I read a testimony this week of a son who was at a school that was discussing Arminian theology of salvation and dismissing the reformed one. The grown man testified of his mother’s wisdom in summing up the positions succinctly: “It depends what kind of God you believe in.”

The attributes of God determine everything about your theology and practice. They especially will impact how you believe God saves sinners, and how to live the Christian life.

In Galatia the churches were being persuaded of a false gospel by adding to the true gospel. They forgot that God not only forgives them of sin, but delivers them from it. From Galatians 1:4 we can learn that

GOD DELIVERS SINNERS FROM THE PERNICIOUS POWER OF THE WORLD THROUGH THE SUPREMELY POWERFUL INFLUENCE OF THE GOSPEL OF JESUS CHRIST.

And in learning this, we may understand the freedom we have been given in Christ, the family we are part of, and the foe who has be defeated by our Deliverer.

THE FREEING IS STATED

The apostle states what many have simply collapsed into the cross’s work of forgiveness of sins. The cross accomplished more than forgiveness, it accomplished freedom. As v.4 states the work of Christ on the cross was not only for forgiveness of sins but “to deliver us from the present evil age.”

The word “deliverance” is used to speak of God rescuing Joseph out of all of his afflictions (Acts 7:10) and of delivering the people of Israel from Egypt (Acts 7:34). It is used here of delivering out of the bondage of sin. In the gospel, God does not merely forgive sinners of sin, but liberates sinners from the power and influence of sin. The Christian is no longer a helpless victim to the fall, but is set free to live at liberty.

John Calvin wrote that there are two bases for just war: (1) that the honor of God be maintained and religion be kept in its purity; (2) that the people be maintained in peace. The second, that the people be maintained in peace is the consequence of the cross here.

The apostle puts it this way in Galatians 5:1 “For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to the yoke of slavery.”

Theologians called this matter the “Liberty of Conscience.” The 1689 Baptist Confession Chapter 21 states:

THE LIBERTY WHICH Christ hath purchased for believers under the gospel, consists in their freedom from the guilt of sin, the condemning wrath of God, the rigour and curse of the law; and in their being delivered from this present evil world, bondage to Satan, and dominion from sin; from the evil of afflictions; the fear, and sting of death, the victory of the grave, and everlasting damnation; as also in their free access to God; and their yielding obedience unto him not out of a slavish fear, but a Child-like love, and willing mind…[and] being delivered out of the hands of all our enemies we might serve the Lord without fear in holiness and righteousness before him, all the days of our life.

The issue for the Galatians was that they were being pressured to accept doctrines and commandments of men as if they were the law of God. They likely conveyed that by doing so they would be loving their neighbors; that is, fulfilling the law of God. This indicates to us that God’s people in Galatia failed to learn that gospel does more than forgive our sins. They became ignorant of a gospel that ‘delivered them out of the hands of all their enemies they might serve the Lord without fear in holiness and righteousness before him, all the days of our life!’

Is that not an issue today? During the most recent crisis we saw both pulpits and the godless state unite to set forth requirements that were taken to be as authoritative as the word of God. It was taught and even accepted by our society and many churches that by obeying these requirements they would be fulfilling the law of God—loving their neighbor. Now that it has come out that much of this was false, those that imbibed this statism are seen to have clearly not learned of a gospel that did anything more than forgive sins. The church married to the state has failed to learn a gospel that not only forgives sins, but liberates from the pernicious power of the world.

There is also preaching today that focuses on externals like pictures of Jesus, nativities, pipe organs, and rejecting lifting hands in worship that does nothing but put Christians in liturgy prison.

And how about Christians who know they are forgiven, but can’t forgive others. It’s just like knowing the gospel declares the forgiveness of sins for you, but omitting that it frees you from the vengeful thinking of the world, so as to forgive others. I heard an illustration of this in the past that lack of forgiveness doesn’t put the other person in a cage, it puts you in one. Now concerning this, one must have a disposition to forgive any who come to you in genuine repentance, but it is required to forgive someone that they are both alive and repentant. And even with that, it doesn’t mean things go back to how they were. Yet, if we are not fostering a disposition of forgiveness, we are not like God our deliverer. We are exemplifying a partial gospel which isn’t good news at all. If God merely forgave our sins, but did not free us toward righteousness it would not be the gospel.

Now, what is vital here is not merely condemning the pernicious power of the world around us and in us (which must be done), but lifting up the awesome power of the gospel that does what we cannot do around us and in us (which must be supremely believed)!

THE FAMILY IS LIBERATED

The people whom God has delivered in the gospel are the church, as the apostle clearly states “to deliver us” 1:4. This obviously would encompass all who are with Paul (v.2) and the Galatians and Christians everywhere (v.11). They are recipients of not only forgiveness of sins, but deliverance from the present evil age. They are called “brothers” (v.11 and throughout); a word that means brothers ands sisters. The whole church, all in the church of every vocation and walk in life are included in receiving this deliverance from the present evil age. Clearly if the “brothers” in the Galatians churches understood this they would not be accepting the yoke of bondage put on them by the judaizers. This indicates that one can be truly forgiven and truly delivered and live in a way that is bound by false yet powerful ideas of the world.

