Sermon Transcript:

Well, good morning. Nobody slipped.

Nobody fell down, which was good because it usually would have been me. So

this morning, we're going to continue with our

series in Galatians called no other gospel, and we're making our way to Chapter Four today. And in chapter four there's this transition now that goes from how you're supposed to live, or who you who has been influencing you to now, what do we do with that? Where are we at? And this is going to be called the prosperous gospel. Man,

I thought everybody get more excited about that title,

the prosperous gospel.

Did you know In November of 2022 the greatest amount ever won in a lottery history was $2.04

billion

remember when they used to be like 100,000 a million? Now it's like billions. I can't even count that high. Just have 10 fingers. One ticket matched all the winning numbers. They didn't even have to share. The person will be hard pressed to even know what to do with that much money.

Other lottery winners in the Powerball mega billions last year, 1.7 7,000,000,001.6

0 billion.

I'm amazed. If that amount of money is available for those willing to spend just a few dollars on a lottery ticket. It's totally mind boggling to me. I don't know about you, but it's just incredible. And I know for some people

that have

very little extra cash, it's their way of giving into a system that's going to actually bankrupt them. You see, it's always the ones that have very little that think they're going to just gain something instantaneously. And they a lot of times, they go week after week after week and they waste their money because the chances of winning are so low, it's almost not worth playing.

Our society has always looked for ways to get rich quick, whatever schemes that they can come up with. They people want to get rich. Here's a little secret,

if you're not joyful now with no money, what's going to make you joyful with $2 billion

you see, there's only one person that could put joy in your life, and his name is Jesus. None of that other stuff matters. The material world isn't where happiness is, it's where Jesus is the only place that joy can be found. I'm going to put a disclaimer on my sermon today. Okay,

I've been asked numerous times as a pastor

if I were to accept a tithe given off of a lottery winnings, everybody's

going What's he going to say? What's he going to say? Of course I would. It took me about one second to think about that. Don't you think God could do better with that money than what that person could do with why would we not take it just because it ended up in Satan's hand doesn't mean it comes back to can't come back to God.

It's all his. He owns everything.

And I'm not approving of playing the lotto, don't get me wrong,

but I do approve of giving to God. I approve he can take better care of that cash than we could ever

you see, the real question is this, we just went through our announcements, and we talked about giving.

Are you tithing now on the little bit that you have, if God blesses you with the windfall, if you're not doing it now, what's going to make you do it when you have more

it's still 10%

10% of $1 is a dime. 10% of $100 is 10 bucks. 10% of $1,000 is $100

you see how, as it goes up, the more you make, the more you get to bless God. You see, it's not about giving to God so he can give back to you. It's about being obedient to God for what he's already blessed you with. You see, if you want the 90% that he allows you to keep to be blessed, then give him the 10% to start with.

This is not a sermon about giving, but I thought, as we were talking a little bit about it today, I want to preach about the gospel that teaches us how we can be prosperous. God wants you to prosper in all of your life.

He's not against money. He's against the love of money.

Did you hear me? People always say money is the tool of the devil. No, it's not. We need it to live. God has blessed us with many different occupations that we can have, houses, that we can own, cars that we can own, but it's all temporary. It's all just while we're here. But God is not against money. He's against the love of money. When that becomes your God, then you've lost touch with who God is. He's not a killjoy. He's a joy giver.

He doesn't want your to kill your fun. He wants you to have fun. Didn't you have fun this morning? I mean, those three fast songs, and we were just like, I was like, man, we're jamming this morning, right? Let's

talk about the prosperous gospel Galatians, chapter four.

12 verses, one through seven. Stand with me as we read from God's Word. I'm going to read from the New International Version you read along with whatever version that you have or that you like. To read from, I know some like the New Living Translation or the CSV or the ESV or the ABC or the XYZ,

as long as it's God's word,

what am I saying? Is this that as long as there, as an heir is underage, he is no different than from a slave. Although he owns the whole estate, the heir is subject to guardians and trustees until the time has been set by his father. So also when we were underage, we were in slavery under the elemental spiritual forces of the world. I'll get back to that. Don't worry.

