Explore Paul’s fervent message to the Galatians about the dangers of distorting the Gospel. Learn how understanding the true Gospel is crucial for both personal growth and the health of the Church, and discover three key questions to evaluate your own grounding in the Gospel.

Distorting Gospel Power

Hypothetically, if you received a glass of pure water, that’s a good thing. However, if someone puts a drop of poison in it, what was previously pure becomes deadly. What the Apostle Paul shares in this book is that adding something, whether subtle or a lot, to the Gospel of Christ undercuts the power of the Gospel to transform a life.

The Book of Galatians is a letter written to relatively new believers to help them appropriately dial in their faith. However, in the first few lines, we realize he’s pretty fired up.

A group of teachers were influencing new Christians in the Galatia network of churches that they were obliged to keep the Jewish cultural customs of the Mosaic Law, including the dietary laws, circumcision, and the rest of the ceremonial law, to be truly pleasing to God. In other words, the Gospel was being distorted.

“The Gospel—the message that we are more wicked than we ever dared believe, but more loved and accepted in Christ than we ever dared hope—creates a radical new dynamic for personal growth, for obedience, for love.” Tim Keller, pastor and author

Unfortunately, the new Galatian converts weren’t grounded enough in the Gospel to discern what was and wasn’t Gospel truth. While Paul’s letter was written to the Galatians, we can see how these distortions can still have deadly consequences for our lives today. So, I will pose three questions to help us evaluate whether we’re grounded enough to understand the Gospel truth.

Am I Grounded Enough to Understand the Gospel:

1) Am I grounded enough to understand there is no different Gospel?

“I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting Him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different Gospel—not that there is another one, but there are some who trouble you and want to distort the Gospel of Christ.” Galatians 1:6-7

There’s no other Gospel; there’s only the Gospel.

Imagine that you serve overseas as a missionary. You share the Gospel that all who turn to Christ in faith are redeemed to the one true sovereign God. God honors His Gospel, and people are birthed into His kingdom. After returning to the States, you eventually learn that the church you helped plant is being diluted by old pagan practices that are being weaved in. How do you respond to that?

That’s what happened in Galatia, and Paul is writing to help them understand and to assume that you can twist or adopt a different Gospel to make it something else. He’s writing this letter around the essentialness of the clearness of the Gospel, which is applied to our hearts so that it makes us Christians.

Why is that important?

• The Gospel is not only the basis for how we enter the Christian life.

• The Gospel is the foundation for how we live the Christian life.

The Gospel isn’t just for unbelievers; it’s also for believers. Paul wasn’t teaching them merely to be better Christians. Instead, he was teaching them to live out of the well of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Christians need the Gospel just as much as non-Christians. Now, I realize that’s a nuanced statement because there are obviously people who don’t know Christ and need to know the Lord. But Paul accentuates that a believer must live out of the well that his or her sins are forgiven in Jesus Christ; that’s the Gospel.

So, Paul is disturbed that false teachers are presenting a false Gospel, and no one is doing anything about it. Not only that, but people are buying into it!

In the Old Testament, Aaron remained down with the people when Moses went up the mountain to meet with God. Despite all the miracles the people had seen when the cultural winds started shifting, they began to worship the Egyptian gods they knew rather than Yahweh. Instead of leading the people, Aaron helped them fashion a golden calf.

“For am I now seeking the approval of man or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ.” Galatians 1:10

Paul is no Aaron. He wouldn’t enable people to mold an image of God into something preferable or people-pleasing. Instead, Paul is astonished (Galatians 1:6) and directly angry at the persons (false teachers) who are misleading the church and perverting the Gospel.

Even as I write these words, I’m asking myself, and I invite you to do the same: Am I grounded enough to understand that there is no different Gospel? There is only the Gospel.

2) Am I grounded enough to understand false teachers present a real and present danger to the Church?

“For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths.” 2 Timothy 4:3-4

I don’t say this lightly because of what we’re witnessing in our cultural hour in our nation and churches, but this phrase “false teachers” permeates the New Testament. In our age of Western culture, when you teach the Scriptures faithfully, people, through a consumeristic mindset, will leave a church for another church that teaches something more culturally adaptable to them.

In 2 Timothy 4:4, Paul uses the word “myth,” which, in the biblical context, refers to things that don’t have scriptural substantiation. Jesus, the Son of God, also gave this same warning in the Sermon on the Mount.

JESUS: “Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep’s clothing.” Matthew 7:15a-b

False teachers may outwardly sound convincing, but it’s not based upon the revelation of God. It’s important to remember that we don’t go to church to be entertained. We attend church to meet with God in the community of other believers. The Apostle Paul unpacks false teachers, and it’s a very sobering part of Galatians. See what he shares about the seriousness and severity of false teaching.

1) The Apostle Paul calls down condemnation on false teachers.

“As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a Gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed.” Galatians 1:9 (emphasis added)

Eternal condemnation awaits a person who proclaims a false Gospel. Paul is so adamant about this that he states: “But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a Gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed (Galatians 1:8).”

2) False teaching causes people to desert God.

“I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different Gospel.” Galatians 1:6 (emphasis added)

When someone distorts the Gospel, they’re turning people from God. When we understand these implications, we begin to understand why Paul was angry—his attitude was justifiable. The deep concern and anger that Paul expressed is the same that any loving parent or friend would experience if a child or spouse were going astray. Paul’s righteous anger stemmed from a deep concern and jealousy for people to know what was true.

