Faith that conquers Galatians 3 vs 1-4

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Hallelujah, that's it. Praise God.

So we continue our study in the book of Galatians.

We are coming to chapter 3 this morning.

How it is just humorous to see Paul calling them foolish

Galatians. What does he really mean by

that? Foolish?

If a pastor calls the church and say you foolish people, the

whole church will store the pastor, isn't it?

But this man has the guts to call this people foolish

Galatians. In fact, it is JB Philips

translation. He even went I don't I don't

agree. He did a very good job.

But he says you idiots, he called them idiots.

So there must be something that is upsetting Paul and we need to

find out why. Why is he so upset with

Galatians that he can call them foolish?

And the word foolish has many different shades of meaning.

And here it does not mean that they lacked mental ability

there. He the the Greek word to

describe those kind of people is moron.

That is not used here. Here the word used is they have

intellectual ability, but they're not using it.

They're keeping it on the shelf somewhere safe in their house.

So they don't use their brain. So Paul is saying, guys, wake

up, its time to use your brain. Don't keep it on the shelf.

Don't put in the almirah somewhere in your safekeeping.

No, no, it's time for you to use it now.

Why does he use those kind of words?

Because we already have seen so much already in chapter 1 and 2.

This is only following idea is only following from that.

They were trying to add to the faith in Jesus, faith plus

works, faith plus ceremonial law.

You must be circumcised. You must do this, you must do

that. So Paul is saying wake up, think

straight, don't be foolish, use your brain.

You know, that's just that's, that's how he's trying to exhort

these people or foolish Galatians who has bewitched you.

What is bewitching? It is some people have, you

know, the superstition that people can sometimes look at

them and cast a spell on them. You know its called evil eye.

Oh, sometimes the child, you know, some of you children are

very cute. Mostly, you know, and people

when the child become sick, why is the child sick?

Why is the child coughing? I think that Lady cast an evil

lie on my child. That's why it became sick.

Have you heard this kind of explanation anytime?

Yeah. So what Paul is trying to say is

who has cast an evil eye on you? Who has bewitched you?

Who cast a spell on you? Now read it there.

Who has bewitched you before your very eyes?

Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified.

So what is he trying to say? I was trying to figure out what

is the meaning of why does he talk about the crucifixion of

Jesus? Talking at the same time about

being being bewitched is because when you look at Christ on the

cross and put your eyes on the cross of Christ, when you are

looking at the crucified Christ, no evil shall fall on you, no

evil shall touch you, no spell will land on you when you are

looking at the cross and Jesus Christ was crucified.

Does it make sense? Why would Paul write like this?

You are foolish Galatians who has bewitched you before your

very eyes. Jesus Christ was clearly ported

as crucified. Basically what they have, what

the language of Paul is deeply rooted in the Greek culture.

Whenever there is a war and a commander or a general is

walking into the area that he has won, there will be soldiers

coming behind him and there will be people.

He'll be mounting a horse and he'll be coming in and grandeur

and there will be a lot of musical instruments and you know

that the people should know that he's coming.

And there will be people walking in the front with a placard.

You know they will have a pole on which they will be something

written on it. You know what is his

achievement, how he has conquered or what are the CTC

conquered? What are his accomplishments?

That is to proclaim to the people so that the general will

be viewed highly by the people who are watching.

Basically its like a billboard. The Billboard is a glorified

version of the placard. But what is he trying to do

here? He's trying to say that Jesus

Christ was placarded, He was lifted on the cross and on.

It is which clearly and also it is for everybody to read.

The whatever is written on the placard is for everyone to read.

Its not secret, its for everyone to read.

So he says Jesus Christ has been lifted up on the cross and you,

he has been placarded so that you may know that you may read,

that you may understand that when you look at that Christ you

will not be bewitched. No one can cast a spell on you.

Does it make any sense? Shout Hallelujah so.

And I was looking at the Septuagint.

That is the Greek translation as well.

There it says Paul constellations foolish,

unthinking Septuagint use the word unthinking.

