Scripture: Galatians 1:11-24
Sermon Series: Galatians – Set Free, Live Free – Sermon 03

Are you an HGTV (picture) fan? Before there was Fixer Upper (picture) or Celebrity IOU (picture), there was Extreme Makeover (picture). What a great show! It was hosted by Ty Pennington and a crew of fantastic volunteers, professional contractors and designers who’d take a terrible house and transform it into a beautiful home. There was normally a family involved about whom you’d hear an inspiring backstory and then the transformation began. 

In 2004, Time magazine had an article about the show. It told the story of Alice Harris (picture) of South-Central Los Angeles. In 2003, a flood had left the community activist and her family, who had no insurance, living in one bedroom. The waters also ruined a stash of Christmas toys that Harris had collected for poor children. Harris said, “I figured no one was going to come to Watts and help us. No one had ever done that.” But Extreme Makeover found her. Bullhorn-wielding host, Ty Pennington, shipped Harris and her family off for a week’s vacation, while over 100 workers and neighbors tore her home down to the foundation and built a new, bigger one. They replaced the Christmas toys and donated appliances, mattresses, and landscaping to her flood-stricken neighbors. They even threw in a basketball court for the neighborhood kids. Now that’s an extreme makeover.

These extreme makeovers have something in common: an outsider comes in with a one-two-three program. First, that outsider sees the possibilities you couldn’t see. Second, that outsider does what you couldn’t do. Third, that outsider pays for what you couldn’t afford to pay.

Did you know Extreme Makeovers are God’s business? God is in the business of transforming lives. He has a similar three-step program. One, He sees possibilities in us that we can’t see in ourselves. He’s able to do what we can never do for ourselves. And He’s able to pay the price for what He does, a price we could never afford but He paid it all for us.

But God’s makeover is a little bit different in one area. A reality show makeover is an external job. God does an internal job. He makes you a new person from the inside out.

We’re continuing our series on the New Testament book of Galatians, Set Free, Live Free. Please turn to Galatians 1:11-24 (p. 913). “For I would have you know, brothers, that the gospel that was preached by me is not man’s gospel. For I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ. For you have heard of my former life in Judaism, how I persecuted the church of God violently and tried to destroy it. And I was advancing in Judaism beyond many of my own age among my people, so extremely zealous was I for the traditions of my fathers. But when He who had set me apart before I was born, and who called me by His grace, was pleased to reveal His Son to me, in order that I might preach him among the Gentiles, I did not immediately consult with anyone; nor did I go up to Jerusalem to those who were apostles before me, but I went away into Arabia, and returned again to Damascus. Then after three years I went up to Jerusalem to visit Cephas and remained with him fifteen days. But I saw none of the other apostles except James the Lord’s brother. (In what I am writing to you, before God, I do not lie!) Then I went into the regions of Syria and Cilicia. And I was still unknown in person to the churches of Judea that are in Christ. They only were hearing it said, “He who used to persecute us is now preaching the faith he once tried to destroy.” And they glorified God because of me.”.

The Bible is the story of God’s extreme makeover of people like us. God’s makeover is radical, and no spiritual makeover is more radical than the Apostle Paul’s. He went from Saul the Persecutor to Paul the Preacher. Here we have Paul’s story in this autobiographical section of his letter. If you’re a Christ-follower, you have a story like it.

In the Galatian churches, the gospel, the good news of God’s free saving grace was under attack. There were Jews or Judaizers saying Christ’s cross wasn’t enough. They taught that salvation occurred when a sinner believed in Christ and added good works to it.

The Apostle Paul saw this horrible attack and took strong steps to kill it. But these false teachers were making it tough for Paul. They not only attacked the gospel, but they made it personal – they attacked Paul. They said he wasn’t even an apostle, that he was a liar. Paul countered their attacks with his own autobiographical story. How do you prove that you’re trustworthy? Tell your story and let it speak for itself. That’s where Paul starts. He tells his gospel story and it’s radical. If you’re taking notes…

1. Radical Truth: It’s God’s truth, not human opinion, vss. 11-12

Today we get in trouble when we try to say, “God told me.” There was a young woman who went off to Bible college, a young man approached her and said, “God told me to marry you.” Wisely, this young woman replied, “Funny, God didn’t tell me,” and she walked away. But God really did tell the Apostle Paul. For I would have you know, brothers, that the gospel that was preached by me is not man’s gospel. For I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ (Galatians 1:11-12).

