The persuasion which is being exercised on you just now is not from him who calls you. They were grieved to think that the Jewish church, with its twelve apostles and its elders, with its manifold links with antiquity and God's past testimony on earth, should seem separated in any measure from the apostle and his work. Dictionary entry details GALATIANS (noun) Sense 1 Meaning: A New Testament book containing the epistle from Saint Paul to the Galatians Classified under: But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother's womb, and called me by his grace, to reveal his Son in me, that I might preach him among the heathen; immediately I conferred not with flesh and blood: neither went I up to Jerusalem to them which were apostles before me; but I went into Arabia, and returned again unto Damascus.". Therefore, no wonder that he says, "God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ.". what is today's heat index And Peter said, "I suggest that we not place a yoke of bondage on them which neither we, nor our fathers were able to bear" ( Acts 15:10 ). The writer of First Maccabees ( 1Ma_8:4 ) says that it was by makrothumia ( G3115) that the Romans became masters of the world, and by that he means the Roman persistence which would never make peace with an enemy even in defeat, a kind of conquering patience. "Now, the other way to be righteous is through faith in Jesus Christ, receiving that grace of God through Him, where God accounts me, as He did Abraham, righteous because I believe. It meant emulation, the desire to attain to nobility when we see it. But then there is another point of exhortation too; and surely we ought not to forget that there are not only the common links of love, and the willingness to succour one another, as we see, beginning with a most extreme case and ending with a general one; but still further, "Let him that is taught in the word communicate unto him that teacheth in all good things;" and not only that, but also the general responsibility of the saint and in a solemn manner. At the outset here (not there) he sets aside human intervention. Paul had written in the earlier part, "I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ lives in me" ( Galatians 2:20 ). In Paul's case there was nothing of the sort. "Paul closes this little section on the idea of circumcision and all and he gets a little testy with those. Reckon that to be. I would [wish that] they were even cut off which trouble you ( Galatians 5:12 ). Rather, if man had been able to obey the law and so acquire a title, then two systems would have interfered with each other as being to the same end. And so I said, "All right, tell me, when Jesus was baptized, who spoke and said, 'This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased" ( Matthew 3:17 )? The Galatians were succumbing to false teaching (7-12) III. He warns against "another gospel," i.e., a different one, which was really none at all. That's the old nature that wants its way, that wants to insist on its own way and all. 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. And I'll argue with Him for a while. Christendom is built upon this footing. But it degenerated; came to mean the desire to have what someone else has, wrong desire for what is not for us. Because you'll never come to their beliefs just by reading the Bible. The apostle Paul himself, inRomans 14:1-23; Romans 14:1-23, insists upon the forbearance of a Gentile even towards the Jew that might be still encumbered by his days, meats, and so on. When God speaks of the seed numerous as the sand or the stars, He gives them a Jewish character of blessing. The very utmost that could be said was, that God had been pleased to reveal His Son to Peter and the others. person's state and condition God-ward may be safe; or lest their The readiest way to destroy the spirituality of a church, and to annihilate the influence of religion, is to excite a spirit of contention. Being found only in Christ, it supposes the manifestation of grace; light does not in the same way that truth does. The tragedy of life is that people who hold different views very often finish up by disliking, not each others' views, but each other. 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. And this is of immense moment to remember. Such is the secret of true power. 