John Conant wrote:

There is a supine and careless ignorance when men having means of knowledge care not to make use of them. And this may proceed from several causes: (1) from pure sloth and laziness because they will not be at pains to get knowledge; (2) from a disregard and light esteem of knowledge and of all heavenly things. They value them not, and so they mind them not; they look not after them; (3) from extreme earthly-mindedness and an inordinate love of the world. Their hearts are set upon, immersed in, and even swallowed up by the world, and so there is no room for the things of heaven. But all these persons, when they shall be called to an account for the neglect of their duty, will have nothing to plead for their excuse.

William Gurnall says,

“Ignorance, above other sins, enslaves a soul to Satan; a knowing man may be his slave, but an ignorant one can be no other. Knowledge does not make the heart good, but it is impossible that without knowledge it should be good. There are some sins which an ignorant person cannot commit; there are more which he cannot but commit. Knowledge is the key (Luke 11:52), Christ is the door (John 10).

This is all to say that knowledge of the gospel’s deliverance in addition to the gospel’s forgiveness is vital for Christian liberty. To remain ignorant of it will be trouble, and to not go after what the deliverance brings shame.

The Galatians were certainly delivered, but without Paul they would remain in the clutches of their ignorance dominated by sinful men and ideas who wish to control their lives for their own purposes. The gospel never leaves you with merely a clean slate, it provides a full life.

THE FOE IS DEFEATED

Satan and the world are put out of office over the Christian’s personal empire of life forever. The apostle says, “to deliver us from the present evil age” (v.4). The world and Satan are two tyrannical monsters who have been put out of office by the Jesus on the cross (Shaw). The “present evil age” is the fallen reign of Adam that usurps itself against the will of God. The fall of man is like an acorn containing everything within a seed to produce the branches of sin we see today. But the Deliverer and his deliverance is far more powerful than an acorn and its oak. This deliverance by the cross enables believers to live not opposed to, but in accordance to God’s will. The descriptive word “evil” (ponerous) is malignant evil. This is an evil that is not content with being bad, but endeavors bring everything and everyone down with it! The “present evil age” is synonymous with the “domain of darkness” out of which we are rescued at salvation (Col. 1). The word “age” (aion) is synonymous with “world” (kosmos). Every believer is forgiven their sins and has God’s Spirit in them to overcome this age and world, but it requires you know this (1 John 5:4–5). This may also require that we seek the Spirit’s filling (E.g. Luke 11:13). The whole world may lie under the sway of the evil one (1 John 5:19), but the evil one has been cast out (Rev 12). The Christian disciple is taught therefore to pray, “deliver us” from this “evil” (ponerous). We get our word pernicious from this word for “evil.” It is a pernicious evil world that wants to bring you and all of God’s people down. God’s deliverance is one that liberates believers from its tyrannical power to live godly lives in this present age. God’s deliverance destroys the acorn of the fall and the branches from its oaks, and seeds the whole earth with noble cedars.

In Acts 7 speaking of “deliverance” Lloyd-Jones calls this an “irruption of God upon our wills.” In the Gospel Christ has come revealing God is our deliverer and irrupts the power of God upon our wills so that we no longer live according to the will of the world, but according to the will of God.

We see the reality of this when we cease being conformed to this age or world and begin to be renewed in our minds having understood the mercies of God in the gospel (Romans 12:1–2).

Paul said it succinctly in Galatians 6:14,

“far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. For neither circumcision counts for anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creation.”

The Galatians were faced with choosing between accepting the powerful influence of the world upon their wills or receiving the truth they were delivered from the present evil age by the work of Jesus Christ. This was not simply a problem for the weak in the church, but for the strongest of them like Peter and Barnabas (cf. 2:14ff). All in the church had to rest in the gospel of Jesus Christ that did not only forgive them of sins, but freed them from their foes. Their foes were the world, flesh, and the devil. They were the ideas being espoused by judaizers. One Greek language scholar wrote,

Paul says that the substitutionary atonement of the Lord Jesus is that which will rescue the poor lost sinner from the clutches of the pernicious teachings of the Judaizers (Wuest)

The believer is no longer under the pernicious one, Satan, who spurred on Adam’s fallen reign, but is freed and liberated into the new age already to do good for God out of a grateful heart forever. This combats legalism. No longer do we regard the traditions and commandments of men as things that make us loving of our neighbors and of God, but only the gospel does this work in us. Therefore we must treasure, preach, proclaim, rejoice in this gospel—this good news about God deliverance!1