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[0:00] Father, sometimes it worries us to think that you are unchanging, that you just don't change. But Father, help us to understand this mystery of who you are.

[0:11] And Father, we get a glimpse of it with this idea that you are unchangingly faithful. That when you accept us as your son or daughter in Jesus, by faith in Jesus, that you never let us go.

[0:26] Nothing can stop you from letting us go. We thank you, Father, that you are a great God, that you are faithful, that you desire to know us and have us know you.

[0:39] And so, Father, bring your word home and bring this truth home to us this morning. And we ask this in the name of Jesus, your son and our savior. Amen. Please be seated. So, one of the challenges in courtship and in marriage is you meet somebody and, you know, you become interested in them.

[1:06] And then you start to get to know them. And that's the challenge. Because as you get to know them, you start to realize there's things about them which you hadn't quite realized before.

[1:19] And sometimes you find that endearing and wonderful. Sometimes you find it shocking and upsetting. And sometimes you just find it a little bit irksome.

[1:31] And part of the whole process of developing a relationship is how you manage those things. As you know, some of you maybe have dated somebody or you started to become friends with somebody.

[1:41] It doesn't have to be romantic. And then after a while you realize, no, I don't really think this is going to work. I don't really think we can be friends. This particular habit or this particular aspect of their personality, I just can't quite manage it.

[1:56] People are angular, if you know what I mean. In fact, it's one of the differences between imaginary friends and real friends. Imaginary friends, I don't know, they always laugh at your jokes.

[2:07] They always just go along with what you want. Real friends don't always laugh at your jokes. And sometimes they can be very irritating. You know, one of the marks of the fact that God is a real God and not just an imaginary God, a make-believe God, is that we Christians believe that the true God that does exist has spoken to reveal himself.

[2:31] And he's revealed himself to us through his word. And so what that means is that when we read his word, because he's not a make-believe God, an imaginary God, there's times when we read his word and we go, ooh, really?

[2:46] Really? You say that? And we cringe. Now, you might think I'm being a little bit extreme. And if you're a guest here, you're thinking, gosh, I know I shouldn't have come to an Anglican church saying such mean things about God.

[3:00] That would never happen to me. I'd like you to take your Bibles and turn to Galatians chapter 4. And we're going to read verses 8 and 9. And if you don't think that, imagine that you are going to, on Monday, tomorrow, you're going to gather all of your co-workers together, and you're going to read this verse to them slowly, these two verses slowly, all your co-workers.

[3:23] The atheist, the agnostic, the spiritual person, the Muslim, the Buddhist, you're going to read this to them. Galatians chapter 4, verses 8 and 9. 1. Formerly, friends, when you did not know God, whoa, just don't go any further.

[3:41] When you did not know God. You're saying, the Muslim says, you're saying I don't know God? The Buddhist says, you're saying I don't know God? The spiritual person, you're saying I don't know God? Formerly, when you did not know God, you were enslaved to those that by nature are not gods.

[4:01] But now that you have come to know God, that's he's talking to Christians. Or rather to be known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and worthless elementary principles of the world whose slaves you want to be once more?

[4:18] Now, depending on your personality type, some of you might be saying, I'd love to read that text to my co-workers. My boss. My boss's boss.

[4:28] And others would be saying, well, George, maybe you have a little bit of a point about sometimes there's things in the Bible that just sort of make us get a little tiny bit uncomfortable. Because for many of us, this would be a very, very, very awkward text to read.

[4:43] In fact, you know, some of the times I say, well, if you know, if you actually know the original language or something like that, it, you know, it says this or that, it softens this or makes it. Actually, that doesn't happen here.

[4:54] In fact, actually, even to make it more blunt, it actually literally says, when it says in verse 8, in my version of the Bible, it says formerly.

[5:08] Literally, it says, however, then. And however, then in the original language is emphatic. In other words, if we were to try to be translating it more literally, it would just look tacky.

[5:23] But you would bold it and make it all capitals because it's supposed to jump out of the page. However, then, when you did not know God, and then you'll notice in verse 9, but now, and it's a direct contrast.