But when at the set time had fully come, God sent a son born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those under the law that we might receive adoption to sonship, because you are his sons. God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts and the Spirit who calls out, Abba Father, for you're no longer a slave, but God's child. And since you're his child, God has made you an heir also, amen, you you get to partake in everything that he's offering. This morning, God bless us with Your Word this morning in Jesus name, I pray Amen, you may have a seat.

So this transition in the chapter four,

this idea of our slavery to sin, for where we were born before Jesus, to this concept with Christ is now, and how we can live for him. We're sons and daughters of the Almighty King. Do you believe that this morning, you're the son and daughter of a king

that's not a earthly king, but a heavenly king.

Before you get all excited about me teaching about a quick rich get quick. Get Rich. Quick sermon today, I won't be so don't worry. I'm opposed to a gospel that endorses a god to those who give to him,

because there's a lot of that gospel being preached today. If you'll just give to God, he'll give back to you. That is not what the Bible tells us about God. I'm opposed to a prosper a prosperity gospel. We don't give our treasure and tithes in order to receive back a financial windfall. Nothing in the Bible could be further from the truth. When we give to God, we do it as an act of obedience. Just like these that were here, they were being obedient to being baptized in something that God had already done. We're obedient to Christ when we give to him. I do believe that God blesses us when we're obedient, though I don't want you to get that wrong, but not as an expectation on our part. Listen, if he never did one more thing for you, has he not done enough? He sent Jesus to pay the penalty for your sins. He didn't have to do anything else for you. He could just sit back on his throne and wait till heaven arrives. Right? He doesn't have to do anything. So we shouldn't expect it.

When we focus on the eternal things of God, money becomes less important. It really does. I'm motivated by God. What are you motivated by? I'm motivated by God. When money becomes your motivator, you could be serving another God.

Fix your eyes on Jesus

and the things of this world become, will become less of a motivator. Amen.

Before we begin with these seven verses, I want to make sure that we're on the same page. My definition of a prosperous gospel is this, having a prosperous relationship with Jesus, the King. That's the definition. Because prosperity is not just about money. It's about your whole life. You can have prosperity in your relationships with your heavenly Father, with your earthly kids. Those are prosperous. Today's movement known as the prosperity gospel movement, is initialize us, initializing our relationship with God. He initializes the relationship with us. Don't ever forget that what makes prosperity the prosperity gospel of false gospel. I'm going to tell you why.

In the Abrahamic covenant, where Abraham said, God told Abraham, you'll be a seed to many heirs, that the nations of this world will come after you, and Abraham will be the father of many nations. It's not in a means to a material entitlement. We are in the lineage of Abraham so we can receive riches from God, right, wrong, we don't receive riches from God. He's already given us everything, even the lineage of Abraham Christians gave in order to gain material compensation from God, give $10 and he'll give you 1000 you see, that's a hundredfold teaching that comes from Mark 1030 and that is not the context of that scripture. That's a false doctrine.

Faith is self generated spiritual force that leads to prosperity. False. The reality is faith.

Is directed at the person of Jesus Christ. We don't direct it at him for our windfall. Prayer is a tool to force God to grant prosperity, if we'll just pray and God will give it to us, right? That's what it says in Matthew seven, right? Ask, seek, knock, and it'll be given to you. Read the whole context. Okay, stop taking scripture out of context, because that'll become who you are. You become a false teacher. The prosperous gospel is me about is about being prosperous because of what God has already given to us in the Messiah, Jesus. My first point is true prosperity is in the eyes of the giver. True prosperity is in the eyes of the giver. You see when we think about a giver like God, could you imagine what that way? He knows what we need. He knows everything that we need. He prosper us in so many ways besides money, because there's a most of us here don't have any real money to our name, but God has given us so many other blessings, and would you not rather have those than money? Would you not rather have your family? Would you not rather have what God has done for you? He has made us an error with him. It says in verse one, Paul says there's availability of being an error with Christ. God has made us an error. Do you know what an error is?

Kids, your parents are saving up a lots of money, so when they die, they're going to give you a bunch of money when they die. That's what an error some estate, some of us, are going to leave very much behind. It's cost too much money to live in in this world now, right?

