Faith Plus Nothing? What the Bible Really Says About Salvation

Hello, and welcome to Through the Bible with Les Feldick, an Oklahoma rancher and farmer. Les Feldick has been teaching homestyle Bible classes for over 20 years in Iowa, Oklahoma, and Texas. Les Feldick's unique style of Bible teaching has made the books of the Bible come to life. When Les is teaching, it's so interesting that people say time just seems to fly by. And now, here is Les Feldick. Okay, ready to go, and for those of you in the studio, this is program number four, and we'll be able to go home. For those of you watching on television, we're just another program, I know, but nevertheless, we trust that you'll sit down with your Bible and check us out. You know, I've always told people, don't go by what I say. Be sure that this is your final authority, and all we're trying to do is open it up to where anybody can understand it. Oh, okay, I thought he wanted me to stop, okay. So anyway, all the past programs have been available on videotape and on the little books, and also now on audio. So if any of you out there on television are interested in these materials, you contact us and we'll get them to you. And again, we always like to thank our listeners for all your letters. We read every letter. Hope we don't get any bigger than what we can do that. We enjoy them so much, and when you have a pertinent question, I try to answer it personally. I get awfully far behind once in a while, but then every once in a while I catch up. So if I'm not answering just as fast as you think, bear with me, and you'll hopefully get an answer to your questions. Okay, this is a Bible study, so this is what we want to do. Back to Galatians where we left off in chapter two, and we were looking at verse 20, where Paul makes this classic statement that he is crucified with Christ. That of course is the very function of the Gospel, that Christ died for the sins of the world, and that He was buried, and that He rose from the dead. And I always like to make the point, and I've been making it more strongly than ever, that when we come under that forgiveness, we are forgiven everything, past, present, and future. We will never, never come into the presence of God with sin on our back, so to speak, because it has all been paid for. Now this is beyond human comprehension. I can't understand it, but I believe it, because that's what the Book teaches, that we have been forgiven all our trespasses, not because of anything we have done, but all because of what Christ has accomplished on our behalf. And that's what makes the Gospel so simple, and yet so complex. We'll never understand it this side of glory. And so then Paul goes on to say in verse 20 of Galatians 2, that even though he's crucified by identification with Christ's death, yet he lives, and the life which he now lives is in the flesh, and it's lived by the faith. And I said in the last program, I prefer the faithfulness of the Son of God. Now what do I mean by that? Whenever you come into a situation like this, and you pick a chair to sit on, like somebody complained out in the audience, how do they sit there all afternoon on such uncomfortable chairs? Well, I don't know, but I told them, they never complain, so you don't have to have upholstery to get people to come in if you're feeding them from the Word. But when you came in, I'll bet not a person in this room analyzed or inspected your chair to see if it would hold you, did you? Not a one of you. Why didn't you? I mean you're practically putting your life on the line, you know, it's no fun sitting down on a concrete floor, so why didn't you examine it? Your faith in that chair, that it would hold you. Now if you're placing your faith in that chair, in turn, what does that chair have to be? Faithful. If the chair isn't faithful, you'd go to the floor, but it's there, and it's holding you. It's faith. Now the same way with Christ. He has claimed to have done everything that's necessary, and I've put my faith in that. Now then, someday when I get to the eternal abode, is God going to say, well, I'm sorry, Les, but it wasn't what it seemed to be? No. You know what He's going to say? The blood of Christ is faithful. He is faithful, and that's why we can trust Him. And so this is what I'm sure Paul is driving at, that it's through the faithfulness, his faith in the One who is faithful to keep us, see? And because He loved me and gave Himself for me. As I was reading yet the other night where someone made the statement, you know, so many people wonder, in fact my own little nine-year-old grandson was asking the other day, Grandpa, do I love God enough? Do I have enough faith that if He should come tonight, that I won't be left behind? Now that's a pretty good question from a ten-year-old. I was just real tickled. But it isn't how much we love Him, it's how much He has loved us. And see that's pointed out so clearly in John chapter 11, with the account of Lazarus. All through that