“For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ.” (Galatians 1:10)
False teachers in Galatia were accusing Paul of man-pleasing. His message of salvation by faith alone would easily have been spun by his opponents as “no law, no works, no cost” salvation.
Preacher, what is your defense when people critique your sermons? “I studied hard all week!” “I went to seminary!” Notice Paul’s response to critics. The gospel he preached, he says, “is not man’s gospel.” Paul doesn’t rise and defend his personality or his gifts. He defends the source of the gospel in three ways.
1. The gospel does not answer to man
If Paul had invented his message, he would have to keep glancing over his shoulder at the people whose approval he coveted. But as a servant of Christ, Paul was not concerned with getting approval for the content of the message. His job was to herald what God had given and get out of the way. There was nothing of his own to add to the gospel.
This gives a preacher a particular kind of confidence. It isn’t confidence in himself. It’s the freedom of a man who knows the message doesn’t depend on him. This means two things. First, the servant has no authority to change what the Master gave him. Second, the servant has no authority to apologize for delivering it.
The temptation is usually described as pleasing the world, softening the hard sayings so the culture will nod. But there is a more subtle temptation. A pastor can preach, teach, argue, and even defend sound doctrine because he badly wants his own people to approve of him. A man can be orthodox and still be looking for applause. Paul reminds us of our audience of One. At the end of the week, the servant looks to his Master and asks, “Was I faithful to what You gave me?”
2. The gospel did not come from man
Nothing in Paul’s past explains the gospel he proclaimed. He was educated, zealous, and ahead of his peers, and all of it produced a man trying to destroy the church. Nor did he get the gospel secondhand from the apostles. He went to Arabia, not Jerusalem. God “was pleased to reveal his Son to me.”
Paul was not slowly improving until he became apostle material. Christ called him while he was persecuting the church. His calling can’t be explained by merit, wisdom, or religious achievement. It can only be explained by grace.
Two necessary implications: First, religious zeal is not saving faith. Paul had plenty of religion, and until Christ was revealed to him he was an unbeliever. The question for every hearer, and every preacher, is not “Am I religious?” but “Do I know and trust the Christ we proclaim?”
Second, nobody is too far gone. Saul of Tarsus would have been near the bottom of anyone’s list of likely converts. Don’t stop praying for the hard-hearted husband, the wandering child, or the hostile neighbor. Sovereign grace doesn’t depend on how close someone seems to the kingdom.
3. The glory of the gospel does not belong to man
Paul ends the chapter with what the churches of Judea said when they heard his story: “They glorified God because of me.” They could have said, “What a man!” or even “Let’s make a movie about this radical convert.” Instead they said, “What a gracious God.”
That’s the test for the pulpit. A hearer might leave saying, “What a gifted preacher,” and a man might quietly hope for that. But the gospel is designed to save sinners in such a way that the sinner becomes evidence of the greatness of God. Grace that comes entirely from God returns in glory entirely to God.
We didn’t draft the gospel, and we do not own the applause. Preach what you have been given to preach. Seek the approval of God Who gave it. And may the church glorify God because of it.