Galatians chapter 4, and we're going to be reading verses eight through 20. We're in the middle of this great letter that the Apostle Paul wrote to several churches in the region of Galatia. And the big dominant problem that he is addressing is the problem of legalism. And so we're learning a lot about legalism. I want to continue to encourage you to read through the entire book each week, to take some time, doesn't take long, I think 15, 20 minutes to read really from chapter one to chapter six. Because Paul, when he wrote this, he didn't write it in little pieces. Now, because of the nature of a series, we take it in pieces. But if you miss the whole, then really, we're missing a big part of the message. And so, it's really important for us to capture the whole. I believe God will bless us.

I believe, as we're going to talk about today, that legalism is still one of the dominant poisons in Bible-teaching churches. And to be able to identify it, to see it, and to know its remedy is really, really, really important for us in our age. So Galatians chapter 4, beginning with verse eight. "Formerly, when you did not know God, you were enslaved by those that by nature are not gods; but now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and worthless elementary principles of the world, whose slaves you want to be once more? You observe days and months and seasons and years. I'm afraid I may have labored over you in vain. Brothers, I entreat you, become as I am, for I also have become as you are. 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, but received me as an angel of God, as Christ Jesus. What then has become of your blessedness? For I testify to you that if possible, you would have gouged out your eyes and given them to me. Have I then become your enemy by telling you the truth? They make much of you, but for no good purpose. They want to shut you out, that you may make much of them. 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 again in anguish of childbirth until Christ is formed in you. I wish I could be present with you now and change my tone, for I am perplexed about you."

May God encourage us through the reading of His Word today. Please be seated. Wasn't it wonderful to see all those graduates? I think if I counted right in our digital bulletin, there's 27 this year. Twenty-seven, I think that might be a record. Yeah. High school. And eight college students. I want you to know that for those of you who will be departing to other places this year, I'm going to miss you. You are a precious part of this church family.

For those of you who are remaining, continue to help this church grow strong in faith, hope, and love. Dig into the ministry of Jesus Christ here. If you're leaving to another place, don't wait for a whole semester to discover your home church. Begin now investigating it, and then place yourself in a local church. And guess what? Don't leave unless the church leaves the gospel while you're there. If the church leaves the gospel while you're there, leave the church, all right? But if the church doesn't leave the gospel, if the church is simply, if there's something better going on with the other place or because there's other friends in another place, stay rooted in church for four years. I believe you will be blessed, and I believe that you'll learn to be a blessing to the Church of Jesus. And so I want to encourage you, want to let you know how thankful we are for you, how excited we are for you in this new venture in your lives, both the high school students, as well as those who are in college or graduating from college.

God has been faithful to you. And He's done that for a good reason, because He loves you. Amen? Amen. So let's pray. Father in heaven, we thank you so much that you love us so that we never really get away from your love. Your love, it's unending. Your love is pervasive. It's expansive. It's everywhere for us who are in Christ to enjoy.

And Lord, I pray that you would liberate us from a spirit of legalism. We pray wherever it found its way sneaking into our hearts, that your Spirit would help us to be free. Father, we pray that Jesus Christ would be formed in us. We need your Spirit to do that work. And so, Father, we pray today as we open up your Word together as a church family, that we grow individually in our individual worship and our individual walk, but that we'd also grow corporately as a family. That we as a family would be stronger in your Spirit and the focus upon Jesus, who is our life, who is our righteousness, who is our peace. So Father, I pray that you would grant us ears to hear what your Spirit is saying to us. And Lord, for those who are here today who do not know Jesus Christ as Savior, as Lord, as Messiah, I pray, oh Father, that this would be the day of their salvation. I pray that you'd open their hearts to see your glory in Jesus' face, you'd do that miracle work, and that they would come to know you. It's in Jesus' name we pray.

Amen. For the person who has been freed by Jesus from the law and from the law's condemnation, legalism literally is senseless. It's absurd. And for this reason, Paul, he's baffled by these churches who have come to know God through faith in Jesus, through the gospel, and then are leaning so heavily into legalism's poisonous presence in their church families. Listen to the words that Paul uses to describe his astonishment over a legalistic spirit that is leaking into a church, a church that knows the grace of God, that knows the gospel. So we read in chapter one, verse six, Paul saying, "I'm astonished. I'm astonished that you're so quickly deserting Him who called you into the grace of Christ, and you're turning to a different gospel." He said, "I don't understand it." And then in chapter three, verse one, "Oh, foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you?" Who's cast a spell over you?

That's the only way I can explain it. There's some demonic deception that has taken place to move you from a place of light and back into a place of darkness. How could this happen? And then in chapter three, verse three, "Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh?" You've experienced the power of the Holy Spirit in your life to bring spiritual life. Do you think you're going to be able to continue along the path of worship just simply through gutting it out to the flesh? And then in one of the verses we're going to look at this morning, Galatians chapter four, verse nine. All these are expressions of astonishment. That's what I want us to capture, how astonished the Apostle Paul is that this has happened.

