THE
PROCLAMATION
O
foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you that you should not obey the truth,
before whose eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed among you as crucified? This
only I want to learn from you: Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the
law, or by the hearing of faith? Are you so foolish? Having begun in
the Spirit, are you now being made perfect by the flesh? Have you suffered
so many things in vain—if indeed it was in vain? Therefore He
who supplies the Spirit to you and works miracles among you, does He do
it by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith? Galatians 3:1-5.
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Introduction
Paul,
as it were, was nailing his “proclamation” to telegraph poles, church doors, and
billboards. He was yelling it from rooftops, street corners, even in town
squares throughout the land: “I bring good news from God!” He’d been all
through Galatia. The Galatians had heard all about it. They had read all about
it. So Paul is amazed at the Galatians for acting as if they never really heard and
believed the good news. After he calls the Galatians “foolish” and “bewitched”
he sets out to remind them what they had heard and had believed in the first
place.
First
off, we need to look at the general gist of what he proclaimed (the headlines) and
was still proclaiming, then we’ll look a bit closer at the solid substance of
what he was proclaiming, (the hardlines).
The
Headlines
Paul
reminds the Galatians that, “Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed among you as
crucified” (Gal. 3:1). We need to zoom in on that word “portrayed”. What does
it mean to portray something? My English dictionary says, firstly that it
means: To represent by a drawing or painting etc. Does this mean that Paul
painted a picture of the crucified Christ and showed it to the Galatians? Well,
we have no biblical record of Paul walking around with a painting of Christ in
his pocket. Therefore, he means that he has proclaimed the crucified Christ
among them.
My
dictionary gives another meaning for the word portray: To represent, as in a
play etc. Did Paul walk around with a team of actors acting out a drama of the
crucifixion? Well, there’s no biblical record of that either. My dictionary
also gives another meaning which is a lot closer to the meaning in the Greek. It
says, To describe or depict in words. Now we’re getting somewhere. The New Testament
Greek word here has a few subtle shades of meaning. However the present context
considered, the word means, “To placard publicly, set forth in a public
proclamation so that all may read.” So, what Paul is saying is that the
crucified Christ has been “placarded” publicly before the eyes of the Galatians.
Therefore, we’re not talking about a Paul walking around holding up a Roman
Catholic crucifix.
But
what about the elements of the Lord’s Supper? Perhaps this is what Paul means
when he says, “Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed among you as crucified.” “Take,
eat; this is My body which is broken for you; do this in remembrance of Me... This cup is the new
covenant in My blood. This do, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me.”
You must admit the crucified Christ is portrayed in the Lord’s Supper. But this
is the very compelling reason why Paul is not referring to the Lord’s Supper. Because
the Lord’s Supper is an ongoing ordinance, “...as often as you drink it...” And
the crucified Christ was portrayed before their eyes, not is
portrayed. Anyway, in chapter 4 of Galatians Paul reminds them that he preached
the gospel to them. Therefore, though the Lord’s Supper is a portrayal of the
crucified Christ, Paul isn’t referring to the Sacrament here. Paul is talking
about a public “proclamation” that took place among the Galatians as a people!
He
was in the streets of Galatia like an old “town crier” who says, “Hear ye! Hear
ye!” Then he pulls out a scroll and he proceeds to make the proclamation. Well,
this is the essence of what Paul had done publicly in Galatia.
Paul
refers to this previous encounter with Galatians in chapter 4:13, where he
says, “You know that because of physical infirmity I preached the gospel to you
at first.” Maybe his infirmity was an eye problem. Paul says they would have
plucked out their own eyes and given them to him if they could (4:15). And then
in 6:11 he makes reference to writing in big letters. Perhaps he mentions the
word “eyes” in chapter 3:1 to jolt their memories of the time Paul proclaimed
the gospel to them.
So
then, Paul didn’t produce a painting of the crucified Christ. Neither did he
perform a drama depicting the crucifixion, but rather he proclaimed a
documented event of history.
So
what was the general gist of Paul’s public proclamation? He says “we preach
Christ crucified” (1 Cor. 1:23). And in 1 Corinthians 2:2 he says, “For I
determined to not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ and Him
crucified.” So Paul then, is consistent. He preached Christ and Him crucified
among the Galatians too. But does that mean the sum total of his preaching was what
people nowadays call the simple gospel? By this they have in mind the stuff of
evangelistic rallies and altar calls, where you tell them about Christ dying on
a cross. You do it in such a way that people can’t help but they feel sorry for
Christ. Then you try to get them to make a “decision” to follow Jesus while they’re
feeling emotional.
It’s
one of the great tragedies in the Church today that men have reduced the gospel
to a few points. Then they trot out these points to parade them before people’s
eyes. They preach the same old sermon every time because they think of these
points as the sum total of the gospel. Is this what Paul was doing on the
highways and byways? Did Paul condense the message of the cross to a few eye-catching
headlines? Did He go around the land just yelling out headlines?
