The Gospel is the power of God unto salvation. It is the work of the Spirit. It is so easy to slip into legalistic thinking and to start to live by old nature standards. We are crucified with Christ. (Galatians 1:6; 3:1-3)

Speaker(s): Pastor Thomas Schaller
Sermon 11892
6:30 PM on 5/24/2020

P. Schaller –

The President said that our country needs prayer. Let’s have a prayer right now for our country, the people. Get
happy for a second. Thank you, Lord. Thank you, God. I was glad when they said what? Let’s go
into the house of the Lord. Let’s see what we’ll do now. We have a few options! I can share
with you from my heart. I just need my iPad and Bible and everything else. I was thinking how
about for a demonstration of love because we haven’t been together like this for a while if the
Greater Grace pastors in the room run up here on the floor. Come on up, chop! Chop! Aren’t
they great guys. How about their wives. Do they want to stand up for a minute? That’s amazing.
As you go, bless the people.

I talked to a brother today and it just came out in our short exchange. He said, I had the weirdest, ungodly thoughts recently. I go, you too? I don’t know if it’s happened to you, but I feel the devil honestly and you know I’m not the guy that sees the devil around the corner every bit but when people get serious with God, he gets serious with
the people. I want you to raise your hand. You are a godly person, saved, but you’re having the
weirdest projections that have come to your mind in the last week. Everybody else, we look up
to you! I have had. It’s been the strangest thing. Weird things, thoughts. Because of our
maturity, I would say, our understanding, we know those thoughts are projections. I put them
in that category. Projections.

Demonic thoughts that contradict what Jesus says. Maybe we will
say more about it. Secondly, I have had the best talks with people about Jesus. I’ve had the best
times talking and I can’t believe how people stop and listen. You might be two meters away
from them or you have your – but they are there and many people are listening. Many are
serious and some of them are saying I haven’t gotten to talk to anyone lately. I’m glad you are
talking to me. Thanks for talking to me. Not in those words but, we stand and have some good
talks. At Sam’s Club there’s a line and sometimes at Home Depot there is a line. I walk in the
opposite direction from the line with the eye contact and then one of these kind of simple
gestures with an invitation and a word. It might be the best time I’ve had evangelizing in a long
time. I’ve had some real good talks.

One man opened his heart to me as he is standing in line. I
felt he was helped. It’s fun. My first point tonight is from the book of Galatians. I’d like you to
turn with me and think with me about the Apostle Paul. These people had become believers
and they were the awesome kind of new believer. What is an awesome new believer? Do you
have it in your mind when a person comes to Christ and they have something so refreshing and
they are so free and filled with joy and love. They have a relationship with God. When I was in
college, I became a believer and there was a Bible study and one guy that had a guitar. He had a
free spirit. The other guy teaching the Bible didn’t have a free spirit. He was baptized in vinegar.
He meditated on the Ten Commandments and was sure you did also!

He was a legalist and he didn’t have the freedom, the joy. I was attracted to the guy that was free. I was attracted to the guy that had life. If you get a group of them, a few of them, five with joy and freedom and the
new birth and the hunger, it’s awesome. We don’t know how many people in Galatia that were
like this, but I want to suggest, we don’t know, I want to suggest Galatia was filled with the
Spirit of God moving, and people were wild about Jesus. They love Jesus. Were they Jews? No.
They were pagans. They were going crazy for God. Reminds me of a story in Latin America,
Bruchko, young guy from Chicago area went to the Amazon and a tribe of people, the Motilone Indians. He worked there to reach them. He was one day in despair.

They were sleeping in hammocks 40 feet up in the air so the leopards would not get them at night. He was
discouraged and then he heard the (sound of singing). They were singing in their Indian
language. He heard it again. They were singing about Jesus. They were singing about Jesus in
their hammocks up there in the trees. They were singing about Jesus. When you find Jesus,
when Jesus sets you free, when you are forgiven, when the Holy Spirit comes into us and we
become worshipers, it is so precious and different. Some might think the Indians have to
become like us Americans or westerners, but they don’t. God is the Father of spirits. When he
sends his Holy Spirit into someone and they find the freedom and joy in Jesus, it’s so precious.
We feed that. We look for that faith.

