 Okay we'll you know resume the class but yeah if the video or audio quality is rather bad do let me know because you know we need to put up these things on the e-platform and it should not be a rather shabby job so so you're saying the video quality is about the same I mean has it changed at all? Let us take the pasta and we continue. Okay all right sure yeah so we have looked at the background in Galatians chapters 1 and 2 we will now get into chapters 3 and 4 so if we could have maybe someone read out Galatians chapter 3 verse 1 please if we could have one person read out Galatians chapter 3 verse 1 please yeah Aashah go ahead okay yeah it showed that you had raised a hand and so I thought maybe you had a question all right yeah so here Paul says to the Galatians you foolish you know the JB Phillips translation it kind of gives a rather I don't know literal kind of a translation and it says oh you dear idiots of Galatia now I think that's a little bit too rude but the term that Paul actually uses over here is the Greek word Anoetos now that word Anoetos means someone who actually can think you know can perceive what is the right thing but they are choosing not to you know so in that sense they are being foolish in the sense they do have the ability to discern whether what is being told is right or wrong but they are not using their reasoning and they're just simply taking I know the wrong information for granted so they are being foolish in that sense and so Paul says you foolish Galatians after you have been so clearly told the truth why is it that you are so you know easily being swayed away is what you know he says over here so moving on to verses 4 to 6 if we could have someone read out verses 4 to 6 please did anyone read out because I mean I can't hear anything at my end did you suffer so many things in vain if indeed it was vain does mean who supplies the spirit to you and what's miracles among you do so by words of the law or by hearing things just as Abraham believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness all right so here Paul reminds them that they've had to go through a lot of persecution for their faith so it has not been easy for them so in spite of having you know their their properties being taken away and in spite of the social you know antagonism that they've had to face in spite of all that they held on to the belief that if they place their trust in Jesus and if they follow him then they can have eternal life they have held on to it in spite of all the sufferings that they have gone through and so he says now after having gone through all of that why are you being you know led away because then all that you have endured would be wasted it would be in vain if you're now turning away from Christ and thinking that you would have to go back to the mosaic law for your salvation and so he says do not allow all of those sacrifices which you have made to go waste what you did in the beginning was correct you know when you placed your faith in the Lord Jesus and him alone because he is sufficient to grant you eternal life so he says that to them and then he asks this question he says so again I ask does God give you his spirit and work miracles among you by the works of the law or by your believing what you heard how did you receive the Holy Spirit did you receive the Holy Spirit when you followed the mosaic law or did you just receive the Holy Spirit because you placed your faith in the work which Jesus Christ did on the cross so did that lead to you know the Holy Spirit being given to you and the obvious answer to that is that they were when they once they were told that it is through Christ through his work on the cross that we receive eternal life they believed it they accepted it and when they did that the Holy Spirit was automatically imparted to them and so now in the same way even the miracles that you know they are that they have experienced in their lives did they have to earn those miracles or were the miracles simply given to them because they trusted in Jesus and trusted in what he had done on the cross okay so obviously it was just the simple faith which led to the working of miracles now just an application you know from this for us today when when we are waiting upon the Lord for an answer you know to our prayers and we are looking for healing or whether we are looking for any other kind of miracle there are there's this kind of feeling among people that they should earn that miracle so they tend to use two kinds of methods to get what they need they either use the begging method or the bribery method the begging method is you know they just they feel that if they just know go on praying and praying and praying long prayers and beeping and crying and begging God and saying Lord you please do this you make this happen and if they feel that if they cry enough and they say you know plead enough then he will maybe be moved his heart maybe maybe moved to give them what they need that that is one wrong approach which people take the other wrong approach that people tend to take is the you know the mode of bribery okay if I spend a lot of time you know reading the Bible and then if I contribute financially to the church and if I do all of these good deeds then maybe the Lord would you know feel that oh here this person is so good and because they are so good because of their goodness I should you know grant them this prayer request so both of these are in fact a wrong ways of you know having our prayers answered because just like the receiving of the Holy Spirit the working of the miracles is also not something that we earn it is just based on faith so we choose to believe that what Christ Jesus did on the cross for us is sufficient for him to grant us whatever our prayer requests are and to provide for us so we should not be using the begging