chapter, it isn't how much Mary and Martha loved Jesus. It was how much He loved them. And then when you come down to that little short verse, Jesus wept, what did the Jews in the area of Lazarus and Martha's home say? My, look how He loved them. Not how much they loved Him. You know, that's something we've got to constantly remember. It isn't how much we love Him, it's how much He loved us, and has saved us, and has kept us. Now let's go on to verse 21. So Paul says, with that in view, I do not frustrate the grace of God. Now again, how many people understand the grace of God? Not many. Everybody still has the idea that God is something up there, that He's just waiting for some frail human being to goof up so He can zap them. No, that's not God's attitude. God's attitude is one of total love, and mercy, and grace. Let me take you back to a verse we talked about in one of our classes the other night. Come back to I Corinthians, and always remember the setting of these various letters of Paul. The Corinthians, as we taught so clearly, I trust, was a carnal church. They had a lot of problems. They were not the epitome of strong believers. They were carnal. They were fleshly. They had a lot of problems. But in spite of all that, look what Paul writes to them in I Corinthians chapter 1, and let's come down to verse 6, even as the testimony of Christ was, what's the next word? Confirmed! Sealed! It's settled! The testimony of Christ was confirmed in you, consequently, so that you come behind in no gift. In other words, they were just as potentially able to accomplish great things as anybody could be, waiting for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. I Corinthians, verse 8. "...who also shall confirm you unto the end, that you may be..." What? Blameless! Hey, now that's mind boggling. Whether you know it or not, that is mind boggling. That people like these Corinthians, with all of their failures and their weaknesses, that if the Lord would have come within the day or two after receiving this letter, would they have stood before God shaking in their boots because of all their failures? No. Paul says if the Lord should come, they would stand before Him blameless. And they weren't blameless. We know they weren't. So on what basis could God do that? It's grace. I remember we had been on the Tulsa station, but probably a month or two, and a gentleman from here in Oklahoma called. And he wasn't angry, but he was a little upset with me that I was more or less alluding to, I hadn't really come out as boldly as I have since, but I was alluding to an eternal security for the true believer. And he said, how can you do that? And I said, Now look, what part of God made it possible for you to be saved in the first place? Well he got my question, and he said, His grace. I said, Did you deserve it? No. I said, Can't you believe that that same grace is going to keep those that are His, even though we don't deserve it? Well he never agreed with me, but I don't even know that he's still a listener, but whatever. That's what we have to understand. None of us deserve to stay saved, but we do because of His grace, if of course we have been truly saved in the first place. And so now if you're back in Galatians chapter 2, that we stand before Him blameless because of the grace of God, that unmerited favor. Now that's not license. You don't always have to come back and say, God's grace is not license. That doesn't say to the believer, go out and do what you please. No way. But when the believer is under all of the power of the Holy Spirit, and he's trying his best in the light of Scripture to walk pleasing in God's sight, and he fails, does God kick him out? No. No. The grace of God. You know years back I used the illustration of anyone who has been a parent, and I imagine most of us have been there. And our little one has just begun to take those first faltering steps, and every parent is proud. In fact I've got one little grandson that just started to walk this last week, and we're all just tickled to death. See that little fellow all of a sudden walk across the room. But when he falls, does everybody get upset and give him a boot in his little seat? No. What do we do? We pick him up, get him on those little wobbly feet, and get him going. Well that's what God does. God doesn't expect us never to fall, and when we do, He's right there ready to pick us up and put us on our way. And you see that's not the concept that most people have of the grace of God, but that's what it is. And so look what Paul says in verse 21. I do not frustrate. I am not going to fly in the face of the grace of God and say, but I have to do this, because this is what the law says. Oh again, I'm going to put it on the board. We haven't used the board for a while, so I'm at it's high time. We today are not, we are not under the law. But where are we? We are under what? Grace. See? Oh what a difference that makes. We are not under the law. We are under grace, and grace is that