your life? Are you following Christ so closely that you can say to others, 'Follow me as I follow Christ'?
Right. Now, well, let's look at let's look at the buckets because I think we're going to get to where you are and what your what your point is. He starts off in verses eight through eleven with with this danger that. Has so alarmed him, right? He says, "Formerly, when you did not know God, this is this is when you were idolaters, bound up in your pagan attempts, your your your your darkened spiritual hearts.
When when you did not know God, here was your condition: you were slaves." To those things that by nature are not gods, you were worshiping and and in bondage to the work of your hand.
So how did you make an idol?
Well, you took a tree and you cut it down and you carved it, or you took metal and you melted it down and you shaped it, and and you made something with your hands, and then you started bowing down and worshiping it as though it as as though what you made was now over you, right? You were enslaved. To those things that are by nature not gods, but now that you have come to know the true God, and then he says this really interesting thing, he defines what he means when he says you have come to know the true God, or rather to be known by God. It's not just that they actually have now information about the true God of heaven; God has an intimate relationship with him. The word know.
In that statement, to be known by God is a relational term. It's it's not just that you know you know, Stu, you've been married to a beautiful woman who's been your wife now for many many years, and and there was a period of time when you didn't know anything about Julie, period, and then there was a period of time where you you started to learn a lot of things about her. You found out where she lived, and you found out what her name was, and you found out, you know, what she liked or didn't like, and you found out kind of information about her, and you had information about her that you never had before, right? And then there came a day when you two made vows together and became husband and wife. And you have a deep, intimate, relational knowledge of one another.
So here's using that crazy little illustration. Paul is saying there was a time where you didn't even know about Yahweh. You you thought the gods that were running the world were the ones that were in the temple in your city. And and you knew about those gods, you know. You understood how the system worked.
You knew what days were special to those gods. You know what kind of sacrifices they they required. You you knew what each one of them. You know you knew their myths. You knew you knew the differences between Athena and and and Venus.
You know you you knew who Mars was. You you knew who Apollo was. You know you knew the. Different gods, and you knew what they liked and didn't like, and you had all this information about them, and and and what their priests were like, and what they expected of you, and then you heard about the true God of heaven, and you became aware that there was a different God who was greater than all of these gods, and then after I came to you. You became intimately committed to that God.
You were known by Him. That that's the idea here, right?
So, so you were known by God. How can you turn back again? How can, in other words, how can you return to those worthless, elementary principles of the world? The idea there is that these people with no knowledge of the true God had basic ways of trying to figure out how to please him, and it all had to do with things you had to do, and and you want to go back and be slaves again, not to those idols, but you want a new kind of slavery that these Judaizers have brought in. And these Judaizers want to enslave you to something Moses gave you that was never intended to be how you please God.
He's already talked to them about the role of the law right back in chapter three, and so so now you want to go back to something that that has been set aside. And in fact, in verse ten, he says you're already doing this. This is not like. A thing you're considering.
Some of you are already doing it. You are observing days. You are observing months. You are observing seasons. You are observing years.
In other words, you've gone back to the religious calendar of the Jews that you had no idea and you never followed before. You followed an entirely different religious calendar. That was just as binding and just as bad, and you got free from that. And now you want to go back to another religious calendar, and all that it entails. Here are the seven feasts that you have to observe, and when you have to observe them.
Here, here are the important months. This is when the the Jewish New Year starts. Here's when the Day of Atonement happens. Here is the Passover season. You're going to go all the way back into a similar system, just you know, with different elements to it.
And and and this is not a way forward. This is actually a way back. This is this is going backwards.
So think about the gospel bringing you to the top of a mountain, and you were rescued from one side of the mountain, and you were elevated to the top where you met Jesus. And instead of staying up there and progressing even further up the mountain, you want to go down the other side of the mountain and go back into a different kind of slavery that's just as worthless. And and Paul says, I I am afraid, I'm I'm I'm very concerned that I have labored over you in vain. In other words, the fruit that I thought had come. When I came to you and spent time with you and labored over you to preach the gospel to you and then to teach the gospel to you, is is has been made of no effect.