mode or the bribery mode you know to to receive miracles from him just like we place our faith in Jesus Christ for salvation we must also place our faith in Jesus Christ to receive whatever we require for our life so we trust him we trust the work that he has done on the cross and that is sufficient for us to receive from him alright yeah the last portion of what we read that would be verse 6 so also Abraham believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness is what it says so let's just maybe actually look at that particular passage in Genesis how exactly was belief credited to him as righteousness if we could have one person read out Genesis chapter 14 verses 5 and 6 Genesis 14 5 and 6 please oh it's 15 I think Genesis 15 okay is that the one where it says this man will not be your heir yes okay I better make that correction thank you thank you yeah go ahead please okay man and before the word of the Lord came to him this man shall not be your hair your own your very own son shall be your hair and he brought him outside and said look toward heaven and number the stars if you are able to number them then he said to him so shall your offspring be and he believed the Lord and he counted it to him as righteousness thank you so this is the you know event where Abraham chooses not to take any kind of financial you know profit from the pagan king and then the Lord comes to him and says you know I will be your reward and then he says whatever you give me Lord is really not of much use to me because I do have no child to pass it on to it will in fact go to slave in my home you know slaves in those days were not really slaves in the sense of somebody of low status they also would be highly educated and highly trained it's just that someone has invested a lot of money and purchased them for the household so they are in fact very expensive and very valuable so that person will inherit whatever you give me is what he says so then the Lord assures him and says no no no this man will not be your air in fact someone from your you know your own flesh and blood would be your air and the Lord takes him outside shows him the sky and he says count the stars now of course in our urban cities we get to see very few stars because of the you know pollution and the light pollution as well because of all the city lights but in those days when he would have gone out and looked up at the sky he would have seen innumerable dots lots and lots of stars so when the Lord says start counting them it really would have been quite a task because to count that many number of you know white dots so the sky would have been full of stars and God says this is how your descendants will be such a large number and Abraham who's never had a child in all of these years chooses to trust what God is saying so he just simply places his faith in God's words and says okay God is saying it God would not lie and so he believes the Lord and because he places his trust in the Lord in that simple childlike manner that is credited to him as righteousness so it's the same with us we believe that if we trust the Lord Jesus and what he did on the cross that's enough he will grant us eternal life we choose to believe that if you just simply trust him that whatever he has done on the cross is sufficient we will receive our miracles so it's just a very simple faith in the words which God has spoken God said if you believe in me I will do this so we just simply in a childlike final way we say okay Lord if you're saying so we know that you have spoken the truth so we choose to believe even though it may or may not logically you know make sense to us so we just simply place our faith in him in his words in what he has spoken knowing that he will never you know mislead us and that he would never lie to us so in this entire process we do not see any mosaic law being followed by Abraham we don't see him being circumcised at this point of time in fact it's two chapters later many many years later that Abraham is asked to be circumcised you know mosaic law of course is not introduced at all during his lifetime but the circum the system of circumcision is brought in but that is later when when Isaac is when Ishmael is almost I think maybe a little either in his teenage years or a little before that so that comes much later so the point that Paul is making over here is that the Lord credited Abrams faith to him as righteousness with no circumcision being involved anywhere in the process and so he says in verse 7 understand then you know we've been coming back to Galatians Galatians chapter 3 right we're in Galatians 3 7 understand then that those who have faith are children of Abraham in the same way Abraham just took God at his word and said if you are saying so Lord I believe it in the same way if we choose to believe what Jesus has claimed about eternal life if we just choose to believe it then we also become children of Abraham is what Paul is assuring over here and so here Paul is you know kind of making the point to those judicers and saying to them you know you seem to be under the impression that genealogically descending from Abraham makes you children but you know what the fact the truth is that you know being in his genealogical lineage does not make your children what makes your children of Abraham is actually the faith that you place in the words of God okay is the clear point that he makes and so he wishes to assure this Galatian Gentile believers you know the Gentile believers who are there among the Galatian church and he wants to assure them and tell them you are in no way inferior to the other believers who have descended naturally through Abraham's lineage because of your faith because of your faith you too have become Abraham's children so you are in no way inferior you don't have to try to imitate the the Jewish believers