attribute of God that is capable of pouring out undeserved favor and mercy on sinners like you and I. Sons of Adam, and all because of the love that was poured out at the cross. That was love epitomized. That was as great an act of love as has ever been done. All because He loved you and I as sinners. Not as some kind of an angelic being, but sinners. Undeserving. Verse 21 again. I do not frustrate the grace of God, for if righteousness come by the law, by legalism, then Christ is dead in vain. Then He was the biggest fool that ever walked to have gone to that kind of a death, if indeed it didn't accomplish that for which He went. But He did. He accomplished it. It's finished, and He did not die in vain. Now as I was just mulling these things over while the rest of you were having coffee, again I haven't stressed enough in the last couple of chapters. Are you seeing now that this little book of Galatians is constantly showing the difference between law and grace, and how He is confronting these little congregations up there in Galatia who were being submarined by the Judaizers who said, You can't be saved by grace alone, you have to keep the law, you have to keep circumcision. And like I said in one of my first programs today, we think, Oh well, this was something in the past, and we're not up against circumcision anymore. No, not circumcision, but you know what? We got a couple dozen other things that are just as insidious, and oh they creep into the life of believers, and then they begin to doubt, and they begin to wonder. Well like I said, just like my little grandson, have I believed enough? And just as soon as you begin to doubt, is this enough? Then what does old Satan pop into your mind? Well maybe I do have to do this, maybe I do have to do that, and that's the way he works. And so we have to constantly stay in the Word, that it's true, and that it is by grace and faith, plus nothing. Now as we go into chapter 3, verse 1. Now why does Paul use the word foolish? Because they were being hoodwinked into thinking they had to add to his gospel. That's what they've been doing. That's why he had to hurry up and write this letter. And so he says, you're foolish. Who has, what's the next word? Who's bewitched you? See? Who has been fooling with your thinking? Well we know who they were. They were Judaizers from Jerusalem. And he says that you should not obey the truth. And what was the truth? Jesus Christ crucified, buried, and risen from the dead, plus nothing, plus nothing. And so here they're saying it had to be plus something. Well that's the way it's always been, except for Abraham. It was always plus something. A lot of people disagree with that. They say that the Old Testament saints were saved by faith. Yes, they were saved by faith, but not faith alone. It was faith plus. And even in Christ's earthly ministry, they weren't saved by just believing that He was the Messiah. They had to repent and be baptized. They still had to keep the law. They were still under temple worship. It was faith plus. But now beginning with Paul's gospel, it's faith plus nothing. I remember years ago, a lady in my Macalester class who was bamboozled by this when she first came in, and she was an artist. And so she made a little plaque for me. And it's an odd looking little duck to be sure, but he's got his head cocked, and the question, faith plus nothing? See? And that's where most people are. Are you crazy? Faith plus nothing? Hey, 90% of Christendom doesn't hear that. 90% of Christendom says it's faith plus. But Paul says it's faith plus nothing for salvation. I'm not talking about the Christian experience as we go on down the road. I'm talking about salvation here. It's faith plus nothing. If it isn't, Christ died for nothing. That's what Paul said. Then He's died in vain. So who has bewitched you, verse 1 of chapter 3 again? That you should not obey the truth, that it's the finished work plus nothing, and before whose eyes Jesus Christ hath been evidently set forth, and crucified among you? Now verse 2, this only would I learn of you. Now watch this, "...received ye the Spirit, the Holy Spirit, the evidence again of their salvation? Did you receive the evidence of salvation by the works of the law? Is that how you got to that place where you are spiritually, by keeping the law? No way, no way. Or did you get to this position by the hearing of faith?" Now come back to Romans. We've got to keep comparing Scripture with Scripture. Romans chapter 10, Romans chapter 10, verse 17. Romans chapter 10, verse 17. Simple little verse. So then faith, saving faith, the kind that needs nothing else, so then faith cometh by works? No, by what? Hearing, see? Hearing. Now there's no work in hearing. There is no work whatsoever in hearing, and that's how faith comes. We contemplate it. We recognize that Christ died, rose from the dead, and that's all I need, and we believe it. And by believing it then, we are listening to the Word of God. Now I've had it on the