But that's what an error is. You're an error to an estate. The problem is, is what it talks about, it says that we're still in slavery as children, because we don't have access to that until it's given to us until that person dies, especially like in a family, the estate doesn't get to you until mom and dad dies kids, so don't try to get it beforehand. We're not giving it up yet. We might need it till we die, right?

We choose to stay under the law when we choose not to be in Christ. You see, we're no different than a slave, is what Paul's saying.

We all have riches around us without the capability of ownership.

Some of you live in a house right now. You make a monthly payment. You say that's my house? No, it's not. The bank owns it.

You still don't own that house until it's paid off. Does that make sense? And that's what God is saying. If you've never accepted Jesus, you're still a slave. You're like a child that's has an error than a state that's coming to them, but you can't receive it yet because they haven't given it to you yet.

So this image Paul creates for us is just amazing. You see, when we don't have Jesus as our personal Lord, we're like underage kids waiting to receive our inheritance. Paul reminds us that it's God who owns the whole estate. He owns everything, and he says

he doesn't own some of it. How much does God own

all of it? You see, sometimes we sell God short because we think he only owns partial parts of it. No, he owns all of it. All of it. As long as you keep trying to please God by cleaning up your life, you're still under the Law.

You're still a slave to it. If I'll just act like this, God's going to love me, you're still a child waiting to receive what God has already given to you.

Does that make sense?

You try to please God without actually coming to God like you're going to be good enough for him? No, it's not going to work. God has already given it to you. Verse two, he says it's an error waiting to receive what is due upon his inheritance. You're still under the guardianship, or what we call the trustee rule, if somebody else still owns it, it's like a board of trustees who make decisions for you. You aren't really an error until they receive word that they can release that money to you.

God has released all of the inheritance to you already in Jesus Christ, you see, stop waiting until you think it's no he's already released it to you. And Paul is trying to make this analogy between you waiting for an inheritance to here's an inheritance waiting to be received. You receive it.

God is funny thing is, is some have chosen not to receive it.

Why? Why would you not want eternal life? Why would you not want the blessings of what it means to be a child of God, no matter what happens in your life, God is going to bless you. You see, going to relate to God the same way they've been relating to God since they were knee high, trying to please God by keeping a set of rules, right? We tell our kids, don't do this. You ever have those rules on the refrigerator for your kids? Wash your hands, do this, put the traffic on the trash. We have all these rules for them, right?

Because we want them to do something with their life instead of playing on their phone and.

Tiktok, right? We say there's things to do around the house. Man, I'm hurting the kids to this morning, right?

But there's these rules. But I think sometimes our children think if they do those things, our parents are going to be pleased. That's not what it's about, because it's not going to happen. You see, verse two says it so clearly, until the time set by the father,

until the the time has been set by the father, the father has released the prosperity of the gospel in Jesus, Christ, the time has already come. It's already here. Jesus is real, if they were not so why would nine people have gone through the waters of baptism this morning. They believe Jesus Christ is real. They believe Jesus Christ is going to change their life. They're not relying on anything else but him. They don't know what tomorrow brings, but they know this, whatever happens, Jesus is going to be right there with them. Amen.

Yes, finances are one of the areas of prosperity. But what about a prosperous prayer life? What about a prosperous relationship with your family? A prosperous spiritual leader for your home? What would that look like for your life? The prosperity gospel is not always about finances. Verse three before Jesus, we were lost. Children wandering around is what it says. We were slaves to this world. You see, spiritual warfare is going on or all around us, whether you choose to believe it or not.

Two weeks ago,

when I was preaching,

I just really felt like I struggled. I was it was a battle just to even talk clearly. I just stumbled over everything.

But you know how good God is. You know how many people said, oh man, thank you for that, Pastor. Can I get your notes or whatever? And I thought, were you listening? I couldn't even say my own name. There's a spiritual battle when we're talking about Jesus to Christ, Satan doesn't want you to hear this morning how to have a prosperous life in him. He wants you to hear nothing but money. No, there's all kinds of other things that will make you prosperous in the God in your life. And some don't even believe that the spiritual battle is going on. One of Satan's greatest weapons is this making us believe that we can handle everything on our own, that we don't need God. If we'll just do the right thing, if we'll just say the right thing, if we'll just buy the right thing, if we'll just move to the right neighborhood, if we'll just put the right gate up, we'll just have the right cameras on our we'll do all these things, right? Then everything is going to be fine.