Paul also contrasts the false teachers’ authority with his own. He references that the Gospel isn’t based on his opinion but that he was commissioned and taught directly by the risen Jesus Himself (Acts 9:1-19). He even begins the letter by declaring, “Paul, an apostle,” which affirms his apostleship, which literally means “I am one sent by God with a divine message, which is the Gospel.”

“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 (emphasis added)

The Gospel is not his Gospel or opinion. What Paul taught isn’t a product of his studies, research, reflection, or wisdom—It’s God-given and is both unchanging and unchangeable. This means his divine teaching is the standard for judging who is orthodox and who is heretical, as he says in verse nine:

“If anybody is preaching to you a Gospel other than what you accepted, let him be eternally condemned!”

We must ask ourselves: Do I have a conviction that I see that false teachers present a real and present danger to the church?

3) Am I grounded enough to understand that only the Gospel brings us into the reality of the kingdom of God?

The Gospel is the only way we’re birthed into becoming a child of God. It’s the only way the Gospel can forgive and reconcile your sins with God. It’s the only Gospel that can give you new life and transform you from the inside out.

As a child, before I came to know the Lord, I remember our church singing “Rock of Ages,” and a strange sensation would wash over me. Even then, I suspected it was the Holy Spirit. But what I didn’t realize was how desperately I needed these words. Stanzas from the song include:

be of sin the double cure; save from wrath and make me pure.

all for sin could not atone; thou must save, and thou alone.

wash me, Savior, or I die.

This is what the Gospel does when it’s integrated into your life. You’re saved from God’s wrath and judgment. While God is loving, He can’t be loving without being just. Therefore, He must judge the world’s injustices, and we’ve all committed injustices against people and God. We’ve all rebelled against our design and broken God’s commandments.

One thing we don’t want to do when we stand before Jesus at the judgment seat is try to justify ourselves. We don’t want to claim we were a good person. It’s because of Jesus’ shed blood and resurrection that we won’t be judged if we put our faith in Him. The judgment fell upon Him. Our only hope is what He did through His death, burial, and resurrection.

By Galatians 5, Paul is fired up. He’s talking about a spirit-empowered life and the fruit of the spirit manifested. But you can’t live in the reality of Galatians 5 without the reality of the Gospel in Galatians 1. A Gospel-centered life is the distinction between living for God and living from God. When you’re in Christ, you’re not living for God but from God. That’s only possible because the Gospel has changed you as the Scriptures say, “for at one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord (Ephesians 5:8).

Without the Gospel properly understood and experienced, the entire house crumbles. Everything is at stake! And that’s why Paul is so lovingly adamant in the opening of the book of Galatians!

In many cultures, including Western cultures, it’s not uncommon to believe that you can get to heaven without knowing Christ. Some even reason that if there’s a God, how could He be so narrow or exclusive? I submit that there’s a greater question we should ask: How can God choose to be so gracious in giving us the way to Him in the first place?

In light of that question, we can start to recognize that when you don’t have the Gospel, you don’t have grace. When we live without grace, we live in our own power, which means that all we have is legalism. In some form or fashion, you’re trying to earn your way to God. You hope that your good outweighs the bad and disregard that God gave us a free gift of faith in Jesus Christ alone. It’s through grace alone.

Casual vs. Convictional Christianity

Of the 5,000 American Christians surveyed on grace, only two percent believe grace is an empowerment for the Christian life. Author John Bevere defined grace as “God’s empowerment that gives you the ability to go beyond your natural ability.” It’s impossible for you to be what God has designed you to be apart from the grace of God working in and through you.

You cannot fulfill what God wants you to do by your own ability. God made your calling beyond your natural ability because you depend on His grace to fulfill it. You can’t believe what you don’t know or believe what you don’t understand. That was the problem in Galatia, and it’s also the problem for 98% of the Christians in America who don’t understand how grace works.

This revelation from God, found in the book of Galatians, is so important because it concerns why we gather as a church family every Sunday.

The Protestant Reformation was a protest against a false Gospel that occurred more than 500 years ago. Martin Luther referred to Galatians as the bedrock of the Protestant Reformation. Like Paul, Martin Luther stood up to the church when she proclaimed and enabled a false Gospel. The church was still doing many virtuous things at the time, but they were proclaiming a false Gospel.

Scripture is God’s Word, and authority is rooted in it. The church only carries authority as she aligns with the prophetic voice of Scripture.

It’s time we ask ourselves:

• Am I grounded enough to determine when I hear something that is not the Gospel?

• Am I grounded enough to discern when I hear something not rooted in the Gospel?

Don’t be a casual Christian. Instead, be a convictional Christian. Jesus didn’t have kind things to say about a lukewarm heart (Revelation 3:16), but His motive was rooted in love so that He could help mold and shape our hearts. He knew that to be lukewarm crushes His witness and the power of His radiance. That’s why Paul is so lovingly adamant in the opening of the Book of Galatians!

God loves you and doesn’t want you to be apart from Him. That’s why when sin broke our relationship with Him, He sent something of greater value to be sacrificed. It’s through the sacrifice of Christ that we’re restored to Him. As you move in faith toward Jesus and confess that He is the Son of God, He saves you and brings you into His family.

Scripture is also clear that no one comes to the Son unless the Father draws them (John 6:44). As you read these words, be keen to your senses. Is God drawing you into His perfect love? If you sense His presence, I pray that you move in surrender to let Him do in you what He desires to do through the power of His grace.

TL;DR

1. Paul’s letter to the Galatians addresses the critical issue of distorting the Gospel by adding to it.

2. He warns that false teachings can lead believers astray and undermine the Gospel’s transformative power.

3. To stay grounded, Christians must understand that there is only one true Gospel, recognize the danger of false teachers, and live a Gospel-centered life.

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