Galatians 4:8–20

Galatians 4:8–20

Watch

Read

Fears for the Church

8 But then, indeed, when you did not know God, you served those which by nature are not gods. 9 But now after you have known God, or rather are known by God, how is it that you turn again to the weak and beggarly elements, to which you desire again to be in bondage? 10 You observe days and months and seasons and years. 11 I am afraid for you, lest I have labored for you in vain.

12 Brethren, I urge you to become like me, for I became like you. You have not injured me at all. 13 You know that because of physical infirmity I preached the gospel to you at the first. 14 And my trial which was in my flesh you did not despise or reject, but you received me as an angel of God, even as Christ Jesus. 15 What then was the blessing you enjoyed? For I bear you witness that, if possible, you would have plucked out your own eyes and given them to me. 16 Have I therefore become your enemy because I tell you the truth?

17 They zealously court you, but for no good; yes, they want to exclude you, that you may be zealous for them. 18 But it is good to be zealous in a good thing always, and not only when I am present with you. 19 My little children, for whom I labor in birth again until Christ is formed in you, 20 I would like to be present with you now and to change my tone; for I have doubts about you.

The New King James Version (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1982), Gal 4:8–20

• Transcript

  Almost there. Perfect. Well, good morning. Good morning. Good morning. Welcome to Coffee and devotions. This where every day you and I we get together. We have a little bit of coffee, we get into God's word and we grow in our love for the Lord together in this year 2020 will make it from the book of Acts to five Lehman, you're right fi Lehman, not by Lehman's, but by Lehman, right. So that's the name of a person. So fie Lehman. And today we're at Galatians chapter four verses eight through 20. Why don't we have some coffee? We'll pray and we'll get the Lord's word together. Lord, thank you so much for this day. On a blessing it is to serve you. Father, we pray that as we read your word that you would teach us Father, we pray that you would watch over our souls. build us up in our knowledge, and love you in Jesus's name, Amen. So we got Galatians chapter four, beginning at verse eight. I'll read through verse 20. Nathan, why don't I read verses eight through 11. And then I'll let you read verses 12 through 16. And then I'll read 17 through 20. Is that sound good? Alright, so eight through 11 Here we go. But then indeed, when you did not know God, you serve those which by nature are not gods. But now after you have known God, or rather are known by God, how is it that you turn again, to the weak and beggarly elements to which you desire again to be in bondage? You observe days and months and seasons and years? I am afraid for you. Let's I have labored for you In vain you read 12 through 16 I want you to recall me, but I became like you, you have not in me at all. You have known that cause of physical, physical is somebody I preached the gospel to you at the force in my child, which was flesh you did not desire or you did not despise or reject. But you see me as an angel of God as Christ what then was the blessing you enjoyed, for IPR? You witness that if you if, if possible, you would have put out your hand if your enemy told me because I told you, the zealously court you before no good. Yes, they want to exclude you, that you may be zealous for them. But it is good to be zealous in a good thing always. And not only when I am present with you, My little children for whom I am in labor and birth pains again, until Christ is formed in you. I would like to be present with you now and change my tone for I have doubts about you. Well, listen, we got three questions. First, a. Do you what? What's the best? That's right. We call the Doom. Alright, so first aim. In this first part, verses eight through 11. You want to open up your Bible there are verses eight through 11. What's he talking about? In there? Right? There's two different things that people could know and what's he saying they once knew. What what's new? Well, they knew him but they also knew God. But then indeed, when you did not know God, they serve by nature things which are not God. Right and so he says, How did you forget God? Are you you used to serve idols? And you used to serve the law. And then you came to know God through Christ, but the power of the Spirit and you were so happy, and then now. Now, if they're going back to the law, now they're now they're saying, You know what, you have to be circumcised. You have to follow the law. They say hold on. You're right. That's not what he says. But now verse nine. But now after you have known God, or rather are known by God, he says, How is it that you turn again to the weak and beggarly elements? What do you think he means by the weak and beggarly elements? I think he's talking about physical ladder itself. You just going back to this study that go back to going back to the woods. Okay, so maybe back to your idolatry. Okay, so if he's talking to a Gentile What about the Jewish people in the church what what would be the weak and beggarly things they would be going back to? What do you mean by water? To be washed away? Yeah, but circumcision is actually cutting off of the foreskin of the male private parts. And so so they're going back to the weak and beggarly elements of the law. Right? Remember when we read through Leviticus and we read about the temple when we read through all that type of stuff? They're going back they want to go back to all that stuff. And yeah, that's such a weak stuff. That's that's beggarly. Yeah, right. Is it about is it about the smells and the bells, the whistles? And the gold? No, what's it about? It's about Jesus. That's right. It's about knowing God and being known by God. And so he says, How are you going back to that stuff as a weekend? beggarly stuff, right. That's how you received the Spirit with power and so he says it he says it's a book bondage for them. And that shows in verse 10, right, what are they observing? Yeah, so yeah, do you remember again, when we were going through the pentatonic when we were looking at all the Old Testament laws? It was probably last year or the year before that in family worship? And do you remember all the different festivals they would have to keep? Yeah, so like you know, right before harvest, there's this festival and then after harvest, there's this festival and before planting, there's this festival and 50 days after planting, there's this festival. There's all these different festivals. Yeah, so there's all right, you have the festival booths. And you have the festival, Pentecost. You have the Passover, you had all new moon festivals. You had all these different things that were meant to show God's goodness. But they were all pointing us to who? to Jesus. Yeah, is it easy for us to do that? Yeah, we want to make sure that we're not judgmental here. We need to say, Okay, how do I