PAUL, APOSTLE TO THE GENTILES
Have you learned to love the Book of Galatians? Or is it dull, boring, confusing, to you? It has been the spark that has ignited glorious reformations in people’s lives since the time of Martin Luther. So you should learn to make friends with it, to love it, to let your heart revel in its powerful Good News. We must study and learn the message of Galatians—what Christ accomplished for us by His sacrifice on the cross, the Good News of the atonement, what is the New Covenant.
On one occasion, the apostle Paul told the people “Be ye followers of me, as I also am of Christ” (1 Cor. 11:1).
Seriously, would you want to “follow” Paul? You wouldn’t be “lukewarm” in your devotion, if you did! In fact, Paul’s devotion illustrates precisely that of the “144,000” who will “finish” God’s work in the earth and be prepared to welcome the Son of God when He returns in glory.
But how does a lukewarm, sensual, half-worldly, half-cold half-hot person get to be “on fire” like Paul?
The answer is GALATIANS. Your human soul can be ignited and catch fire just like Paul’s if only you can SEE what Paul saw. It would be worth a period of fasting and prayer for you to learn to understand and love Galatians. For sure, such a prayer is one that God would absolutely love to answer!
People wonder why Paul’s Letter to the Galatians could have such gospel dynamite in it that it one time turned Europe upside down, and turned the church upside down that I am a member of. The reason is that there are “big ideas” in Galatians that explode in people’s hearts like sticks of spiritual dynamite.
We are smothered with advertising for sales—grocery, department, hardware stores, whatever. But we can’t have any of the precious goods the merchant offers unless we take the initiative to come and pay the price. We must take the first step; otherwise, all he offers is in vain for us.
Many youth have acquired a similar idea of God’s salvation. What Christ accomplished by His sacrifice on His cross makes an “offer” which does us no good unless we take the initiative to come and get it. Many just don’t want to get “involved.” They back off. Don’t take the offer.
I sense no gratitude to the merchant who “offers” me his merchandise; and if I pay his price and take it, I feel I owe him nothing. We’re on equal terms now. Is this Christ’s salvation bargain? He has done nothing for me if I decline His “offer.” And if I accept His “offer,” I have done my part in the salvation transaction. The best kind of devotion possible for me to feel is lukewarmness.
For hundreds of years this has been the idea most Catholics and Protestants have had. But Galatians gives a different idea: Christ’s sacrifice has already impacted every human being, whether or not he/she believes. It is not a mere offer; He has given the gift to “all,” yes, say some thoughtful believers, He has placed the gift in your hands. The Holy Spirit helps us appreciate the gift and this effects the atonement—the reconciliation of an alienated heart toward God. This is the cleansing of the sanctuary truth which goes beyond the ordinary Protestant/Catholic understanding of justification by faith. It goes beyond our current Arminian understanding of justification.
The statement of the “acceptance theory” of the 1888 message of righteousness by faith is made in the quarterly with these words: “Through the study of Galatians, E. J. Waggoner and A. T. Jones helped the Adventist Church rediscover the truth of righteousness by faith in the 1880s and 1890s” (The Gospel in Galatians, p. 2 [2011]). The word “rediscover” is the operative word. The “acceptance theory” cannot be maintained in the face of what Ellen White wrote: “An unwillingness to yield up preconceived opinions, . . . [occurred] at Minneapolis against the Lord’s message through Brethren {E.J.} Waggoner and {A.T.} Jones. By exciting that opposition Satan succeeded in shutting away from our people, in a great measure, the special power of the Holy Spirit that God longed to impart to them. . . . The light that is to lighten the whole earth with its glory was resisted, and by the action of our own brethren has been in a great degree kept away from the world” (1 SM 234, 235).
The one who wrote Galatians was the former Saul, a murderous “thug”, the end-product of Israel’s old covenant. How ironic, that Saul should participate in the stoning of Stephen the prophet, which event signaled the end of the 490 years of grace extended by God to His people. God’s patient forgiving mercy terminated for that “ancient church” as its national apostasy in the worship of “self” drove away the Spirit of God resulting in national ruin with the destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70 by the Romans. But Christ plucked a brand from the fire,—the Pharisee Saul,— before its collapse.
History repeats itself. Saul is a paradigm of the Old Testament church—the end-product of old covenant unbelief. Hence Paul readily identified the problem in Galatia of their backsliding from the gospel and applied the only remedy for the salvation of the church. All these things were written as examples for us.
Saul was the microcosm of the centuries-long old covenant unbelief of the ancient Israelite church in which they promised God to do everything just right. Christ Himself had instituted all the rites and ceremonies after they made their old covenant with God at Mt. Sinai, in order to lead them back to “the faith” in His promise of the everlasting covenant. But the leadership and scholarship of that day did not know the meaning of these types and symbols and failed to identify their Messiah when He came from above.
