Galatians Series Begins with “The Controversial Gospel and An Amazing Grace”

On Sunday, January 8, in a packed assembly, the South Region of our church began our initial Biblical study of the year, the book of Galatians.

Lively singing, our usual pattern, began our service. Scott Benoit and Carlos Collado – two, old timers – mixed in as leaders with Drew Cline and Kyle Woodley – the newer, young guns – to add a sense of freshness to the new year.

Jim and Nancy Fuda helped us through a boat-load of announcements from Saturday door knocking for fire prevention to a Dave Ramsey financial peace class and beyond. Later, Augusto Russell, who works in the insurance field, shared a powerful communion regarding Jesus and his supreme act, the greatest life insurance policy ever. Following that, Dr. Brian Knox, inspired us to give by sharing about the greatest physician there has ever been, Dr. God.

The overall theme for our study of Galatians is “Grace and Truth on Fire.” We started with a brief introduction and then a look at Galatians 1:1-10 . There we saw truth on fire as Paul vigorously defended the gospel he preached. We also saw grace on fire as “the apostle to the Gentiles” talked about the Christ who rescues us from this age to serve a mighty God.

The day concluded with a moving guitar duet by Eric Easton and Jenna Allen called “Give Me Jesus.” These powerful lyrics were then repeated as we all joined in to sing. We cannot get caught up in the things of this world or the religious debates that do not matter. We must cling to Jesus. We must constantly be refreshed by his teachings, bathed in his blood and thankful for his grace.

At 2 PM, several small group leaders returned to the building to read several passages on fasting. The resulting discussion gave us deeper convictions on this topic as our church has a month of prayer and fasting during January to kick off this new season for the glory of Christ.