You can have all of that stuff and still be lost and still not an error of the throne of Christ, because those things don't save you.

God has better things to do than worry about my little problem, right? No, he doesn't. He died for the sins of the world. Every problem is his problem. He wants it. He says, Give it to me. And Paul uses this wild phrase in verse three. Look at this phrase,

elemental, spiritual forces.

I had to look that up. I was like,

I know I'm a theologian. I've had tons of schooling, but I still had to go, what is that? What is he really talking about? He's talking about earth, fire, wind, rain, the elements that are subject of worship to people.

See people go outside and they go, look at this creation, man, and they worship the creation instead of the Creator. You see, when we see the creation, we say, What a great God that we have. Look at all these stars, look at the sun, look at the moon. Did you see the moon last night? Did you guys see the moon last night? It was amazing.

A full moon,

but sometimes we stop, and we start worshiping the elemental, spiritual forces that are around us, and we start making these idols out of the creation, instead of worshiping the Creator. And I was like, wow, Paul, really,

it's true.

There are Sun goddesses, Moon goddesses, sex goddesses, all kinds of worship that people do to anything but God.

You see, they're the subject of worship,

instead of worshiping God for creating this planet for us to enjoy. So Paul says, when we worship the elements, we become slaves to them,

right? We become dependent on them. We create our own gods. We create our elemental worship. It's still going on today.

You see, we need the true gospel of Jesus Christ proclaimed like never before, because there are people still doing this thing. The church in general has fallen asleep.

Do you believe that,

if it were not so, why are not more people getting saved? Why are not more people coming to Christ? Why is our community not for Christ? Oh, they say they are, but they don't live like they are. You see, when we know somebody has Christ, we see them living for Christ. We see them.

Living out their faith, we see that they haven't fallen asleep. Paul says to you and to me this morning, don't fall asleep,

whatever you do. Get this one right.

Make sure Jesus has set you free.

You see, make sure you have the right objective when it comes to prosperity. In verses four and five, strong verses about the power of Jesus. Don't miss this. But when the time, when the set time had fully come, God sent His Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those under the law that we might receive adoption to sonship,

people use that verse as a Christmas verse. You know that I I texted, I texted pastors every Sunday morning.

The Lord has given me the opportunity to be friends with many pastors. I have lots of pastors in our association, and I texted that, and several of them texted back. Say, Oh, that's a great Christmas verse. I looked at it, I go, Well, I'm not talking about Christmas, but I guess, okay,

everyone say this with me, timing,

timing,

when the full time has God come? God sent, and who did God send at the right time? Jesus the Christ, the Messiah, the Savior, the living one. It was all his timing, his son. He didn't send an Angel, he didn't send a messenger. He sent His one and only anointed son. Now, don't you feel privileged to know that God has sent His one and only Son for you and for me, it's amazing to think the greatest thing that God has done is he sent his son via the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary.

I get asked this sometimes by other denominations, what's your take on the Virgin Mary? I said, wonderful person, great obedience, highly favored, as the scripture says, and blessed. But she ain't Jesus, and she ain't God, because my Jesus went to a cross and died for my sins, and my God sent Jesus through the Virgin Mary, under her knee, under her obedience. And look at what she says in Luke chapter one, verses 34 through 36

this is what happened when the Holy Spirit came to speak to Mary.

She says, How will this be? Mary asked the angel, since I am a virgin, The angel answered, The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the Holy One will be born, will be called the Son of God.

And this is what happened with Mary. So God also did this during the time that everybody was still under the Law, they were still trying to please God. But I want you to know Jesus came while you were still under the Law, while you were still dirty and nasty and doing the sins that you do, he still came and died on the cross. Romans five eight says this while you were still sinners. Christ died for you, not when you a he finally stopped smoking today. He finally did the he finally stopped doing this. He's finally stopped watching pornography, whatever. No, listen while you were in your sins. Jesus died for you. He didn't wait for you to clean your life up because he knew you never would.