If you work for a large company, when a big decision comes up, someone will say, “What does corporate say?” It happens politically, “What does Washington say?” The Judaizers were saying, “What does Jerusalem say?”

The church was founded in Jerusalem. False teachers accuse Paul of getting his gospel message from the apostles in Jerusalem. So, Paul draws a line in the sand and says that’s not true. He barely had any contact with Jerusalem.

Have you ever received a message, or instruction, which claimed to be from a certain person, but you weren’t sure if it was true? It happens a lot with kids. “Dad said it’s my turn with the video game.”

Did you see the movie, Crimson Tide (picture)? An example of this takes place in that movie which is set on an American nuclear submarine. This submarine received orders to fire a nuclear warhead on some rebel Russian bases, essentially starting a nuclear war. Then, just when they’re about to comply with those orders, they receive a new message that may contain orders to cancel the launch. However, the new orders are incomplete and can’t be authenticated. One of the movie characters, Mr. Hunter, is particularly concerned about this message fragment, that it might tell them to cancel the missile strike. The movie tells the story of the extremes Hunter goes to in order to receive the rest of this message and determine its source.

Sometimes the issue of whether a message is authentic is critical. It could determine whether a nuclear war starts. In Galatians 1, it determines whether the gospel is true. It determines whether the gospel message is from God.

If no one taught Paul the gospel, how did he get it? Jesus revealed it to him personally. That’s how Paul’s message coincided with the Jerusalem apostles’ message. Paul had the best teacher possible, the Lord Jesus. The apostles may have had group Bible study with Jesus, Paul had a one on one with Him.

Paul didn’t formulate a theory from his Jewish education. He wasn’t taught it by some guru. It was revealed to him directly by Jesus Christ. He met the risen Christ firsthand so there was absolutely no doubt in his mind. Jesus revealed to Paul what he could never have figured out by himself. As with the disciples on the road to Emmaus, Jesus taught Paul how everything in the Old Testament pointed to Jesus being the Messiah. Paul received divine revelation firsthand and passed it on.

These false teachers claimed that Paul lacked authenticity with his gospel. He wasn’t part of the original twelve disciples, so he had to have gotten his information second-hand. Consequently, the Judaizers taught that Paul missed some important elements; namely, obedience to the Old Testament law. According to them, the Law needed to be added to the gospel for salvation.

Remember that the church was in her infancy during this stage. Hucksters were claiming to have knowledge of the gospel. There were no books or leaflets to pass around or historical records to check or conferences to attend in order to determine whether someone was authentic. 

These Judaizers insisted that their claims were just as valid as Paul’s when it came to the gospel. Only someone with apostolic authority could correct the error being thrust upon the Galatians, so Paul insists that his gospel was not second-hand. Instead, it was received by divine revelation from Jesus Christ.  

With the use of the term revelation, Paul insists his gospel came from the primary source, the Lord Jesus.  The nature of revelation is that it is a process or an event unveiling that which had been hidden before. It’s an opening up of that which was previously secret.

These verses emphasize two important truths. First, the gospel was not Paul’s idea; it was God’s. Second, because the gospel comes from God, it must be true. Paul is merely the conduit for the truth, not its source. Christianity does not come from legends or weird dreams. It’s not the result of scholarly argument, or a compromise by some ancient church council. The gospel message is truly good news because it is God’s Good News.

The gospel is not a matter of human opinion. It doesn’t come from any human. What’s more, human opinion doesn’t even factor into it. You can’t please God if you’re concerned about tweaking the gospel to please others. We don’t get a vote on what the gospel is, because the gospel doesn’t originate with any human being. The gospel is not something that changes according to the poll numbers. C.S. Lewis (picture) said it well: Christianity must be from God, for who else could have thought it up!

This conflict isn’t new. All the world’s religions created by man demand the necessity of human works or human effort for salvation. They all say, Do. But biblical Christianity says, Done. It’s why the gospel had to come by divine revelation. All human religions end up glorifying humans. We climb up to God. The Bible says that God reached down to us because we were helpless.