That means they have the ability to think, but they don't want to

think. How many Christians live like

that? Do we have something called

examined life? Examined life is you look at

your own faith and analyze it. Why are you believing in Jesus?

What has he done for you? Why do you want to believe in

him? Do you have a reason to give to

somebody who says, why are you a Christian if you don't have?

We are unthinking Christians because Peter, when he writes,

he says you must be willing to give an apologia, a defense of

your faith, a reasonable explanation of why you believe

what you believe. Does it make sense?

So we should know why we believe in Jesus.

When somebody is bewitched, it is involuntary.

Like, I don't know, I just was talking to somebody in some

other country and I was trying to pray for them.

And when I prayed there was a spirit that is speaking.

And I asked the spirit, who are you?

And he gave the name and it sounded like Russian to me.

So after the prayer, I asked him, what does his name mean to

you? Oh, he was my colleague.

When did he work with you? 2006.

And what nationality belong? Oh, I don't know.

He may be Russian or Romanian, I don't know.

I said, what in Russia? In Romania also, they use black

magic. I didn't expect, but it was

there. So I said leave the leave the

person. Now I cast it out.

The point I am trying to make is bewitched is an involuntary

target. A person becomes an involuntary

target. But Paul is saying why are you

bewitched? You are acting as somebody cast

a spell on you when you yourself are walking into it.

That's the contradiction. That is a contradiction of the

Galatian people. Why is he calling them foolish?

Because they are to believe in Jesus only, nothing more,

nothing more. Just Jesus.

And because they're adding things, he's calling them

foolish. You're walking into the trap.

You're acting like you're bewitched.

You are not using your brain. You're putting it on a shelf.

So wake up, Galatians. You know these people.

Galatians before I already explained to you in one of my

previous sermons, Galatia is not a particular city.

It's a region. It's like a state.

You have many other cities in that place, Iconium, Lystra or

Lystra whatever you call it, then Derby, different places.

So when he went to a place called Iconium and he started

preaching, you see it all in Acts chapter 14.

Acts 14 · chapter mention

When you when you read there, so many things happened there.

Its so dramatic is the passage, the chapter you see there Paul

and Barabas preaching the gospel, people responding in big

numbers. Both Jewish and Gentiles

believed in Jesus and after some time the unbelieving Jews, they

stirred up the crowd and then they just wanted to they made a

plan to stone Paul and Barnabas. When they came to know the that

there's a plan to attack, they just slipped in the night and

left the place and went to Lystra.

And there again when when Paul was speaking, he found a man

sitting on the floor and in his face was something that was

noticeable that Paul could see that he had faith to be healed

and he was a crippled from the birth.

He never walked from the time he was born.

And he looked at him and said stand up and walk.

I said, did he say in the name of Jesus?

He didn't. Did he say, I want to pray for

you brother, Just wait, Father, have mercy on this man.

Nothing. He said hey, stand up and that

guy stood up and when he was starting jumping and walking the

priest who has been in that place, they thought that the the

Jews ZEU yes, Jews. That is one of the gods, the

Greek gods, the Jews is come in the flesh.

What is that If I saw he just use it like that Jews that you

were think JUICE. So that's the reason why I'm

spelling it out, because, you know, in a restaurant people go

and sit there. Zeus.

Sorry, Zeus, correcting my pronunciation.

Thank you. I will skip the joke now.

Thank you. Cool.

So. Let's just keep going it were 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? I had to struggle a lot with

this verse. I had to sit and think a lot

about it in this verse and in verse 5 as well.

He talks about it in verse 5. Does God give you His Spirit and

work miracles among you because you observe the law or because

you believe what you heard? So what is the measure?

What is the kind of experience that Paul has in mind when he's

saying about receiving the Holy Spirit?

What kind of experience is Paul having in his mind?

When you look into the life of Paul, he was trying to persecute

the Christians. He was going towards Damascus

with the authority to arrest people, enter their homes and

seize the men, women, children and put them in the jail.

But before he could do it, he was struck by a bright light and

he had an encounter with Jesus. I will not repeat the whole

story. You know the story.

So after that event he was told, go into the city.

You will be told what he should do.

