Easter at River Park this year!
For whatever reason, the school board has decided that they will no longer rent the football field at Gilmer High School to us, so we are adapting, and will be at the North end of the park, right beside the playground.
I hope you’ll be inviting your friends, family, and neighbors to worship with us on Resurrection Sunday! Be sure to bring your lawn chairs and blankets to spread out in the park.
Jesus replied, “You hypocrites! Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you, for he wrote,
-Jesus, Mark 7:6-8 NLT
‘These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me.
Their worship is a farce, for they teach man-made ideas as commands from God.’
For you ignore God’s law and substitute your own tradition.”
Do you ever feel like you have to perform to get people to approve of you or love you? In what kinds of situations are you most likely to feel that way (i.e., parenting, work, friendships, etc.)?
Does that need for performance-approval ever bleed over into your relationship with God? If so, what does that indicate about the way you view God’s love?
What in your current life or your past might contribute to the belief that you have to perform in order for God to love you?
Trusting in God’s unchanging love is a gospel essential for us. Until we truly believe God loves us, apart from our performance, our spiritual lives will be stagnant. We’ll constantly try to prove ourselves to God, bending us out of shape into legalism.
Fortunately, the gospel helps us see that we are free from this lie because of what Jesus has done on our behalf. This is the reminder Paul gives his readers in Galatians 4:8-20.
Before you Gentiles knew God, you were slaves to so-called gods that do not even exist. So now that you know God (or should I say, now that God knows you), why do you want to go back again and become slaves once more to the weak and useless spiritual principles of this world? You are trying to earn favor with God by observing certain days or months or seasons or years. I fear for you. Perhaps all my hard work with you was for nothing.
Dear brothers and sisters, I plead with you to live as I do in freedom from these things, for I have become like you Gentiles—free from those laws.
You did not mistreat me when I first preached to you. Surely you remember that I was sick when I first brought you the Good News. But even though my condition tempted you to reject me, you did not despise me or turn me away. No, you took me in and cared for me as though I were an angel from God or even Christ Jesus himself. Where is that joyful and grateful spirit you felt then? I am sure you would have taken out your own eyes and given them to me if it had been possible. Have I now become your enemy because I am telling you the truth?
Those false teachers are so eager to win your favor, but their intentions are not good. They are trying to shut you off from me so that you will pay attention only to them. If someone is eager to do good things for you, that’s all right; but let them do it all the time, not just when I’m with you.
Oh, my dear children! I feel as if I’m going through labor pains for you again, and they will continue until Christ is fully developed in your lives. I wish I were with you right now so I could change my tone. But at this distance I don’t know how else to help you.
-Paul, Galatians 4:8-20 NLT
After Paul planted the church in Galatia, false teachers known as Judaizers showed up trying to convince the Galatians that Paul was a liar and their enemy. The Judaizers wanted to drive a wedge between these believers and Paul. They wanted to win the believers’ allegiance to themselves and to their belief of works-righteousness. Paul’s concern for the Galatian believers would continue until Christ was “fully developed in your lives.”
As we mature in our faith, we are transformed as the nature and character of Jesus are developed in us. The Judaizers’ legalistic teaching threatened to stunt that development.
How did Paul contrast the Galatians’ lives before Christ and their lives after coming to Christ?
What was Paul asking in his rhetorical questions about becoming slaves again? How would you respond if you were asked the same thing?
How can we believers avoid slipping back into enslavement to old habits and comfort zones?
What are some of the “weak and bankrupt elemental forces” that keep Christians today from growing in their faith? What pointless rules and rituals are we under pressure to conform to?
How can reflecting on our past and our spiritual milestones (as Paul encouraged the Galatian Christians to do in verses 13-15) encourage us to grow in relationship with God?
How had false teachings influenced the Galatians? Describe Paul’s response to this turn of events.
Why did Paul ask in verse whether he was now an enemy of the Galatian believers? What concern did he express in regard to their relationship with the legalistic Judaizers? How was this more than mere partisan rivalry and jealousy?
How does a relationship with God based on performance and keeping the rules take the joy out of the Christian life?
How can we cultivate an ongoing enthusiasm for godliness and the things of God?