It's only been about two years since he'd been with them. So two years, they go like that, and he'd been physically present with them, and he was the first to proclaim the gospel to them. Churches were planted. Churches began to thrive. Neighbors began to tell neighbors about Jesus Christ, and lives were being changed. And in two short years, this legalistic spirit, through the Judaizers, the teachers who are coming in with this emphasis upon the law away from Christ, and that the church now is gobbling up the doctrines, the preaching, the teaching, the influence of these Judaizers, and he's astonished. Look at verse nine of Galatians 4. "But now that you have come to know God, or rather be known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and worthless elementary principles of the world?" It wasn't long ago when you were living in the weak and elementary principles world by following idols. It wasn't long ago that you discovered the joy of the Christian life of knowing God, being known by God.

How can you turn back to these principles that give no life? Legalism quickly became a problem for the early church. Again, just two or so years after Paul personally ministries in Galatia, the churches that he planted are moving into this deadly error. So quickly, the spiritual center of a church turns away from Jesus and to Moses. Galatians is written to warn us. It's not just written for the church that existed in the 1st century. That church has been translated. It's in heaven now, waiting future resurrection. But it's a letter written by the Holy Spirit through the Apostle Paul to us, to warn us against the clear and present danger of legalism in our day. If you were to ask me for my opinion regarding what ails the modern Bible teaching church, at the top of my list, I would write legalism.

It's not the only problem, but it's at the top of the list. If you ask me what hinders Bethany, our own church family, from experiencing revival, at the top of my list, again, it's not the only issue, but at the top of my list, it's a legalistic spirit. Remember that legalism is a misuse of God's good and perfect law. Legalism sets the law at the center of the fellowship table. It's the centerpiece of the table. So instead of a cup of wine and a loaf of bread, the blood of Jesus, the body of Jesus, we drink from the cup of commandments and eat the loaf of the law. Legalism makes the law our main conversation. Legalism makes the law our focal point, our basis for our fellowship. It's what unites us. Legalism becomes our measure for discernment, what we view as good or bad.

Legalism becomes our means by which we discern the heart of God, what does God want, and it becomes the method by which we disciple others. Legalism is poisonous. It's poisonous not because it places importance on practical obedience. The gospel does that far more than legalism. The gospel leans in to the importance of practical obedience to the Lord. Legalism is poisonous because it places the means of obedience upon our own willpower rather than upon the Holy Spirit. Legalism is poisonous because it fixes our eyes, our attention, upon stone tablets instead of upon the stone that the builders rejected, our Messiah, the only one who can redeem us from the curse of the law. Legalism is poisonous because it places God in our control instead of God being sovereign as one who does whatever he pleases, and we just have to follow him. We just have to trust him. See, legalism has a formula for life.

If you do this, this, and this, then you're going to have this in return. That's how we put God in a box. God says, "No, trust me. Worship me. Love me. Believe in me." But I'm not going to tell you what the outcome is tomorrow. I'm not going to tell you what trials await or what blessings await. I'm just going to ask you to trust me today, and that's the gospel. Legalism, it wears many faces, and that's why it's sometimes very difficult to discern because we think of one specific face of legalism as legalism, and truly, that is a face.

But legalism has many masks, many faces in Jesus' church. Sometimes it does wear the Sheriff Rule face. Sheriff Rule, he says, "Here's all the rules you have to keep." Sometimes it wears the Judge Frowny face. You know Judge Frowny, always looking, knowing that people aren't doing what they're supposed to be doing. Other times, it wears the Detective Dig Dirt face. You know Detective Dig Dirt? "I got to look and see what people are doing, what they're thinking. I got to find out what's wrong with them." Right?

Legalism other times wears Reporter Gossip face. You know Reporter Gossip. Once we find out what's wrong, we got to talk about it because talking about it, that's righteous, right? We can't let this keep going on, so we have to talk about the people who are not doing right. And many times, it wears the Professor Pride face. "I got my life in order." There's lots and lots of faces to legalism. Each face looks different from the next, but its root, legalism is a longing for personal performance which supplants Christ's accomplishment. It's a longing for rules that replace a relationship with the living God. It's a longing for working that unseats grace, for criticism which ousts compassion, for disciplined effort which neglects the power of the Spirit.

So legalism tempts the serious-minded believer because legalism sells itself as a serious pursuit of righteousness, and the serious-minded believer, again, has a serious longing for practical righteousness. And so legalism sells itself that way. It says, "If you really want and are serious about practical righteous life, you have to buy into what I'm selling." Legalism whispers, "You really have a choice between two options, me, legalism, or just free falling to sin. Just decide you don't really care about sin in your own life." But legalism lies. It lies by creating this false dichotomy. Legalism makes us think that there's only two options when in fact the third option is really the only option that works, and that's the option of the true gospel. So the gospel understands that licentiousness in the evangelical church is another clear and present danger, but legalism is not the remedy for license. Legalism, in fact, pours gas on the flame of license in the church.

The remedy for sin, practical sin in the church, is the true gospel that sets our hearts upon the cross of Jesus and fixes our eyes upon Jesus' person. Jesus, not the law, is our righteousness. Jesus is our peace. Jesus is our joy. The source of our strength is never our own personal resolve to live for God. The source of our strength is connecting ourselves, striving to connect, to abide in Christ through faith so that His life flows through us and that the fruit of His Spirit is born. So the main idea we're going to trace here today is that a legalistic spirit is alluring. It's sneaky. So let's be watchful for the signs of a legalistic spirit in our own souls, in our own community. Let's remember that Jesus the Messiah is our life, and let us fix our eyes upon Him.