And so I think that's what's going on here in the first part. Of of this section, so verses eight through eleven, the danger of turning back to what enslaved us. I'd love to interject a quick Weersby quote, Doctor Horn, if I may. Yeah, he says he says Weersby says in his in his book Be Free, his commentary on Galatians. He says, "What really happened when the Galatians turned from grace to law?
To begin with, they abandoned liberty for bondage. When they were ignorant sinners, they served the false gods they and had experienced the tragedy of." Such pagan slavery. This is so good. Listen to this. But then they had trusted Christ and been delivered from superstition and slavery.
Now they were abandoning their liberty in Christ, going back into bondage. They were dropping out of the school of grace and enrolling in the kindergarten of law. They were destroying all the good work the Lord had done in them through Paul's ministry.
So I just, I just, I think that's what, and I think a lot of times that's what. You know this immaturity, the the danger of this. You know the carnality of the Corinthians was addressed, and they were just they were just living in the flesh. But the danger of this Judaizer in this Galatian heresy is they're saying, "Hey, this is what this is what makes you right before God: faith and grace and Christ." But works and ceremonies and circumcision, and the these Galatian Christians, these young Galatian Christians, were buying this, and it's like they reverted back into their adolescence, back into being a slave, and back into the law, which was not the point of the law. The whole point of the law was to graduate them.
Into grace and get them to Christ.
So, I love how you sum that up. And these verses are so important. And it's so there's so many practical points for our Christian life. But I'm gonna let you keep going because you're on this right track as you as you take us all the way through 20. Yeah.
So, you know, the first bucket was I'm so frustrated that you're turning back. Again, to the bondage that that the gospel freed you from, you're just looking at a different bondage, but it's is binding as the one you came out of.
So that's the first thing. Second thing is a very deeply personal appeal in verses 12 through 16. Paul is literally going to open up his heart, and and he says some things that are interesting. He says, "Brothers," so he he's acknowledging their deep relationship. All right, brothers, I entreat you.
He's appealing in the strongest terms. I entreat you, become as I am, for I also have become as you are. And the idea there is, look, I became like a Gentile. I became like a Gentile, and so I'm asking you not to become like a Jew, but to become like me. I I left.
The Judaism that you're running to. I left what these Judaizers are peddling. I left that. I used to be one of its chief architects. I used to be one of its chief defenders.
I used to be one of its chief promoters. I was. I was deeply engaged in what these Judaizers are trying to bring to you. And I left that, and I came to you, and so now I'm asking you to leave what they're peddling and come back to me. Come back to where we were in Galatians chapter one before these people came and spoiled you, right?
So become as I am, for I have also become as you are. And then he says, "Remember when I came, you did me no wrong." You know it was because of a bodily ailment that I preached the gospel to you at first, and though my condition was a trial to you, you did not scorn or despise me like you're doing now. Right now you're despising me and you're kind of mocking me because the Judaizers have convinced you that I'm not really worth listening to. You you scorn and despise me, but you didn't at first when I came to you. You remember what?
What condition I came in, I was so bruised and battered. I was so disfigured from what happened to me at Lister and Derby. And so when I came into your midst and spent time there, you remember my physical condition. That was the occasion for me coming to you, and that's how you heard the gospel from me. Because as I recuperated, and you cared for me, I preached the gospel and I taught the gospel.
And and when I came, I know it was a hardship to you. I know what people thought about me, and I I know how it was a hardship to you. But you didn't scorn or despise me. You received me like an angel from the Lord, or you received me as you would have received Christ Himself. That's the kind of reception I had from you, and now.
We've gone from that kind of a deep committed reception to where you were willing even to gouge out your eyes for me.
So there's a little hint there that some of Paul's ailment may have been on account of the stoning, where where the stones maybe broke the facial bones and and created a vision problem. Around his eyes, you know, because when you were stoned, you weren't stoned with little tiny pebbles. You were stoned with fist fist-sized rocks, baseball-sized rocks, hurled at you with great force from people standing not too far away from you. I mean, think about the damage that a baseball hurled at full strength, hitting an unprotected face, would do. That's what stoning was like.