board in times gone by. What is faith? Taking God at His Word. God said it, we believe it, and God recognizes it. And on the basis of that, He moves in and does everything that needs to be done. Now that's simplification, I know, and a lot of people can't buy it. I can't help that. But the Scripture says that it's by faith, and not the works of the Law. Now verse 3 is the same thing, only in a little different word. And why? Because repetition is the mother of learning, and until we hear these things over and over and over, it just doesn't seem to soak in. So here he comes with verse 3. Are you so foolish? Well, same word he used in verse 1. Oh foolish Galatians. Now he comes back and he says, Are you so foolish? Having begun in the Spirit, the work of the Holy Spirit, which of course generated salvation because of their faith, are you now made perfect, or right with God, by the flesh? Now what's the flesh a reference to? Well, the Law. The Law was fleshly. It was weak. It was beggarly. See? Alright, so the Spirit of the, did you receive the Spirit by the works of the Law, or by the hearing of faith? Have you begun in the Spirit, and now have been made perfect by the flesh? Again, let's come back to Romans. It's been a long time since we've been back there. Romans, I mean before today. Before today. Okay, verse, well chapter 7 first. Romans chapter 7. Yeah, I know we've been back here before too, but I'm talking about way back. Okay, Romans chapter 7, verse 5 and 6. Romans 7. For when we were in the flesh, in other words we as yet had no spiritual life, the motions of sins, in other words the activity of what the Law would condemn us for, the motions of sins which were by the Law, they did work in our members, that is the body of flesh, they worked in our members to bring forth fruit unto what? Death. See, and that's what the unsaved person is living for. All he's living for is the day when he dies physically, and the works of his unsaved experience are going to come up before him at the Great White Throne Judgment some day. And that's the fruit that they're going to have, death. Now verse 6. Now we're delivered from the Law which was an administration of death, we are delivered from the Law that being dead wherein we were held, that is the Law, that we should, here it comes, that we should serve now as believers, that we should serve in newness of spirit, in other words this whole transformation of life in the realm of the spiritual, that we are now in the newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter. What's he talking about? The Law. See? We're not under that Law of the oldness of the letter, we are now in this whole new frame of thinking, which is the spiritual realm. And oh my goodness, how do we get there? Believe the Gospel. Believe the Gospel, and so many people can't see that. Back to Galatians chapter 3, verse 3 again. So are you so foolish, having begun in the Spirit, that is by Paul's Gospel through faith plus nothing, are you now going to move into a deeper spiritual life by the flesh? And what does the flesh want in the Galatian churches? Legalism. See? Law. It's just part of that old Adamic nature to want to be under some kind of a Law. Galatians 3, verse 4. Have you suffered so many things in vain, if it be yet in vain? Now verse 5. He therefore that ministereth to you the Spirit, the Holy Spirit, it's capitalized, and worketh miracles among you. Whatever it was. Does he do it by the works of the Law, or by the hearing of faith? Well you can answer that question. They couldn't perform any miracles under the working of the Law. It was impossible. But when the Holy Spirit activated the hearts and minds of those pagan Galatians and others throughout the Roman Empire, what was it? It was a miraculous transformation from paganism with all of its excesses, with its idolatry, and its immorality. And what did they do? They stepped out into a whole new lifestyle. Now that's a miracle enough in itself. And no doubt in the early church there were other manifestations of the miraculous. Paul doesn't explicitly delineate them, but the question is still the same. If you have witnessed a miracle, was it through the keeping of the Law, or was it through the manifestation of the Spirit who was activated by faith? Plus how much? Nothing. Now if you don't remember anything else today, I want you to remember that. We're not under Law, we're under grace. And how do we come under grace and out from under the Law? By faith. Plus how much? Nothing. And so this is the whole theme of Galatians. Don't be suckered into coming under some kind of a works religion. Maintain the fact that we are saved by grace through faith, plus nothing. That's enough for one day, isn't it? Box 760, Kenta, Oklahoma, 74552. That's Route 1, Box 760, Kenta, Oklahoma, 74552. Through the Bible with Les Feldick, is viewer supported, and your gift is appreciated. Thank you, and be sure to tune in next time for Through the Bible with Les Feldick. Bye-bye.