Let's rejoice in Him. So today, I want to talk about four helps to overcome a legalistic spirit. And when we get to Galatians 5, we're going to read that the fruit of the Spirit is love, and the second is joy. Fruit of God's Spirit. When God's Spirit is at work instead of the law, there's love that dominates. That's the most central quality that the Holy Spirit brings. But the next is like it. It's joy. It's joy. So next to love, joy is the hallmark of God's Spirit filling His church.

The lack of joy, then, is one indication that a legalistic spirit is at work in our soul. You see, joy is never the defining response of the legalist. This doesn't mean that the legalist never laughs, never smiles, is never happy. But it means that the legalist is not particularly known for his or her joy. Joy is a temporary visitor to the legalist's life. Joy is maybe a nice add-on that occasionally comes in the legalist's life. But for the life of one who is filled by God's Spirit, joy is a defining characteristic. It is a foundation stone. And for this reason, our pursuit of joy in Jesus is one of the greatest helps that we have to overcome legalism in our hearts, to pursue joy. Pursue joy with a great passion.

That's the call of the gospel to us. Pursue our joy in Jesus, who is the author of our joy. And there are four causes for rejoicing that I think Paul draws out here that particularly hammers away at legalism, and the first is for a rejoicing in knowing God. A rejoicing in knowing God. Look at verse eight. "Formerly, when you did not know God." Now he's talking to the Gentiles in these churches in Galatia, and prior to hearing the gospel, the Gentiles were what? They were idolaters. They were pagans. They worshiped gods made of wood and stone.

And these gods are not really gods at all. They're demonic spirits that were being worshiped here. As every false god, behind a false god is a demonic spirit. And it says, "Formerly, when you didn't know God," you didn't know the true God at all, "you were enslaved to those that by nature are not gods." So they were bowing down to these idols, these false gods, these demonic entities, and these demonic entities were enslaving them, controlling their lives, leading them into evil practices, into terrible relationships. Now, what Paul is saying here is that people who do not know Jesus don't know God. There's not a person in Galatia that knew God until the gospel came. Not one. Were there people who were religious? Yeah.

They built huge temples throughout Galatia. Were they serious about religion? Yeah. But Apostle Paul says, "Before the gospel came, not one of you knew God." You see, there is no interfaith fellowship where believers share common spiritual life with those who don't believe in Jesus. There is no fellowship. Now again, we're called to love and to see, like Paul did, to be willing to sacrifice ourselves, to go to those who are worshiping idols and tell them that they need to turn away from their idols to worship the true living God through Jesus. That's the good news. But light and darkness cannot join together, let's be assured. Light can only join with light, and darkness can only join with darkness, but where there's light, it dispels darkness.

It doesn't mix with it. Look at verse nine. "But now that you have come to know God," and I love this, because he's emphasizing these folks who have been overcome by a legalistic spirit, that there's something new that's happened in their life, and that something new he describes as, "You have come to know God." And he asks the question, "How can you turn back again, then, once you've come to know God?" And the word for know is much more than knowing about. It's knowing in a personal relationship, knowing in an intimate fashion. Now that you've come to know God, know God as your Father. He's been talking about adoption, as Pastor Josh so well explained last week, and you've come to know God as your daddy. How then can you turn back away from God, in a relationship with God where you don't know Him anymore because you're looking to the law to do something for you that the law can never do, and that's to help you grow in your knowledge and your relationship with the Lord. Paul understands why legalism is attractive to those who don't know God as their Father.

Legalism, in many ways, is better than paganism. But the Galatians have been adopted. They know God as a child knows his or her daddy. So Paul is reminding this precious church that the gospel of Jesus brings them into a real, living, personal relationship with the living God who loves them now. And it is this relationship of knowing God that is one of the greatest protections against a legalist experience. That's why he's bringing it back to them. Because he wants them to think about this relationship they have with God where they know Him. And he wants them to reflect that by all these false teachers coming in, they aren't growing in their knowledge of God. They're focused on the law, but they're growing more and more distant. And he knows that that's happened, and he's reminding them of the blessing of knowing God and the blessing that the gospel brings.

Now again, a legalistic spirit doesn't reject personal relationship with God, but a legalistic spirit fails to make knowing God the center. So knowing God becomes a nice thing for a legalist. So we're not saying all legalists say, "I don't care about knowing God at all." It's just that knowing God becomes, again, superficial, off-center of life, and as a result, it loses its focus, loses its joy, it loses its vibrancy. Here's what Jeremiah nine says. And this has been true, again, all through the ages from the time that God created man in His image. This is the call of God, to know Him, to enjoy Him. And this is what Jeremiah writes. He says, "Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom. Let not a mighty man boast in his might. Let not the rich man boast in his riches. But let him who boasts," if you have something to boast about in life, boast about this, "that he understands and knows me."

