What did hinder you? But he was not thus disobedient to the heavenly vision. What a condemnation of themselves, that no system which ever seeks for an earthly succession can in the least make Paul answer its purpose! Why this: "Abraham had two sons, the one by a bondmaid, and the other by a freewoman." I said, "That's a lie." This highlights the problem of reading contemporary ideas back into Scripture. The history of the flesh its sad and humbling history is soon over; but the history that faith opens into never closes. On the other hand Sarah stands for the new covenant in Jesus Christ, God's new way of dealing with men not by law but by grace. Vincent Taylor once said, "The test of a good theologian is, can he write a tract?" How could it be otherwise with one persecuting at the moment that he was arrested, in hot deadly opposition to God's church up to his most unexpected call from heaven? Matthew 23:13; 2 Corinthians 11:20; Revelation 11:5. Because you'll never come to their beliefs by just reading the Bible. Those that walk according to this rule would be saints in general. Do not abuse your freedom (13-15) I. Christ has set us free (1-6) Discussion Questions What has Christ set us free from? Consequently we have no allusion to the Lord's coming in this epistle to the Galatians. The law kills instead of giving life, and puts under condemnation instead of giving that Spirit which is necessarily a spring of sonship and liberty. If it should be asked, What course must we take that the better interest may get the better? That is to say, the covenant that was made between God and Abraham had reference to the seed which was coming, symbolized by Isaac, but really looking onward to Christ. But he proves more when he says that Abraham believed God; it was plainly not a question of law. Secular Greek uses it of the virtue of an Emperor who never lets his private interests influence the government of his people. "Stand fast in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage." (Galatians 5:1) "You have become estranged from Christ, you who attempt to be justified by law; you have fallen from grace. He said. We find that offensive in our society today, but in those days, the area of Galatia was the center of the worship of Sybil, and the priests of Sybil would castrate themselves. . Which son represented them? In Christ alone, in His cross, let us boast, and in the new creature which is by Christ. Such is the reasoning in which the apostle uses this very remarkable prophecy. Read Galatians 5: 14-17. For if a man "keeps the whole law, yet he offends in one point, he is guilty of all" ( James 2:10 ). (89) , . The sense is, "if you contend with each other;" and the reference is, probably, to the strifes which would arise between the two parties in the churches - the Jewish and the Gentile converts. Saints they may have been; and such, we know, moved about from Jerusalem. So here it is said that God was pleased to reveal His Son in him, that he might preach the good news of Him among the heathen. It will stand. God asks, and man is called to give, i.e., is called to obedience. Now you've got to defend it against the challenges and so you've got to start making up or taking positions that are thoroughly unscriptural in order to defend your position." The man who makes law the principle of his life is in the position of a slave; whereas the man who makes grace the principle of his life is free, for, as a great saint put it, the Christian's maxim is, "Love God and do what you like." too often might be ready to turn aside. By the Spirit of God, we're waiting for that hope of righteousness through faith. (ii) There is the obligation to our fellow men. "God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth" ( John 4:24 ). Galatians 5:1-15 focuses on what those in Christ should do with our freedom in Christ. When he declared that the end of the reign of law had come and that the reign of grace had arrived, it was always possible for someone to say, "That, then, means that I can do what I like; all the restraints are lifted and I can follow my inclinations wherever they lead me. Christian freedom does not mean that believers may do as they like. And I can set up these rules, and I can get out my little gold stars. And so, I would listen to these fellows, and I listened, you know, and just said, "Well, you know, that's what the scripture says, you know," when they would quote scriptures. If you're looking to that as a righteous standing before God, then you are not experiencing the grace of God in your life. 26 Let us not be desirous of vain glory, provoking one another, envying one another. It is an actual result of the cross of Christ. Now, the law always brings fallen man into importance: such it must be in its principle. Now, let us not believe or think that this liberty that we have is the liberty to do anything we might want to do in the flesh. Am I going to yield to my flesh, or am I going to yield to the Spirit? Unitarians. He wouldn't bother correcting me. Nor this only. For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do." Josephus ascribed it to Jezebel when she built a temple to Baal in Jerusalem. Is not this just the law for you! Nothing can be more conclusive than this disproof of the fleshly pretensions that were connected with Jerusalem, and were brought in under cover of Abraham, but really to the subversion of the gospel. There was no such thing as a gradual training. The case is hit off exactly to the life. The meaning is that you never can get stability in blessing until you have simply God putting forth His own power according to His own grace. In the epistle to the Galatians we have another tone and style, a serious and grieved spirit, with feelings not less deep it may be, even more profoundly moved than in writing to the Corinthians; and for this reason, that the foundations were still more deeply affected by that which was working among the assemblies of Galatia. 