The significance of Stephen’s defense speech before the “council” and “high priest” was God’s last warning and appeal to the leadership of His church to repent for their idolatrous history culminating in the murder of “the Just One” (Acts 7:52). The “council” had accused Stephen of teaching antinomianism (Acts 6:13), but they were the idolaters cherishing murder in their hearts (Acts 7:53). Stephen proclaimed the law and the gospel of the cross of Christ which pricked their hearts; and they chose to reject the Spirit’s gift of repentance and instead took up stones. The leaderships’ decision sealed their fate as a nation. They would no more listen to the still small voice of the Spirit. They committed the unpardonable sin by attributing the work of the Spirit to the devil.
The young Saul was part of the council which participated in the stoning of Stephen by acting as the “coat check” for the judge, jury and executioners. The shining face of Stephen and his forgiving spirit toward his executions made a profound impression upon Saul (Acts 7:60). Jesus had prayed for them all, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do” (Luke 23:34; Acts 6:15-7:60). But that was Stephen’s last sermon—the benediction he pronounced was in his dying. We have the sermon recorded; no self got in. No “prophet of Baal” could preach such a sermon.
Saul, too, resisted the Holy Spirit, and gave in to the “group think” of his superiors within the Sanhedrim. He concluded with them that Stephen was a blasphemer and that Christians were followers of an imposter Messiah. Stephen was a libertine who flaunted the law of God.
Saul now sought to gain the favor of his colleagues by following their example in the murder of Stephen. He would exterminate every last Christian he could find. By obtaining letters of recommendation from the high court in Jerusalem he could go out to synagogues and with their support persecute the followers of Jesus. This was Saul’s purpose when journeying to Damascus.
But the Lord Jesus arrested him on the road with the blinding vision of His exalted position in heaven as a result of His crucifixion. “In the way a light from heaven, above the brightness of the sun, shining round about me and them which journeyed with me” (Acts 26:13).
The Lord Jesus asked him, “Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?” “Christ here identifies Himself with His people. In persecuting the followers of Jesus, Saul had struck directly against the Lord of heaven. In falsely accusing and testifying against them, he had falsely accused and testified against the Saviour of the world” (AA 117). Saul was sincerely deceived by Satan. In doing the work of Satan he thought he was doing the work of God. He was actually re-crucifying the Son of God afresh in the person of His saints. This is how closely Christ is bound to His people. It is not a vicarious or half-way identification. Jesus fully identifies. It is as real as the Son of God’s presence was in the burning fiery furnace for the three Hebrew worthies.
Christ said to Saul: “It is hard for thee to kick against the pricks” (Acts 26:14). The Lord put obstacles in his path to make the wrong way seem like kicking against the goads. Yes, the Lord made it “hard” for Saul to be lost! Isn’t that personal love? Continual resistance of the Holy Spirit is terribly hard! It wears a person down—fighting against God is no fun! We read in Galatians 5:17 that the Holy Spirit “strives against the flesh,” another name for our sinful nature. Thank God He does! If He leaves us alone, we are lost. Our sinful nature “strives” against the Spirit—true; but it’s good news that the Spirit is stronger than the flesh. How do we know that? “Where sin abounded, grace abounded much more” (Rom 5:20).
So much does the Lord “desire” us to be saved, that Jesus says the Holy Spirit actually makes it hard for anyone to be lost! We can resist and reject all that He does for us; but a wise writer has said that: “Yet do not therefore conclude that the upward path is the hard and the downward road the easy way. All along the road that leads to [eternal] death there are pains and penalties, there are sorrows and disappointments, there are warnings not to go on. God’s love has made it hard for the heedless and headstrong to destroy themselves” (MB 139). Saul was ruining himself in his enmity against Christ: he would have come down with some terrible disease if he had gone on. The “goads” were devices that pricked the ox if he held back from pulling. Saul was having a great time back-slapping all the Temple leaders in their hatred of Christ; but he was trampling on his own deeply inner conscience. The Holy Spirit was convicting him of truth buried in his heart; if he had gone on in that crazy way of living he would have come down with some life-threatening physical ill. It was a miserable life Saul was leading!
With our sinful nature inherited from the fallen Adam, we naturally want the way of “self.” Our last great battle! But if we kneel with Jesus in Gethsemane, l-o-o-k and l-i-s-t-e-n, we hear Him cry in tearful anguish, sweating blood, “O My Father, if it is possible” don’t let Me have to endure this coming cross, the horror of this second death! “Nevertheless, not as I will, but as You will” (Matt. 26:39). We learn from Him what to do with that “self,” that “I.”
A new birth is needed every step of our way, but the Good News is that He loves us so much that He actually makes the path to eternal ruin a “hard” one. This again is contrary to “conventional wisdom” that says it’s easy to just slide down hill into hell.