See, that's really what life is all about. "That I am the Lord who practices steadfast love and justice and righteousness in the earth. For in these things I delight. I delight in a people who know me." And then Jesus, He emphasized this even more dramatically, particularly in John 17 when He says this to His disciples, or He says this to the Father, His disciples are in the room, "And this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you sent." He said, "Every time I talk about eternal life, that's what I'm talking about. I'm talking about a relationship with the living God where people who formerly didn't know God now know Him personally." This personal knowledge is the goal to which our hearts yearn. It's the satisfaction, the only satisfaction which quenches this thirst. It's the delight that overcomes every dark desire.

And the gospel of Jesus opens the door to this. I love the way Paul, one of my favorite verses in all my life is second Corinthians 4:6. It says, "And the God who said, 'Let light shine out of darkness,'" what has He done? "He's shone into our hearts to give us the lightof the knowledge of the glory of God. He's shown light so we can know God, and not get information about, but actually experience and behold the glory of God in the face of Jesus. So when I was in high school, the man who served the church as the high school Sunday school superintendent was a great guy. I didn't know him deeply, but on Sunday, he would always greet me, and he showed personal interest in my life. We never really met outside of Sunday morning and that brief interaction that a high schooler has with a guy who's kind of organizing all the Sunday school classes that were there for the high school students. But Don Pearson was one of those laypeople in my church that showed he cared for me, and through his personal greeting, through his interest in my life. And he did two specific things that profoundly impacted my life to this day. The first is he told me one day, out of the blue, we weren't talking about what are my desires, what are my future plans. He just came up to me. He says, "Rich, I think God would have you to be a pastor." And it was right at this moment, I didn't talk to him about this before, but at this moment, I had been praying over this thing, "Lord, what would you want me to do?" I found great joy in teaching my peers the Bible, and I saw great fruitfulness, but I still loved math and science. I had other plans that had been settled on my heart, and God was beginning to make a change in me. And it was in that time, this guy in the church, out of nowhere, said, "Rich, I think God wants you to be a pastor." And we didn't talk very deeply about that, but it had a huge influence. There were a couple others in the church family who said the same, just independently, and God used that. I say that to say, church family, God uses you all even in some ways. You don't even know. You could invest and work hard and say, "Well, they're not much impact." And often that happens. That does happen. There's often times we sow seed, seeds. And hard ground, shallow soil, thorny ground. We can get discouraged. "Well, I'm sowing all this seed.

Nothing's happened from it." And then you might throw this one little kernel of seed into someone's life, and you think, "I'm not expecting much." It's just . And 40 years later, they're going to talk about it. We don't know that. I just know sowing seed makes an impact. That's what God wants us to do, and people need seeds sown in their life. Everybody does. And if you have Christ, you are a seed sower. Sow seeds in the world, but sow seeds in your own church family as well. But anyway, the second thing he did was when I was a junior in high school, he gave me a book by J. Packer called "Knowing God."^[1] And I took that home, and I read it, and I was like, "Oh, this is just exploding my understanding of the Lord." And I tell you, I still have that book, and I've read it many times because it had such an impact upon my life. Let me just read a couple of statements from Packer, statements that shook my heart. "One can know a great deal about God without much knowledge of Him." Do you know that's true? To have all your theology, boom. I got my Bible study. I got it. But you don't know God at all. One can have a great deal of knowledge about a godly life even, about how you live a godly life, and not know God. Then he writes, "Knowledge about God and the capacity to think clearly and talk well on Christian themes is not at all the same thing as knowing Him." There's a difference between knowing God and knowing about God. When you truly know God, you have energy to serve Him, boldness to share Him, and contentment in Him. I love that. So a person who knows God, they have energy to serve Him. They're not having to have their arm twisted. They have boldness to share Him. They realize, okay, there's something happening inside me. I got to tell other people, even if I'm shy, and I have great contentment in Him. I can trust Him. From that time forward, I've asked that the Lord would keep me from a theological knowledge of Him that's disconnected from personal knowledge of Him, and that is a huge danger, particularly for Bible school students or, and seminary students. The question we ask is do I learn to know God more and more? Do I yearn not merely to know more about God, but to know Him as a child knows his or her dad, as a person knows his or her best friend? The Apostle Paul says this, "Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus, knowing the Messiah, Jesus, my Lord, for whose sake I've suffered the loss of all things, and I count them as rubbish in order that I might gain Christ, in order that I might know Him more and more." Now, every believer knows God. If you're a believer, if you have Jesus Christ, these Galatians that he says, "You knew God.

You know God." He's reminding you of this. So every believer comes into a knowledge of God. They have eternal life, and that's to know God. But not every believer knows God to the same degree. The whole of the Christian life is summed up in the pursuit of a stronger, deeper, more real knowledge of the living God. And we need God's gracious working through Jesus, by His Spirit, if we are to grow in knowing Him. There's not a formula for it. But there is a path that God outlines for us, and that path is marked with Jesus. It's marked with the Holy Spirit. We need Him to work in us, to grow us, and that's why the law is such a great obstacle to growth in knowing God because it takes us off the path of Christ. It takes us off the path of the Holy Spirit and puts us on the path of performance. If I just do what I'm supposed to do, then I'm going to grow in my knowledge of God, and that is not true. Look at verse 10 to 11. "You observe days and months and seasons and years.