[5:36] So, in fact, actually, the text is making a very, very, some very, very stark claims. We're going to camp here for a second just to get our minds around it because you never know when somebody's going to ask you about stuff like this.

[5:48] So, if you could put up the first point, Andrew, that would be very helpful. And here's the claim that the text is making. The true God exists and there are no gods. The true God exists and there are no gods.

[6:01] And some of you might say, well, George, how does that fit in? I mean, Paul wouldn't have known about Hinduism and he wouldn't have known about Buddhism and he wouldn't have known about Islam amongst three things.

[6:14] How would that have worked? Well, just sort of one tiny little thing. He probably actually did know a little bit about Hinduism because the church that was sort of the sending church for Paul was Antioch and there's archaeological evidence that there was some contact.

[6:31] There might even have been people of what we now call India in the congregation. So, actually, he might very well have known a little bit about Hinduism and Buddhism. But the fact of the matter is, is that the ideas of Hinduism and Buddhism, either that all is God or that everything isn't God but the God is sort of in everything, those actually were already Greek philosophers that thought about that.

[6:58] So, Paul was familiar with it. And Islam, of course, didn't develop for almost 700 years afterwards, so he wouldn't have known that. But it would have some similarities to a type of radical Judaism, so he would have been familiar with that.

[7:14] So, in fact, and here's where things get very uncomfortable. And if you're guessed, you're going to be maybe a little bit shocked. And hopefully, as we talk it through, you still might be very shocked, but at least you'll maybe understand why we would say such a shocking thing.

[7:28] The fact of the matter is, is that even in the presence of a billion Hindus and a billion Muslims, this text would say that Allah is not a God.

[7:46] And the Hindu gods are not gods. They're not by nature. They're not real. That's what the text is saying. The true God exists, and there are no gods.

[8:07] Some of us might be thinking, that's really, really a very, very, very big claim. And it might be all right, George, for us to talk about this right now, when we're all sort of together.

[8:18] But I'm also a little bit confused, George, because aren't a lot of people of other faiths, and even those who have no faith at all, they don't believe in any God whatsoever, aren't a lot of them a lot better than Christians?

[8:33] And the answer would be, yes, they are. But Christianity doesn't make any claim about people being better. Read the text again. And this is the problematic thing, because, George, you know, you're saying that they're enslaved.

[8:47] But surely, don't you think they live better lives? Like, some of you might even be thinking of, I don't know, a Christian, and maybe an atheist, and you'd say to yourself, George, I'd rather have the atheist as my boss, because they're a better person.

[9:00] So, I don't know how they're enslaved. Well, let's listen to the text again. Formerly, when you did not know God, you were enslaved to those that by nature are not gods.

[9:14] But now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and worthless elementary principles of the world, whose slaves you want to be once more?

[9:26] The text is very clear, making a big claim. If you could put up the next point, that would be great. Here's a way to start to understand it. We will always be enslaved by what we worship, unless we worship what we were created to worship.

[9:42] You know, it's interesting. As I was writing this, I had in the back of my mind a regular conversation partner that I have, who's always trying to embarrass me in public.

[9:55] And, but occasionally he gives me, I mean, it's sort of odd. I mean, one week he can try to embarrass me in public by saying something in a really loud voice about, so you worship a God who likes to kill people and cause people to holy war.

[10:11] The whole restaurant, all of Starbucks goes quiet, you know. And then the next week he'll say something sort of positive to me. But, you know, in a sense, he would agree with that, up until the comma, he would agree, we will always be enslaved by what we worship.

[10:27] In fact, he'd probably say to me, George, if you just stop there, you hit it right, they hit the nail on the head. You hit a home run. You hit a home run. We will always be enslaved by what we worship.

[10:40] In fact, not just my friend who's an atheist. Many, many people who wouldn't necessarily call themselves atheists or agnostics, they just say, you know, all religion, you know, it just enslaves you. You know, like, why waste your time on Sunday morning going to a church, paying money?

