Ryan Hale

I am not sure that I always grasp the extent to which God and his word stand in direct contrast with the ways of man and the systems of our world today. Some might say that to live the Christian life is like swimming upstream. Others might say that a Christian should be counter-cultural.

While these descriptions are certainly correct, I’m not sure that the language is vivid enough even yet to describe how different God’s ways are from man’s ways.

I thought of that today as I read – yet again, after reading this same verse many, many times and not thinking of it this way – this verse in 1 Corinthians 10:

So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.

1 Corinthians 10:31

Paul has explained to the Corinthians that they should not be so prideful in their insistence that they can eat food that has been sacrificed to idols. He tells the Corinthians that they should be considering others, preventing them from stumbling in their walk with Christ just by their eating, just because they have the knowledge that they can.

No, if they were to do this, they would be thinking only of themselves, and this is exactly how the world works. And this is why eating meat that has been sacrificed to idols is such a significant issue.

Yes, Paul says, it is important not to participate with idols, which are demonic in nature. It is important of course, in that case, not to eat meat that has been sacrificed to idols.

But even more important is the need to think first of the glory for God.

In the world’s way of thinking, we think of what we want. We think of what pleases us. That which makes us feel good.

We spend time on ourselves. We spend time making ourselves money. We work to build our fame, our fortune, our power. We spend time on that for which we are passionate.

Paul says, though, that if you are a believer, if you follow Christ, you think and live very differently. You live to glorify God. In this example, Paul is talking about whether or not the believers should eat meat that has been sacrificed to idols, but he is clear in his comprehensiveness of his statement: Whatever you do, do it for the glory of God.

Are there ways in which that which we want can overlap with giving glory to God? Yes, of course. But frequently, like the situation with the Corinthians’ desire to eat meat, even if it has been sacrificed to idols, they need to first consider what would bring God glory. Yes, legally, they can do it. But no, it will not bring God glory. Others may stumble. Others may lose their opportunity to know Christ. Others may not be saved because of their desire to exercise their rights. And thus, we will lose our opportunity to glorify God, or for him to receive more glory because that would be one or more persons who will not worship him, who will not glorify him.

God’s way to think, to act, to live, is completely different than the world’s way, than our way. As followers of Christ, we must learn to not live for ourselves, not even just living for others, but instead living for the glory of God.

Apostle Paul and the Corinthian church have evidently been exchanging letters back and forth and the Corinthians, unfortunately, seem to be somewhat contrarian in their perspective of how they should be treating certain – let’s say – more sensitive topics.

For example, at one point, the Corinthians wrote to Paul that “We all possess knowledge.”

What are they saying?

It seems that the Corinthians are saying to Paul that they know what he knows. They understand what was written. They are saying that they have the knowledge of the scriptures that Paul has, which in all likelihood is true.

In short, it seems that they are saying that they know their rights. They have the right, in this case, to eat food, specifically meat, that has been sacrificed to idols. Why? Because an idol is nothing. There is no actual god in that idol, so any food that has been sacrificed to that idol is not actually a sacrifice at all.

But Paul explains back to the Corinthians that there is something more that is required. It isn’t just that the Corinthians need to know their rights. They don’t need to just know the law. They need to understand, within the confines of the law, how they can love other people in such a way that those others can come to know Christ. They need to know how they can do that without placing barriers in front of those other people, preventing those others from fully coming to Jesus, giving themselves to him.

Now about food sacrificed to idols: We know that “We all possess knowledge.” But knowledge puffs up while love builds up. Those who think they know something do not yet know as they ought to know. But whoever loves God is known by God.

1 Corinthians 8:1-3

By eating this meat that has been sacrificed to idols, even though these people within the Corinthian church are correct from a lawful perspective and from a spiritually “legal” perspective, Paul is explaining that they are acting wrongly from a loving perspective. Their actions, while based on right understanding, are actually preventing other people from knowing Christ because it looks completely wrong to these other people.

This meat that they are eating has been sacrificed to another god. How could they eat it? That is what the pagans would do!

Paul is saying that this is the thinking of those who are considering coming to follow Christ and yet are seeing the Corinthian Christians eat this meat and find themselves scandalized, or as Paul says, it becomes a stumbling block to them and their young faith is destroyed.

Is their faith destroyed because the Corinthians were wrong to eat the meat? No, they weren’t wrong in their understanding. They weren’t wrong in their knowledge. They were wrong in their love for other people.