18 but if you are led by (verse 16-18) the spirit, you are not under law. But he lists some of the works of the flesh. A person doesn't lose his temper. Man is only the receiver; and truly, as we know, "it is more blessed to give than to receive." Far too short a time, if it were a question of due initiation into the testimony of the twelve. But to the end of the day there remained for Paul two obligations. What Does Galatians 5:13 Mean? He habitually measured things not so much by their bearing on Jews or Gentiles as by their effect on Christ's glory. He had been trained up under the most distinguished teacher the great Rabbin Gamaliel; but "when it pleased him, who had separated him from his mother's womb, and called him by his grace, to reveal his Son in him." Both sides of the dispute are guilty. Causes me to become judgmental. Carousing; this word (komos) has an interesting history. It is not enough that we cease to do evil, but we must learn to do well. It was to demonstrate his sinfulness, not to gain the inheritance. Legal activity is but labouring in the fire for vanity; and if, alas! It was the ungrateful heart of man that, in its avidity after something that would bring an appearance of strength and unity, would sacrifice that, which was of heaven for what was after all connected with the earth and the flesh. And they are quite zealous in their beliefs, very fervent in the proclamations of their beliefs. Their ears were heavy, and their eyes blinded by their legalism. [Note: Longenecker, p. Envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like ( Galatians 5:21 ): So, the such like covers a lot of things. "Yeah, but I had the right to do it." The Bible says, "The natural man cannot understand the things of the Spirit: neither can he know them, they are spiritually discerned" ( 1 Corinthians 2:14 ). Was this then a reproach? In point of fact, to bring in Christ is also best of all to secure the blessing, the privileges, the glory that God has in His grace for every one that believes. It was partly directed to the hearts and consciences of the Jews, partly in view of the approaching rupture of all ties with Israel. Paul urged his readers to live unbound to the Law of Moses (Galatians 5:1-12). Meanwhile another and a better sort of blessing is given, as a better Seed also is given the true Heir of all the promises of God, even Christ the Lord. You're talking nonsense. There are many present privileges and future glories that belong to the Christian; and promise is one of them. It will appear that we are the disciples of Christ indeed when we have love one to another (John 13:35); and, where this temper is kept up, if it do not wholly extinguish those unhappy discords that are among Christians, yet at least it will so far accommodate them that the fatal consequences of them will be prevented. Therefore, that righteousness is perfect. has an affinity for both. And I'm washed and I'm cleansed and I go on. Oh, I'm comforted by that. Next he turns to direct exhortation, the chief salient points of which will call for but few words. There is no recounting what God had done for them. "Love suffereth long and is kind." It also described the bands of the devotees of Bacchus, god of wine. It is to be noted that the summit of all meanings was the allegorical meaning. And it is given to me through my faith in Jesus Christ. Consequently it is plain from the beginning, that the apostleship of Paul made a demand upon faith which the other apostolate did not. All of the bases are covered. And Paul, far from deriving his apostleship or aught else from Peter, was obliged to rebuke him, and this publicly. And people to follow after me, you know. Strife; originally this word had mainly to do with the rivalry for prizes. Such was the will of God the Father that had raised Christ from the dead. Indeed, there is no soul really above them. Our Christianity obliges us not only to die unto sin, but to live unto righteousness; not only to oppose the works of the flesh, but to bring forth the fruits of the Spirit too. For ye are all the children of God." Grace brings out the faithful promise of God, and His goodness to him that deserves nothing. Accordingly the duty here recommended to us is that we set ourselves to act under the guidance and influence of the blessed Spirit, and agreeably to the motions and tendency of the new nature in us; and, if this be our care in the ordinary course and tenour of our lives, we may depend upon it that, though we may not be freed from the stirrings and oppositions of our corrupt nature, we shall be kept from fulfilling it in the lusts thereof; so that though it remain in us, yet it shall not obtain a dominion over us. Reckon that to be. Still less is it possible to let the law set its force aside. That's just my old flesh