And oftentimes, if they wanted to prolong it, they would avoid hitting the face. They would, they would, you know, they would go for the body. They would, they would break an arm or they would break a knee or a leg. And then, eventually, when they were ready to put the person out of its misery, his misery or her misery, they would finally go for the face, and that would be be the end. And so here is Paul, and he's deeply disfigured, and some of the disfiguration had to be his face, and it could have been.
Affected his vision, and they were willing to gouge out their own eyes and give them to him. And so the question is, has for them is so? What happened? How did I go from that to how you feel about me now? Have I become your enemy by telling you the truth?
And so you know, you you really have this incredible statement that. Paul is saying something has happened. It isn't just affected your relationship to Christ. It it's affected your relationship to me. And and the minute that something like that happens in our day and age, we should all take notice.
You know, when when someone who has invested time and effort and energy and and blessed you with truth. And all of a sudden, somebody comes along and starts saying things, and alienates your heart from that pastor that has loved you and your family for all those years. You ought to stand up and pay attention. You ought to sit up and. Tension, because something is off there.
That's right. And how how often do we shoot the messenger? You know, I don't like what they're saying. I don't. I don't really.
I'm impugning motives, and so often, you know, parents are like this. Parents, we love our kids so much. The kid is the kid is smoking weed and partying like crazy, and another another concerned person shares it with you, and you you just don't like my kid. Your kid didn't get the kind of grades my kid got. You're you're a what's W'rong with you?
But we we have these blinders on, and it's always the teacher's fault. It's always someone else's fault. My kids, my daughter's not the mean girl, my son's not the bully, but you know, so we we we kind of shoot the messenger. And and I'm not saying that people in in times past and current don't have bad motives when they confront folks. But here, here Paul is.
Poured his heart and soul. They've seen it. I mean, he he makes a just this ironclad case, Doctor Horn, for his his his ministry to them in in bringing them up. And I know you're about to get to this this epic verse that Oswald Chambers talks about. Just this that really the essence of the whole Christian life: Christ being formed in us.
And this is what his modus operandi was. But man, sometimes the new birth and the new life can be messy, right?
Sometimes it can be pretty rough, and that's what we're seeing here. Yeah, and so that's the third bucket. I think what happens in verses 17 through 20 sort of sums up the section, and and Paul says, "Okay, let me contrast the motive of a false teacher with the motive of a true teacher." And just kind of cut to the chase, and then we'll see it. A false teacher is always going to want to conform you to their own image, or to their own teaching, or to their leader. Where a true teacher is always going to want to form Christ in you.
And that's that's really what's going on here. These false Judaizers are making much of these Galatians. You know, Paul has come to them. They used to be pagan idolaters. The Judaizers had no interest in them.
They had no desire to even talk to them. They hated these these pagan idolaters, right? They they would say to one another, "God created them to fuel the fires of hell." And then Paul wins them to Christ, and now all of a sudden the Judaizers have a big interest. They're like, "Okay, boy, there's Paul, and he's getting a lot of attention." We want to go down there, and we want to win those people that he won to Christ. We want to win them back to Moses, because if we can win them back to Moses, everybody's going to look at us and and make the kind of big deal about us that people are making about Paul.
The entire church is buzzing. Hey, have you heard what Paul did? Man, it's amazing. He's been going on these missionary trips, and the Gentiles have been abandoning their idols, and they've been turning to the living God, and it is amazing. And the Judaizers are going, "No, wait a second.
If those people are going to start worshiping the true God, it isn't going to be Paul that gets the credit. We got to get him to Moses." And so they come and they start making much of these Gentiles. the The idea of making much means they they pursue them with flattery and zeal. And oh man, you guys are this is amazing. It's wonderful.
And and Paul says, "Where were these people when you were idolaters?" I'm the one that came to you. When I came to you, I came and I didn't try to win you to myself. I didn't try to win you to Judaism. I didn't try to win you to Moses. I won you to Christ.
And these people are coming, and they're giving token, token words to Jesus. Oh, that's wonderful! How nice that Paul, you know, led you to to to the true God by by talking about this guy named Jesus. That's wonderful. But we got to talk to you about the real, the real person you need to be thinking about, and following, and understanding, and becoming a disciple.