2. Radical Transformation: The Persecutor becomes the Preacher, vss. 13-17

Former atheist Lee Strobel (picture) turned preacher shared: “How can I tell you the difference God has made in my life? My daughter Allison was 5 years old when I became a follower of Jesus, and all she had known in those five years was a dad who was profane and angry. I remember I came home one night and kicked a hole in the living room wall just out of anger with life. I am ashamed to think of the times Allison hid in her room to get away from me. Five months after I gave my life to Jesus Christ, that little girl went to my wife and said, “Mommy, I want God to do for me what he’s done for Daddy.” At age 5! What was she saying? She’d never studied the archeological evidence [regarding the truth of the Bible]. All she knew was her dad used to be this way: hard to live with. But more and more her dad is becoming this way. And if that is what God does to people, then sign her up. At age 5 she gave her life to Jesus. God changed my family. He changed my world. He changed my eternity.” That’s normal Christianity. When someone really meets Jesus, when they believe the gospel there is always transformation.

That’s Paul’s testimony. His transformation story is told three times in the book of Acts with the fourth in Galatians. Every Christ-follower’s story is different, but the storyline is always the same. God called you to faith. He revealed His Son to your sinful heart. You accepted His gift of grace, and He radically transformed your life.

Every Christ-follower has “B.C. Days,” meaning their life before Christ days. We sometimes talk about finding God. The fact is that we’re found by God. Paul didn’t find God – God found him and revealed His Son to him. The same is true of us. We were found by God. From out of nowhere, Jesus stepped onto the scene of our life and saved us. Karl Barth (picture) perhaps the 20^th century’s greatest theologian, liked to say that True Christians are the victims of a successful surprise attack by God.

What if I told you that I follow Whoopi Goldberg (picture) on Twitter and this morning she posted an amazing tweet. Goldberg has mocked Christians on The View, so that’s what makes this amazing. Whoopi tweeted, “This morning I have turned from my sins and put my faith in Jesus to save me. I now declare that Jesus is my Lord!” You’d be skeptical about her conversion.

As far as I know, Whoopi Goldberg still ridicules Christians and rejects Christ. Yet, our reaction would be how those early Christians must have reacted when they heard the news that Saul, the cruel persecutor of Christians, had become a follower of Christ. There were probably many of them who said, “Yeah. Right. What are you smoking?” Instead of Whoopi, I could have used Vladimir Putin (picture), since he’s cruel and basically an international thug who persecutes anyone who opposes him, including Christians.

Before he became a Christian, Paul savaged Christians. He stood by encouraging the stoning of Stephen. He had Christians arrested and thrown into prison. He’s the last person Christians expected to be saved. His testimony is a story about how God can change even a monster into an evangelist.

Every Christian has a testimony. A testimony is just recounting what God has done in your life. When a witness is sworn into a court of law, they’re asked to testify. All they’re expected to do is honestly relate what they saw, heard, or experienced. That’s what your testimony is. You just relate the story of the difference Jesus has made in your life.

There are three parts to every testimony: (1) My life before Christ. (2) How and when I met Christ. (3) How my life has changed since I met Christ. I’d encourage you to memorize those three points and write your testimony using that outline. People can say they don’t believe the Bible, but they can’t argue with the fact that your life has been transformed! Paul explains the characteristics of his conversion experience in these verses.

God did it. It pleased God to reveal His Son to me. Whenever Paul spoke or wrote about his conversion, it was always with the emphasis that God did the work. Salvation is of the Lord” (Jonah 2:9).

God did it by His grace. Salvation reminds us of a young prophet Jeremiah or a John the Baptist. God had His hand on their lives before they were even born. Salvation is always by God’s grace, not human effort or character. Grace and rescue go together. Whoever God redeems He calls through His Word. The mystery of God’s will and human responsibility are a mystery to us. Scripture is clear that God is not willing that any should perish (2 Peter 3:9). 

God did all through Christ. In Philippians 3, Paul makes it clear that as far as works, he had plenty to brag about when he was an unconverted man. He had religion and self-righteousness, as well as reputation and recognition BUT  

he didn’t have Jesus. When Jesus appeared to him on the Damascus Road, he realized all that he was missing – everything. He was self-righteous but that was like filthy rags compared to Jesus’ righteousness.