that's upset. If, instead of acting like men and Christians, they would behave themselves more like brute beasts, in tearing and rending one another, they could expect nothing as the consequence of it, but that they would be consumed one of another; and therefore they had the greatest reason not to indulge themselves in such quarrels and animosities. For he had shown that our purchase by Christ delivers even the Jew from subjection to the law; whilst Gentiles are set at once on the ground of grace without the intervention of any legal apprenticeship whatever, "Howbeit then, when ye knew not God, ye did service unto them which by nature are no gods. The persuasion which is being exercised on you just now is not from him who calls you. Plutarch says that it has a far wider place than justice. of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God ( Galatians 5:21 ). Paul takes that old story and allegorises it. One of the lawyers one day challenged Jesus as to the greatest commandment. In fact, what Jerusalem had done, as far as this was concerned, was to let slip men that would impose circumcision evil workers, as he in a later epistle contemptuously calls such like of the concision; for they were corrupting the Gentile churches by Judaism, instead of helping them in Christ. He acts on this in faith; he understands it with an energy and a brightness that increased even in his Roman prison. It comes from a root which means to choose, and it was used for a philosopher's school of followers or for any band of people who shared a common belief. But when men would have anything fraught with distress to His people, when through their folly confusion must ensue, contrary to all that His heart loved, then it was left to others. But in this he could glory. All sprang, no doubt, from the same God, from the same Lord Jesus Christ; but even so from God and from the Lord in other relationships. I. Circumcision is part of the old law that enslaves us. During the Medieval period it was depicted as "Joachim and Anne Meeting at the Golden Gate", meaning Mary's conception through the chaste kiss of her parents at the Golden Gate in Jerusalem; [64] the 14th and 15th centuries were the heyday for this scene, after which it was gradually replaced by more allegorical depictions featuring an adult Mary. In either case "let him be accursed.". beasts of prey falling upon and devouring one another: for wolves This he means here by "faith." To worship the living and true, creator God - and not the false gods, false religions we pursue. Paul ends with a very blunt saying. I'm going to walk in love." Make a child thoroughly happy, and you will soon see that its duty becomes comparatively light and a joy. Every word he uses has a picture behind it. The truth of God to our hearts.So, you has he made alive who were dead because of your trespasses and sins. But this is a future prophetic vision not touched on here. Then after a certain lapse of time he does see Jerusalem, but no more than Peter and James, not the apostolic college officially. it has a, perhaps, a naivet about it in that it does trust.You know I've been burned so many times by trusting men, but I pray, "God, never make me jaundiced." That died with Christ. Help me, Lord. They don't come to man from God.And the Jehovah Witnesses, just the Arian heresy of the early church. It is thus, then, that grace uses it to give me death in my conscience before God. "We had ten thousand souls saved last week. Thus, the idea is, in their contentions they would destroy the spirituality and happiness of each other; their characters would be ruined; and the church be overthrown. And what is the end of them? He shows that God would give us a deliverance from self-importance; and what a mercy it is to be so blessed, that one can afford to forget one's self! The prosperity doctrines of the gnostic heresy of the early church. But when one is miserable, does not every duty, even where it may be as light as a feather, feel as if it were an iron chain on you? You can't do anything to buy forgiveness. But God has made you alive in Christ Jesus. My very nature is dealt with. This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust [desires] of the flesh ( Galatians 5:15-16 ). But this was only provisional and parenthetic. Apparently the believers who advocated grace and the believers who advocated law bitterly opposed one another in the Galatian churches. Men of, disposition, careless and unthinking, consume othersthose of, But if ye bite and devour one another, take heed that ye be not consumed one of another, , but if ye be biting and eating up one another. True to the Spirit. He tells them that as many as take the ground of law works are under the curse already. But not from God. You are bound to carry it out consistently. He had been himself (could they deny it?) Galatians 5:16. My responsibility is defined by the place in which I am found. You know, you can look down and see the Channel Islands. Yet, wondrous to say, when she desires to be under grace by-and-by, all those that are now brought in by promise will be accounted as children to her. Under which type did they fall Ishmael or Isaac? The apostle urges that all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. IF YOU RECEIVE CIRCUMCISION. The very defence set up, and the meanings which these men put on the forms and ceremonies of which