They knew that there would controversy by going to eat this meat. They knew that this was a significant issue of their day. And yet, because they knew they were right – or because they knew their “rights” – they went ahead and did it anyway. And they did it despite realizing that other people would fall away from Christ.

Paul explains, though, that if someone would fall away from Christ as a result of the meat he were eating, he would never eat meat again! The important point is not that we are right, or that we are able to exercise our rights. The important point, instead, is that we would show love to others so that they would know Jesus!

Of course, there are fundamental truths upon which we cannot compromise. We cannot remove the foundations of our faith to accommodate people who do not believe in the foundations of that faith.

But there are many different aspects of our faith that are secondary, yet have, because of the knowledge that we have obtained, become primary in our minds such that our insistence that we are right, that we can do this thing or we insist that we cannot do this thing, that it becomes a stumbling block for others to follow Christ.

Here is, in my opinion, a silly example:

I have heard it said that Christians cannot have tattoos. I have also heard it said that Christians are allowed to have tattoos. I understand the argument for why someone would say one or the other, why they would take one position or the other. But are you so sure of your position – for or against – that it is worth arguing about such a statement that you are willing to risk someone falling out of relationship with you, or as I have actually seen happen, with Christ as a result?

There are several examples, I believe, that we could make with this, but I believe Paul, in this case would say that if, by getting a tattoo, you cause another person to stumble, he would never get a tattoo. On the other hand, if criticizing a person for getting a tattoo might cause them to stumble in their relationship with Christ, I believe that he would not voice that criticism, understanding that there are differing views on this topic and that this would be a significant problem for some people.

We must be careful with our knowledge, that it doesn’t puff us up, but instead walk in love, building up one another so that each will know Christ and grow in him.

We often live as if our time will never end. We act as if death won’t come for us. We act as if there will be no end for us, and furthermore, that there will be no judgment. And as a result, we can find ourselves being extremely careless with our time and with our resources.

The point at which people find themselves realizing that there has been a lot of waste often compels them to give a warning to others. Or possibly there are even moments of regret, or possibly pride that we “would do it all over again”. These moments of reflection even get written down or memorialized in speeches or lectures, shared and reshared by the rest of us to remind us of the truth, that our time in short so we must live for that which is valuable, that which is important.

Recently I was speaking with a friend who mentioned to me the scene at the end of the movie Schindler’s List where Schindler realizes how many more people he could have saved, if only he would have made more money, or sold his car, or even sold the pen in his hand. He could have saved many more people. Many more could have been taken away from the enemy.

Here is the scene to which my friend was referring:

Schindler had done an amazing job of saving many people, yet at the same time, he also realized how much had been wasted. Time had been wasted. Money had been wasted. He realized how much more he could have done. The time had come to the end for him, yet he realized how many other people had their time come to an end long before his time had ended.

There is a similar spirit in Paul’s statement to the Corinthians as he tells them also that the time, their time, is short:

What I mean, brothers and sisters, is that the time is short. From now on those who have wives should live as if they do not; those who mourn, as if they did not; those who are happy, as if they were not; those who buy something, as if it were not theirs to keep; those who use the things of the world, as if not engrossed in them. For this world in its present form is passing away.

1 Corinthians 7:29-31

Whether we realize it or not, our time is short and our lives, our world, is passing away. But if we are honest, we know that we often stop thinking about what is truly important and instead focus upon ourselves. Instead of focusing on what is eternal, we focus on our own comforts, our own selves.

But Paul points out the real truth: These things are all passing away and the only thing that is eternal is the King and his kingdom. He is the one person to whom we should be giving our time and our energy. Not to myself. Not to build me up. Not to make me rich or powerful or famous. In the end, there is no point to any of this because it is all passing away. We build it all. We work for ourselves, to build ourselves up, and yet it will only be torn down. No one to remember our name. No one to remember anything about what we have built.

Instead, there is only one who will last and one to whom we must give our lives: To Christ, and to him alone. We must live to lift him up. We must live to glorify him. We must live for him and for him alone because he is the only one who will last.

So in a similar way to Schindler’s experience, Paul tells the Corinthians that the things of this world that worry them, they should live in such a way that they no longer worry them. These things are passing away. In just the space of a few years, they will no longer be there, but God and his glory will live on forever, as will the souls of the other people there in Corinth, either with the Lord in his kingdom, or separate from the Lord outside.