It's not Christ. It's not. It's not Jesus of Nazareth. It's Moses, and and so Paul says these these people are making much of you, but they have no good purpose. It's not going to get too good in.
They want to shut you out. They don't want you following Christ alone. They're okay if you talk about Jesus, but but what they really want is to get you back to Moses. And when you turn away from Jesus to Moses, you're going to get shut out. Of the kingdom and shut out of of the salvation that Christ provided.
So, so they want to shut you out, so so that you might make much of them. In other words, um, when when you turn away from what I taught you to what they are teaching you, all of a sudden you are going to be. Paying attention to them because they are the ones that have all the information about the seasons. They have all the information about how to do circumcision and what day after birth. They have all the information about the ritual washings and how to do them.
They have all the ritual informations about all the the high days and the Sabbath day. They know what can happen on a Sabbath day and what can't. They know what work is and what work isn't. They've got all of these things. Defined out to the T.
They know exactly what you should pay tithes on when you go down the market, and they're going to bring all of this. and And what's going to happen is, as you buy into their teaching. You're going to make much of them. You're going to go. Oh, these people are so righteous.
They are so holy. We better listen really, really careful. And when they come into your midst, oh, Rabbi, have the biggest seat in the and in in the church. Let let's give you the seat of honor. This is exactly what the Pharisees wanted in Jesus' day, and now the Judaizers are are wanting that same thing from Paul's converts.
And Paul says. This is really what's going on. They want that status in your eyes, right? It is always verse eighteen, good to be made much of for a good purpose, and and and what they're doing is not a good purpose, right?
So it is always good to be made much of for a good purpose, and not only when I am present with you, my little children, for whom I am in anguish again. In childbirth, until Christ is formed in you, Paul says, "Listen, it's always good to be celebrated for the right reasons." And I can just tell you that that the reason we should be celebrating you is not because you found Moses, it's because you found Jesus. And and I came and labored among you like a woman in childbirth, and what was born. In you was a deep knowledge and relational intimacy with the Messiah, and I'm praying that Christ, who saved you, will be formed up in you. Right, Christ in you, the hope of glory, Paul said in the Colossian church.
So, so this is Paul's burden. He he's saying to them, look, here are people who are making much of you because they want to form you in the image of Moses. And I make much of you because I want Christ to be formed up in you. I'm not interested in bringing you to Moses. We respect Moses because he taught us much that enlightens us about Christ.
But but I'm not trying to form Moses up in you. I'm trying to form Christ up in you. I'm not trying to lead you to Moses. I'm trying to lead you to Christ. Huge difference, right?
And and that's. Probably the biggest lesson in this chapter is that a a true disciple of Jesus isn't just someone who's taught the Bible and and taught spiritual truth. It is a person who is discipled into Christ, so that they look like Christ, they talk like Christ, they think like Christ, they are all in with Christ. And that's the difference. Here are people who are trying to teach religious things from the Old Testament to to draw people away from Christ.
Anything that draws me away from Christ, no matter how good it sounds or how religious it sounds, or how many verses are attached to it, if it draws me away from Christ, Paul says it's a false gospel. Amen. This is this is the essence of it all, isn't it? More of Jesus, less of me. John three thirty.
Paul's passionate call in Philippians three ten that I may know Him. And boy, we see the fellowship of His suffering in here for sure, don't we? As He expresses His passion to take them to Jesus to grow Christ in them, and that's really effectively. God's called pastors into our life to mature us in Christ, to bring us up in Christ. If they're not doing that, if they're not taking us to that cross, if they're not, if they're not passionately, uh.
Facilitating Christ growing in me, growing in the grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, and they're missing the boat. And so that's how we really need to pray for our pastors. This is a big fat prayer request for our pastors. An appreciation for our pastors on Pastors Appreciation Month, also a call to the fidelity. And the purity of the gospel, and it's not the law that that does this.
Like these Judaizers were trying to take these guys back away from their first love, but it's Jesus Christ and Him crucified.
So, Dr. Horn, thank you. This is rich, man. I mean, I just I love these verses. I appreciate them a lot more in the setting.