To draw a little picture, when I have two things, I sometimes make this whole idea of a cliff and a man walking this way on the narrow path. For 100 dollars you can take that home! Legalism is something we invent in our hearts. We invent rules that we live by, by our own efforts and our strength. Legalism for us is Bible teaching, the
law of Moses and we live by that and get discouraged and depressed by it. I have a tendency to
put myself under these rules. Those Indians singing up in those hammocks weren’t doing that.
They found something else. God gave it to them. God gave them grace and they lived by faith in
what the missionary had told them. Bam! It happened. They were born of the Spirit. They were
born of God. Years pass and the story is amazing.

They had 47 different stations, Indians coming
to Christ and God changing hearts and bringing them to Jesus. He was very much concerned
they wouldn’t fall into some legalism like we all can do. I need to hear a fresh message once
again about God. I want to hear about God. I want to lose sight of me a little bit. Whatever
about me. You’re not what you should be. You haven’t measured up. You don’t love enough or
whatever it is. I know all of that. That’s not where I’m living. I’m hungry for God. God has given
us a new system and it’s not law. It’s him. It’s Jesus again and again and again. Galatians 1:6 I marvel
you have lost him. You are removed from him. I kind of feel in these weeks we have been living
with out as much Body life as in the past.

I have so much enjoyed the fact we are not removed from him. He’s in the morning and in the night. He’s in our fellowship and our great songs. Forget about it. Cut lose from the rules and regulations and the old sin nature that I have in me. Old sin nature means old sin nature that really wants and does live by law. Tell me what to do and I will
do it said the rich young ruler. What must I do to have eternal life? I’ve been living by the law
and kept it from my childhood. Then why are asking me how to have eternal life if you are such
a perfect person? You know you don’t have eternal life and you’re still working for it based on
law. The gospel. The gospel is the power of God unto salvation. The anointing in our hearts and
our ministry. Not judging each other.

Not on each other’s case. Looking beyond and love. People are looking for love. People are looking for freedom for the joy and they are finding it in him. Paul said I am amazed you are so soon removed from him. Galatians 1:6 there is always another gospel which is not another. There be some that trouble you and pervert the gospel of Christ.
They trouble you. They trouble you. It’s tough. They trouble you. I don’t want my sisters and
brothers to be troubled. I want my sisters and brothers to be edified and built up. We want our
sisters and brothers to believe they can walk on water. “I can’t walk on water.” Before you say
that, think again. God. God. “I cannot do this.” Wait a minute. There’s God. You know God. You walk with God. God’s grace is there. I’m not saying we are walking on water but maybe in a day
every day we are because of the new man, the new creation that dwells in every one of us.

To provoke each other in love and faith. When we are encouraged or led in the Spirit and built up
in him. At the end of the trial here, this is about him. I want to say something about P. Carl
Silva. At the end of my message we have a three-minute video tape in tribute to P. Carl. He
came here as a young man to go to Bible college from India. Very sweet, gentle, and passionate.
He became the missionary in India. He left and it fell on him to go back and P. Brian also. He
became the pastor. This is what he followed. The other side of the cliff on this side are these
demonic, satanic projections. You are no good. You fail. You are not saved. The church doesn’t
mean anything. There is nothing here for you. You are a nobody. Nothing. Go make a world for
yourself. Live your life and gain your life.

Find it. You are an artist you know. You’re very talented. You’re a writer, actor, professional, athlete, smart, genius and so on. I have a way for you. I think without my covering, God wants to give us a covering and he gives us this covering from the Holy Spirit, this covering of the Word, covering of the pastor, of the Body, of meeting
often one with another, assembling and forsaking not. Don’t come to the church if you are sick
or not ready to come. As God leaves you, we want you to be healthy and safe. That is not an
issue with me at this point in this time tonight. We have a covering. We need it. This world Paul
is saying to the Galatians you started, Galatians 3:1. That’s what can happen to me. I am somehow
foolish. I left the fear of God.

I’ve left the divine counsels of God, the joy, the freedom that is in God. You’re not obeying the truth. Yes, you’re keeping the Ten Commandments living by law and considering circumcision because of the false teachers. I hold you responsible. You should be able to discern the two sides of the cliff. When legalism is happening, I need to recognize that’s not freedom. That’s not the Spirit. That’s not the way to go. When the weird projections
come mentally, resist the devil. He will flee from you. Martin Luther said if you mock the devil
and make fun of him, he cannot stand it. I don’t know how he knew that! I mock the devil. His
mind is not the mind of Christ. His ways are not the way of God. It’s a way that may seem right
unto a man, but the end is death. We have to be wise in these days.