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. consequences of a contrary spirit and conduct. It is liberty and not law that the Christian stands in. Now you're, you know, chopping Jesus up, and said, "Well, He is God here, and but, for a while He wasn't God and the universe was without God for a little bit here, or whatever. And "Titus," as he says here, "who was with me, being a Greek," etc. Suppose a man desires to become a naturalized subject of a country and carefully carries out all the rules and regulations of that country as they affect naturalization. And what is the end of them? Those that walk according to this rule would be saints in general. Thus is seen sovereign grace, and nothing else, as well as a heavenly link instantly formed between the Lord in glory and His servant on earth. (a) Eros (compare G2037) means the love of a man for a maid; it is the love which has passion in it. And mark how the Holy Ghost turns Abraham into an additional and most unexpected proof of the grace of God and the truth of the gospel. I mean, if you're walking in love, what rules can you lay down? It comes by reading the book of Mormon. Galatians 5:14. "For if the inheritance be of law, it is no more of promise:" otherwise by the condition of law you would annul the promise. Was this the love the law claimed? Liberty from the law and from the bondage of the law, because that cannot make you righteous. Thus He lived and moved here below. They had been by degrees instructed according to the testimony which the Lord Jesus was pleased to give; and most suited it was, of course, to the time, people, and circumstances. And so with the Mormons. For I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ. The Jews will surely be exalted, as well as converted nationally, and they will then put down their enemies, being made the head when other nations become the tail. THE INTRODUCTION ( Galatians 1:1-10) 1. 26 Let us not be desirous of vain glory, provoking one another, envying one another. ", At once the apostle launches into the troubled sea. I wish that those who are upsetting you would get themselves not only circumcised but castrated! But we have a good deal more. He did not forget His people Israel; but He had always the glory of Christ before Him; and the moment we rise up to this blessed Seed of all blessing (the true Isaac, dead and risen really, as the son of Abraham was then in figure), the blessing of the Gentiles is secured in that one sole person, before the Jews are multiplied in their land under the new covenant, and possess the gate of their enemies. But as in the end the child of the slave girl was cast out and had no share in the inheritance, so in the end those who are legalists will be cast out from God and have no share in the inheritance of grace. The Spirit against the flesh. he gives us this one general rule, which, if duly observed, would be the most sovereign remedy against the prevalence of corruption; and that is to walk in the Spirit (Galatians 5:16; Galatians 5:16): This I say, then, Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh. That is, walk in fellowship with God. He tells them (Galatians 5:13; Galatians 5:13) that they had been called unto liberty, and he would have them to stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ had made them free; but yet he would have them be very careful that they did not use this liberty as an occasion to the flesh--that they did not thence take occasion to indulge themselves in any corrupt affections and practices, and particularly such as might create distance and disaffection, and be the ground of quarrels and contentions among them: but, on the contrary, he would have them by love to serve one another, to maintain that mutual love and affection which, notwithstanding any minor differences there might be among them, would dispose them to all those offices of respect and kindness to each other which the Christian religion obliged them to. And now the apostle enters on another part of his subject. Not that they have actually broken down and failed; but so incapable is man of standing before God on the principle of doing the law, that it is all over with him the moment he pretends to it. Such is the only possible way in which blessing can be brought in, in order that such souls as we are should be blessed and maintained in it. Whom did their principle make them resemble? Can it be doubted that the special form of spiritual thought and feeling formed, for instance, by James's or Peter's teaching, yea, even by that of John, while harmonizing, where the heart was open, with the instruction of Paul, nevertheless would appear at first very different? Copyright 2023, Bible Study Tools. It is predicated upon the work of God. They're contrary, and I do not always walk after the Spirit. Don't seek after it. Besides, we have a more daily duty: "Bear ye one another's burdens." Paul did not stand alone. He owned and valued, in its own place, the difficult, weighty, and momentous work which God had assigned to Peter, James, and the rest; but at the same time he stood firmly humbly, of course, and lovingly, but firmly for that which the Lord had assigned to himself and his colleagues among the Gentiles; and, so far from Christ's liberty having been in the least weakened, the apostolic conclave put their seal, with the whole church at Jerusalem, upon it most heartily. He wants to get rid of the first Adam and all its appliances, not to keep it on; and therefore he puts on Christ. Partisan