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Through the Bible with Les Feldick
LESSON 1 * PART 4 * BOOK 34
GALATIANS 4:1-14 - PART 2
The Law was perfect from God's point. Galatians 4:10
"Ye observe days, and months, and times, and years." Now what group of people did that? Now reading on in verse 11.
Galatians 4:11
Now what does Paul mean by that? I stressed, especially when we studied the two Corinthian letters, how much the apostle Paul suffered and deprived himself so that the Gospel might go to these Gentile communities. Well, listen it was bad enough in vain for Paul, but oh, how much worse in vain for what Christ had done.
Galatians 4:12a
Now Paul was an apostle, but was he beyond the reach of the ordinary believer? Paul was a sinner saved by Grace just like you and I. Galatians 4:12b
Paul didn't put himself above the rank and file. Oh, granted these Galatians had come out of paganism, but what had Paul come out of? So Paul goes on to say in verse 12 -
Galatians 4:12b
Paul wanted to be their example. I want to come back to what Paul says early on in I Corinthians Chapter 4. Now today most people say, "We'll follow Jesus." But that's not what the Holy Spirit writes through the apostle Paul. Paul says we are to follow him, because who is Paul following? He's following the ascended Christ, and we follow Paul.
I Corinthians 4:16
"Wherefore I beseech (beg) you, be ye followers of me. Remember everything that Timothy knew, he learned from Paul. Barnabas, Silas, Titus and all of Paul's helpers learned everything from this one apostle. I Corinthians 4:16
"Wherefore I beseech you, be ye followers of me."
I Corinthians 11:1
"Be ye followers of me, even as I also am of Christ."
Now remember Paul had a real warm place in his heart for the Philippians. Remember Paul nearly died in Philippi, and they nursed him back to strength. Philippians 3:17
Galatians 4:11-13
13. Ye know how through infirmity of the flesh I preached the gospel unto you at the first. 14. And my temptation (testing) which was in flesh ye despised not, nor rejected; but received me as an angel of God, even as Christ Jesus."
I've always put it on the idea that when Paul said that Israel had more advantages than any other group of people because unto them was committed the Word of God.
Romans 3:1-2
Well I've always used those verses as the basis for my claiming that Luke must have been a Jew because otherwise Paul couldn't have written that. Well if Luke was a Gentile then Paul could not have rightly written by inspiration Romans 3:1-2. Saul was a Jewish name, but what was Paul? That was a Roman name. Now II Corinthians Chapter 11 and verse 5. Look what Paul says again.
II Corinthians 11:5
Peter. Peter. So here in verse 5 Paul says, "I was not a whit behind Peter in authority." Paul may not have spent 3 years in Palestine, but he spent 3 years with, I think, a private tutor from the Lord Jesus Himself in Arabia. So again even in time spent with the Lord, he's not one whit behind Peter. Now let's look at verse 23.
II Corinthians 11:22-23
23. Are they ministers of Christ? Then Paul goes on to show how much he had suffered for them and us tonight. II Corinthians 11:24
"Of the Jews five times received I forty stripes save one."
II Corinthians 11:25-27
In journeying often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils by mine own countrymen, in perils by the heathen, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren; 27. II Corinthians 12:11
Galatians 4:13
"Ye know how through infirmity of the flesh I preached the gospel unto you at the first."
Paul is always bringing up the fact that he passed on to them that which he had received first from the Lord Jesus Christ. Paul also brings up the fact that he is at the head of that long line of sinners saved by Grace that comprised the Body of Christ as we see in I Timothy.
Let's read verse 14 of Galatians 4.
Galatians 4:14
Again go back to II Corinthians Chapter 12. What was the apostle Paul's testing? II Corinthians 12:6-8
7. And lest I should be exalted above measure through the abundance of the revelations, (lest Paul should get boastful and puffed up, not for what he had seen in glory, but even for these tremendous revelations that God had given him. We don't know exactly how all of this came about, but we do know that God permitted Paul to suffer an affliction, much like he did Job. Paul asked the Lord three times to take this affliction away from him. II Corinthians 12:9
I'm sure God says, "Now Paul that's when I can use you." Then God says, "OK Moses now we're ready to use you, let's go to Pharaoh."
So here you have the same thing in Paul. Paul probably would have liked to have been a big handsome Jew like King Saul was, but he wasn't. But look what God told him.
II Corinthians 12:9

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