[10:54] Like, why don't you just sleep in, go to a nice restaurant for brunch, and then just hang out all afternoon and watch some football games and drink a few brews? Like, why bother yourself with anything big or mighty like that?

[11:04] You know, it just enslaves you. It just bends your life out of shape. Just bends your life out of shape to serve this. And Christians, you see, this is a, I think it's a very Christian statement.

[11:20] We will always be enslaved by what we worship unless we worship what we were created to worship. You see, at the very heart of the Christian faith is not just that the Christian faith is just like what gives us a little bit of meaning in our life.

[11:38] It makes us happy, gives us a sense of purpose. And, you know, when we talk like that amongst our non-Christian friends, they might think it's weird because they might think, you know, like, why don't you get your meaning and all, I don't know, like just from being centered, doing a little bit of yoga, I don't know, volunteering occasionally or, you know, whatever.

[11:59] It seems a bit odd and it leaves you to take odd positions on things like abortion. But, you know, at the end of the day, if we say, well, it just gives me some peace, it gives me some purpose. And they say, well, you know, for some it's rock climbing, you know, for some it's yoga, you know, for him it's church.

[12:14] You know, for me it's a few beers, watching football all afternoon. Like, whatever, you know, cranks, you know, whatever turns your crank, like, that's all we say. But Christians actually make a very, very, very deep claim.

[12:25] We make a claim that we are creatures in a created order, that there is a God who does exist, and that God who does exist chose to create out of nothing.

[12:39] And when he made human beings, he made us to be in his image and likeness. And he made us to know him and to be known by him and to have fellowship, communication, community with him.

[13:01] That's how he made us. He made us to look out to him, to love him, to be grateful to him, just to rejoice in who he is, just as in a sense, you know, if you have a really, really great friend and you just sort of rejoice in who they are and your friendship.

[13:18] Like, you know, not all, but you just have this sense of joy, of having a really good friend or, you know, somebody really important in your life like that. And in a very real way, but to the nth degree, because God is eternal, that for all eternity, just sort of rejoice in God.

[13:31] And God made us to sense, to get our meaning in relationship to him, to get our direction in relationship with him, to have our sense of worth in connection to him and to get our satisfaction in connection with him.

[13:48] God made us to be the type of creature that always looks out or goes out to have meaning and hope and purpose and satisfaction and direction.

[13:59] And when, in Genesis 3, we raised our fist at God and said that we want to be equal with you at least, and we turned our back on God, when we did that, it didn't mean that we stopped being human.

[14:19] It meant that our backs are turned to God, that we become far from God, that we become lost, in a sense, in our own imaginings apart from God.

[14:30] But that part of us, that we were made to look for somebody or somewhere or something or some idea or some principle that will give some meaning to our life, some purpose to our life, some direction to our life, some shape to our life, some grounding to our life, that part of us that continues to look out, continues to look out.

[14:53] It doesn't go away, but what it means is that we will now look everywhere other than God. To have meaning, to have a sense of purpose, to have a sense of direction, to have a sense of being grounded, to have some type of satisfaction, of hope, that will have to be now somewhere other than God.

[15:13] And if you think about it for a second, if we were designed in such a way that we would find that in God, and now we go somewhere else other than God, that's actually being bent out of shape.

[15:30] And the fact of the matter is, is that much of what we give ourselves to and find our meaning in is even less than human. Friends, every single person you meet today, it doesn't matter if you go for a walk down Rideau Street and you meet the most broken down street person that you've ever seen, or if by chance you're walking down the street and you get a glimpse of a billionaire or you get a glimpse of the prime minister, every single human being will last longer than Canada, will last longer than the United States.

[16:13] Canada will come to an end. The United States will come to an end, unless Jesus comes first. But human beings survive death. Canada is not made in the image of God.

[16:27] Every human being is made in the image of God. The person will last longer than the nation, the ideology. And that doesn't even count the fact that so many of us, what we do to find meaning in our life, even, you know, we find meaning in our life from having gadgets, but they're all less than us.