I'm afraid I may have labored over you in vain." Now, Paul, he's not saying that it's wrong to observe days and months and seasons and years. We do that by coming to church on Sunday morning. We observe Sunday, don't we? But Paul is saying that it's wrong to claim that our life with God, our growing knowledge of God, depends upon observing days and months and seasons and years. That if we don't observe days and months and seasons and years, then we cannot be approved by God, because these laws are absolutely necessary in order for us to know God, in order to grow and be vibrant in our spiritual life. So, in the first century, because the early church was primarily Jewish with a minority of Gentile, the question for the early church that Galatians is dealing with is does a Gentile have to become a Jew in order to be approved by God? And Paul's saying, "God forbid. May it never be. No, that's not true." You don't have to follow all of these prescribed laws related to months and years and rituals, and ultimately circumcision, in order to be approved by God, in order to grow in your Christian life. A Gentile doesn't have to become a Jew. Today, how many Jewish Christians do any of us know? Now, I know here, I think I know of two. And we may have even more. If you are a Jewish believer or follower of the Messiah and you're Jewish in your ethnicity, talk to me. I'd love to talk to you more about it. But for that reason, really, this question isn't the question anymore. I don't know of very many people who have been pressed into, you have to become a Jew in order to be a follower of Jesus, in order to be part of the family of God. Today, oftentimes, it's the opposite. Do Jews have to become Gentiles in order to be a follower of Jesus? Do you have to get rid of your entire ethnic identity? And the answer is no, that's another form of legalism, to say that there's something outside of Jesus. And that's why Apostle Paul is just rooting us back to Jesus and to the Holy Spirit, whom Jesus sends and gives to be our helper. A legalistic spirit will lead us to know God less today than we did yesterday. The Spirit brings life. The flesh profits nothing. So how do I know if I'm knowing God more and more, or if I'm retreating from my knowledge of God like these dear, precious brothers and sisters in the churches in Galatia? Let me give you some symptoms. Symptoms of rejoicing when you are rejoicing in knowing God, because remember, rejoicing is the antidote. When you rejoice in knowing God, there's an eagerness to meet Him in the morning and to end the day with Him at night. When you rejoice in knowing God, there's a consciousness of His personal presence through the moments of each day. When you rejoice in knowing God, there's a longing for others to know Him with you. When you rejoice in knowing God, there's a love for the people whom the Lord loves. There is a conviction of sin and a repentance from it. There is a joyful song in the heart and on the lips. There is a looking to serve Him with gladness. We're looking for opportunities. There is a generosity of our resources to advance His name. When we are rejoicing in knowing God, there's a commitment to the obedience of faith. When we're rejoicing to know Him, there's a courage to honor Him in the face of opposition, like Daniel of old. When we rejoice to know God, there's a willingness to suffer for Him. We recognize everything is loss compared to the surpassing value of knowing Him. So four helps to overcome a legalistic spirit. The first is rejoice. Rejoice in knowing God. Allow that to be your constant joy. But second, and I love this here in verse nine. I really love the way the Apostle Paul, it's almost like he checks himself and he stops, and he kind of makes an addition to his thoughts that the Holy Spirit brought in, in verse nine, and that is a rejoicing in being known by God. So rejoicing in knowing God, but I think even greater and more fundamental and first is rejoicing in being known by God. Look what he says in verse nine. "But now that you have come to know God," and then he writes, "or rather to be known by God," because those two are always connected. Now, which comes first? Knowing God or being known by God? It's being known by God. And that's why he says, "Hey, I've got to check this," because it's not about us and what we do to know God, it's first what God has already done. He has revealed Himself to us. He has opened up our heart through His electing love. He has created in us this life so that we can believe in Jesus and we can know Him. So now that you've come to know God, or rather be known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak, worthless, elementary principles of this world? Being known by God is the greatest of wonders. It's what we sing about. It's amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that saved, redeemed a wretch like me.^[2] I once was lost. I was so far outside of God, and God found me and came to know me, and to know me with a redeeming love. The Lord not only knows about us, but He knows us. If you are in Christ, the Lord knows you. He knows you by name. He sets His love upon you and me with great interest, with great attention. This past week, we had the joy of being with our grandchildren in Colorado, and we went to a lot of parks. A lot of parks. They love going to the parks. And so I think we went to four or five different parks. And guess what? At each park, they wanted us to watch him. Watch him swing, watch him climb the playground equipment, slide down the thing. You know what we did? We watched him. Now, there were a lot of other kids at all these parks. And as an adult, you kind of have this supervisory, "Okay, I care about everybody here, about their safety and about what's going on, but I really care about these because I know them.