And in that time, what will we say? Will we regret the way that we spent our time? Will we regret how we have spent the resources that we were given? Or will we hear from the Lord, “Well done, good and faithful servant?”

These are important questions that we must ask ourselves now, in this time. We must pose these questions to ourselves even at this moment where we are facing challenges, even while we are having difficulty. Why? Because our answers to these questions will define the next 10, 20, 30 years or more of our lives. We can’t wait until things get better. They never will. Instead, our answers to those questions will guide how we live the rest of our lives. Whether we will look back thinking that we have wasted our lives, or whether we look back knowing that we gave our lives for the things that will last. That which is eternal and will last beyond us, forever, into eternity: The glory of our King and for the good of other people who could, like us, come to know him.

Stop me if you have heard this one before…

“I just wish this preacher would give us the meat of the word, not just the milk all of the time…”

“I think I will need to go to this other church because they really get into the meat of the word of God.”

“Wow, we got the meat today!”

I remember when I first heard people say things like this, thinking that it sounded very strange to me. I tend to be a meat-eater myself, enjoying eating that much more than a glass of milk any day!

At the same time, frequently, I found that I actually liked the message that had been given that day. What was the problem?

The person saying this was saying that they thought the preaching was too elementary for them. They want to go “deeper”. They want to dig into the word of God and go line by line, if not word by word. They want to understand the original Greek and the Hebrew meanings of each word so that they have more knowledge, more understanding.

And that is all fine. No problem.

But if you are the one responsible for doing the teaching, how do you know that the people are ready for this “meat”, or solid food, as Paul calls it? Let’s see what Paul said about it:

Brothers and sisters, I could not address you as people who live by the Spirit but as people who are still worldly—mere infants in Christ.  I gave you milk, not solid food, for you were not yet ready for it. Indeed, you are still not ready.  You are still worldly. For since there is jealousy and quarreling among you, are you not worldly? Are you not acting like mere humans?  For when one says, “I follow Paul,” and another, “I follow Apollos,” are you not mere human beings?

1 Corinthians 3:1-4

The church in Corinth had several problems, but one of the biggest issues was that of divisions within the church. As he says here, some were saying that they followed Paul, others Apollos. In other places, they also say that some follow Peter, and others Jesus Christ.

The point is that they were divided. They were jealous of one another. They were arguing. In short, they were worldly. As a church, little had changed. They were acting the same after they came to Christ as they did before.

These same types of things happen even today. I’ve seen evidence of it in churches. I’ve seen evidence of it in various missions. Whether we are talking about this specific type of worldliness or another, the values of the world constantly try to seep their way into the church.

It is a shame on a few different levels. First, because it steals the glory that God deserves away from him. Both as a result of the people within the church not honoring the Lord completely as well as others not being able to fully see the difference between what it means to follow Christ, loving him with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength. God should be able to receive glory as a result of the change within the people for whom Jesus came to give himself upon the cross. And what is more, he should be able to receive glory as a result of more people knowing God because they want the beauty of the life that they should see in other believers.

But on another level, it is a shame because it means that the people are not growing in their faith. Only as a result of their growth should their teachers make the decision to take the next steps to teach them more, to teach them deeper topics. Maybe it is possible for the people to understand the concepts of placing their faith Christ in their mind, but following Christ is not just an issue of understanding, but of doing. Jesus said that we can show our love to him by obeying him, by doing what he said to do, not just understanding what he had to say.

Once the people of the church are able to not only understand, but they begin to obey Christ and no longer “produce the fruit” of the world but instead produce the fruit of the Holy Spirit, then they are ready for solid food. Before then, just as Paul said, they continue to need milk, that which is for spiritual children.

Paul was dealing with a difficult situation in Corinth. In fact, there were several difficult situations, with everything from incest to lawsuits amongst the believers. From sexual immorality to significant questions about whether someone should be married or stay single. From eating food that had been offered as a sacrifice to idols to whether or not a woman should cover her head in church.

One question, one problem, after another, Paul faced as he wrote to the church in Corinth.

However, the one problem that he started with was the problem of division in the church. Some people were saying that they followed Paul, some said that they followed Apollos. Others said that they followed Peter. And some said that they only followed Christ. The people were aligning with the various leaders that had either come through Corinth to teach the people, or that they knew about because of the messages that the people who had taught were teaching them.

