The Gospel Offends

Galatians 1:6-10

⁶ I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you to live in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel—⁷ which is really no gospel at all. Evidently some people are throwing you into confusion and are trying to pervert the gospel of Christ. ⁸ But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let them be under God’s curse! ⁹ As we have already said, so now I say again: If anybody is preaching to you a gospel other than what you accepted, let them be under God’s curse!

¹⁰ Am I now trying to win the approval of human beings, or of God? Or am I trying to please people? If I were still trying to please people, I would not be a servant of Christ.

The Apostle Paul is writing a letter to the Galatian church with a stern warning here. He is amazed that they have quickly turned away from the Gospel and turned to false ideas in his absence.

When we think of the amazing and wonderful Gospel – that we are saved by the grace of God through Jesus alone, it can be hard to imagine why believers would turn away from such good news?

However, on further reflection we can also see how offensive the true Gospel is to our selfish human nature.

The Gospel offends our pride. It tells us that we are sinners in need of a saviour, and that we cannot save ourselves. It gives no credit to us at all for our salvation; it is all the work of Jesus for us. You cannot truly come to God unless you humble yourself and ask for His grace.

The gospel also offends our wisdom. It saves us by something that may seem foolish — God coming to earth as a man and dying a humiliating death on our behalf.

The gospel offends our knowledge. It tells us to believe something which we cannot see or prove — that a dead man, Jesus Christ, rose from the dead and defeated death on our behalf.

So yes, when we look at human nature, we can better understand why someone would be tempted to pervert the Gospel of grace or turn away from it.

It’s a constant battle with our pride and our lofty thoughts of wisdom and knowledge to stay in the place of humility before God.

Lord, we come to You in humility and ask that You protect our hearts from the pride that would lead us away from Your Gospel. Thank You for the beautiful salvation through Jesus and the gift of Your grace to us.

Written by Shelley Witt