strife will be fatal to the Christian community as a whole. The law was given them with all pomp and solemnity. "Oh, well, He laid down His divinity before He died." If he had preached the full truth of the gospel, he insists that they had received it. This then is the apostle's allusion and reasoning; but he proceeds to meet a natural objection. A different issue ensued from their settling down in the mutual independence of the Gentile churches and the Jewish. Selfishness in the end does not exalt a man; it destroys him. "Wherefore then serveth the law? The gospel had led Peter to treat the Jews and Gentiles all alike. But they drank it in the proportion of three parts of water to two of wine. It was not another, as he says. Thank God Jesus Christ has set me free from my bondage to my flesh. Now, man was created and by God as a living spirit. Her child was born free and according to God's promise--and all his descendants must be free. We don't understand that word too much. And they ate, giving over to their fleshly appetites and in so doing, the flesh dominated. The apostle takes notice of the latter here, because he is speaking of their behaviour towards one another; and, when he makes use of this as an argument to persuade them to mutual love, he intimates both that this would be a good evidence of their sincerity in religion and also the most likely means of rooting out those dissensions and divisions that were among them. That is not what Christian liberty is about. 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 ). Nor this only. And in these are all the law and the prophets" ( Matthew 22:37-40 ). And they want to get on our case because we don't run down every night and baptize people the moment they're saved. Plutarch says that it has a far wider place than justice. Let others talk as they will of the law, no law can censure the real fruits of the Holy Ghost, or those in whom they are found. It is not the joy that comes from earthly things, still less from triumphing over someone else in competition. No, rejoins the apostle; you are going back to heathenism. And when he went there, was it a question of receiving aught from the twelve? He was given, whether in power or in person, not by the law, but by the hearing of faith. 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. (Acts 15:1-41) As it is said here, "They gave to me and Barnabas the right hands of fellowship, that we should go unto the heathen and they unto the circumcision. In other words, if the believer simply were one forgiven by grace, without having either life in Christ or the Holy Ghost dwelling in him, he might, perhaps, plead that he could not avoid sinning. No doubt there was a difference of tone. Matthew 23:13; 2 Corinthians 11:20; Revelation 11:5. He revealed that Jesus was the Christ, the Son of the living God. The contents of the greeting ( Galatians 1:3a ) ii. Legal activity is but labouring in the fire for vanity; and if, alas! "You've been called unto liberty." For he comes to another and most cogent argument. An undue regard to the approbation and applause of men is one great ground of the unhappy strifes and contentions that exist among Christians. This agape love is gentle; it is good. He fully allows that the Lord was both made of a woman and made under the law; but what was the ultimate object in view! As wild beasts contend sometimes until both are slain. Further. They're just warmed over, put in a new coat, and declared by a fresh voice, or sometimes the voices aren't so fresh, but they're things, concepts that . Or are you inclined toward the easy-going yieldingness of Peter? Thank You, Jesus, for Your forgiveness and for Your love and for Your grace to me.". These concepts, these heresies that develop within the church are passed on by men. 25 Mar 2017 23:00:00 -0500 1896 sunday full false Wednesday Night | Galatians 5:5-6 Part 2 | Dr. Jimmy Young A little leaven leavens the whole lump. Paul was confident the Galatians would resist the one leading them in the wrong direction. "Now, a lot of times when people come to me with some weird concept, I'll say, "Where in the world did you get that idea?" This passage, however, indicates they are having disputes. Having brought in the true character of the Christian's life as flowing simply and solely from Christ, and from Christ crucified too, so here he takes up the Holy Ghost. Galatians 1:1-24. Galatians 5:15 - John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible BUT IF YE BITE AND DEVOUR ONE ANOTHER,.. If understood, it completely cut all the earthly swaddling-clothes of the heavenly church, and of the Christian. Here one may be very brief: "The heir, as long as he is a child, differeth nothing from a servant, though he be lord of all; but is under tutors and governors, until the time appointed of the father. Anything else would have been imperfect; but still it had essentially a transitional character. They're covered by the fact that you're walking in love. One of the encouragements, as we know, which God furnished to Abraham was, that he should have a seed like the sand of the sea, and like the stars of the sky. 