A Perverted Gospel
Pastor Bill Nichols - September 13, 2009Introduction
The word "pervert" used as a verb means "lead astray; corrupt; to divert to a wrong purpose." Webster's New American Dictionary In the Greek, there are actually four different words that are translated either perverse or pervert/perverted in the Bible. The one that we are concerned with in our message this morning is "Metastrepho" and it means to "transform into something of an opposite character." Vines Expository Dictionary It would be like changing day into night, or black into white, or good into evil.
Last week I emphasized the fact that Paul, from the very first words of his letter to the churches in Galatia, defended his apostleship as an appointment, not from man, but from Jesus Christ and God the Father. Today we pick up in verse six where Paul begins to defend the gospel that he had preached, against a perverted gospel that was being preached by the false teachers who had infiltrated the church.
Galatians 1:6-10
"I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you by the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel - which is really no gospel at all. Evidently some people are throwing you into confusion and are trying to pervert the gospel of Christ. But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let him be eternally condemned! As we have already said, so now I say again: If anybody is preaching to you a gospel other than what you accepted, let him be eternally condemned!
"Am I now trying to win the approval of men, or of God? Or am I trying to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a servant of Christ."
I. A Different Gospel
The word "astonished" here means a continuous amazement on Paul's part. Paul simply could not believe it no matter how much he thought about it. Have you ever seen or heard something that was so utterly hard to believe, even though you had personally witnessed it yourself? There are some things that I have witnessed or experienced in my life that I still find it hard to believe, even though I know them to be true. That is exactly how Paul felt about the Galatians. They were his children in the faith. They were people that he had personally brought to salvation when he had been there before. And now they were people who were deserting the true gospel for a different one.
The words "so quickly" probably refers to the quick decision they had made concerning the false teaching they were hearing and not the elapsed time since they were first saved. These false teachers were preaching a different gospel than the one they had heard from Paul, and the people were readily accepting it and turning away. The word Paul uses is a military term that describes a soldiers desertion from his unit. In this circumstance, their desertion is not just a desertion from the gospel which Paul had preached, rather it is a desertion from the God who had called them to salvation through Paul's preaching.
Verse six". . .the one who called you by the grace of Christ. . ."
What was this gospel that they had so quickly turned to? Paul uses three different terms to describe this gospel. I need to use the King James Version here to help clarify the meaning of the words that are translated into our English from the Greek. First, in verse six, Paul calls it a different gospel. The KJV calls it another gospel, which in the Greek means "another of a different sort". Then in verse seven Paul calls it "no gospel at all."
Here is where it gets interesting in the KJV. The KJV says, "which is not another."
The Greek word translated another here means "another of the same sort," meaning the same sort as Paul had previously preached. In other words, the gospel that the false teachers were preaching was one that was of a different sort than the one that he had preached to them.
Finally in verse eight Paul calls it a perverted gospel. The gospel that the false teachers were preaching was one that had been transformed into something of opposite character from the original one Paul had preached.
It seemed incredulous to Paul that these people had received the gospel and had been saved were deserting the true gospel for a false one.
Let me take a little aside here for a few minutes. What does the word gospel mean? Good News! The good news is that Jesus died on the cross, was buried and then rose again. The good news is that faith in Jesus death, burial and resurrection results in eternal life. The good news is that this salvation is a gift of God, by grace through faith. The good news is that man is no longer under the requirements of the Mosaic Law, which could never bring salvation in the first place. Paul preached a gospel of grace by faith in Jesus Christ.
The false teachers were preaching a gospel that said, in addition to accepting Jesus as Lord, you have to obey the law! That flies in the face of everything that Paul preached. You cannot have it both ways. Either you are saved by grace through faith, or you are saved by obedience to the Law of Moses.
Look with me for a minute at Galatians 3:2-3
"I would like to learn just one thing from you: Did you receive the Spirit by observing the law, or by believing what you heard? Are you so foolish? After beginning with the Spirit, are you now trying to attain your goal by human effort?"
The false teachers were teaching a different gospel, one that was powerless to save, a gospel that once again enslaved men to the law.
II. Let False Teachers be Eternally Condemned
How did Paul feel about these false teachers? Galatians 1:8-9 he called a curse down on them. If he changed the message, or if an angel changed the message, or anyone else changed the gospel message, Paul said let him be accursed. The Greek word means to be devoted to destruction! Or, more bluntly and something you might understand a little better, "Let him be damned to hell!"
Paul's message was and is the true gospel. It was given to him by direct revelation and it says nothing concerning works of any kind. Anyone who would add works of any kind is changing the gospel and Paul says let him be damned to hell!
That, my friends, is one of the problems in the church today, which I call legalism. Many churches today preach that you must be saved by faith, and then they add all these other requirements if you are to get to heaven. Just like these false teachers who said belief in Jesus is not enough, churches today say, you must be saved by belief in Jesus and you must keep the Ten Commandments. They teach that if you drink or if you smoke or if you dance or, well I am sure that you can fill in the blank, then you will go to hell.
In Galatians chapters five & six, Paul will deal with the works of the flesh and the fruit of the spirit, and how we are to practice our liberty in a way that will be pleasing to God. Freedom in Christ is not a ticket to unlicensed sin! But we are also not to be enslaved once again to that which cannot save us. We will talk about those things in a few weeks.
The gospel that Paul preached is the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ. See First Corinthians 15:1-4! That's it! If you study the whole of Paul's teaching, he identifies some things that a person should probably understand in order to bring them to a point of belief in Christ.
Romans 3:23
"All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God."
Romans 6:23
"The wages of sin is death but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord."
Ephesians 2:8-9
"For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast."
But the heart of the gospel, that which one must believe in order to repent and receive Jesus as Lord is the death, burial and the resurrection!
Conclusion
The gospel of Paul. The gospel of Peter which he preached on the day of Pentecost in Acts chapter two. And the gospel that I preach today all are one and the same. That Jesus, God's Son, died on the cross and paid the penalty for your sins. He was buried and on the third day He rose from the grave conquering sin and death. If you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you shall be saved! That is it!
If you believe this, you too can be saved by responding to the calling of the Holy Spirit and confessing Jesus as Lord and Savior.