is what he he wants to assure them off over here now if we could have one person read out verses 10 and 11 please 13 years old okay so he had just entered his teenage years thank you so much for that yes yeah if we could have someone read out verses 11 10 and 11 read in the book of the law and do them now it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law of force the righteous shall lead by faith yes so here we have Paul pointing out that following the law in fact does not lead to blessing because that was the way it was in the Old Testament the Lord said if you want to be blessed then follow the law you know fulfill the mosaic law and then you would be blessed is what God had taught them in the Old Testament times and so these people these Judaizers are still under the impression that if they follow the law of Moses then they would be blessed and now Paul is saying it's the exact opposite earlier maybe following the mosaic law would have led to blessing because that's basically what Yahweh had put in place but now Jesus Christ has given a new covenant so now you if you were to follow the mosaic law rather than being blessed you would end up with the opposite result of being cursed cursed is everyone who does not continue to do everything written in the book of the law and we have you know that explained further to us in James 2 10 where it very clearly says whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point one single time you need to mess up with one single law among those 613 that have been given and you're done it's like as if you are guilty of breaking all of it is what it says in James 2 10 it says so clearly over there whoever keeps the whole law yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it now that is the reason why this law which is a good thing became a curse because nobody was able to keep it that perfectly only Jesus was able to fulfill the law completely he kept it every single time did not break it even once did not break even one point even once he was able to keep the law completely fulfill every requirement of it all the 613 laws but the others could not do that and so it the law which is a good thing became like a curse for people because they're unable to continue doing everything written in the book of the law as was required and so if he goes to Paul says in verse 11 clearly no one who relies on the law is justified before God because they all fail at some point people fail therefore he says the righteous will live by faith now this term the righteous will live by faith has been taken from Habakkuk chapter 2 verse 4 if we could you know maybe read that yeah if somebody could read out Habakkuk chapter 2 verse 4 please Habakkuk chapter 2 verse 4 behold his soul is puffed up it is not upright within him but the righteous shall live by his faith okay see here there's a contrast between the wicked enemy and the righteous godly person and so it says over here regarding the enemy that he is puffed up his desires are not correct he does not have righteous desires on the other hand in contrast the godly person he chooses to live by faith so over here it's not really talking so much about belief it's talking about faithfulness so over here this particular verse is in fact talking about works okay the works of the enemy the wicked man are not good when you look at his works you realize that his heart is all puffed up that he's in fact rebelling against the living god he wants to live in his own way as opposed to that when you look at the righteous godly person if you look at his works you see that he is a man of loyalty and faithfulness he chooses to stay faithful to God and so if you were to take Habakkuk chapter 2 verse 4 at face value it actually is talking about good works and evil works but then when we come here to the New Testament and this particular phrase is picked up from Habakkuk 2.4 in all the three places where this particular phrase is used in the New Testament it is so clearly demonstrated that just simply good works on their own cannot save it's rather the belief that you place in the god who is asking you to do the good works the belief that you place in him and in the righteousness which he has to offer freely not you know you cannot earn that righteousness it's something that he gives to you freely if you place your faith in that god and what he is offering to you then that would lead to salvation and then out of that salvation because now you are saved you choose to live like a saved person you choose to live in a righteous way so in Habakkuk 2.4 you don't quite get all the clarity because we have to understand in the Old Testament it was very clearly just partial revelation throughout the Old Testament what God was kind of revealing to the people was still only partial revelation and so to understand all the scriptures in their fullness in a completeness in the Old Testament you know those verses we can only really understand them fully when we now look at them in the light of the New Testament okay so so when when Habakkuk under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit first spoke these words what he spoke was a very important truth but he could only catch one part of it and all the three instances where this particular phrase is used in the New Testament the emphasis we see is on salvation so you know even though we kind of started off the class late due to all those technical problems it would be really good if we could very quickly look at all of these three references and see how these this whole aspect of faith is you know emphasized in these passages so we'll begin by looking at Romans chapter 1 verses 16 and 17 if we could have one person read out please Romans 1 16 and 17 can I read pastor yes please for I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ for it is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes for you first and also for the grief for in the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith as it is written that just shall be by faith okay so over here in Romans 1 16 it says the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who not who do who does good works it says to everyone who believes so the eternal life the salvation that is being offered it is being offered on the basic of belief on the basis of faith and it says in verse 17 a righteousness that is by faith from right from the beginning from first to last it is just by faith that this righteousness is being given so in this particular you know verse where it's talking about the rather just will live by faith the righteous will live by faith the emphasis is being placed on eternal life how do you gain that eternal life that eternal life is given to everyone who believes you know verse 16 God the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes and therefore that I know the righteous will live by faith the emphasis over here is on eternal life how do you gain eternal life it is by faith alone moving on to the next verse Galatians 3 10 and 11 if someone could read out Galatians 3 10 and 11 though I know the the the one which we just read out now if someone could just read it again ma'am Galatians 3 10 and 11 but as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse but it is written cursed is everyone who does not continue in all things which are written in the book of the law to do that but that no one is justified by the law in the sight of God is evident for the just shall live by faith now over here in this passage the emphasis is on whom you have placed your faith on if you have placed your faith on the law then you must continue to do everything written in it and you must do a perfect job of it if your faith is on the law on the other hand if your faith is being placed on God and on what he has offered through Jesus then your fear your righteousness you know your salvation will come to you through the faith which you have placed so here the emphasis is on the object of faith are you placing your faith on the law or are you faith placing your faith on on what you know Jesus Christ has done um okay we'll we'll we'll look at that um yeah just to move on to the third passage Hebrews chapter 10 26 and 27 Hebrews 10 26 and 27 for if we go on sinning deliberately after reciting the knowledge of the truth there no longer remains a sacrifice for sin but a fearful expectation of judgment and a fury of fire that will consume the ever since ever okay so Hebrews chapter 10 you know it's a lengthier passage but over here he's saying you know you believers you're living in sin and that is not correct uh so if he goes on to say in fact if you deliberately keep on sinning uh you know the sacrifice for sins which Jesus Christ has done it will no longer apply to you you're the only thing you will have to expect from him is judgment so he goes on to say in verses 34 to 39 he says you know once upon a time you suffered so much persecution and you gladly went through that he says in Hebrews 10 34 joyfully accepted the confiscation of property because you knew that you yourselves had better and lasting possessions you knew that Christ has promised you eternal possessions and so for the sake of that you were willing to even give up your property you know lose the things which you have on this earth and so he says in Hebrews 10 35 do not throw away your confidence you know this confidence which you have placed in the words of Jesus and the promise that he has made do not throw away that confidence hold on to it and then he says you need to persevere so that when you have done the will of God you know you will receive what has been promised and so then in verse 38 Hebrews 10 38 he says and but my righteous one will live by faith and I take no pleasure in the one who shrinks back okay so here when this phrase uh the just shall live by faith is used here the emphasis is on the person who is putting the faith what kind of a person is it is it a person who has you know placed their faith in God and are acting it out in their everyday life or have they claimed to have placed their faith in God but their lifestyle does not show that they have any trust in him you know so so in in these three places where this particular phrase is used in the New Testament you have emphasis on one aspect of this phrase the just shall live by faith and each of these three places the meaning is brought out that it is faith which is important and out of that faith your action you know flows out so that is very clearly clarified for us in these passages that it is faith which leads to salvation now the very valid question you know which has been posted over here posted over here is what is the role of repentance to gain salvation so before a person becomes saved when they experience the conviction of the Holy Spirit and they begin to understand what Jesus Christ has done for them on the cross at that point you know they feel that oh I am a sinner I deserve punishment and judgment but God and His mercy has made an alternate arrangement for me and so you know He's inviting me to accept that so when somebody hears that there could be multiple ways that they respond to that one response could be oh this is all just a fairy tale not to be believed on the other hand there may be some people you know who may say oh I can think about it you know this seems like a good idea good concept but let me think about it and they know they wait for a while there could be others who immediately respond and say oh yes I am indeed a sinner and here is a God who wants to give me a second chance he says he's just going to wash away all of my sins and allow me you know by His strength to start living a new way of life no longer living in sin