The true Christian will not deviate from the straight path of Faith alone in Christ alone by Grace alone by Scripture alone for the Glory of God alone. True Christians do not turn off the path to the right of thinking their human works will lead to salvation (such as the Judaizers mentioned in Galatians) or to the left thinking departing from holy living & practicing ungodliness does not matter at all (such as Antinomians who do not take God's moral laws seriously). Anything leading off the straight path of Biblical truth leads to damnation & destruction by the wrath of God (Galatians 1:6-9).
There have always been those who balk at the idea of God’s salvation being offered freely to those who believe. They reason that such a grand gift as forgiveness from such a holy God must require some kind of payment from us. We thank God for His grace, but we understand that He expects us to somehow earn that grace—in other words, there must be something that we can do to pay off the debt we owe to God.
In the early church, those who taught a combination of God’s grace and human effort were called “Judaizers.” The word Judaizer comes from a Greek verb meaning “to live according to Jewish customs.” The word appears in Galatians 2:14 where Paul describes how he confronted Peter for forcing Gentile Christians to “Judaize.”
A Judaizer taught that, in order for a Christian to truly be right with God, he must conform to the Mosaic Law. Circumcision, especially, was promoted as necessary for salvation. Gentiles had to become Jewish proselytes first, and then they could come to Christ. The doctrine of the Judaizers was a mixture of grace (through Christ) and works.
SERMON ACTIVITY
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