[16:46] Like, why is it that we find meaning for something that we make, which is less than us? I talk in my blog about, if you look at it this week, about, you know, whether Hinduism and all and the Buddhist type of idea, you know, and that in the Bible.

[17:00] And at the heart of it is all of these ideas see ultimate reality as fundamentally impersonal. But in our day-to-day lives, if something is making more and more impersonal, if we serve impersonal things, that makes us less, not more.

[17:16] And whether it's ideas like Marxism or capitalism or whatever, if that becomes what drives us and what motivates us, we're giving ourselves to something that's less to us. And if we're giving ourselves to that which is less than that, us, how can it not bend us out of shape?

[17:32] You see that the Bible here, which is on one hand talking about something which is very, very, very, very, very, very counterculture. Let me tell you, the counterculture in Canada is not countercultural.

[17:46] Galatians 4, 8 and 9 is profoundly countercultural, which is why we would feel so profoundly awkward about talking about it with our boss and our boss's boss and our co-workers.

[18:06] But when you think about it, there's profound wisdom. We might be uncomfortable about it, but there is profound wisdom. If you could put up the next point, the not-by-nature gods enslave people, the true God, died a slave's death to redeem and free us from slavery to not-by-nature gods.

[18:29] You see, what the Bible is saying here is, like you might wonder, is the Bible saying that there's not other gods?

[18:40] Like, that's a bit of a more complicated thing. The Bible sort of says that they're not by nature gods. In other words, on one level, they don't exist as gods.

[18:53] But even this word elementary principles, there's three different ways that can be translated in English, all of them valid. Elementary principles and elementary powers or elementary spirits.

[19:06] If you look at Bible translations, all three of them will be present. And the idea in the original language encompasses all three. And, you know, sometimes if you think about it, what we give ourselves to are principles, ideas, capitalism, Marxism, queer theory, like gender, we give ourselves to principles, our ideas.

[19:27] We also give ourselves to fundamental forces. We give ourselves to sex or our tribe or we give ourselves to power.

[19:38] We give ourselves to fundamental sort of powers in the world. And the Bible also says that sometimes those things which are worshipped as idols or gods are in fact demons.

[19:49] That they're in fact they're demons. and in all of these cases if we give ourselves to them and they're not the real God and we were made to worship and to know the real God to find our meaning, our hope, our satisfaction, our grounding, everything in the real God who truly exists, who creates all things and sustains all things.

[20:10] He's not a God who made all things and then went away. He's a God who made all things and then sustains everything. Every second of existence is sustained in existence by God not by itself but by God and we were made to know that God and to worship that God and if we go either towards principles or powers or spirits we are bending ourselves and this idea that is now sort of being revealed to us and is very profoundly uncomfortable to us as Canadians this is not it's so funny that the way we automatically try to think of God is that when we think of God we think of him like an elemental power or an elemental principle.

[20:53] We think of him as an abstraction which is what a principle is or we think of him as connected to a power whether it's the power that race holds or the power that money holds or the power that just our desire for power holds or we think of God in terms of almost really ways that would be the best way to think of demons as that God is going to be a God who just wants to control us he just wants to enslave us he wants to demean us and we automatically in our fallen state tend to project upon God these categories because that's what we're looking for in the time all in the world all in the world all in the world and so when we hear this thing about the true God we automatically start to try to think of him in terms of these categories but they're not by nature God's enslaved people but when we think of God how is it that God has fundamentally vindicated his word and justified his word and revealed who he is he does it through the cross about a year ago

[21:59] I was having a conversation in a Starbucks of all places and I and the person was going on and on about how you know God kills people and it's just it's going to hurt like she she was going on and the other people were all listening in but this one person was taking the lead and talking about how God relates to people and I had one of those Holy Spirit moments somebody must have been praying for me keep praying for me when I said you know the God that you believe in kills people puts people to death but the God that I believe in the real God doesn't put people to death but dies for people and all the person could do because they had intellectual integrity was say I never thought of that and then I had a very brief one minute explanation about how Christians believe that God the Son of God