So, God revealed Christ to Paul, in Paul, and through Paul. Faith in Christ brought about a radical inner transformation. The “inwardness” of Christ is a major truth for Paul.

God did it for the sake of others. God saved Paul to rescue him from his sin and to use him to win others. God chose Paul to preach among the Gentiles the same grace that he had experienced. That in itself was evidence that Paul’s conversion was God. A prejudiced Jew would never decide for himself to minister to the despised Gentiles.

It was completely unthinkable that Paul would ever change and become a gospel preacher. What could change a person so dramatically? It’s only the grace of God. Only the grace of God, only the love of God can truly change a person’s heart. God called him by grace and revealed His Son in Paul. God called the greatest persecutor around to come and serve Him so that all the glory would go to God and not to Paul.

Knowing this, when we begin to think we’ve done something great, we shouldn’t think too highly of ourselves. God doesn’t call the great, He calls the lowest. There’s no place for pride in the family of God.

If Paul had been converted today, we’d have him sharing his testimony at the next Franklin Graham Crusade. That’s a mistake. Paul goes to Arabia. Have you ever noticed how many of God’s servants had their training in the university of the wilderness? When God wanted to make Moses the leader of His people, He sent him to the wilderness. Moses had gone through the Egyptian schools, and thought he was ready to be the deliverer of God’s people. When he left the university of Egypt he may have said, “Now I am ready to undertake my great lifework.” But immediately, he started killing Egyptians and hiding them in the sand, and God said, “You’re not ready yet, Moses; you need a post-graduate course.” He was forty years learning the wisdom of Egypt, and forty years forgetting it and learning the wisdom of God. Paul had solitary time with the Savior in Arabia to prepare to serve the Lord.

We need to know Jesus before we have a platform. Scripture warns about not putting a novice or a young believer in the spotlight. A.W. Tozer (picture) called it Wheaties Christianity. That’s when a celebrity has trusted Christ and is thrust out on the stage before they’ve matured in knowing the Savior. It often ruins them. Paul got to know Jesus before he started preaching Jesus.

3. Radical Relationships: There’s camaraderie in the Gospel, vss. 18-21

“Then after three years I went up to Jerusalem to visit Cephas and remained with him fifteen days. But I saw none of the other apostles except James the Lord’s brother” (Galatians 1:18-19). Cephas is the Aramaic for Peter. The word visit is the same word that gives us our English word history. The thought is to sit down and swap stories.

Paul went to visit Peter. He went to learn what it was to walk with Jesus. Maybe they sat by the fire at Peter’s place. “How did you meet Jesus, Peter?” “What about you, Paul? Tell me about this Damascus Road experience.”

Every Christ-follower needs story sharing. Others help us stay on track. If you have Christian friends who always agree with you and never tell you the tough stuff, you need a new set of friends.

Peter and Paul became partners instead of rivals. They should never have been friends. Peter was blue collar, a fisherman. Paul was a university guy. The gospel bridges what in a lost world are walls and barriers.

I’m thankful for godly men in our area in the ministry like Bill Busch at Community Church and John Olkowski at Faith Chapel. They’re kindred spirits. I have a handful of friends that I touch base with at least once a month. We all need that. Do you have it? Do you have friends who are helping you know Jesus better? Are you helping them grow spiritually? If all you have are activity friends, they go golfing or shopping with you, you’re missing out.

Solitary time in Arabia is important but the Christian life is not to be a solitary life. We must be rooted in Christian community to be healthy Christians.

Peter and James and the others had heard about the ministry that Paul was doing. They recognized the hand of God on his life. They celebrated it and affirmed it as the work of God. They recognized Peter as an apostle to Jews and Paul as an apostle to Gentiles. This was a big deal! This is how we want to strive to relate to one another. We want to look for and recognize that God is at work among all of us, yet not in the same way. It’s easy to think that you have to be excited about the same thing I’m excited about in order for us to be working for the same God. Have you ever felt that way in a Christian group? That there’s only one way God is supposed to work in our lives? God uses different gifts in different ways. He’s not in the cookie cutter business.