In reality, these are no different than the problems that we see today. We routinely see that churches will split as a result of personalities driving wedges between the people of the church. Often those personalities will look for a type of authority, of power, that they can exert over others in the church, and thus we see splits within the church with people desiring to support one person or another.

This is a similar situation to what we see here in Corinth, except that Paul and the other teachers weren’t trying to create their own type of power. No, instead, Paul insists that his only message was to make Christ, and him crucified, known to the people. That was the message. That is all that he brought. That was the wisdom that he could offer.

But Paul points out that his message, of course, did not actually seem like a wise message at all from the perspective of the “mature”, from the viewpoint of those that were the rulers of that age. In fact, it seemed like nothing but foolishness.

Your message is about a guy who was killed?

Your message is to tell people that they should follow someone who seems to have failed?

But Paul points out that there is a significant difference between the wisdom of God and the wisdom of people:

We do, however, speak a message of wisdom among the mature, but not the wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are coming to nothing. No, we declare God’s wisdom, a mystery that has been hidden and that God destined for our glory before time began. None of the rulers of this age understood it, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. However, as it is written:

“What no eye has seen,
what no ear has heard,
and what no human mind has conceived”—
the things God has prepared for those who love him—

these are the things God has revealed to us by his Spirit.

1 Corinthians 2:6-10

The wisdom of men is to follow people that seem to be a success from a worldly perspective. They have accumulated wealth and power. They have amassed fame. And yet, as Paul says, they are coming to nothing. The power and success of this world is nothing. We are here for a moment in time, and then we are gone.

We know this truth by our instinct. We know that death is coming. We know that our lives are only temporary, and yet we are continually enticed by the attraction of wealth, power, and fame. In this way, through these values of the world, we can have significance. Other people will lift us up. Other people will glorify us. Even if it is for a short while, we will receive glory and honor, even if it is amongst other people who will also only be here for a short while.

Paul says, however, that his message is not based on the wisdom of this world. His message is based on the wisdom of God, and the wisdom of God speaks of Christ crucified. And why should this be considered to be wisdom, let alone the wisdom of God? Because it is eternal.

By placing our faith in the wisdom of God, by placing our faith in Christ who has been crucified, we place our faith in that which will go on forever. The glory with which we participate is not a glory that is temporary. It is a glory that is eternal because it is a glory that goes to the one who is eternal, to Jesus Christ himself. Instead of receiving glory to ourselves, we give glory to him and we participate in his joy and glory because through his death and resurrection, we are allowed to enter into his kingdom and live with him forever. Physical death has no hold upon us because we will live forever, glorifying the king forever.

This is the wisdom of God. We do not live for today. We live forever. And that is the message of wisdom that Paul brought to the Corinthian church and that we bring even today, in our time.

I have spent quite a lot of time over the last few years teaching and talking about how we, as followers of Christ, can “produce fruit”.  For example, Jesus told the Pharisees and Sadducees that they must produce fruit in keeping with repentance. In our context, very frequently, given that we are often teaching about making disciples, we focus on multiplying disciples as a definition of producing fruit.  And I think that is an accurate representation of what several of the scriptures intended, but it isn’t necessarily complete as we think about what it means to produce fruit.

We see at least one other type of fruit noted within the New Testament.  The fruit of the Holy Spirit.

I see this as an extremely important topic because there is one way, and really only one way, that we can know that we are in Christ and have been saved:  If we have the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God himself, living within us, then we have been saved.  We cannot know it because of something that we have done or because of something someone else has told us.  When we are saved, God seals his promise to us and within us and identifies us as his own by placing his Holy Spirit within us.

An obvious question, as a result of understanding this, should then come up:  How do I know that I have the Holy Spirit?

There may be a few different ways that we can know this, and the answer may depend upon the theology of the person that you are asking.  However, my intent is to make my answer to this question as simple as possible by way of using an analogy to understand the answer to this question.

Let’s assume that you are looking at a tree, and you think that it might be an apple tree, but you aren’t sure.  How would you know for sure if this tree is an apple tree?

Aside from checking its DNA or knowing some of its other characteristics, what would be the most obvious way to know that this tree is an apple tree?

We would know that it is an apple tree based on the fruit that it produces.

Does it produce apples?  Then yes, it is an apple tree.

Yes, I understand that answer seems pretty simple, and you might even say simplistic, but it is an easy answer and the easiest way to know if this tree is an apple tree.