I know the way they think. I know what they're timid about. I know what they're fearful about." And I see it when they scrape their knee. If the other kid scrapes their knee, I say, "Ah, it's just a knee." Your little granddaughter scrapes. "Oh, come over here. Let me help you." Your heart goes out to them because you know them. You really, really, really care. Now, does God know everyone? Yeah, in one sense, God knows everyone. He knows about everybody. He created every person in his image. He loves everyone, and we can say that. But his own children, he knows them. That's different. He knows his own children who, by faith, have been adopted in his family differently from the way he knows everyone else. And that's what Paul's exalting. It's a special kind of knowledge of God upon the people in the church. We are a people who are known by God. One of the greatest helps to overcoming a legalistic spirit is leaning in and just simply rejoicing in this amazing truth that we are known by God. To be known by God is a great wonder. It means that the Lord himself invests his heart, his person, his interest in me. To be known by God is to be accepted as his child, to be cared for as his own sheep, to be protected as the apple of his eye, to be provided for as one forever cherished, to be constantly and always on the mind of the living God, to be forever seen, never invisible, always embraced, never alone, to be eternally secure in his love. With my grandchildren, because of these verse, I've taken recently to ask a question. We often play that game, "I love you so, so, so much." And they say, "I love you so, so much." I say, "I love you more." They, "Oh, I love you more." And then I'll say this. I'll say, "Well, who do you think loved first?

Do you think I loved you first, or do you think you loved me first?" It always stops them. And of course, they get the answer. Even the little two-year-old gets the answer. "Well, you loved me first." "And do you know why I loved you first?" "Because I loved you before you were able to love," I tell them. "Before you knew me at all, or before you could even know me, I loved you. I loved you while you were still in your mommy's tummy." Who loved first? Did we love God first, or did God first love us? And that's amazing, really. Because before we could love. While we're rebels, we are bound up, enslaved to our own sin. We're even just punching and doing all kinds of offensive things. God says, "I am going to love you.

I'm going to know you." 1 Corinthians 8:3 says, "If anyone loves God, he is known by God." Rejoicing in being known by God, it's a vital source of protection against legalism and a strength to our spiritual life. It's right to lean into this gift and say, "I'm just going to take some time to rejoice that I am one of those who, by his grace, is known by the living God, the creator of this universe." What are some symptoms of rejoicing in being known? When we rejoice in being known by God, there's a feeling of safety in the face of danger and troubles. There is a confidence in future unknowns. I don't know what tomorrow's going to bring. I don't know how that test is going to turn out. I don't know what's going to happen after the surgery. I don't know what's going to happen to resolve this problem. I don't know. I don't know. But when I'm rejoicing in being known by God, guess what? I can trust him. When we rejoice in being known by God, there's a thankful heart. There's a singing voice in the good times. There's a praising posture in the hard times. There's a watching for blessings because we are known by God, and we know that our God is a generous God who loves to bless his people. There's an assured expectation of a future reward because the God who knows us promised us that. There's an absence of fear. There's an absence of fear of rejection, an absence of fear of future punishment, and there's a joy in his love. We love him because he first loved us. To be loved by God is the gain of all worthy things. To not be loved by God is the loss of all worthy things. And if you're here today and you have not placed your life in Jesus' hands, you cannot say, "I am known by God." Not in the way that Paul means it here. But God invites you into that company. He invites you into that family. He says, "I want you to be one of those who can say, 'I am known by God.

I'm loved by God with an everlasting love.'" And God sent his Son so that you could be part of that family. Believe in him. Believe in him. So we gain help to overcome legalistic spirit through rejoicing in knowing God, through rejoicing in being known by God. And I'm going to go through these last two rather quickly. Although, this part, it's special because it'sThe apostle Paul's heart. He's been writing, "Who's bewitched you? I'm astonished that you have left the gospel, the true gospel, and turned to a different gospel." So bam, bam, bam, bam. And now it's like his heart just breaks. He's writing this out of sincere, tender love, and now his heart just melts at this point as he's writing. I can imagine he's taking the quill and there's tears dropping down on the pages because here we see his heart just melting as a pastor, as an apostle/pastor shepherd for these people who he cares about so deeply. Let's look at what he says. So there's a help in rejoicing in the ministry of God's true servants. So Paul, it's like I picture him opening in his mind a scrapbook of memories, and he looks in his mind and just like we have on our Apple phones now, here's the memories for today and I still don't know the logarithm for all that, how they put it, but I love it. Oh, yeah, because I'm always looking at pictures I would've never looked at again. I'm remembering. And that's what he does. He takes these pictures and he says, "Let's look at some snapshots and let's think back just a couple of years ago of some tender things that God's done." And these snapshots are filled with life and joy and vibrancy. And he says in verse 12, "Brothers, I entreat you, become as I am, for I also have become as you are." So he reminds them that he had become like a Gentile in the sense that he's rejected the law of Moses. So, "I reject the law of Moses.

I became like you. I know that the law of Moses isn't a means to gain approval. That's what I used to think, and I left that." So now he becomes like him in their rejection of legalism as a means to grow. That's what he's saying there. So verse 13, "You did me no wrong." He's reflecting back on two and a half years or so earlier. "You know it was because of bodily ailment that I preached the gospel to you at first." He wasn't planning to go to Galatia, but then he got sick, and God kind of sidelined him. Does God ever do that through physical ailments and other things? He kind of sidelines. You think, "Well, this is a big bummer.