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. The Spirit of God can employ it to make a man feel that all is over with him; but He goes farther in grace, and by that very law brings the man in dead to the law, and not merely condemned. It was they who had changed, not he. For his own special call was an indisputable fact; and it is a great joy to the heart to think how Christianity (while it leaves the deepest and the highest space in all directions, so to speak, for the working of the Holy Ghost, while there is more room in it than anywhere else for the play both of the renewed mind and the affections that the Spirit of God gives, while, consequently, it admits of the richest possible exercises of both mind and heart), nevertheless, in its grand truths rests on the most patent and certain facts. Under which type did they fall Ishmael or Isaac? "But the fruit of the Spirit". This closes the course of the apostle's argument. Thou shalt not hearken unto the words of that prophet, or that dreamer of dreams; for the Lord your God proveth you, to know whether ye love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul. (Deuteronomy 13:3.). The Christian's faith is founded not on a book but on a person; its dynamic is not obedience to any law but love to Jesus Christ. having begun in the Spirit, are ye now made perfect by the flesh? Hence in this epistle it is not so much the laying bare the need of man of the sinner, as the vindication of that same grace of God for the saint, with the exhibition of the ruinous results to him who is drawn aside from the deep and broad groundwork that God has laid for souls in Christ. Thus it is evident that the legal system is a parenthesis. I am perfectly delivered, and the measure of my deliverance is Christ, and Christ raised from the dead. Next: Galatians 5:4 It is . . If I am a mere man, a sinner, the end of that is (for responsibility is not like power, destroyed by sin) the eternal judgment of God. It is all devoted to the deliverance of the saint from this present evil age by the cross of Christ, and his consistent maintenance of the new nature and position of grace of the new creation in Christ Jesus. The message of redemption through the cross was offensive. though he had prayed thrice, as his Lord had done on another and wondrous occasion, so the apostle was to have communion with Christ in this way, and learn that there is something better than the taking away of that which makes nothing of the flesh. Thus, whether it be the Gentile without law, or the Jew with it, all are shut up under sin. Gentiles might boast in their freedom. On the contrary, they must think of others and act to please them. Is not this just the law for you! That you're not going to be otherwise minded.". There was no difference in the blessing of Christ: man's guilt and God's grace were alike indiscriminate. Paul cautioned both sides to love one another or they would consume each other. Here it means that tranquillity of heart which derives from the all-pervading consciousness that our times are in the hands of God. Do your souls go along with Paul's decision? (Compare John 1:9; John 1:17.). But if ye bite and devour one another, take heed that ye be not consumed one of another. You cannot go farther. Fornication; it has been said, and said truly, that the one completely new virtue Christianity brought into the world was chastity. I tried." So, Peter uses this same phrase to describe the law as a yoke of bondage. It has been defined as "readiness for any pleasure." This is exceedingly important, and the more as I believe the scope of the allusion to Abraham and to his seed is not often appreciated. self-seeking, dissension, heretical division, envy, drunkenness, carousing, and all that is like these things, I warn you, as I have warned you before, that those who do things like that will not inherit the Kingdom of God. And so, I have to reckon the old man to be dead each day, and oftentimes, many times through the day.The flesh is lusting against the Spirit. It is not a question of law at all. These were his lineal posterity. And it proclaimed the full and equally blessed standing of those who received Christ. Now these things are an allegory. You are bound to carry it out consistently. There is no depreciating of any soul, but the plain statement of the positive truth, which after all is the best and the humblest way, that most of all magnifies God, and edifies His children. Shall we turn now to Galatians chapter five. God reserves to Himself this great blessedness in the gospel; whereas under the law there was nothing of the kind. The fate of any group permitting such a development issues inevitably in that of "The Gingham Dog and the Calico Cat": The apostle said as much in this very passage. He acts on this in faith; he understands it with an energy and a brightness that increased even in his Roman prison. If you want to be a subject in God's kingdom, then you cannot do these things. And so, such things leaves an unending list of things of the flesh. take heed that ye be not consumed one of another: The Galatians are warned earnestly and intently to view their predicament and to decide not to destroy each other spiritually. There is a warfare that goes on in the life of the believer. You couldn't believe the things the Jehovah Witnesses believe, unless you read their screwy attitudes and ideas in their books. Promise was before the law, and flowed out of the grace of God. Pungent, abrupt, indignant, he none the less was led of God. It therefore often happened that the Rabbis would take a simple bit of historical narrative from the Old Testament and read into it inner meanings which often appear to us fantastic but which were very convincing to the people of their day. He's temperant. As for me, brothers, if I am still preaching that circumcision is necessary, why am I still being persecuted? Outline of Galatians 5:1-15. The apostle concludes this chapter with a caution against pride and envy, Galatians 5:26; Galatians 5:26. You'll be disappointed. #1 "It is for freedom" By "freedom," this verse means that we can serve others in the name of the Lord and reap the reward of joy that comes from it (Galatians 5:13-15). It had nothing whatever to do even with the Lord Himself, in the days of His flesh, when acting as minister of the circumcision in the land of Judea. The word used here ( dakno), means, properly, to bite, to sting; and here seems to be used in the sense of contending and striving - a metaphor probably taken from dogs and wild beasts. So, Paul here exhorts us to walk in the Spirit and to live after the Spirit or on the spirit side of our lives. So far from this being the smallest allowance of Jewish prejudice, it was itself a powerful blow against it. I'm still His child. David said, "Thy rod and thy staff they comfort me" ( Psalms 23:4 ). 5:1-12 Look now it is I, Paul, who am speaking to you I tell you that if you get yourself circumcised Christ is no good to you. Even so we, when we were children," etc. His theology always ran one danger. There is no comparison of countless seed; there is not an allusion to the sand of the sea, or to the stars of the sky. In other words, you did not get this from God. done his duty; but it was precisely what he could not do, because he was a sinner. Paul was preaching that Jesus paid the complete price for your redemption on the cross. "You don't know how long I've been taking it, Lord. Now, in the fifteenth chapter of the book of Acts, when this same issue had arisen in the church in Antioch, when certain of the brethren came down from Jerusalem and were hassling the Gentile saints in Antioch and said, "You can't be saved unless you are circumcised and keep the law of Moses," Paul and Barnabas and others from Antioch took these brothers right back to Jerusalem, because they came unto the pretense of, "We have the authority of the Jerusalem church to declare these things." Hagar had a son called Ishmael. And I was challenged by that for a while. 18 but if you are led by (verse 16-18) the spirit, you are not under law. 13 For, brethren, ye have been called unto liberty; only use not liberty for an occasion to the flesh, but by love serve one another. "Whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth, and scourges every son whom He receives" ( Hebrews 12:6 ). He does not say that it is the complement of it; but most decidedly it flows from the same divine spring of grace. (c) Storge (compare G794) rather means affection and is specially used of the love of parents and children. Finally, he concludes by putting the sentence of death, if I may so say, on circumcision, and all such as might adopt it. The reason is, that he has not yet come to own by faith that he has no strength any more than righteousness, and that Christ is all and in all. But if ye bite and devour one another, [you better] take heed that ye be not consumed one of another. Accordingly he draws from this a most weighty argument against bringing in the law as the rule of life for the believer. And this is a universal principle. Paul adds a grim bit of advice. Consequently we have no allusion to the Lord's coming in this epistle to the Galatians. Can I be righteous by keeping the law? The truth is, that they had their relationship to the twelve tribes of Israel. And so, they started telling people, "Well, Chuck believes this." You can't do anything to buy redemption. He said, "You've got to be born again." Even as in a natural man there is something of this struggle (the convictions of his conscience and the corruption of his own heart strive with