The murder of Stephen and the harassment of the church was the persecution of Christ. Stephen was God’s servant proclaiming the message of the cross. “In that moment of divine revelation Saul remembered with terror that Stephen, who had borne witness of a crucified and risen Saviour, had been sacrificed by his consent, and that later, through his instrumentality, many other worthy followers of Jesus had met their death by cruel persecution” (AA 116).
Saul asked: “Who art thou, Lord? And He said, I am Jesus whom thou persecutest” (Acts 26:15). This was Jesus self-revelation of the ever-present cross to Saul. “In the glorious Being who stood before him he saw the Crucified One” (AA 115). “Now Saul knew for a certainty that the promised Messiah had come to this earth as Jesus of Nazareth and that He had been rejected and crucified by those whom He came to save. He knew also that the Saviour had risen in triumph from the tomb and had ascended into the heavens” (AA 116). “The prophetic records of Holy Writ were opened to his understanding. He saw that the rejection of Jesus by the Jews, His crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension, had been foretold by the prophets and proved Him to be the promised Messiah” (AA 115).
The point is that conviction came to Saul’s heart by means of the cross of Christ. It was a heart-melting appreciation that his Messiah was “the crucified One.” Now all the prophecies, types and shadows of the ceremonial system came alive for him as pointing to “the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world” (John 1:29).
Saul of Tarsus learned, however, and he tells us at last that “I do not frustrate the grace of God” (Gal. 2:21). He is, at last, “crucified with Christ” (vs. 20). The Good Shepherd seeking His lost sheep and all these prophets and apostles rebuking us for our sin, even giving their lives in being “crucified with Christ” in order to be faithful, are identical with the ministry of that much more abounding grace of God (cf. Rom. 5:21).
The old covenant never leads to the cross. It cannot produce genuine conversion. It never produces genuine revival and reformation. It always leads to dependence on “self” and the people’s promises to “trust and obey”. It, indeed, genders to bondage and slavery in a continuous spiral into sin. The reason is that faith in the old covenant is dependent upon the motivation of fear—hope of reward and terror of hell. Sin equals death and everyone is afraid to die.
The only true religion is the religion that derives from the self-denying love of God revealed at the cross. It alone produces new covenant faith. It produces genuine revival and reformation. It was the revelation of the cross to Saul that opened up to him the whole reason for Israel’s history of ups and downs in revival and reformation. Their history was a consequence of their old covenant promise to God to do every just right. The old covenant never leads to the cross. Consequently, Israel missed their Crucified Messiah.
The significance of Saul’s visit to Damascus was his divinely directed connection with the Christian church their on “Straight Street”. After a brief sojourn with the believer Judas the Lord Jesus gave Ananias a vision which intersected with a vision given Saul that they should be united. Overcoming his initial fears of his former persecutor, Saul, Ananias paid him a visit.
It was during their fellowship that the miraculous turning of blindness to restored eyesight occurred by the falling off of the cataracts. Saul received the laying on of hands by Ananias thus commissioning him as Christ’s “chosen instrument to carry [his] name before the Gentiles and their kings before the people of Israel” (Acts 9:15). This is programmatic for the rest of Acts. Chapters 13-28 depict Paul’s mission in which he indeed witnessed before Gentiles, the Jewish king Agrippa, and regularly in the synagogues to the sons of Israel. Above all, Paul was called to be the apostle to the Gentiles, and they are mentioned first. In his speech before Agrippa, the call to a Gentile mission constitutes the center of the conversion account. Paul is sent forth as the servant and witness of Christ (Acts 26:16).
Furthermore, and more importantly, Saul was “filled with the Holy Spirit” (Acts 9:17). The incontrovertible evidence of God’s fulfillment of His everlasting covenant promise is the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. “The blessing of Abraham [is] . . . through Jesus Christ; that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith” (Gal. 3:14). Saul was saved by God’s grace [the cross]. Saul responded with a heart reconciled to God by divine love. God’s promise [His covenant] was received—“through faith.”
The year in Antioch (Acts 11:26-26). With the increasing success of the Antioch witness, Barnabas looked for additional help. He immediately thought of Paul, the Greek-speaking Jew like himself. He remembered how persuasively Paul had preached in Damascus and in the Greek-speaking synagogues of Jerusalem (Acts 9:27, 29). Who would be a more natural worker among the Gentiles of Antioch? Paul had gone to his native Tarsus (Acts 9:30). Barnabas went off to Tarsus to get Paul. He may have had some difficulty in finding him. Paul may have been involved in work throughout Cilicia, using tarsus as home base. Luke finally located him and persuaded him to come to Antioch. Paul and Barnabas are described as “teaching” in Antioch for a whole year (v. 26). Everything we know about Paul would indicate that he was heavily involved in the evangelism of the Antioch church.