And he was without sight for three days, and he was fasting

and praying. And God deals with another man

called Ananias. Go to sorts of place and you

will find a man called Saul. Pray for him.

Oh, he's a wicked man. He's a very bad man.

Don't worry about it. I will show him how much he must

suffer. You go lay your hand on him,

because he's seeing you come to him and lay hand on him, that

his eyes may be restored. All the story you see there and

then when Ananyas laid hands on him, he received the Holy

Spirit. What kind of Holy Spirit

experience did Paul have? The Bible doesn't tell us.

Was it the initial receiving of the Spirit which happens when

you believe in Jesus, or is he talking about the Pentecostal

experience of second blessing, that after you are converted

again, you have a second experience and encounter with

the Holy Spirit and you receive power for ministry?

Is he talking about that? It is not very clear.

So I, I spent a lot of time yesterday trying to understand

it, but it is not too difficult for us to decipher it or to

understand it because it can be sometimes both can happen in one

go. Both can happen in one go.

What do I mean it? At the time of your conversion,

you also have an experience with the Holy Spirit and you are

saved, sealed with the promised Holy Spirit.

According to Ephesians 113 to those who believed he gave them

the Holy Spirit, sealed them with the promised Holy Spirit.

So that is, that is every Christian.

If you are a believer, you have the Holy Spirit.

There is no doubt about it at all.

We stand by this teaching that every believer is filled with

the Holy Spirit. But Paul talks about repeated

feelings when he says Ephesians 518 be being filled with the

Holy Spirit. What is he saying?

It is not a one time experience. It has to be a continuous

experience. It has to be on the go.

You should be filled with the Spirit every day.

There is an ongoing experience, but he also talks about gifts of

the Holy Spirit, which are given by the Spirit.

So you have the Assemblies of God, which is one of the main

branches of the Pentecostal denomination.

That's the one main church that has stood and has taught many

things and has promulgated many teachings on the Pentecostal

experience. They are the people who try to

say that there's a second experience that is distinct from

being born again. Then you have another encounter

with the Holy Spirit, and that time you receive the Holy Spirit

for power. See, this is not for self.

It is for others. Always is for others.

The Pentecostal experience of the baptism of the Holy Spirit

is for ministry for other people, not for yourself.

But when you are born again, you receive the Holy Spirit is for

you because you become a child of God.

That is what makes you to connect with God.

When you pray, when you kneel down, Father looks at that

Spirit that is in you and connects with you and speaks to

you because you are his child. Is it becoming clearer or am I

making it more difficult? I hope I'm trying to make it

simple. So in this experience, what I'm

trying to say here is this whole chapter.

When you read you will see the word in the Greek you have got

pistis is faith. There's also the word same root

is used for even for verb. So if you put together all these

forms, nouns, 7 word, 7 times, the word pistis is used, which

is a noun and the same root with a verb, sentence, sense of a

verb is used five times, adjective 2 times, total 14

times. So if you know that the word

pistis, pistios, pistas, whatever is a Greek word, 14

times it is used. What does it mean?

That's the main thing he's talking about.

It's the main thing that Paul is wanting to talk to you in this

chapter is faith. What is this faith?

It is so easy to understand. Every believer knows he has

faith. That's why he is a child of God.

But what is faith? Until and unless we analyze it

and understand it, we will be little bit of like Galatians,

unthinking Christians. We need to analyze it.

And who is the father of faith? Abraham.

So that's the reason why Paul goes on to talk about Abraham.

He he talks about himself, he talks about the Galatians

experience. How did you receive the Holy

Spirit when you heard? Not?

Because you are observing the law.

You heard the gospel, you believed it.

That's how you received the Holy Spirit.

And then he says, OK, let's talk about Abraham.

And he says God proclaimed the message to Abraham before he

anybody else heard the gospel. He proclaimed to him.

And he said, because you believe I am creating your faith as a

righteousness, and all the nations of the world will be

blessed through you. All the nations will be blessed

through you. So what Paul is trying to say

here is, OK, God gave this promise to Abraham.