[22:59] I didn't quite use these words I was more articulate and hopefully more at their level but I just said the very center we believe that God's Son took on human flesh and died on the cross to free you the not by nature God's enslaved people the true God died a slave's death because that's what the crucifixion is a slave's death why did Jesus come why did he become like a slave a servant and die a slave or servant's death he did it to redeem and free us from slavery to not by nature gods that's what Jesus did you know it's very interesting I learned this week at synod one of the speakers was comparing the final words of Jesus before his death and the final words of Buddha before his death the final words of Buddha before his death was strive without ceasing the final words of Jesus before he died it is finished not I am finished but it is finished my task to come to die a slave's death to redeem those enslaved by not by nature gods my task my mission has finished some of you might say okay

[24:41] George help me out with something here I thought God knows everything so how can it say that he knows me like I thought God knows everything how can it say he knows me look again at verses 8 and 9 you might have noticed that 8 and 9 are important verses and if all you remember afterwards is 8 and 9 and not my points then I have the Holy Spirit done a good work in our midst listen to verses 8 and 9 again formerly when you did not know God you were enslaved by those that by nature are not gods but now that you have come to know God or rather to be known by God if you could put up the first point the next point that would be very helpful when by faith we receive the gospel we become known by God as his treasured child forever that's what the text is saying when we by faith receive we receive the gospel we become known by God as his treasured child forever if you go back later on and those of you were here last week and I didn't put to sleep and you remember it we talked about how you know it's so interesting when you give your life to Jesus like when I when I became a Christian

[25:54] I didn't know an awful lot all I had was this sense that there must be something more and that when I was in the presence of real Christians who were singing God's praise and then I saw them afterwards I sensed that there was something more and I knew there was something more and I knew it was connected to Jesus and I knew I had to have Jesus in my life and I had a strong long battle before I surrendered all I had was this sense that if I reached out to Jesus he would take me and that there was something more and you all have your own different stories but one of the wonderful things is that we we just have in my case I just have this sense that there's something more and you reach out to Jesus and he reaches down to you and takes you and then you start to realize as you read his word all that happens when he takes you by the hand like I didn't really have any sense that when I reached out to Jesus that when he took my hand what he was doing is saying

[26:58] George this seals the exchange the doom you deserve was on me the destiny I deserve is now on you the shame that is on you is now on me being able to be in a sense fully open to God is now on you all the things that you've done wrong that you deserve punishment for that's now on me my perfect life of obedience that now clothes you I didn't know those things when I put out my hand to Jesus I learned them afterwards maybe some of you are just learning it now and one of the other things I didn't know is that when I put my hand out to Jesus and he reached down and took mine I become known by God and not only do I become known by God

[28:00] I become God's known by God and his treasured child and this is something that will exist forever just pause a little bit before I explain a little more about no one you know it seems very very unkind and uncharitable to say that there are no other gods that exist but this is why it's so important to the gospel to grasp this if there are other gods or other powers that really exist that are like God that are true rivals to God then one of them could elbow God and he'll let me go one of them can make an accusation about me to God and God will let me go one of them can grab me themselves and pull me out of God's grips and God will let me go but when we understand that there is in fact only one

[29:10] God and there are no other gods then when the Bible says that we are known by God and he will never let us go nothing can make him let us go because God has no rivals he has no rivals this if you go back and you read Galatians 4 and you see all this language about the son you understand that maybe part of how to understand how it is that God can know everything but now it says that he knows us in a particular way because now what it's talking about it's a different type of idea than just mere knowledge it's knowing us as the son who inherits everything which is what we talked about last week it's personal knowledge in fact if you could put up the next point here's the claim

[30:10] I cannot know God unless he knows me first I cannot know God unless he knows me first what's going on in this idea of personal knowledge and God knowing us first in some way imagine imagine you're going to this church for a year and in this church you start to hear a lot about this other person a lot of different people they talk about this person a lot and they just talk about him or her and they tell you lots of stories about him for instance he's not here but we could probably all tell you 10 Daniel Gilman stories he wouldn't mind me using him as an person and you might actually say who's that person that's

