Notes on Galatians

Galatians 1:

Paul’s letter to the Galatians addresses the delineation between the teaching of Christ and the teaching of man—a delineation that the Galatians had apparently blurred. Paul begins by reminding them that “the gospel they have received” is not from him or from any man but the Man Christ Jesus. With this knowledge, he asks them, why do they seek a different gospel? Why do they seek what is man’s, which can profit nothing, when they have already received what is God’s, which is everything?

How are we to know the difference between what is man’s and what is God’s? Know what you have received by revelation, not by the teaching of man (v. 11-12). Paul goes on to explain how for many years what he was taught by man defined him and inspired all his actions, but in a single moment, through the revelation of Christ in him on the road to Damascus, the teachings of all those years crumbled to the ground and only one fact remained: Christ and Christ crucified. Nor was it necessary for him to “confer with flesh and blood” (v.16), because the Son and His will had already been divinely revealed to him and no teaching of man could shake or expand upon that knowledge. What he warns the Galatians against is not the loss of that knowledge (“what you have received”), but the perversion of it by, again, the teachings of man (v. 6-7). The lesson here is to trust what has been divinely revealed to you, through the Word of God and through the revelation of faith, and to put no trust in what man says. Suddenly, Paul’s repeated reminder that the gospel he preaches is not from him but from God becomes extremely relevant.

This passage reminds me of the closing passage in Tolstoy’s Religion and Morality, which could very well have been directly inspired by Paul’s letter to the Galatians:

“But you may ask me: what is the essence of this unscientific and unphilosophical method of comprehension? If it is neither philosophical nor scientific, what is it? How can it be defined? The only reply I can make to this is that, since religious knowledge is the thing on which all else depends, and which presupposes any other kind of knowledge, we cannot define it because we have no instruments with which to make the definition. In religious terminology this comprehension is called ‘revelation.’ Without ascribing any mystical significance to this word it is perfectly correct, since this understanding is not acquired through any study or effort on the part of any particular person, or people, but only through acceptance by a person or people of the manifestation of infinite reason which is gradually revealing itself to mankind.”

 

Galatians 3-5:

“…Only those who are of faith are sons of Abraham,” Gal. 3:7.

Sons = heirs to the promise, which is the inheritance of faith (Gal. 3:18).

“Now to Abraham and his Seed were the promises made. He does not say, ‘And to seeds,’ as of many, but as of one, ‘And to your Seed,’ who is Christ,” Gal. 3:16.

The promise, or covenant, was made to Abraham because of his faith (Gal. 3:6), and to Christ, the mediator of the covenant between God and man (Gal. 3:19). Christ, Abraham’s seed, became the fulfillment of the promise of the inheritance of faith. Thus, salvation is the covenant between God and Abraham—i.e., between God and man—and the inheritance of all those who are bound to God in the same way Abraham was: not by law, but by faith. We are heirs with Abraham and with Christ not because we share the same lineage, as the law would demand, but because, like Abraham, “we believed.” (See also Gal. 3:13-14.) This covenant, confirmed by God (Gal. 3:17), the law cannot touch. There is no other deciding factor for the heirdom than faith:

“For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise,” Gal. 3:26-29.

“What purpose then does the law serve?” (Gal. 3:19). “To keep us under guard before faith would be revealed,” (Gal. 3:23). See also Gal. 3:19, 23-25.

If God is one, does the mediator mediate between God and the law? (Gal. 3:20). “Is the law then against…God? Certainly not!” (Gal. 3:21). Rather, the law is the standard of perfection, to which no one but God Himself can measure up, so that the promise could come through faith (Gal. 3:22, Rom.11:32). “The law was our tutor to bring us to Christ…” (Gal. 3:24).

God wanted us to be justified by faith, not by the law, which we could not keep. God wanted our Savior to be the very One we had rejected. God wanted salvation to come through the Spirit (through the revelation of faith, Gal. 1), not through the flesh, that the flesh and its works might be put to death even as Christ was put to death. And if the flesh is put to death, then we are freed from “the yoke of bondage” which is the law. We are now no longer “in bondage under the elements of the world” (Gal. 4:3) but have “received the adoption as sons” (4:5) and live in spirit, having died to the flesh.

“Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage,” (Gal. 5:1).

“If you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law,” (Gal. 5:18).

“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law. And those who are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit,” Gal. 5:22-25 (emphasis added).