In a similar way, Paul has written to the Galatian church and explained to them that they have been set free in Christ.  In Christ, they are free from the ties to the Law and from the shackles of sin and death.  Instead, through their faith in Christ, they can know God.  They will be God’s people under the new covenant that God made with his people through the blood of Christ.

And as they place their faith in the death and resurrection of Jesus, that it will save them also and they will be able to know God through him, then God will mark them with the Holy Spirit.

Yet Paul takes some additional next steps as well to explain how they, the Galatians and each of who read this letter, can know that they have the Holy Spirit, that they are “walking” by the Spirit.  He explains to the Galatians that they will produce the fruit of the Spirit.  Instead of indulging the desires of their flesh, they ill produce the fruit of the Spirit.

The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.

Galatians 5:22-23

When we understand that the fruit of the Holy Spirit includes these things, we can begin to ask ourselves:

Do I have the Holy Spirit living within me?  Am I walking by the Holy Spirit?  To answer these questions, and to feel like we have come to the right answer instead of simply answering the question in the way that we would hope the answer to be, we can ask even further some additional, simple questions:

Did I just answer my friend and his questions or criticisms in love?

Do I feel joy as I go throughout my day?

Am I treating my wife, or my kids, with patience or kindness?

Am I exercising self-control in this difficult situation?

If the answer to those questions is Yes, then as a believer in Christ, you are walking in step with the Holy Spirit.  You are producing the fruit of the Holy Spirit.  If you are not, if you answer No to those questions, then it is probably time to go back to Square One, back to the beginning, and repent.  Repent of the things that you are doing wrong.  Repent of the things that are preventing you from producing the fruit of the Holy Spirit.  God offers grace and mercy and loves you, but he wants you to produce the fruit of the Holy Spirit, so you must walk in step with the Spirit that he has given you.

Another way that we can think about this is from a negative point of view.  Even before pointing out the fruit of the Spirit, Paul says that the ways in which we indulge our flesh, instead of producing the fruit of the Spirit, are obvious:

The acts of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.

Galatians 5:19-21

Paul groups these “acts of the flesh” into various categories:

Sexual immorality, impurity, and debauchery – These are pretty easy to point out as acts of the flesh.  These are the things that are easily and often shamed within our societies.  Sexual sins where, instead of using our bodies in the way that God intended, we use them to simply gratify ourselves.

Idolatry and witchcraft – Once again, these are pretty easy to understand as acts of the flesh.  Idolatry and witchcraft place other spirits or other gods before the one true God, the only God.  Instead of worshiping God, we are calling upon other gods or invoking other spirits to serve us.

Hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy – Now we are diving more deeply into the everyday lives of many people, even today.  Are you taking part in arguments and cause discord?  Are you angry?  Are you jealous or envious?  Do you cause or take part in dissension?  Do groups or factions – us vs. them – spring up around you, or do you take part in them?

Drunkenness, orgies, and the like – Again, these are some of the sins that seem to be fairly easy to understand as not belonging to the life of a follower of Christ.

My point is that we should think carefully about the fruit that we are producing.  If we say that we are followers of Jesus, and God has placed his Spirit within us, then he has called us to freedom.  But our freedom is so that we can produce the fruit of the Spirit.  And when we produce the fruit of the Spirit, we are also fulfilling all of the commandments that God has given. We can know that we are walking by the Spirit by the fruit that we are producing.

Last night, I was talking with my friend who is studying Islam. He is a Christian but in his attempt to understand Islam and help others to know Christ, he is studying Islam to help these people exit and follow Jesus.

In the course of the conversation, my friend looked up from his studies and simply said:

If I was a Muslim and knew what is in the book that I was following, in the religion that I was following, I would be in despair. I would be so sad.

I won’t go into the detail of what he meant by that at this point, but I was reminded of that this morning when I read what Paul wrote to the Galatians as they were seeking to know God by following the Law.

As I wrote previously, the Judaizers had come into the Galatian churches preaching that, Yes, these Christians must follow Christ, but they must also follow the Law. They must do everything that Moses had commanded them to do. They must follow the commandments that God had given all of the way back to Moses if they truly wanted to follow God. For example, God had commanded Abraham that the men of his people must be circumcised, so all Israelite men would then subsequently be circumcised.

Some of the Galatians began to believe and follow what the Judaizers had been teaching them. There were enough people that were doing this that it alarmed Paul enough to write a letter to pull them back from doing it. Paul had experience with where the Law would take them. Paul knew the futility of trying to keep the Law as a way to be justified by God. He knew that their attempts would lead to nothing but despair.