We have to realize that in a relaxed way I don’t want to lose my fervency. I’m relaxed but I want to be fervent, singing in a hammock (the sound of Indian singing). However it sounded! I wasn’t there and I don’t know,
and you know I’m not a singer. God was there. Alleluia! I have a thing about my life. We do
things and it may not look so pretty but we get it done by God’s grace. How many have done
things imperfect, but God was in it. You have five loaves and two fish and it didn’t look like
much of a banquet, but God was in it. How about going down to Egypt. It didn’t look so pretty
but God in it. God is with you, kick back and enjoy the popcorn. Come on in and have a good
time. Laughter does good like medicine. The spirit is not a condemning spirit and a judgmental
spirit that happens in our hearts and it’s shocking to Paul.

He’s saying, these are my words. Oh no! You guys were awesome. You were playing the guitar, kicking back, barefooted, singing in the grass and now look at you guys. Old, crusty, baptized in vinegar, sour, judging. Where did
your joy go? What happened to you? That’s what he is saying. Galatians 3:2, here’s a crazy story.
Samson sleeps with a woman at midnight and gets up. That woman was not his wife. At
midnight he gets up. The Philistines are around him. He’s in a difficult situation to trap him and catch him. He takes the gates of the city and they are obviously big heavy doors and walks up to
Hebron, 50 miles uphill he walks with the gates of the city, a Philistine town and goes up to
Israel, to Hebron walking and carrying it. I’m not saying anything other than that is the craziest
story I could ever imagine.

I don’t know what it means except it is the Spirit of God moving on
Samson. Why? I don’t know. Grace of God. “That’s not right.” I don’t know. I’m not God.
Samson is a believer and God gives him grace. We are to be strong in that grace and have a
song of grace and learn how to build up ourselves in grace and walk in this unique walk of faith.
P. Carl in his ministry back in India and Bible college, wisdom, steel in him. He was so tender
and kind. His wife wrote a beautiful piece she sent today about what a great man he was. I left
my phone in my office but he’s beautiful. She said I’ve never seen anyone manifest Christ like
my husband in all his trials and situations, his wisdom and his love. We are on this road also.

We need to be aware of our tendencies this way and maybe the things that happened to us this
way. You can find a man and say how did your life begin to crumble? I don’t know. It just
happened. I made a stupid decision. I never knew about resisting the devil and casting down
thoughts against God. I wish I learned how to live like Samson and live by faith and also be a
godly man. Now I’m lying down in sorrow. We say to him and everyone else that can hear us, P.
Scibelli said it. Be still and know that I am God. May our God be a huge, big, awesome God. May
our God take us through our life all the days of our life. May we be able to say I have entered
into the house of God and I benefited from it in many ways. I will not turn back. I have nowhere
to go but forward with Jesus Christ. Are you so foolish having begun in the Spirit but now made
perfect by the flesh?

Amen.

Suzi wrote May 23, 2020:

“My darling husband Carl Silva went home to be with his Lord and
Savior Jesus Christ.” I don’t know if I’m going to get through this. “As a wife, I can say he was
the most Christ like person I’ve ever known at home and out of the home. He was a loving,
caring, gentle spirited, selfless husband. He was a devoted, affectionate, encouraging father to
our son Andrew. He was a Spirit taught, Spirit led, faithful, tender hearted, diligent pastor. He
lived for one purpose – to tell others about Jesus. Patient in trials, faithful, wise, prayerful
believing the impossible and a passion for missions is the life that he lived.

He served the Lord with joy and gladness in his heart even during his testing times. He has borne much fruit in the
last eight years and, even in the midst of affliction, chose to focus on the Word and the work that
God called him to do. In his trial, he was still thinking of others. I’ve been so blessed to have
been married to him and serve the Lord together.”

Wow! Amazing. His ministry goes on. I think
there are 127 churches in India that have come from his work. He’s very fruitful. Loved Pastor
Stevens and loved us very much.

We’re going to miss him.

 

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