so that person chooses to respond and that we call it the act of repentance so when a person is repenting they may not really know the entire doctrine behind salvation they may not have you know God caught the full picture but there is one basic thing they are ashamed of the way they have lived so far that component will be there they have decided to give up the way they have lived so far no longer will I continue living in sin I recognize that this is sin and now I choose to place my faith in this Jesus who says he can give me a new start and he can give me salvation so it may be as basic as that they may not have caught all of the details of what this entire doctrine of salvation involves but one thing they know no longer am I going to continue living the way I did I want to change and this Jesus is promising me you know the washing away of my sins and this Jesus is promising me a new start so I choose to submit to him so that act of repentance becomes the beginning of the salvation experience so so what role would repentance play in salvation that is something that happens you know before you get saved at that point when you make a commitment and say now onwards I no longer will I live the way I used to no longer will I live in those sins I choose to come out of them I choose now to submit to this Jesus and follow him because he has promised me that he can give me a better life so that's a choice that you make now after salvation yes we continue repenting you know on a regular basis in the sense every time we we sin we go back to him for his cleansing you know which is what we looked at when we were doing the epistles of John so first John 1 9 you know by each time we sin we immediately we realize that we have done that and then we are ashamed of it we say Lord what I have done is sin so please cleanse me so we go to him and he's faithful and just he chooses to forgive us and he starts purifying us from the unrighteousness that is there in us so there is repentance which happens even after salvation and that that is basically regular daily cleansing which we do so that we can continue being a part of him so that we can continue having us having a strong connection with him so there is a role which repentance plays before you get saved and there is also the regular role which repentance plays in our lives you know on a regular basis yeah I hope that was satisfactory Elisha yes so brother Elisha I hope that was a satisfactory answer but then if you want to ask anything further you know you could actually do that yeah okay yeah I mean I could not hear too clearly but I think you said that was fine you know moving on to verses 15 to 18 yeah if someone could please read out you know all the way from verse 15 up to verse 18 to give a human example brothers even with a man may come in no no one knows it or adds to it once it has been certified now the promise we made to Abraham and to his offspring it does not say until offspring referring to many but referring to one and to your offspring offspring who is Christ this is what I mean the law which came 400 years afterward does not rule a covenant previously ratified by God so as to make the promise void for if the inheritance comes by the law it no longer comes by promise but God gave it to Abraham by promise okay now he says I will use a you know in in your NKGV it says I think an example from the I don't remember the exact wording over there but in verse 15 but then you know basically what he's saying is I'm going to give you an example from an ordinary life from the earthly life you know the life that we live down here I will give you a normal example and he goes on to talk about someone who has made a you know a will and so even though it's just a human will made by a human person you know we follow the the we respect the clauses which are there in that will which that person has drawn up and we fulfill it so the point that Paul is making over here is that he says you know when we give so much respect to a human contract to a human will that has been written out and we we see to it that it is fulfilled don't you think that God you know who has made his divine covenant with us don't think that he would keep his promises so he reminds these people and he says long back God made a divine covenant he made a divine promise to Abraham and to his seed so he clarifies and says you know this covenant was made with two persons it was made with Abraham and it was made with Jesus Christ okay so because he explains that it is it's not talking about all the people of Israel it's talking about Christ specifically over here when it says seed of Abraham so this divine covenant that God made with Abraham and with Christ saying that because you trusted my words because you placed your faith in me I choose to you know grant your righteousness do you think that God would go back on that and he says in verse 17 Paul says the law was introduced 430 years after this covenant was made between Abraham and God so do you think that just because a law was introduced 430 years later that law would just cancel out a divine promise that God made when human covenants are given so much respect and are fulfilled don't you think the covenant that God made with Abraham would not be fulfilled you know is the point that he is making over here so he says it because of God's because of what God said righteousness will definitely come through faith just as he promised Abraham just as he promised Christ it will not come through the law because the law was not given in the picture at that time the law was only given 430 years later so we will look on at verse 19 and the other verses that follow regarding the law and the role that the law played so we'll do that after the break so if we could all rejoin please at 10 o'clock yeah so we will resume the class at that time thank you