And so for this reason, and because many of the people that he was writing to were Gentiles and not Jews, thus not having all of the background that Paul had given that he was a Pharisaical Jew, Paul asks them: Do you even know what you are asking for by trying to follow the Law? Do you know what it says?

Tell me, you who want to be under the law, are you not aware of what the law says? For it is written that Abraham had two sons, one by the slave woman and the other by the free woman. His son by the slave woman was born according to the flesh, but his son by the free woman was born as the result of a divine promise.

Galatians 4:21-23

Paul goes on to say that Abraham’s two wives represented two separate covenants, two agreements between God and his people. Hagar, the servant woman to Sarah, had come from Egypt, given to Abraham after Pharaoh had sent Abraham and his entire family away, out of Egypt. As he sent them out, he gave Abraham several servants and livestock. Hagar was one of these that came from Pharaoh, leaving Egypt with Abraham. In short, Hagar was a slave and would remain a slave. She only became a wife to Abraham because Sarah had given her to Abraham in an attempt to have a child, given that it seemed that Sarah was no longer able to have children.

Hagar represented the covenant that God made with his people through the Law. He gave the Israelites the Law and said that, if they will follow the Law, God would be their God and they would be his people. If they kept the Law…

So like Hagar, the Israelites were slaves to the Law. If they wanted to be God’s people, they must follow the Law. And of course they didn’t follow the Law, and in fact they found that it was impossible to follow the Law. No one was able to follow it completely. No human was able to fulfill the Law completely.

On the other hand, Sarah was Abraham’s one, legitimate wife. She represented freedom. She represented the promise. God had given Abraham a promise that his descendents would be like the stars in the sky, but he didn’t even have a son. He didn’t even have one descendent, let alone his descendents being numbered like the stars in the sky.

Yet God had given a promise, and his promise would be fulfilled. In fact, God told Abraham that it would be fulfilled through Sarah, not through Hagar. Even though God would bless Hagar’s son Ishmael, God would make his covenant with Isaac, not with Ishmael. God would be the God of Isaac, Sarah’s son. She was the free woman. She was the one through whom God’s promise would be fulfilled. Not the slave woman, but the free woman.

In the same way, God made a new covenant with his people. Jesus said that his blood would be poured out as a sign of the new covenant. It would be for the forgiveness of all people. And this forgiveness would allow people to enter into the presence of God. Not because they have somehow been good religious people, but because they have received the promise that has been given to them by faith in the blood of Christ which allows them to enter into God’s kingdom.

Paul therefore asks the Galatian church: Is that really what you want? Do you really want to enter back into slavery by the Law? Do you even know what that means?

Of course they don’t understand it! Otherwise, they would have never chosen that particular path. Otherwise, they would have rejected the Judaizer’s message immediately. They would have said that they were God’s people as a result of the promise that was fulfilled in Jesus Christ, not as a result of being good religious people.

The good news – in fact, the best news! – is that this promise is for all people. It was available to the Galatians, but it is also available to us today. We can be God’s people by believing God. We can be God’s people by receiving the promise, by placing our faith in Christ, that his death and resurrection will allow us to live, allow us to receive the promise that God has given. In this way, we will not be children born to the slave woman, but instead, children of the promise born to be free.

One of the greatest challenges, I believe, for those that seek God, is to understand how to reach him. In fact, that is the central issue, the one primary question.

Here are some examples of responses that I have heard to this question: How can we reach God? How can we come to him?

1. Well, I believe that if I am a good person, then someday God will judge me and allow me to enter heaven.

In this case, the person is trying to be “good”. Of course, the problem with this way of reaching God is that it is based on our sense of what the word good means, not God’s sense of what good means. God is a perfect God. He is a holy God, completely righteous and without so much as a blemish. So for each of us, even with one blemish, we are no longer holy. We are no longer perfect, so we cannot be with God.

2. We must pray to him five times a day. We must offer money to the poor. We must take a trip to a holy city and walk around a stone several times…

Or said another way, we must do the good works that our religion requires. This is what will allow us to come to God.

In this second case, you have a person who is trying to reach God by their good religious works. They want to not just be a good person, but they want to be a good religious person, doing lot of good religious works. Their religion has said that they need to do X to reach God, so they do X. Their religion has said that they need to do Y to reach God, so they do Y.

