Demolishing False Beliefs
No Other Gospel
Sunday, September 22, 2024
Call to Worship:
John 4: 23-24 "Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth."
Let us gather and bring our hearts, our voices in praise, and our minds to learn and receive. Let us gather and allow the Spirit to move us to praise our Lord and give us revelation and understanding.
Let us remember who we are as the Body of Christ:
1 Peter 2:9 "But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light."
Hebrews 13;15 “Through Jesus, therefore, let us continually offer to God a sacrifice of praise—the fruit of lips that openly profess his name.”
Amen Let us pray.
Songs.
Intro: Who are you living to please? More so, whose approval do you desperately seek? What is the motivation for that approval?
Do you ask yourself these questions ever? Because if we’re willing to look, we will likely find we have been conditioned in this world to place a high value on how others see us and connect that to our self-worth. This means our self-worth is in constant flux of whether we meet someone’s approval or not. And what if we are trying to seek the approval of many people all at once and they all have different standards and expectations? It’s an impossible feat and leaves us exhausted and stressed out. This is the approval addict trap we can so easily fall into-we’re conditioned to.
But, we have been given the truth to break free from this. We just need to understand what that truth is and how to apply it in our lives. The truth is the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Do you ever consider what the Gospel message means in connection to your self-worth?
You see salvation is not simply a ticket to heaven. Salvation is the beginning of a dynamic, new relationship with God!
In our brokenness and conditioned worldly thinking we complicate the Gospel and resist the truth of His amazing love; we resist the truth of our acceptance to God through His Son, and only through His Son. It is a hard truth to grasp that we can stand before a Holy God accepted, loved, and valued beyond measure when we know all our flaws; we know the thoughts we have; we know how unlovable we have been or have heard from those closest to us how we don’t measure up time and again. Here’s the greatest mystery, God knows everything about us, and still we are acceptable before Him. All because of what Christ did; this is the Good News of the Gospel!
We’re not the only ones who get this all mixed up-the early churches did too because they share the same humanity we live in. The Apostle Paul needed to clarify the truth for them so they might build their lives on the firm foundation that is Christ and Him crucified- nothing more and nothing less. Let’s listen and heed the truth in what he shares. Let’s hear how this truth applies to our understanding of our self-worth and how our motivations are guided by our level of understanding.
Galatians 1: 1-12 NIV
Paul, an apostle—sent not from men nor by a man, but by Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised him from the dead— 2 and all the brothers and sisters with me, To the churches in Galatia: 3 Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, 4 who gave himself for our sins to rescue us from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father, 5 to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.
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.
11 I want you to know, brothers and sisters, that the gospel I preached is not of human origin. 12 I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it; rather, I received it by revelation from Jesus Christ.
There is only one Gospel. We can’t add to it or take away from it. And that Gospel is the message of Jesus Christ being sent by the Father to be the sacrifice on heaven’s altar for the sins of humanity and pay our debt in full. Through Christ we have been justified-there was no turning a blind eye to our sin. God dealt with the sin and the penalty was death. This was the justification that we discussed previously. His Son paid that penalty for us. Why? So we could be reconciled-the other part of the Gospel message to be seen as holy, blameless, and righteous before God- not because of our doing. Solely because of His Son who was spotless and pure, without sin who took our place on the cross, and because of what Jesus did, we are now as we believe in Him, redeemed and acceptable to God.
Hear this today-this is no small thing. Before we were enemies of God under His wrath in our fleshly nature. Our righteous acts were like filthy rags as we discussed last time before our Holy God. Now through Christ, we can come before God and be seen as acceptable- worthy- as His child, an heir with Christ, as part of His Kingdom. For all eternity!
This is the Gospel! We can’t earn it and no one can take it from us. It is the truth and it is our truth as we receive Christ as our Lord and Savior.
Fully accepted, worthy, loved, and highly valued before our Holy God and Father. This is the foundation of our self-worth.
Just let that truth sit a moment in your heart. How often do you let the depth of this reality pierce through everything else you know and have been taught? How often do you let this truth wash over every lie you have believed or every harsh word spoken against you? How often do you say, this is my truth now; this is who I am because God says so and I believe Him?