one another; his convictions would suppress his corruptions, and his corruptions silence his convictions), so in a renewed man, where there is something of a good principle, there is a struggle between the old nature and the new nature, the remainders of sin and the beginnings of grace; and this Christians must expect will be their exercise as long as they continue in this world. Here particularly the Christian is guarded against the inroads of legalism. There followed Paul teachers, Judaizers who brought another gospel, which was not really a gospel. "Desirous of vainglory,". I call your attention particularly to this, brethren, that an act apparently so simple as Peter's ceasing to eat with the Gentiles had such a solemn character in the eye of the apostle Paul, that he considered it a question of the truth of the gospel. Thus all things fall into their place, and the Spirit connects us in heart with that which God is doing and will do for the glory of Christ. Peace; in contemporary colloquial Greek this word (eirene, G1515) had two interesting usages. "If righteousness come by the law," (he does not merely say, "come of the law," but come by it,) "then Christ is dead [died] in vain." "For I am as ye are." All therefore becomes a matter of the pure grace of God; and He is pleased to bless the Gentiles in the Seed, even Christ dead and risen. And facts tell on their mind. And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the heathen through faith," not by becoming proselytes of the gate, or entering on a legal basis, but "foreseeing that God would justify the heathen through faith, preached before the gospel unto Abraham, saying, In thee shall all nations be blessed." 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. As we go down these things here, these are the things that God will exclude from His kingdom. It's faith which works by love.Now Paul said, Again, you remember he said, "You did start well. There is such a thing as, by patient continuance in well doing, to seek for eternal life. This is not a word which classical Greek uses commonly. That it is His sacrifice for your sins that brings you redemption and the forgiveness of sins. 3 Yes, I testify again to every man who receives circumcision, that he is a debtor to do the whole law. On the other hand, the spirit (the renewed part of us) strives against the flesh, and opposes the will and desire of it: and hence it comes to pass that we cannot do the things that we would. Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these ( Galatians 5:18-19 ). Practical Godliness Enforced; Works of the Flesh and of the Spirit; The Fruits of the Spirit. But because they are not born of the Spirit and have no understanding of the spiritual dimension of life, you're talking riddles to them. Paul begins chapter 5 by stating flatly that Christ has set us free in order that we should be free. I. Circumcision is part of the old law that enslaves us. Indeed, we may say that now he thunders on the Galatians that were dragging in the law. If ever there was a man who more than another contended for the oneness of the saints in every sense, above all, for the one body of Christ, for the unity of the Spirit, it was the apostle Paul. The context behind the Galatians church We have been crucified to the requirements of the law Kill our desire or need to keep the law as a means of gaining justification Galatians 2:15-16 Being crucified to self Matthew 16:24 There is only one throne in our hearts and life, and only one person can sit on it Galatians 5:24 And this life is sustained by the very same person who is its source. When we get to the root meaning of these words, we see that life has not changed so very much. Now, that righteousness depends upon the work of Jesus Christ as my sacrifice, as my substitute. It is the power of that love, and not the constraint of law, that will keep us right; for love is always more powerful than law. On the other hand, where unity becomes an object, it is never understood; and at the same time the walk of faith cannot be maintained. 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." That's all the law is saying to you. For He knows our tendency to mingle law with grace in some form or measure, and treats that which was of the fathers and long before Moses, as a foreign ingredient deleterious to Christians. (1.) That died with Christ. Thus it wrought among the Galatians. What a subversion, not only of the truth of God revealed in the gospel, but also of redemption, which is its basis! It isn't a liberty to live after my flesh. And I'm washed and I'm cleansed and I go on. The way of law makes salvation dependent on human achievement; the man who takes the way of grace simply casts himself and his sin upon the mercy of God. And mark the difference. The whole concept is: how do I establish a righteous standing before God?
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