Headlines
are just summaries encapsulating the story. They are just attention grabbers. They’re
not the whole story. If you’re interested, you’re supposed to buy the whole newspaper
and “read all about it.” But there are people today arguing that the headlines
of the gospel are the whole story. And they accuse people (such as myself) of
adding to the gospel when we say the whole Bible is the gospel. Well, the whole
Bible is the Gospel, because the whole Bible speaks of Jesus Christ. The Old
Testament speaks of what He was coming to do. The New Testament speaks of what He has done.
He was coming to keep the Law as a Covenant of Works. Read all about it in the
Old Testament and in the New, yes, the whole Bible. He was coming to keep God’s
Law perfectly on behalf of those condemned by the Law. Read all about it in the
Old and New Testaments, the Bible.
Here’s
the general gist of what Paul the Town Crier was yelling out: “Hear ye! Hear
ye! God the maker and creator of heaven and earth has sent His only begotten
Son into the world to save the world! His Son never stopped being the Son of
God, but also became the Son of Man. He was conceived by the power of the Holy
Spirit and was born of a virgin. He was crucified at the hands of wicked men. His
dead body was placed among the dead, but on the third day He rose again. After
He revealed Himself to many people He ascended into heaven. He is now seated at
the right hand of the Father. But this Man Jesus Christ is coming to judge you,
whether you’re alive or dead at the time. And He has sent His Spirit to testify
to the truth of the One I proclaim. Therefore, repent and believe in the
Gospel!”
These
are just some of the headlines, all of which have to do with the Gospel message.
And those of you who know your creeds will have detected some of the so called
Apostles’ Creed in some of those headlines. But all the other headlines can be
summarized in the one big headline: Christ and Him crucified. And Paul has
already portrayed this before the eyes of the foolish Galatians. Who have been
listening to and believing what the trashy tabloids are putting out, you know,
the ones that embellish the truth and make up things? But Paul is proclaiming
only what has been written and recorded in all of God’s Word.
The
Hardlines
Are
you familiar with that portion of Scripture in John’s Gospel where Jesus was
telling people that they had to eat His flesh and drink His blood? (John 6). Well,
a whole bunch of His disciples departed from Him about that point! John 6:60
says, “Therefore many of His disciples, when they heard this, said, ‘This is a
hard saying; who can understand it?’” When they got down to brass tacks, when
they got beyond the headlines, they didn’t like what Christ was saying. These
hard sayings we are calling hard lines. Hard lines are the solid substance of
the message.
Headlines
are milk for babies. Hard lines are the meat. Paul said to the Corinthians, “I
fed you with milk and not with solid food; for until now you were not able to
receive it...” (1 Cor. 3:2). The Apostle Peter wrote, “As newborn babes, desire
the pure milk of the word, that you may grow thereby” (1 Pet. 2:2). The idea is
that people begin with just the headlines and then they progress onto the hard
lines.
I
almost compulsively bought a newspaper because I was intrigued by a headline. But
I changed my mind. Why buy a paper for only one little article? I can’t be
bothered with the sports section; the jobs section; the new homes section. I’m mainly
interested mainly in the Editorial section. But this is exactly the way people
treat the Bible. And I put it to you that they do this precisely because of
their view of the gospel.
“What
do Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy have to do with the
Gospel?” is what they ask. “What does any of the Old Testament have to do with
the Gospel? Nothing!” is what they say. “The Old Testament is the Law and what
does the Law have to do with the Gospel?” is what they say.
The
Galatians were in the process of departing from Christ, so what does Paul do? He
writes them an Epistle explaining the purpose of the Law. But what does the Law
have to do with the Gospel? It has everything to do with the Gospel. Why?
Because we are saved by works of the Law! That’s why. But not by our own
works, not by our owns works of the Law. But we are saved by Christ’s works of
the Law.
Christ
kept the Law as a Covenant of Works perfectly unto death, even death on a cross.
Therefore, you cannot present Christ and Him crucified unless you explain why
He was crucified. He was crucified because He was fulfilling the Law. Read all
about in the Old Testament in the New Testament, i.e., the whole Bible.
Matthew
5:17-18 should suffice for now: Jesus said, “Do not think I came to destroy the
Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill For assuredly, I say
to you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means
pass from the law till all is fulfilled.” Therefore, you cannot possibly know
what Jesus did if you have no idea what the Law is. And you’ll never have any
idea if you keep on thinking the Law has got nothing to do with the gospel.
Dr.
Martyn Lloyd-Jones put it this way, “A person who does not know his Old
Testament is – forgive the expression – just a fool. You need your Old
Testament; you cannot understand the New without it.” This is exactly what Paul
is saying to the foolish Galatians. He’s preaching them the Gospel from the Old
Testament. If you read ahead you’d see that he quotes from a few places in
Genesis, from Exodus, Leviticus, places in Deuteronomy, Isaiah, Habakkuk,
Malachi. He’s all over the Old Testament as he proclaims the crucified Christ
to them.