But of course, the question in this case is whether or not we have done enough religious works. Have I really followed everything that my religion requires? Is there more that I should do? And the answer is always, invariably, yes. There is more that I could do. There is more that I should do. This person is left with doubt and continues to struggle in their attempt to reach God through their religious works.

3. I believe. I have faith. And because of this, God will allow me to come to him.

In this case, the main question is this: What is it that you believe in? In what are you placing your faith? You say you have faith, but in what?

This is the primary question of our day for those who seek God, and not surprisingly, it was the same question that the people of Biblical times struggled with as well. The Apostle Paul risked his life, over and over, to be able to communicate the answer to his question to people everywhere that he went and even when they had believed what he had said, they continued to struggle.

Case in point: Paul had taken the message of Christ to the Galatian churches, those in Pisidian Antioch, Iconium, Lystra, and Derbe. Paul spoke of the kingdom of God and our ability to come to God through the sacrifice of Christ on the cross. Paul told them that they must put their faith in that sacrifice so that they would be purified, that we may be forgiven so that we may be seen by God as clean, holy and perfect in the eyes of God.

Many people in those cities had believed and followed Paul’s teaching, and yet now there Judaizers who were coming to those churches, telling them that they must, essentially, also become Jewish, following all of the the Law given by God to the Israelites.

In short, the Judaizers were saying that these new believers needed to do all of the good religious works to be saved. They needed to follow the Law. They needed to do all of the things that the Law requires. And some of the Galatians were convinced.

Why?

Because there is something within us that wants to tell God how we will reach him. Not listen to God tell us what we must do or how we can know him. No, we want to continue to listen to the lie that Satan told Adam and Eve in the garden, that we can be like him. We can call the shots. We can be our own gods.

So we create our own religions, and we invent our own ways, and we create our own promises. We do everything except what God himself has told us to do.

God has called us to receive the promise that he has given to us. Paul says it this way:

He redeemed us in order that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that by faith we might receive the promise of the Spirit.

Galatians 3:14

God blessed Abraham with the blessing of knowing him. God would be Abraham’s God, and Abraham would be the first amongst God’s people. God would be Abraham’s inheritance, his great reward and that promise would be given not only to him but also to his seed. Not seeds, but seed, and that promise would culminate in the promise arriving to the point of the Seed of Abraham, namely Jesus, who would fulfill the promise of God, making God known to all people.

God did all of the work. It is his plan, and it is all for his glory. Not ours. Nothing happened in our relationship with God because we made it happen. Believing this would nullify the death of Christ on the cross.

But that is exactly the intent of many people today. They prefer to nullify God’s plan. They prefer to nullify the death of Christ on the cross and instead become their own god. But this is not the plan of the one, true God. No, this plan will pass away along with the people that believe their own lies and pass them along to others. The only plan that will last forever is the promise that was originally given to Abraham and that which has reached us even today. It is the promise of the Spirit that we receive by faith in Christ, our creator, redeemer, and king, the one that has saved us and whom we will serve forever.

Paul had been shipwrecked on the island of Malta along with the rest of the people from the ship on which he was being taken to Rome. After three months, he left and started moving north, stopping in Syracuse and then passing to the north, just off of the coast of where we live today. They made a couple of other stops on their way north to Rome and then finally arrived in Rome where he intentionally connects with the local Jewish leaders, even calling them to his house to talk with them.

They were willing to listen for a time, but when Paul brought them to teach them about Christ, he emphasized the teaching of the kingdom of God:

They arranged to meet Paul on a certain day, and came in even larger numbers to the place where he was staying. He witnessed to them from morning till evening, explaining about the kingdom of God, and from the Law of Moses and from the Prophets he tried to persuade them about Jesus.

Acts 28:23

Paul explains to the Jewish leaders the kingdom of God, the Law of Moses, and the Prophets. But why are these points the emphasis of Paul’s discussion with the Jews? Two main reasons:

First, the Jews believed, and in fact many still believe, that the Abrahamic and Mosaic covenants are the covenants that they had with God. But Paul is explaining that there is now a different reality, a different way in which they must come to God. God had told Abraham and Moses both that he would be their God and they would be his people. To Abraham, God said that they must circumcise their males as a sign of their people, and to Moses, God reminded him that he and all of the people must obey his commandements. And if they will do that, then the covenant would remain in effect.