Actually, when I looked more deeper into the story of the

Abraham story, how did Abraham believe?

He had a problem. Basically that problem is he was

not able to have a child of his own.

He was wealthy, powerful and he had an army of his own.

Everything is going good for him.

There is no problem with his life, but only one little thing.

He didn't have a child and he was he.

God appeared to him at the age of 75 and he keeps talking to in

between several times and now at the 99 1/2 years of age again he

appears to him and says by this time next year you are going to

have a son. And Sarah listen from in the

tent. She says will I have the

pleasure of becoming a mum, nurse, a baby at this age?

And she laughs. The Angel who didn't see her

physically was why does she laugh?

He has to go back inside and ask, did you laugh?

And she says no. And the Angel says no, she did

laugh. That's why they named their son

Isaac. Isaac means laughed.

OK, so now what am I trying to say here is there was a

necessity, there was a need, there was a lack.

And God promised I am going to fulfill that lack.

And Abraham believed him. Now there are many things here,

important things. One, when the faith comes into

your heart, there will be a revelation.

Without revelation its not possible to have faith.

Whether it is through your need or through intellectual grasp or

understanding, you will have a revelation.

And when you have revelation, that is the one that puts the

seed for your faith. Seed for your faith comes

through revelation and no revelation faith is not

possible. And when I you know, these are

the things, some, some things are difficult to understand when

you are beginning your life, when you are young, you can't

see much into the future. But after you have lived your

life for 1020304050 years, you look back, it becomes easy to

understand life because you are able to see retrospectively what

happened in your life. What are the milestones?

When you look at the milestones, you know that you did hear God

that time you think, did I really hear God?

Did I do I know it? And then after a few years, when

you look back and say, yeah, that day God spoke to me.

That thing, God did it for me, that thing because God ordained

it for me. So as you look back into your

life, faith makes sense. It becomes easy to explain.

Every time when I look into my life, I have supernatural

revelation. I did have.

It is not just thinking or else I'm reading the Bible.

I think God is speaking to me from this verse.

Not like that. I had supernatural revelation

few times and one of the first ones that I ever had was to hear

the Holy Spirit. He just flashed into my mind.

I would say it's like a fiery letters or golden letters and I

could grasp it. You are not fighting with flesh

and blood, but its principalities and powers and

whatever. I was struggling at that time.

In one second everything gone. I was free.

But did I understand it? No.

It took me 40 plus years to understand.

Now I know that God had given me a revelation 40, nearly 3440

years ago. And now I know when I'm, when

I'm praying for people and I'm cashing over the devil.

I can tell the devil I have authority over you because he

said to me. He said to me I am not fighting

with flesh and bread, with peace, partisan powers.

When he said to me he has given me authority over you, you

devil, you are now coming out. So revelation is very important.

And Abraham in all those intercourses with God, with

Yahweh, he had not only deposited the seeds of faith in

him, but in fact he became the father of the faith because of

the revelation. Whatever is your, whatever is

your need for guidance, or I had to do this, I had to do that.

What is the best way? Should I take left turn or right

turn? God speaks to you in your ear.

Is there a promise in the Bible about it?

Yes, in the book of Isaiah. So when you have that experience

and when you take that path and then you find things are going

well, you look back and say thank you Lord for speaking to

me that day. Thank you for guiding me.

See, this is how Christian, Christian life is developing

into your own individual life. See Abrahams experience is not

for himself. It is for every one of us.

Every one of us is an Abraham. Everyone of us is a Sarah.

Why? Because your experience is so

unique and that is required for the body of Christ.

So don't keep your mouth shut, but speak about it so that

somebody else faith will be ignited because they hear your

story. The faith is contagious.

You cannot keep to yourself. When you share your faith, it

ignites faith in somebody. It has got that power because

somebody came to transmit that faith from their heart, from

their mouth to someone. That faith has reached you

today. So my question is, what do you

want to do with this faith that you have, which God has

deposited in you? Do you want to keep your mouth

shut? That's not the purpose.

That's not the purpose. The whole world is celebrating

Christmas. They are shouting Jesus was

born, Jesus was born, Jesus was born.