I know, I know I'm

hurting some toes this morning. That's okay.

The Scripture text leads to that. All this happens so we can know that the gospel of Jesus is a prosperous gospel, not in a way that you might think. And it's not about money. Look at the last part of verse five. With me, you might receive adoption to his sonship.

We've been purchased out of slavery. Amen, he bought us. We can become sons and daughters of God. That is prosperous. That's what it means to be prosperous. You see, it's a priceless gift.

It's worth more than all the money in the world, because money can never buy your eternity.

You can't pay for somebody to go to heaven. Only Jesus can do that for you. So stop trying to fix your eternity. Give it to Christ, and he'll save you and he'll set you free. Elon Musk is the richest person on the planet.

His net worth is $270

billion

he might become the first trillionaire on this planet,

but he can never give you the gospel of Jesus. He can give you all the money that he has, but that will still not save you.

True prosperity is in the eyes of the giver. In this case, God himself.

In 1928 a group of the world's most successful financiers met at the Edgewood Beach Hotel, Edgewater Beach Hotel in Chicago, and these were the people that were present, the president of the largest utility company, the gray.

Biggest wheat speculator,

the president of the New York Stock Exchange, a member of the President's Cabinet, the greatest bear on Wall Street. That's what they call those guys, the president of the bank of the International Settlements, the head of the world's greatest monopoly. Collectively, these tycoons controlled more worth than the whole United States was worth.

For years, newspapers and magazines have been printing their successes, successive stories urging the youth

of the nation to follow those examples. 25 years later, this is what happened to these men. Okay, rich, the big the big wigs were all hanging out. 25 years later, the president of the largest independent steel company, Charles Schwab, and you may know that name lived on borrowed money the last five years of his life, and he died broke.

The greatest wheat speculator, Arthur cutton. He died abroad. Insolvent. Means nothing. He had nothing. The president of the New York Stock Exchange, Richard Whitney, served a term in the Sing Sing prison.

The member of the President's Cabinet, Albert fall, was pardoned from prison so he could go home to die. The greatest bear on Wall Street, Jesse Livermore committed suicide. The president of the bank of the International sentiments, Leon Frazier, committed suicide. The head of the world's greatest monopoly, evar druger committed suicide. Listen, all of these men had learned how to make money but never learned how to live.

You see, they were trusting in their money for them to give them prosperity and happiness and joy. True prosperity comes from living for Jesus, you don't have to have material possessions to be happy in Christ. Have you received the richest gift in the world? His name is Jesus, priceless. Secondly, true prosperity is free to the receiver. True prosperity is in the eyes of the giver, and it's also free to the receiver. The last two verses of our text, Paul's already told us that in Christ, we're adoptive sons and daughters. Now he adds a second part to it. In Verse six, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts. Wow.

You see he just what's amazing about His death on the cross is he told his disciples, I have to go so that I can prepare a place for you. And he says this, I'm going to leave behind the Comforter, the Holy Spirit. He said, physically, I can't stay here, but spiritually, everybody's going to have access to me through the Holy Spirit. He sends them into our hearts, lives in us as we're Christians. And Paul tells us this amazing thing, because this huge God is relatable through Jesus Christ. Don't you all think sometimes when you see something and you go, man, God is so big. He's so huge. Why does he even care about us? He's so much bigger than us. But he came down to earth to relate to us, to be a real father. Now

I'm going to be honest with you, sometimes our fathers let us down on this earth.

I have a great father. He's been a great example for me, but I know a lot of people have not

but we have one father that'll never let us down, and he's the Heavenly Father, and He will comfort you, and He will give you that comfort that you need during your time of grief.

My dad is 83 years old, about to be 84 in February. My mom passed away in April. He's having a hard time

65 years of marriage, and we saw him last night and visited with them and

try to cheer him up. You know,

our fathers

are so, so amazing. If you've had a good father here on this earth, thank God if you do,

but he still can't compare to my heavenly Father, because he's done so much more for me when he paid for my sins. You see this, Paul tells us that we can cry out to our Heavenly Father this term called abba, abba, father. It's such an endearing term. It actually means daddy. You call out to God and you say, Daddy,

Daddy, I need you. I can't make it anymore on this earth. I don't know what's going on, but I just need you. And he says, we get to cry out to Him,

hug your dad, kiss your dad, love your dad. If you got your earthly father, make up with your dad. Don't leave this earth without doing that. The amazing thing is, we see this Triune God in the universe come alive. We have God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, just like we baptized in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, the salvation is both objective and subjective. Meaning. It's not induced by our feelings, because Jesus already did it, and we don't have to feel but it's actually.