[31:19] Bob that's Bob really oh gosh that's Bob and you might feel like you know them because you've heard so much about them but you don't really know them right you just know a whole lot of stuff about them you don't know them and then maybe you're in lineup for coffee with Bob and you just say hi and and it's one of those times when you say hi to Bob there's a little bit of a click or you have a sense of a connection between the two of you and then before you know it you decide to have coffee or something after the service or lunch after the service and you hit it off and in the days and weeks ahead you start to spend time together and you get to know each other and you become friends and in that personal knowledge what happens in that process is you get this sense that you're entering into their life in some way they now know you and you're entering into their life and at the same time you have the sense that they're entering into your life they have a bit of a place in your life and at the same time you also sort of understand that not only is there this friendship now but that there's going to be growth into the future that it's not just that you have a one nice conversation but you have this sense that there's a friendship and it's going to grow like there's some hope or future or legs on this relationship and at the same time you have this bit of a claim that goes and

[32:53] Bob said well actually we're not friends you'd be crushed because in that type of personal knowledge there's a claim and not only a claim but a sense of things going on in the future and you'd be crushed now that's how it just works when there's just two people and we're both people and it's a little bit equal but let's just think of you know it's hard to think of God but think of something different think about becoming friends with the Queen of England I was going to use either Trump or Trudeau as an example but the opinion polls might not make that a good example in terms of how they're doing so I think most people like the Queen and we know a little bit about it some of us know people who are fixated about the Queen and we think it's a little bit odd right Queen memorabilia Queen facts and stuff like that by the way I'm talking about the Queen of England not the Rock group just to be clear about this in case some of you are a little bit confused and but and you know the way it is with the

[33:55] Queen how on earth could I ever become the Queen's friend I've been told that if she reaches out her hand to you you can take it but you don't reach out your hand to her and have her take it and you know it would be let's say you have an honour and you get to go to Buckingham Palace and you meet the Queen and you know you might think I think there was a bit of connection between me and the Queen and your friends would say are you smoking dope like get over yourself there's no connection between you and the Queen but if the Queen phones you up you go whoa and she says and she chats with you for a few moments like if you were like me it would be like

[35:02] I would be like the deer in the headlights right you wouldn't know what to say and then she invites you over for lunch and it's maybe not a thousand people but just ten and then she calls you and she invites you over and then it's a private thing and then at some point in time you realize you're talking on the phone you're actually spending time with each other the Queen knows you the Queen considers you her friend and now I can consider the Queen my friend before I wasn't allowed to even touch her now if we get together I could put my arm around her I think she's short my arm around her and I wouldn't have guards coming and arresting me she could put her arm on me now if that's how it works just with the Queen that's how it works even in a far higher degree with God in our arrogance and pride we catch for

[36:03] God but in reality we can't know God unless he knows us first and when he knows us some of his life comes into us and our life goes into him and a claim is made by God in our friendship and the possibility of growth into the future is present as well God will never let me go God will never let me go if you could put up the next point when God knows me he knows me for eternity my knowing of him ebbs and flows his knowing of me is unfailing and here's where that other knowledge of him is very powerful if I got to become friends with the queen at some point in time I might start to worry that if she knew a little bit about me she wouldn't want to be my friend or it might be that in a couple of months or something