The shops are shouting it, malls are shouting it.

Everywhere you see decorations on the street, lamps are

decorated everywhere. They are saying Jesus is coming

to the world. But nobody's heart it is

touching. It's not touching anybody's

heart because somebody who has faith has to open their mouth

for that message to become meaningful to somebody.

I would encourage you to open your mouth this Christmas

season. Tell somebody, Jesus saved me

and he wants to save you too. How much time does it take to

say that? Right, right.

The doors will open for you to talk about evangelism.

Cool. So yeah, there's so much more to

talk about. Faith 1 John 54 For whatever is

born of God conquers the world. Whatever is born of God conquers

the world. Has Abrahams faith conquered the

world? It did.

Has your faith conquered the world?

That's the next question. Yield to God, God my I, yield my

spirit, my soul, my body, my mind to you.

Holy Spirit, take over and guide me.

Paul could say in the previous chapter, it is no longer I that

live, but Christ just who lives in me and reigns in me.

Until you come to that point of surrender where you think that

your life is not yours, but it is his, and you allow Him to

live in you through you and that great exchange you do, then your

faith will conquer the world. Then your faith will conquer the

world. Until then we are putting in the

safekeeping somewhere in the house.

Faith is the gift of God. No one can boast about it.

Faith is God, not conviction that rests on his self

revelation and responds with personal trust and obedience.

So faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God, Word

of Christ, Romans 10/17. Faith comes by hearing and

hearing by the word of Christ. So we need to have this

experience. Only then your faith will become

valid. You know, there are people who

have lots, lot of kinds of faith in the world.

You, you meet a Buddhist or a Muslim, they all have some kind

of a faith. Even atheist also has a faith

that there's no God. He believes it.

You may say, oh, that's a faith. He says, no, I don't think it's

a faith, but that's a faith because they do not, they cannot

prove that God does not exist. There's so much more shouting in

their face that God exists. Look at the world, whether you

might whether you look it through a microscope or a

telescope, you have lot of plenty of evidence.

It is difficult to erase it and they are having some kind of a

faith. Faith is always the work of God

and involves hearing his voice whereby the believer lays hold

half his lays hold of his preferred will.

It is John Calvin. I was quite surprised that John

Calvin said those words because I thought in his theology is not

much room for revelation. But he says faith is always the

work of God involves hearing his voice.

You have to hear the voice of the Holy Spirit.

When you hear his voice, then you lay hold of his will.

You lay hold of his will. Whether it is marriage, whether

it is Job is your vocation or the holiday where you want to

go. It is not for you to make a

decision on your own. This is what I believe.

You got to go to God and say, hi, I want to go to Italy, Rome.

Is it your will? Is it your will?

I was just thinking there was a time.

I just think if you want to have a holiday, you can have a

holiday, you have money, you go. And now I think, no, it's not

like that. You have to go to God and say,

can I have some fun? God says yes, go.

God says no, don't go. It's very simple.

Every time we have gone on different trips, like once we

went to India, we we bought the tickets 10 months in advance.

But those ten months I have prayed every flight, every means

of transport I bring under the bread of Christ.

And every train we take, every flight we take, you know

everything. The people we meet, the words we

speak. I have prayed over it several

times. And when it's all over, we take

the flight and land back here. Then the COVID was declared as

so God kept an eye on us and brought us back home.

He did not allow us to be struck somewhere.

Because you committed your holiday to God, He ordains it

for you. He protects you.

He keeps a special eye on you. This is how I want everybody to

live your life. Don't live on your own.

I have intelligence. I have a lot of the ability to

think through. I can plan.

I want to make my life according to my likes and dislikes.

That's not the way to live Christian life.

You have to bring it to God. Cool, let's go.

Romans 1423. Whatever is not of faith is sin.

It is not of faith, it is sin. So you need to have that faith

mixed in everything. And without faith it's

impossible to please him, for he who comes to God must believe

that he is and that he is a rewarder of those who seek him.

And you know, this is all things.

All these things are talked about in the book of Hebrews.

Genuine scriptural faith is not our ability to count it done.