how do these things fall in line for me because I think Christians can fall into this what we'll get there in a minute, right. That'd be first the calling. Let's keep going. And so he says in verse What does he say in verse 12? What is he urged them to? Come like? What do you think he means by that? Stop. Boys plays a polar close. Yeah, good, good, good. And he says that when he came to them, was he like in good health and doing well? No. How would he come to them? Oh, yeah. And my trial which was in flesh, you did not this Faisal. But you see the label of God. There was something wrong with Paul right in Second Corinthians he had talked about a thorn in his flesh that he had asked God three different times it take away and God said, Nope, My grace is sufficient for you. And now here, he's, he's saying when he came to them, did they have reason to say this guys? We don't want him around here. Yeah, they did. Yeah, they could. Oh, they couldn't have couldn't they? But did they? How did they receive him? Yeah, right. They received him they learned from him. Imagine how much have you had a really really good friend before? Could you imagine one of your good friends turning their back on you? Yeah, this is people that Paul loves. Now they're turning their back away from him. I think that hurts him. He loves these people. He shared the gospel with these people and other going away Oh, really? Yeah. Verse 16. Notice what he says in verse 16. I see a four become your enemy, because I tell you how does he think they're treating him like his enemy? Does he understand how this happened? No, because they once loved him right says if I needed my eyes were plucked your eye out and given it to me if you could have that's how much they were like brothers, sisters like family, like best friends that loved each other now. Now he's now he's their enemy. That's kind of hard. He says it now he talks about his enemies right? In verse 17. What does he say about about these people are trying to turn them back. Towards the law back towards circumcision stuff like that. For you, good. Yes. No, no, no. These illicitly court, you know, but for no good. Are they being the Judaizers right people who are trying to suck them back into the Old Testament law into the Old Testament rituals under the Old Testament. Smells and bells of of trying to be about works righteousness somehow and he says is it further good? No. All right, what do they really want? Nope. Verse 17. Right but for no good yes. They want what that you may be yes. So what are they? What are these Judaizers what are they wanting? Do they want the people to love Jesus? They want yeah, they want them to be followers of themselves. Issues. It's not really a religion. It's just Oh, yeah. Do this. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Did you know well, here's here's a reality to write. Even in the Christian world. This can happen. Where churches become all about following the pastor all about following some personality or some motivational speaker rather than about loving Jesus, rather than about telling the truth, even when it might hurt. And so people become very aggressively protective of following a teacher but it's the zealously for building up a person's reputation a person's following rather than saying, Go look Jesus. Or let's let's go look to the real king, the real one we should be following. Or there's Ellis not for their good but because they want disciples. Right. And so in verse 19, we're almost done. Here. So in verse 19. I labeled it what do you say then to wrap that up in verse 20? I would like to proceed. I would like to be pleasant with your mouth and tune my tone for I have doubts about you. Yeah, right. So does he want to be talking like this to them? He wants to go visit them. And he wants to talk to them and in person face to face. Well, let's go ahead and summarize this right so give me what would you say is one sentence to summarize a section or would you say this is about? Because you just want the best verse, but now we're asking. Now you got to put this into your own words and summarize it to gospel. Don't turn aside from the true gospel, okay. I might say. Be careful of the beggarly elements and of popularity seekers cling to Jesus. But that's almost calling isn't it? That's pretty much it. Yeah, so you would underline verse 11. As the best verse 1111 and 19 Huh? Yeah, I think I think I would probably do. Verse eight, nine, and 16. But I like your your choices too. What would what would you guys underline in your Bibles? What would you say are the best verses they get at the heart of this passage? Well last, let's ask about calling. How's this point you to Christ or change your life? Let's go say religions or crowds. How will you know it's a fake religion? to Christ that's not pointing to Christ. What Christ? What Jesus Christ, the Almighty Christ. Where will you know that this is the the True JESUS? How will you know? That's right. Are they pointing you back to God's word? That's why it's so important. Right? What we're doing right now, getting into the Bible and just reading what it actually says. And understanding what it actually says. So we were not tricked when somebody says what Jesus is really like, and you're like, Whoa, hold on. Let me go check the scriptures. That's not what he's like. No, he freed me from that bondage. No, he's more righteous than that. People will say things about Jesus all sorts of nice things. They'll say, Oh, he was a really good teacher. But he wasn't God. Or though Yeah, I agree. Yeah. People will say about Jesus, you know, Jesus was a great prophet. But he wasn't actually God. How do you keep them? Well, but even remember, you know, John, chapter one, in the beginning was a Word and Word was with God and the Word was God. Right? What about some people will say, Well, Jesus was an angel from God, a messenger from God. But it isn't actually God. Right, because the book of Hebrews says to which of his angels did he ever say sit here at my right hand? Right? No, he's different than the angels. He's so it's very important as we think about what who is the true Jesus that we go to the Scriptures. And we know the Scriptures, because the scriptures will tell us this is the way follow Jesus. Well, you ready to pray? Okay. Father, thank You for Your word. Thank you for Jesus Christ. Father, we pray that Your Holy Spirit might arrest our hearts and fill our eyes with Jesus Christ that we might know you and that as we know your word, and as you show us who you are, we pray that you would keep our hearts from following after idols, idols both in our hearts and idols that would be presented to us in the world God, you know that we are fickle people drawn towards the things that we could see and feel and smell. Or we pray that we might know who you are, and that we would walk by the Spirit please God keep us in Jesus's name. Amen. May Lord bless you today. may walk in the joy and peace of Jesus Christ, may you know your Savior and may you have peace that comes only from him. We'll see you tomorrow. Bye bye. Transcribed by https://otter.ai