[37:09] I do something and as a result of that she won't want to be my friend but God knows me from the moment of my conception to the moment of my death he knows the dreams I have that I don't remember when I wake up he knows all my masks he knows the things I'm proud of he knows the things I'm ashamed of he knows all these things about me and yet he chose in love to have God the son of God die for me and he knows me perfectly and he chooses to know me perfectly deeply eternally unshakably I have periods of rebellion I have periods of doubt I have periods of just unbelievable narcissistic self obsession do I hear an amen no just but God his knowledge of me never stops he knows me eternally and you see as this truth begins to grip us there's a profound type of security that starts to enter into our life that religion will just never provide because you see religion is always about performance it's always about being able to have the right type of family to be successful at child raising to be successful in friendships to be successful in being able to if not successful at least to mask your lack of success and make claims of success to look really good in church and not have people know about maybe some bad things going on in your life bad things in your marriage bad things in your friendship bad things with your health and it's all about always trying to have to maintain a front and an appearance and as the gospel begins to grip us there begins to be this type of basic security that

[39:12] God knows me he knows me eternally and when he knows me eternally he knows me eternally he will never let me go the direction is going to go into all of eternity the new heaven and the new earth he knows me he will not let me go I can hardly bear to know myself because of some of the things I've done but he saw it and he died for me he knows me which is why just in closing if we read the next of the text the rest of the text we start to see some very important things look at verse 12 brothers and sisters I entreat you become as I am for I also have become as you are it's the first command in the book of Galatians if you could put up the point the gospel is unbending but it shapes us to stoop to share the gospel what it means what I mean is this what

[40:13] Paul is saying here is that when he became like Galatians he lived amongst them he worked amongst them he ate like them he learned how they thought he learned how they talked he listened to them in compassion he went to them he spent time with them he stooped you see you can only stoop if you're secure if you're consumed with pride and arrogance and you're looking down on your nose on people they have to come up to you but when you're secure in being known by God you can stoop to listen and try to understand and after listening and understanding and compassion be able to share the unbending gospel because you know that God loves them and wants to know them as well listen to verse 13 and following you know it was because of a bodily ailment that I preached the gospel to you at first what has become of your blessedness for

[41:26] I testify to you that if possible you would have garged out your eyes and given them to me have I then become your enemy by telling you the truth as we are gripped by the gospel we are shaped to be used for God's glory in the midst of suffering why suffering is still suffering but as we're gripped by the fact that God knows me and my identity isn't found in my health my beauty my strength my ability to be used by God is also not defined by my strength and my beauty my ability to be used by God is shaped by the fact that he stooped to me and knows me then even in weakness God can use us just as Paul brought the gospel as a result of weakness and one final thing if you could put up the point as I start reading at verse 17 they make much of you in other words the false brothers that are troubling them they flatter all the time but for no good purpose they want to shut you out in other words they want to shut you out from

[42:49] Paul and the apostolic church that you may make much of them that you might be just in a group that flatters them they flatter you so you will flatter them go more and more secure you are freed up to give not expecting that you are going to give so you get something back because there is that fundamental psychic security in religion it's always inherently competitive and who's in power and whether you're using praise songs or whether you're using hymns or whether it's

[43:52] Anglican or whether it's Baptist or whether it's Roman Catholic or whether it's this and as long as these things exist on the level of religion you can't just sort of do something purely for them expecting nothing in return but as the gospel grips us the ability to give expecting nothing in return is one of the implications and byproducts of the gospel please stand I don't know how you'll pray as a result of this sermon but for some of you maybe who have never given your lives to Jesus I just want to really assure you nothing in your life is a surprise to God nothing that will be in your life in the future is a surprise to God knowing you perfectly Jesus died for you and he died for you so that

[44:53] God when you trust him in faith that God would know you in such a way and if you've never done it there's no better time than right now to just call out to Jesus and say Jesus be my savior and know me that's all you have to say Jesus be my savior and know me be my savior and know me thank you that you that you to say that in your words father thank you for Jesus thank you for the gospel thank you father that you know us first thank you father that when you know us first we can know you thank you that you communicate that through your word thank you father for the wonder of the cross and what Jesus did for us thank you father how that reveals who you are and your heart for us and your desire for us to free us so that we aren't enslaved to make us secure knowing that you know us father thank you for the gospel thank you father for this father make us disciples of

[46:07]  Jesus who are gripped by the gospel learning to believe what you say in your word and live secure lives for your glory and all this we ask in the name of Jesus your son and our savior amen