Speaking
of the Gospel Paul says to the Romans, “For in it [the gospel] is the
righteousness of God is revealed” (Rom. 1:17). The righteousness of God is
revealed in Jesus Christ. How is it revealed in Jesus Christ? It’s revealed by
looking at what Christ did on the cross. Listen to how Jay Adams put it, “The
cross was not merely an act of compassion and mercy directed toward mankind; it
was a cosmic event in which God demonstrated who and what He is before all the
universe.”
Are
you getting the picture? Is it sinking in? THE CROSS IS A DEMONSTRATION OF WHO
GOD IS! Who or what is this God who made the heaven and the earth and dwells in
unapproachable light? Well, there’s the headline: “Man Dies On Cross!” But you
have to own a Bible before you can read all about it.
Now,
I’m sure we’ve all heard about Christians in foreign lands, where all they had
was one page of the New Testament and this kind of thing? Or the story of the
man who went into the Christian bookshop asking if Mark had written any other
books because he enjoyed it so much. Well, it’s one of those vexing questions:
How much of the Gospel does a man need to understand before he’s saved? Well, I
want to put it to you that it’s not how much you understand, but rather how
much can you reject and be saved.
You’ve
probably heard that Martin Luther called the Epistle of James an epistle of
straw! I’d like to defend his honour by saying that Luther did not reject James.
He just, at the time, found what James seemed to him to be teaching, hard to
swallow. Luther had gone from the headlines of the Gospel to the hard lines of
James’ Epistle! Luther, it would seem, was struggling with something of what
the Galatians were struggling. What is the proper use of the Law for the
Christian? The Law is no longer a Covenant of Works to us who are saved by
grace. So what is it then? Well, I’ll tell you again: - the Law is the
revelation of who God is.
And
if you want to see the revelation of who God is then look to the cross. For
that is where the Law of God points you. But you won’t fully understand the
cross without understanding the Law as a Covenant of Works. But neither will
you fully understand the Law if it is devoid of the cross. That’s why there is
Gospel in the Old Testament and Law in the New Testament. They go hand in hand.
Remove the Law from the Gospel and you have Antinomianism. Remove the Gospel
from the Law and you have Legalism. Therefore, read all about the cross in the
whole Bible, Old and New Testaments.
What
does Paul say to the Corinthians in 1 Corinthians 15:1-4? “Moreover, brethren,
I declare to you the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received and
in which you stand, by which also you are saved, if you hold fast that word
which I preached to you – unless you believed in vain. For I delivered to you
first of all that which I also received: that Christ died for our sins
according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose again the
third day according to the Scriptures...”
Whatever
Jesus Christ did then, He did in accordance to the Scriptures. In fact, Jesus
said, “You search the Scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life; and
these are they which testify of Me” (John 5:39). What Scriptures were Jesus
talking about? He was talking to Pharisees. Therefore, Jesus was saying the Old
Testament testified of Him. Something that testifies is a testament, isn’t it? No
one would argue against the fact that the New Testament testifies of Jesus. Therefore,
if Jesus Christ says the Old Testament is testifying of Him, then the Old
Testament must be included as the gospel. And the Apostle Paul was using the OT
as such. Edmund P Clowney says it like this: “If we are going to carry Bibles and
not simply pocket Testaments, we should surely be using the Old Testament more
than we do. The missionary Bible of the apostolic church was the Old Testament
Scripture. Our Lord in the synagogue in Nazareth (Luke 4), Peter at Pentecost
(Acts 2), Paul in the synagogues of Asia Minor and Greece – these all preached
the gospel from the Old Testament. During the time which the apostolic witness
to Christ was still being recorded, the Old Testament was the Scripture from
which the church preached Christ.”
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Paul
like any normal Christian going to tell people about Christ would surely take a
Bible with him. The Old Testament had been translated into Greek, and some of
the New Testament may have been available to him. Paul says to Timothy, “Bring
the cloak that I left with Carpus at Troas when you come – and the books,
especially the parchments.” Listen to an excerpt of what he proclaimed when he
went to Athens: “Truly, these times of ignorance God overlooked, but now commands
all men everywhere to repent, because He has appointed a day on which He will
judge the world in righteousness by the Man whom He has ordained. He has given
assurance of this to all by raising Him from the dead” (Acts 17:30-31).
Conclusion
When
it comes to proclaiming the Gospel it’s good to draw people’s attention to the
headlines. But keep in mind that headlines are just that, headlines. Therefore,
don’t forget to show people the hardlines too.
Have
you been guilty of ignoring those parts of the Bible you deem as unimportant? Have
you been neglecting books of the Old Testament? Perhaps you’ve been neglecting
to read the whole of the Old Testament? If this is the case with you, isn’t
it a bit like you’ve living on a diet of headlines? How do you expect to grow
as a Christian? How deep is your understanding of Christ and Him crucified? You
need to read the hardlines as well as the headlines in order to grow in Christ.
I
would encourage you, whatever you thought the gospel was in the past, treat the
whole Bible as the Gospel, for that’s what it is. For the whole Bible is the revelation
of what God was going to do and has done in Christ. This is what Paul meant
when he said he’s clearly portrayed the crucified Christ before the eyes of the
Galatians.
