Welcome to the Daily Blade. The word of God is described as the sword of the spirit, the primary spiritual weapon in the Christian's armor against the forces of evil. Your hosts are Joby Martin and Kyle Thompson, and they stand ready to equip men for the fight. Let's sharpen up.

Welcome back to the Daily Blade. As you know, in my time on the Daily Blade, I'm just walking through the book of Galatians right now. We have made it to Galatians, chapter three. Today we're going to walk through Galatians three, verses one through six. Paul says, Oh foolish Galatians, exclamation point. This is the way the Bible lets us know that he's really, really, really angry, more than just mad. I mean, he is he is very like fighting mad because of what the Galatians are doing. Because again, in case you missed the previous two weeks, the church in Galatia was founded on the gospel, and now they have allowed some Judaizers to come in and add to or distort the gospel. And so Paul is addressing them very, very directly, oh foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you? It was before your eyes that Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified. Let me ask you only this Did you receive the Spirit by works of the law or by hearing with faith? Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh? Did you suffer so many things in vain, if indeed it was in vain? Does he who supplies the Spirit to you and works miracles among you do so by works of the law or by hearing with faith? Just as Abraham believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness. Well, Paul is saying, he's that he's asking these rhetorical questions, but the obvious answer is we got saved, we received the Spirit, we have been made righteous by our faith in Christ. And so he says, Who has bewitched you? This is very, very forceful language. He says, somebody has cast a spell on you, somebody has tricked you. Anytime you move away from the gospel of Jesus Christ, you are moving towards things that are evil and dark and demonic. Now, the reason that he brings up Abraham in verse 6, just as Abraham believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness, here's what he's saying. There wasn't even a law when Abraham was around. The law doesn't come for another 430 years. But Abraham put his faith in God and his faith was counted or credited to him as righteousness. And that righteousness did not mean right activity. It's not like Abraham earned it, but by his faith, he was giving a right standing before God. In fact, Abraham had terrible activity in his life. If you just do a quick scan of the book of Genesis, you find out that Abraham pimped out his wife two separate times and lied to the authorities to protect himself. So there's no way that he earned a right standing before God. The word for faith in Greek is pestuo. It doesn't just mean that you believe that, but you believe in. You trust in. And what he's saying is, and some of you Galatians, you saw this. Apparently, there were some people at the church of Galatia, and they actually were at the crucifixion. They know firsthand about the crucifixion of Jesus. Now, these days it is very popular to hear people deconstruct from their faith. Let me tell you who deconstructs from their faith. Somebody who has never actually experienced the grace of God. Why? Because the Bible says in Romans that nothing can separate you from the love of God. You may walk away from emotionalism or going through the motions at youth camp, or you may walk away from some kind of church culture that you grew up in. But if you have been made right with God by putting your faith in Jesus Christ, then you can no more deny that than I can deny the Son. Now here's what's true. What I believe about God has zero impact on the reality that Christ came, Christ died, and Christ was resurrected for my sins. What I believe in, what I trust in, it changes everything about my eternal reality. So let me warn you: do not be bewitched or do not be led astray by anyone. Know the gospel. Sit under gospel teaching, constantly and relentlessly preach the gospel to yourself. And if you need a little brush up on the gospel about the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, I'm going to give you some homework. Read Romans chapter 3, verses 9 through 26. I think it is probably the most concise description of what the gospel is, that every single one of us were born into sin. We were created by God for God. Sin corrupts that. And in our sin nature, we were born as sinners who are dead in our trespasses. But God demonstrated his love for us in this that while we were yet still sinners, Christ died for us. The invitation of God is not to try harder and do better, but to surrender, to believe. When Jesus Christ died on the cross, somehow that counted for me. And when you know that, you know that gospel, then you realize it is not by our works that we are saved, it is by the finished work of Jesus Christ. Immerse yourself in this gospel and fight with everything you're made of to never be led astray or to never be bewitched by any other untruth. Amen.

Thank you for listening to today's episode. Before you go, if you want to help equip other men for the fight, share this podcast around and leave us a five star rating and review. Stay sharp.