I had my plan all set out, my trip was set. Picnic, the outdoor service was supposed to be there." Does God ever do that? Yeah, He does. He's God. But God had a plan. He had a plan that was unseen at the time. He says, "I got so sick I had to stay in Galatia." You remember that, right? And so when I came to you, I was really miserable. But in the midst of this bodily ailment, we're not even sure exactly what it was. Many Bible scholars think it was malaria. I tend to agree with that idea. He says, "I preached the gospel to you at first, and though my condition was a trial to you…" He says, "So I came, and I was so weak that y'all had to help me, you had to help me a lot.

And my condition, my bodily weakness was a trial to you. And even though it was a trial to you, you didn't despise me for it as I preached the gospel. You loved me even in the midst of this physical misery, even in the midst of this weakness that required a lot of service." Undoubtedly, it was a weakness that also brought a lot of gross stuff in front of him. He didn't look good. But he says, "But you received me as an angel of God, as a messenger sent from the Lord, even as you would receive the Messiah, Jesus." So Paul knows that God sends him to this people to deliver the gospel. He used a sickness to get him there. And he also knows that people in general, because he's traveled a lot, he taught a lot, he knows that people in general are impressed by certain things from public speakers, and then they turn away from public speakers because of certain things. And so you've got to dress right. If you're going to be a public speaker, you better wear your good tennis shoes on the day that you speak publicly. You've got to look right. And you've got to speak with a certain kind of energy. And you've got to tell the right kind of jokes, you tell the right stories, engage people, all these things. He knows that that's the way people are, and he's not opposed to doing that. He's just opposed to leaning on those. And he says, "But I came to you, man.

I was so sick I couldn't wear the good clothes. I didn't smell right. I didn't look right. I was so weak I could hardly even speak." And what did God do? What did God do? He created a blessing, a spiritual, eternal blessing for you, and through that, you looked past upon this ugly, weak condition that I was in, and you loved me, and you blessed me. And he says, "Well, what's become of this blessedness? I've been gone for two… When we departed, we cried, and we loved each other, and now these Judaizers are coming in preaching a different gospel, and they're telling you that you need to separate from me, and that they're actually convincing you that I'm not who I am." And he says, "I testify that if possible, back then you would have gouged out your eyes and given them to me.

There was nothing that you would be willing to sacrifice if it was going to bless me." And then he asks this question. What a question this is. "Have I then become your enemy by telling you the truth?" The love of man is often fickle and fragile, and we see it here. The gospel, by nature, offends our flesh. So if we are under the ministry of elders in a church, of elders who've been appointed by the Holy Spirit, we can expect that if they're good elders, they're going to offend us at some point. They're going to say some things that we disagree with. They're going to give some correction. They're at times even going to give rebuke, and we're not going to like it. We can expect that. That's what Paul is saying. He says, "Have I become your enemy?

I'm not correcting you, I'm not rebuking you because I hate you. It's because I love you. But now why are you considering me an enemy? Now, I know why you would disagree with me, that's why I'm having this discussion, but why would you hate me? Because you know how much I loved you, and I know how much you once loved me." When we are rebuked, our pride is stung to the point of resentment and anger, and that's what's happening here. And so the question is, what we do at the point of offense will create either vulnerability in our soul toward false doctrine or strengthen our soul toward the truth, toward the Lord Himself. Our attitudes toward those whom God has placed to teach us His word will either be a great protection against false doctrines or become a door open to deep deception. That's what he's saying. He's saying, "Hey, I want you to consider your heart toward me.

Is that from God that you have begun to pull back in your love for me?" Of course, the Galatians at the moment don't think that Paul's telling them the truth, but he was, and their rejection of his person made them more vulnerable to their acceptance of false teaching. Look at verse 17. "They," he's talking about these false teachers. He says, "This is part of their design. They make much of you, but for no good purpose." That they build you up only so that you can form a team against me, and me and the true gospel. And if they can convince you that you're a team together and we don't like the Apostle Paul, then they're more easily able to convince you that Paul's gospel is false. So it's the attitude toward the leader that God has sent to them that became an open door of vulnerability to the reception of false doctrine, and that's what Paul says, that's what false teachers do. They want to shut you out, that you may make much of them. In other words, they want to carve you away from influence of godly teaching, godly ministry, so that you can think they're the greatest. A legalistic spirit thrives on unjust criticism, unfounded rumor, and unreconcilable complaint. So one of the best helps to overcome a legalistic spirit is to rejoice in the ministry of God's true servants. And earlier, I encouraged you seniors in high school, when you get to college, look for a godly church, a Bible teaching church that also obeys the Lord and is passionate for the Lord's mission. Plant yourself and place yourself under the spiritual leadership shepherding of a group of elders. And ask them, talk to them before you do that, because you want to know who you're putting yourself under. But stay there. Stay there. And there is a path of blessing and protection as you do so. So, the last issue of protection. We find help in overcoming a legalistic spirit by rejoicing in God's goal for our life. Look at verse 19. "My little children, for whom again I am in anguish of childbirth, until Christ is formed in you." So Paul's expressing his love, and I'm pretty confident the Apostle Paul hasn't experienced the anguish of childbirth. Pretty confident of that. And yet he uses it. He's been around it, and he used the illustration. He says, "I don't quite understand it, but when I hear women who are giving birth to children scream, I understand there's a kind of agony, an anguish of childbirth that's associated with that, that I'm going to use in this illustration as though I've experienced it." He says, "And it's like when I first came to you, I was so sick and I was so miserable.