Right? We do have feelings about it, right? We don't judge our relationship with Jesus on our feelings. But man, the feeling that we have, knowing that we have eternal life, is amazing. Listen to this.

I wrote this down. I'm gonna I'm gonna say this twice. Okay, God sent His Son so that we can be placed in position to become sons and daughters. And he sent his spirit so that we might have also have the experience of the same reality. You see, he sent him for the position to be, for us to be in position. But he also sent him so we can have that experience as the same reality. You see, we have the position experience, so we can call him daddy, so we can say, Abba Father. I love you. I need you. Today. You see, the Spirit of God is a free gift to all believers. We're family. Amen, we become family. Did you see your family get baptized today? That's your family. Before Jesus, God only heard prayers of the high priest. Now, after Jesus, He hears us cry out to God. He says, we have an intimacy with God. Abba Father, verse seven, when you place your faith in God, you're no longer a slave. Let me ask you this serious question. If you're no longer a slave, why do you live like you are on this earth?

Live like you're free.

We say things like I can't I'm not able, I'm too tired, I'm too busy.

I used to pray. I used to read the Bible. I used to go to church. I used to do this.

Stop living like you're a slave to sin, and start living like a free person. In Christ, you have been freed from all of that stuff. God says that you get to live like you're free, like you're saved. Go ahead, live that way. Last part of verse seven, since God made you part of the family, you now have what I call refrigerator rights. You

know what I'm talking about.

The only person that gets to go in your refrigerator at your house is usually your immediate family

or those closest to you, and you let them open the refrigerator, letting all your cool air out, because they're in there looking.

Your kids don't ever do that, right, like it changed from 10 minutes ago.

They're looking to see

what they can take.

You see with God, we have refrigerator rights. We get to walk in, open up the refrigerator and take whatever we want.

And he says, Go ahead, live like that. Live in that freedom. You're an heir to the throne. It's all about him. I want to close with two verses, Mark 836,

Mark 836,

what good is it for someone to gain the whole world yet forfeit their soul. Even Elon Musk can't get into heaven with all his cash. I bet you he wishes he would, or could. Matthew 624,

no one can serve two masters. You will either hate one and love the other, or you will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money. Prosperity doesn't always mean financial windfalls. Prosperity in Jesus is priceless. Are you prosperous? Has God won over your heart? Have you asked him to be the Lord of your life? We're going to sing an amazing song called I speak Jesus, and during this time, we have these kneelers here, and we call this an altar.

It's time for us to get right with God. It's time for us to say, enough is enough. I want to be free. I want to live like that. How do I do that? Ask Him. Ask Him to show you he's given you his Holy Spirit.

If you're here today and you saw these baptisms, and maybe you've never given your life to Christ, that's the first step to prosperity. Is a life free in Christ, you come and you say, I want to receive You as my Lord and Savior. And you ask him to be the Lord of your life. Romans 10, verse nine and 10 says, If you'll confess Him as your Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, He says you will be saved. It doesn't say you might be, you could be or should be. It says you will be. And he says, For it's with your mouth you confess, but it's with your heart that you believe and become a child of God. So if that's you today, during this song, would you come? Would you pray to ask God to forgive you of your sins and invite Him into your life? Or if you're just here and you haven't been disconnected from God, would you reconnect with him today

and afterwards, when you come and do your business with God, we have a prayer room right outside these doors. I'm going to ask you to stop by there and tell us about.

Your decision so that we can help you on that journey. Just like those that have come, we help them get to this point. We want to help you as well, Father, we thank you for all that you've done and all that you will do. We trust you with this moment and Father, help us speak Jesus in our lives. In Jesus name, I pray Amen. Would you stand and let's sing?