Of course, the Israelites had not only disobeyed God’s commandments, but they had also renounced their allegiance to God as their king. They said that they wanted a human king just like all of the nations around them. And right along with that desire came their ongoing worship of the other “gods” of the other nations.

So as Jesus came, he came preaching the kingdom of God. Why? Because in Christ, Jesus came to reclaim what was rightly his, his kingdom of people on the earth.

Of course, as the Israelites heard him, they assumed that the kingdom of God meant the nation of Israel. They were still thinking about the Abrahamic and Mosaic covenants. But those covenants had been broken long ago, and at the Last Supper, Jesus explained that there was now a new covenant, a covenant that was established by his blood. Those that placed their faith in Jesus’s blood would be his people. And in fact, his blood would be offered to all people, not just to the Israelites. The offering of the covenant was now expanded to everyone, not just the Israelites any longer.

Paul also explained the Law and the Prophets to the Jewish leaders. He did this to help the Jews understand that Jesus is the king in the kingdom of God. The Law and the Prophets spoke of the Messiah, the one who would come to rule over his people. This Messiah was predicted to have done many amazing things, whether to have been born of a virgin, to have been killed despite being innocent, and to have been resurrected from the dead.

Of course, the only person to have fulfilled all of these prophecies, and many more, was Jesus. And so Paul explained all of these things to the Jews. They would hear and decide whether or not they would believe.

Some would believe. Unfortunately, others would not. Those that would not would reject Israel’s true king, the one Messiah, Jesus Christ. They would reject becoming part of true kingdom of God, where all are welcome who would follow him.

Instead, those that would believe by placing their faith in his blood as a payment for their sins, they would become part of the kingdom of God. They would live for Christ as their king, doing all that he had commanded the people of his kingdom to do.

This was the teaching of Jesus, inviting people to enter into his kingdom, the kingdom of God, through his blood. And this also was the teaching of Paul, that we all, both Israelites and Gentiles, can enter into the kingdom through Christ and the payment of sins. The blood of Jesus is the blood of the new covenant and the new covenant establishes those that are part of God’s kingdom and those that are not. Those that place their faith in Christ’s blood and make him the king of their lives become a part of the kingdom of God.

But unfortunately, those that do not will become like the Jews who reject Paul, and ultimately reject Christ. In fact, Paul quotes Isaiah back to the Jews as they reject his message, and it should continue to be a warning to us even today:

“You will be ever hearing but never understanding;
you will be ever seeing but never perceiving.”
For this people’s heart has become calloused;
they hardly hear with their ears,
and they have closed their eyes.
Otherwise they might see with their eyes,
hear with their ears,
understand with their hearts
and turn, and I would heal them.

Acts 28:26-27

Paul was headed to Rome. Following his hearings with Felix, Festus, and subsequently also with King Agrippa, Paul was headed to Rome with the centurion Julius, whose job it was to make sure that he made it.

They had left in a bad season in which to be sailing and had run into a storm that would eventually force them and the boat that they were on, which included 276 people on board, to run aground on the island of Malta, off course from where they had intended to turn right to go along the coast of Sicily and through the Strait of Messina.

But despite the fact that they would run aground, an angel had appeared to Paul and told him that they would all live. They would all be saved:

But now I urge you to keep up your courage, because not one of you will be lost; only the ship will be destroyed. Last night an angel of the God to whom I belong and whom I serve stood beside me and said, ‘Do not be afraid, Paul. You must stand trial before Caesar; and God has graciously given you the lives of all who sail with you.’ So keep up your courage, men, for I have faith in God that it will happen just as he told me. Nevertheless, we must run aground on some island.”

Acts 27:22-26

As the angel came to give this message to Paul, he was simply confirming the message that Jesus had previously given. Paul would go to Rome, and just has he had testified before the other officials, he would also testify for Christ to the head of the Roman Empire himself, directly to Caesar.

God’s plan would not be stopped. Paul would go to Rome just as Jesus had said that he would. Paul would speak of Christ, the King of kings before the king himself. He would tell him of God’s anointed one, the one who would truly rule, not only over Israel, not only over the Roman empire, but over the entire earth.

This is the same one that we are waiting upon even today. God was not late when he sent Jesus and he will not be late when he sends him again. He will come at precisely the right time, just as he did before. God’s plan for Paul was fulfilled just as he said it would be, and his plan for the return of the King will be fulfilled. We do not know yet when, but we must continue to wait for the Lord to complete his plan because his will will be done.