Every single one of us should be saying this over and over again.
Yet in our world, we have been deeply conditioned to place a high value on what others think about us. This is the second main portion of satan’s lie we are busting apart. Remember Performance + Others’ Opinions = Self-Worth.
- False Belief: I Must Be Approved by Others to Feel Good.
The Apostle Paul is calling out to the Galatians to remember exactly what the Gospel message is truth about who we are in Christ. Other people were twisting the truth and adding to it-going to back to rules which then putting it all back on themselves to achieve and accomplish righteousness. Sounds familiar today right? Looking for other ways to be seen as acceptable and worthy. Paul is saying NO remember what you heard and received as truth.
He asks a powerful question we all need to reflect on.
Galatians 1:10 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.
How many know you have believed this and fallen into this trap of constantly seeking the approval of others to boost your self-esteem?
What is the danger in this:
How we view ourselves and how we think others perceive us can lead us to become approval addicts.
Hello, my name is Karrie and I have been an approval addict. It’s still a battle, but now I know differently and I have tools to help me overcome the pull into this trap.
There can be such a high when we know others are pleased with us. But it’s not lasting and leaves us in a constant cycle of seeking approval.
Have you ever felt like the one everybody calls on-they know they can count on you! They know you won’t say no because you want them to look approvingly upon you.
Helping others is wonderful, we know this. It becomes unhealthy when your motivation to say yes is because you need their approval to feel good. So while that initial high might feel good because yet another person is momentarily pleased with you, over time you might have a growing resentment because of all the demand.
Can you relate today?
Here is when we know we have fallen into this trap of approval addiction-the need to feel good about ourselves through how others view us:
After you give and you give, after many sacrifices and sincere effort on your part, it takes only 1 word spoken that is unappreciative to absolutely ruin your self-worth. All good is forgotten and 1 insensitive word brings you down.
Jesus says, in John 14:6 Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father except through Me.
He also says in John 10:27 My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me.
Sadly we don’t often follow Jesus, looking to and listening to Him as our truth. We look to others and place a value on their approval of us over what God says. We might not intentionally do this, but we do it nonetheless.
We join clubs and social groups, and even come to church believing others will be like us so surely we’ll be accepted as we are and approved of. And yet, we still hear those words or comments that are not affirming or approving. And then what happens? We feel it- rejection-the very thing we fear most.
Remember what this series is pulling back the curtain on.
- Our Motivation: Fear of Rejection.
The approval need is the lie we believe-To avoid a fear of rejection from others.
Paul gets right to the heart of the matter, who are we trying to please?
Galatians 1:10 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.
What we must know is when we are turning to others for only what God can provide (our security in our self-worth and absolute acceptance) this action is a direct result of our acceptance of satan’s lie we have been breaking down.
If we live by this fear- we then conform our attitudes and actions to the expectations of others.
Christ wants us to understand truth as it is, defined by God. So we can walk in the freedom of knowing without a doubt who we are as children of God and live in that freedom.
For many of us, just like the Galatians and also like the Corinthians this is a long journey of learning to let go of false beliefs and strongholds that are deeply woven into our culture and therefore, our make-up. Look at what Paul revealed to the Corinthians and see if you might see yourself in them.
1 Corinthians 3: 1-3 Brothers and sisters, I could not address you as people who live by the Spirit but as people who are still worldly—mere infants in Christ. 2 I gave you milk, not solid food, for you were not yet ready for it. Indeed, you are still not ready. 3 You are still worldly. For since there is jealousy and quarreling among you, are you not worldly? Are you not acting like mere humans?
To which you might say, but we are humans. True…but humans who have been filled with the Holy Spirit and as Paul reminded us in our key Scripture, we are to live by the Spirit, not according to the ways of man that are flawed, broken, and self-serving. The only way we will mature in Christ and walk more boldly in the Spirit is to have the right understanding of who our self-worth is founded in and whose approval it is we need to be concerned with.
The truth is most if not all of us have some fear of rejection.