4. Radical Celebration; Christians are excited when even enemies come to Christ, vss. 22-24

It’s Sunday, so let’s be honest. Is there someone that you don’t want to see in heaven? Is there an enemy that has made your life so miserable that if they didn’t make it to heaven, it wouldn’t bother you? Maybe you have an ex-spouse that just grinds your nerves?

Paul’s last words are convicting. “And I was still unknown in person to the churches of Judea that are in Christ. They only were hearing it said, “He who used to persecute us is now preaching the faith he once tried to destroy.” And they glorified God because of me” (Galatians 1:22-24).

They glorified God, recognizing that Paul was a trophy of His grace. When the change in our life is so real that others see it and say so, it proves to us and everyone else that the gospel truly is the power of God for salvation to anyone and everyone who believes. What else can explain the dramatic reversals from evil individual to committed Christ-follower down through the ages? What else can explain the profound transformation in our own lives?

Sometimes we domesticate the gospel and forget it’s truly the power of an omnipotent God. The gospel can transform the life of the evilest individual. The gospel is not some formula for how to get saved; it’s divine power that actually brings about our salvation from first to last. It’s the power of God.

Conclusion

Too often we limit the power of the gospel. When Paul was busting the doors of Christians down and busting heads, no one would have ever thought that he’d come to Christ. The gospel has power!

Do we believe that the gospel can do an Extreme Makeover? Do we believe that the cross can still do a Radical Transformation?

Who is the least likely person to come to Christ in your mind? How about Annie Lobert (picture)? Annie founded…are you ready? Hookers for Jesus (picture). I’ll let you Google her wonderful story for yourself later. She was a Vegas call girl who after a bout with Hodgkins and a drug overdose, came to Christ. Later she went back to the Strip to reach out to other sex workers. Through her ministry, Hookers for Jesus, she meets sex workers where they’re at, offering help to get out of the industry and start new lives in Christ.

The next Billy Graham (picture) might be drunk right now. The next Corrie Ten Boom (picture) might be the woman driving in front of you with the pro-choice bumper sticker. The next Dietrich Bonhoeffer (picture) might currently be a misogynistic, profanity-spewing hip-hop artist. The next Charles Spurgeon (picture) might be some liberal news reporter. The next Elizabeth Elliot (picture) might be a heroin-addicted porn star. The next Augustine (picture) might be a sexually promiscuous cult member, just like, come to think of it, the first Augustine was. The Spirit of God can turn all that around and radically transform anyone, even you and even me, and He loves to do so.

The gospel isn’t something that man made up; it’s God’s gospel, the divine gospel. It’s the power of God to save all who believe what God has done in Christ on that bloody cross. If Paul was here, he’d tell you that there is only one gospel, and that gospel came from God. You can trust the gospel.

Let’s tie this up with Some Take Home Truths:

No one is too sinful to be saved. Since Jesus saved Saul, He can save anyone. It doesn’t matter what you’ve done or how you’ve been living. You may be religious, you may be rebellious, or you might just be a regular person. Either way you need to be saved.

God may have knocked you off your high horse like He did Paul. If so, it’s because He loves you. He wants to bring you Home to Himself. God’s not after retribution; He longs for you to experience reconciliation with Him.

Don’t lose hope for others to be saved. Some of you have been praying for a loved one or friend for a long time. Don’t give up. Romans 12:12: Rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer.

Prepare yourself for persecution. Like Paul, we will suffer for following the Savior. Persecution is a promise. Paul wrote in Philippians 1:29: “For it has been granted to you that for the sake of Christ you should not only believe in Him but also suffer for His sake.”

Never tire of sharing your testimony. Paul couldn’t stop talking about his salvation. Every one of his letters begins with a greeting of grace and he retells his testimony over and over again.  

Hold on tightly to your relationships with your brothers and sisters in Christ. If you’re born again, you and I are spiritually related. I’m your brother. You’re my sister or brother. The Greek word for “brother” means, “from the same womb.” It means we’ve been “birthed together.”

The gospel has power. The gospel increases in power with a united church of brothers and sisters united in prayer for the lost and on mission!

God is in the Extreme Makeover business. Has He made over your life? If He has, are you sharing with others how He can make over theirs?