Yeah, I preached the gospel and it was like the anguish of childbirth, but hey, a baby's born. But now you've grown. You've had two or three years, you've grown, and you've reverted back to the point where I'm going to have to go all through all that again in order to give you birth again. How could you do this to me?" And I think some parents perhaps can understand that. Sometimes the anguish of later years and as kids are growing up, it's like, "Oh, it's like the anguish of childbirth all over again." And it is because it's a hard ministry. But he's describing that to them, and notice the way Paul describes the goal, though. What's his goal? What's his heart? "Until Christ is formed in you." Until Christ is formed in you. I love that. One way to take this phrase, until Christ is formed in you, is until the qualities of the Messiah grow in your hearts. The quality of the love of the Messiah, the truth of the Messiah, the righteousness of the Messiah, the mercy, the zeal, the joy, the peace of the Messiah is formed in you. Until these qualities are formed in you, and I think that's a decent way to take that. But I think even a better way to understand this, until Christ is formed in you. It's a very unusual phrase. I don't think it appears anywhere else. There's similar phrasing, but until Christ is formed in you is until the person, I think it means until the person of the Messiah takes such a place in your heart that your life isn't yours anymore. It's Christ's. That the person of Jesus is so dominant that your life is His. I think that's what Paul said earlier in Galatians 2:20. "I've been crucified with Christ.

It is no longer I who live, but it's Christ who lives in me." That's what my life is about. Our flesh and legalismDistracts us onto so many good desires, decent desires, not wrong desires, especially in church life. Legalistic spirit causes us to desire a certain kind of building, for instance, and say, "Oh, I wish they would've painted it this way. I wish it would've looked that way. I wish it had better…" A legalistic spirit causes us to desire a certain kind of music. We sing, but then we leave saying, "I don't really like that song. That's the one thing I take away from the whole worship service. I didn't like one of the songs we sang." A legalistic spirit causes us to desire a certain kind of website. "I look on our website, and I can't find a…" A legalistic spirit causes us to desire a certain kind of Sunday school for our children, a certain kind of evangelism, a certain kind of missions ministry, a certain kind of church government, a certain kind of responsiveness to our individual needs, a certain kind of fellowship experience. Now, there is nothing wrong in themselves with these desires until they get in the way of God's glory in His church, until those small, little, insignificant desires replace the one eternal desire for Christ, the Messiah, to be formed in us. One great protection against legalism is rejoicing in this one goal. Christ offers Himself to be formed in me. How might all that happen? And we're going to talk about this the rest of the chapters. So up until chapter three, there's no mention of the Holy Spirit. Beginning with chapter three, the Holy Spirit is mentioned by name 16 times. Do you think there's an emphasis? Paul's talking about the problem. He starts still talking about the problem. He starts entering into the solution, and then explodes. Do you think the presence of the Holy Spirit has a huge impact upon the life of a person staying rooted in the gospel and living for God's glory? This past week, decided it's Colorado, might be my last time in Colorado, and I need to fly some kites with these mountains in the background, and got three kites for each of my grandchildren. And the days weren't happening that were kite-flying days, and so finally I said, "We're going to go anyway." And we took these three kites, and I had my six-year-old grandson. I said, "You hold the kite here, and then I'll hold the kite here." And I say, "Now, you need to run as fast as you can in the direction of the wind so that I'll pull it up and then let go, and we'll see what happens." And so he ran, took off as fast as his legs carry him, and the kite got up about 15, maybe 20 feet, and we did that a half a dozen times and fly around. Okay, this is just not happening today. And it might not happen the whole trip because our days are closing. So the next day, though, oh, the most beautiful kite-flying day that one could have. And we went out there, and I said, "Okay, now, Asher." And he wasn't really having it because he wasn't having much fun before when I had him run all over the place. And I said, "Asher, all you have to do is just hold it, and then I'll draw tight, and then when I say let go, just let it go." And okay, so we do it, and he let it go, and . And our little two-year-old granddaughter, it was such a great day. Our little two-year-old granddaughter grabbed one of the kites, and she flew it for as long as her heart wanted to fly it. It wasn't coming down. She was able to keep that thing way up in the air and have a great time with it. Let me ask you, what made the difference? Answer: the wind blew. When Nicodemus is asking Jesus about this crazy statement about you must be born again, Jesus replies back to him, "Do not marvel that I said to you, 'You must be born again.'

The wind blows wherever it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you don't know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit." Don't fly the kite of your soul on a day that has no wind. Pray for the wind. Only then will we live for His glory. Let's pray. Father, thank you for this wonderful day. Thank you for this morning. Please bless us as we have this gospel longing. Help us, Father, to enjoy your Spirit and His fruit growing deeper and deeper in our lives and our church family. Bless our time as a picnic. Please bless the food as we eat it, the fellowship, as we encourage one another. And Lord, we pray with open hearts, Lord, please allow your Spirit to blow into our lives and to fill us today. We ask this in Jesus'

Referenced in this sermon

1. Knowing God by J. I. Packer (1973). View ↩
2. Amazing Grace by John Newton (1779). View ↩