Being rejected by others is no fun and depending on that rejection can cause some deep and lasting pain. Often this has started in our homes when we were children. God desires for all parents to be the loving model of who He is, but the reality is, many are not. Many are deeply broken themselves and instead of love- display rejection in countless ways. Then once we experience it, we come to expect it in others as we go into the world.
There are many devastating effects of rejection:
-we might find it difficult to give and receive love because someone withheld love from us.
-We might find it difficult to open up and reveal our inner thoughts and motives because surely if others know the real me they will reject us just like others did before.
-We might only allow superficial relationships or we might isolate altogether simply to avoid rejection. We withdraw and decline most invitations to engage socially.
-We might have a sense of despair at feeling unloved or being unwanted, or unaccepted.
Can you see the snowball mess we find ourselves in that began with a fear we might not even known we had, of being rejected and we let it grow and grow to where it drives how we behave, what we think about, what we do, and who gets to decide our worth-we give that away to others to determine.
Nobody, not your parents, your spouse, your children, or your co-workers-nobody has that authority to determine your self-worth, so we need to stop giving them that power. So hard I know… we are so deeply conditioned in this way to want and need approval from others, but it is a race we’ll never win.
The truth we must choose to believe and receive is we ARE NOT REJECTED- quite the opposite! We have been redeemed and reconciled before the Most High God and we are loved by Him! But we must receive this truth.
Truth: Our fear of rejection will control us to the degree by which we base our self-worth on the opinion of others, rather than our relationship with God.
Our dependence on others for value only brings bondage while abiding in the truth of Christ’s love and acceptance brings freedom.
We cannot seek both as a basis for our self-worth.
Truth: Only God can provide the security we are desperately seeking.
God wants to be Lord of our lives and He is unwilling to share His lordship with anyone.
Ponder: who is the Lord of your life? Your actions will tell you.
- God’s Solution: Reconciliation to Restored Relationship.
God made a way for us to be reconciled to Him as we read in our Scripture.
Justification as we discussed in our previous message explains the judicial facts of our forgiveness and righteousness in Christ.
Reconciliation explains the relational aspect of our salvation. Let’s look to His Word that is truth and shows us His purpose. The moment we receive Christ by faith, we enter into a personal relationship.
Reconciliation is the greatest theme in Scripture.
Galatians 1: 3-5 3 Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, 4 who gave himself for our sins to rescue us from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father, 5 to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.
Ephesians 2: 15-16 15 by setting aside in his flesh the law with its commands and regulations. His purpose was to create in himself one new humanity out of the two, thus making peace, 16 and in one body to reconcile both of them to God through the cross, by which he put to death their hostility.
Colossians 1: 21-22 NASB 21 And although you were previously alienated and hostile in attitude, engaged in evil deeds, 22 yet He has now reconciled you in His body of flesh through death, in order to present you before Him holy and blameless and beyond reproach—
We can’t contribute to Christ’s gift of salvation. Our faith is a response to what He has already done.
Ephesians 1: 13-14 13 And you also were included in Christ when you heard the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation. When you believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, 14 who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession—to the praise of his glory.
Romans 8:15 15 The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.”
Do you see, we are to open our hearts and see our God as the loving Father He is? We are only willing to do this as we believe and begin to trust in our unchanging worth in His eyes; as we make what He says of greater value than what others say.
Do you need help learning this? Read 1 Corinthians 13 and where the word Love is, replace it with My Father, because remember we read in His Word, God IS love. So when we say love, we are talking about God. Hear His character. Do this over and over until your heart begins to receive and soften to who He is and wants to be in your life. Let’s read this together today your Bibles.
Application: ask God to show you if your perception of Him is in error in any way. He will show you what is true.
Conclusion: Christ is the final authority on our worth and acceptance. He gave His very life so we could be reconciled to God. Through the cross, we are acceptable to God. Let us seek to please the One who fully accepts us and values His Word over others’ opinions. Let us help one another grasp and walk in this truth.
Let’s pray.
Prayers:
Final Blessing: 2 Corinthians 13:14 The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.