they make Christianity so largely to consist, demonstrate their most barefaced turning back to idolatry. But if ye bite and devour one another These are sins which will undoubtedly shut men out of heaven. I have not. What is good fruit in the Bible? Naughty Paul. And, doubtless, God had all this in view when He pledged Himself with an oath to Abraham. You can't be both. (a) Eros (compare G2037) means the love of a man for a maid; it is the love which has passion in it. If the world were the great enemy at Corinth, the law perverted is that against which the Spirit of God raises up the apostle in writing to the Galatians. When the emphasis of man became on the physical fleshly side of him, he no longer was one with God, who is a Spirit and must be worshipped in spirit and in truth. Paul went on to argue that if you accepted circumcision, that is to say, if you accepted one part of the law, logically you had to accept the whole law. It supposed, and went forth to every creature on the ground of the total ruin of Jew and Gentile. Was it possible, then, that any could desire to put the Gentiles under law, when they had been brought out from it themselves by the will of God, the work of Christ, and the witness of the Holy Spirit? we know too well the result from sinful man. For they were saying that was it was necessary to be circumcised and to keep the law of Moses in order to be righteous before God, to be saved. Accordingly the apostle lays stress on the fact that he was "unknown by face unto the churches of Judea which were in Christ: but they had heard only, that he which persecuted us in times past now preacheth the faith which once he destroyed. You cannot weaken his apostleship without endangering the very gospel that you have received yourselves. is this all? As if he had said, "You must expect a struggle between flesh and spirit as long as you are in the world, that the flesh will be lusting against the spirit as well as the spirit against the flesh; but if, in the prevailing bent and tenour of your lives, you be led by the Spirit,--if you act under the guidance and government of the Holy Spirit and of that spiritual nature and disposition he has wrought in you,--if you make the word of God your rule and the grace of God your principle,--it will hence appear that you are not under the law, not under the condemning, though you are still under the commanding, power of it; for there is now no condemnation to those that are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit; and as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God," Romans 8:1-14. I wish we could always remember, when the devil tempts us to disputes, that the disagreement of members within the church can lead to nothing else than the ruin and consumption of the whole body. All is confusion. For God would not fellowship with man dominated by his flesh. To put a stop to coveting is to "head other sins off at the pass.". Behold, I Paul say unto you, that if ye be circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing ( Galatians 5:2 ). for want of love the Lord threatens to remove, and sometimes does Everything lost then would be gained when promise has its way. Born and bred in the abominable idolatries of the heathen, they were strangers to the institutions of Israel. Do you know what happens? There was no insult to him, nor injury done, in saying that he did not acknowledge the law for a Christian. Now take care that you do not use your wonderful . These words are used by him emphatically; for he did not merely say Bite, which denotes an angry person, but likewise, Devour, which denotes one who persists in wickedness. But, further, he refers in a very affecting manner to some personal circumstances how in his own body he was a witness of having nothing to do with flesh; for what God had been pleased to put upon him as serving Him in the gospel was not great power of nature, but that which made him contemptible in his preaching. The Holy Ghost is given as the seal of faith in Christ on the accomplishment of redemption, not before nor otherwise. Such was the case with the Old Testament believers, and many Jewish believers then alive. Her child was born free and according to God's promise--and all his descendants must be free. lest ye be consumed one of anotherconsumamini; Ah! Their predicament would only become worse, as evidenced by the fact that already they are biting and devouring one another instead of growing closer to one another. I mean, you never get it from reading the Bible and waiting upon God. GALATIANS 5:2-12. Now, Paul taught righteousness through faith. But before He sent the promised Seed, man's self-confidence needed the discipline of the intermediate thing, the law; and after infinite long-suffering on God's part, the people who undertook to obey it had to be swept out of the land for their disobedience. And they glorified God in me.". So, they went right up to settle the issue, and the church had one of the first church councils gathered to settle a dispute, a problem within the church. Had they been occupied with Christ, they would have really loved one another, and in other respects too fulfilled the law, without thinking about themselves or it. To this he gives the most solemn asseveration: "The things which I write unto you, behold, before God, I lie not."
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