A study of Galatians 4:21-30, where Paul uses Sarah and Hagar as an allegory of two covenants. Pastor Robert Rohlin explains the ancient rule that makes the point work, since the status of the mother settled the status of the son. Hagar was a slave, so Ishmael was born into slavery, while Sarah was free, so Isaac was born free and was the child of promise. The manner of conception mattered too, because Ishmael came by human planning and Isaac came by a miracle to a woman of ninety. The question the message leaves you with is the one Paul is really asking: do you want what man can arrange, or what God can give?

A Thanksgiving message built on twelve reasons to thank God, drawn from Psalm 100. Pastor Robert Rohlin begins with the five kernels of corn some families still put beside each plate. That custom remembers the winter when the Pilgrims' rations fell to a few kernels a day and nearly half of them died before spring. He tells how they kept giving thanks for what little they had, how Squanto taught them to raise corn, and how the 1621 harvest ended in a three-day feast with Massasoit and the Wampanoag as guests. It is a message for anyone whose gratitude has grown thin, because the first Thanksgiving was held by people who had just buried half their friends.

A study of Galatians 4:1-11 on the difference between a slave and an heir. Paul compares living under the law to a child under guardians and managers until the date his father has set, which is exactly what the law was doing until Christ arrived. Pastor Robert Rohlin presses the question the passage raises: are you still living like a slave when God has already made you an heir? He spends time on the fullness of time, on God choosing the exact moment to send His Son, born of a woman and born under the law, and on the virgin birth Paul is pointing at. The message ends where Paul ends, warning against going back to the weak and beggarly things a person was rescued from.

A study of Galatians 3:19-29 that answers an obvious question. If the law never justified anyone, why did God give it at all? Pastor Robert Rohlin lays out Paul's answer, that the law was added because of transgressions, to show us our sin and to restrain it, the way a speed limit does. He works through 1 Timothy 1, where Paul says the law is good when it is used lawfully, and it was never given for the righteous man. Then the passage turns to what believers become through faith: children of God, clothed with Christ, and heirs according to the promise.

A study of Galatians 3:13-18. Pastor Robert Rohlin starts with the hardest sentence in the passage, that Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, because it is written that cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree. Then he turns to the argument Paul builds on a single letter. The promise was made to Abraham and to his seed, singular, not seeds, and that seed is Christ. Since a ratified covenant cannot be revoked or added to, a law given four hundred and thirty years later could not cancel a promise God had already made. The whole point is that the inheritance comes by promise, not by keeping rules.

Please note: the recording for this service did not capture. Every audio and video file from that Sunday morning contains room noise only, with no speech on it. This has been verified twice, by two separate transcription engines on different hardware, and both returned no speech at any point in the recording. The message itself was "Faith or Law," the fourth in the study through Galatians, working from Galatians 3:1-12 and Paul's question to a church that began in the Spirit and was drifting back to law-keeping. The sermon outline is attached as a PDF and is complete. Please use it in place of the recording. The audio and video attached to this record should be disregarded.

A study of Galatians 2:11-21, where Paul opposes Peter to his face in Antioch. Peter had been eating with Gentile believers until men from the circumcision party arrived, and then he pulled back out of fear and led others into the same hypocrisy. Pastor Robert Rohlin sets that against Peter's own rooftop vision in Acts 10, where God told him plainly not to call unclean what God had cleansed. The confrontation was not about table manners but about whether justification comes by faith in Christ or by works of the law. The passage ends with Paul saying he is crucified with Christ, and this message asks what that actually means on a Monday.

Part of the series Living Before the Audience of One. Paul answers the Judaizers by pointing to his own testimony: his message came not from men but by the direct revelation of Jesus Christ. An autobiographical apologetic of authority, and a portrait of what amazing grace does to a persecutor.

The opening message in Galatians. Paul asserts his apostleship and pronounces a curse on any perverted gospel, because there is only one gospel and only one audience that matters. A study of the four things false religions do: add to the Bible, multiply salvation requirements, subtract from the deity of Christ, and divide the body of Christ.

A short message on 1 Corinthians 14:15, where Paul says he will pray with the spirit and pray with the understanding also. Pastor Robert Rohlin walks through why the mind cannot be left out of prayer, since a man praying without understanding does not know what he is asking for. He explains the difference between body, soul, and spirit, and describes the soul, the seat of mind, will, and emotions, as the ground being reclaimed over a lifetime. His summary of the Christian life is worth the listen by itself. We have been delivered from the penalty of sin, we are being delivered from its power, and one day we will be delivered from its presence.