I've read these verses before, but when you go through the book, book of the Bible, like Galatians, when you go through expositively, verse by verse, boy, it sure helps you contextualize and really gives you a deeper sense of the gravity of the text and what's going on here. And and then it helps you even better, which we jump to an application too soon, I believe, but it helps you better apply it. You know, and and literally. Through the lens of our modern day, these same truths being ever apparent. Any thought?
Closing words, pastors. You pray us out of here. Yeah, I think sometimes for pastors, and even for those of us who teach the word in Bible Bible settings. There's a subtle temptation, and I know this is not the main point of the passage, but I think it's an important application for those of us who teach the truth. There's there is a subtle temptation that in in talking to people about Jesus, we are actually trying to win them to ourselves, and there's a very big difference between really the the idea of of Being zealous to lead people to Christ, or to be zealous in talking about Christ, so that people will actually be loyal to us, right?
I, as a pastor, and and I speak for all of us. You know, there is this temptation, especially when you're working with people, and God is growing your church, and your and your or your Bible study, and all of a sudden. People are making much of you, and and there there's a little bit of an intoxication there, and and and so Paul is really helping us really recognize that they were making much of Paul. These Galatians were making much of Paul, and Paul was very very clear about this. He said, you know, in making much of me, don't forget you.
I've been telling you to make much of Christ. I my whole reason for the ministry I've had is not to get you to make much of me. I've been making much of you because I want to make much of Christ. Right? The the idea is more than personal loyalty.
Paul is looking for loyalty to Christ. That Christ would be formed up in you, and and so. You know, I think that's really important. And Paul's anguish is not that these people did not have information. I mean, he had taught them; he had actually taught them about Jesus.
It's not a lack of information; it's a lack of commitment. They were so easily distracted. From the doctrine that he taught them, by the zeal of the Judaizers, you know there's there's a sense in which this happens often in churches. We we go to churches and there's a charismatic guy who gets on the stage right now. There's a bunch of them that are putting ladders on their stages, and it's all over social media.
They crawl up on the top of a ladder and they tell the story of Zacchaeus, or or they drive their Lamborghini on stage, you know, as the as the entrance to their sermon, and it's all this wow factor. And you got to come to our church. You got to see our pastor. He is—he is funny. He's amazing.
He gets up on a ladder. He—he's like, wow. You just—you just wouldn't believe. And all of a sudden, people are making much of their pastor, and you almost never hear them making much of Christ. And Paul would say, that's not pastor appreciation.
That's not the kind of pastor appreciation I want. Paul is saying when you make much of me, which I'm thankful that you love me, you you would gouge out your eyes for me. The kind of attention that I want you to have for me is the kind of attention that leads you to Christ, not to me. And I think that's a really important way for us to end this because. You know, there there is a sense in in the American church, even in our kind of of corner of evangelicalism, where it's really it's really easy to to get church members all jazzed up about the personality of their leader to the point that Christ is almost obscured, and and that's a good pastor will be deeply grieved by that.
Not just like humbly. Oh, I'm so sorry this happened. He'll be deeply grieved by that. Paul. Paul was deeply grieved by that, and and that's really a good check on each one of us.
Well, let me pray, Stu, and ask God to use this section of Galatians to His glory and for the good of our our own souls. Lord, thank you, thank you, thank you, for the gospel of Your Son. Lord, help us to make much of Him. Lord, we're so grateful for the love that we have for one another, and for how you put a love for us in in our hearts for the people, and and and done the same in the hearts of the people for us. And we're grateful for that.
We don't want to minimize that in any way. But Lord, beyond all of that, we want to make much of You. And we pray that every labor that we do in Your Word would lead people to a right understanding and a deep, deep commitment and and a wonderful growing love in their relationship with You.
So help us to make much of You. Thank You for making much of us by coming to die for us. And Lord, we we commend ourselves to Your care and to Your grace. In Jesus' name, Amen. Thank you, Dr.
Horne, and thank you for joining us for this Wednesday in the Word podcast. Learn more at WedInTheWord dot com. Follow us on YouTube, Facebook, and all social media, including Instagram. And be encouraged. Stay in the Word.
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