It is a deep consciousness divinely imparted to the heart

of man that it is done. It is the faith that only God

can give. What am I trying to say here?

Deeply in your heart you are conscious, and the Holy Spirit

puts it in your heart. It is done.

We are you're you're asking for something when you're asking for

a healing, asking for a deliverance.

You're you're trusting God to come through to do a miracle for

you Divinely ordained instinct, you call it instinct or whatever

it is, nudge in your heart, you know it is done and then the

miracle happens. Miracle before the miracle

happens there somebody has to believe, somebody has to have

faith and only then a miracle happens.

So I'm quite amazed about the things that I have been thinking

about in in James chapter 2 verse 19, you believe that God

James 2:19

is 1. You do well.

The demons also believe and shudder.

You tell the demon God exists. It may be shaking, but it cannot

be saved. It cannot be saved.

Demon is judged already. They will go into hell, but they

shudder at the name mentioning of the name of God.

What about believers? They don't have the same kind of

fear the demons have. How many of us really afraid of

God? I see some hands going up.

That's good. Good to see that when when you

are able to answer affirmatively, that means you

have a genuine encounter with God.

And when you have a genuine encounter with God, you will

have a respect. Is not fear fear, its not about

crouching before God. It is that reverence that comes

in your heart that lifts him up, that gives him the top place,

that obeys him, that just wants to please him.

Nothing else matters except his approval.

Just a nod, just a wink. We are looking for that wink

from his eyes and that is really living by faith.

Just living by faith and this, this kind of a faith will be

tested. If it is not tested, it is not

genuine. Remember Me, these words of

mind, every faith, when it is tested, only we know it is

genuine. And I think it is Peter who

talks about our faith being tested.

That is like gold being refined in fire.

The gold is a solid. It takes a lot of heat to melt

it. But when you melt the gold and

all the impurities come up on top, you remove the impurities

and then you allow it to cool down, that becomes pure like

that. Trials have got a place in

Christian life and they make you pure, they make you holy, they

make you to align with the will of God, the mind of God.

And there is a place for trials and faith will be tested and

other otherwise it will not be legitimate.

And faith is a gift of the Holy Spirit.

Galatians 522. So we have looked at so many

things about the faith, but ultimately what is important is

that we need to have this faith like Abraham.

And when you have the faith, you will be justified.

That is what it justifies. And Paul goes on to talk about

everywhere he scatters this idea in Romans 117, the just shall

live by faith, which picks up from the book of Habakkuk in the

Old Testament. He talks about in the book of

Galatians, he talks about elsewhere.

It is the most powerful thing that anyone can ever understand

and rely or base your life on is the faith.

Your foundation has to be faith in Jesus Christ, nobody else.

No other thing, no other thing. It is not Jesus plus something.

No, it is Jesus only. It is Jesus only and then you

have a real faith that's very, very important for us to

understand. So let's look at I think my time

is finished so I'll try to cover it next week, explain a little

more. There's so much more to talk in

chapter 3. We'll continue next week.

Shall we pray? Father, we thank you again,

thank you again, thank you again.

Thank you again for the gift of faith which your given a measure

of it to each one of us. I thank you for the deposit of

faith in our heart, in our spirit that has helped us to cry

out to our Father, to connect with You and to be saved and to

believe in your Son Jesus. We pray for the gift of faith.

We thank you Jesus. Nothing else can substitute it,

nothing else can replace it. Nothing else can replace it.

It is just Jesus and Him alone. He is our life, He is our light,

He is our bread, He is our fortress.

He is everything to us. He is our shepherd.

And I worship you, our Father, for this great gift of Jesus.

We thank you. For the gift of faith, we honor

you, We praise you. Lord, bless your children now.

Holy Spirit, I invite you now to touch their heart.

Put your hand, Lord Jesus, upon their heart right now that they

may know that you are touching them and strengthen their faith.

Make it strong. It may be able to stand firm

until you're coming to the glory of your name, Jesus.

Name, we ask and everybody says Amen.

Thanks for joining us at Omega. If you need prayer for healing

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