You do not want to become the children of Abraham in that sense, which would be the revival of the flesh. That is, if you are circumcised ritually for the purpose of having a righteous standing before God. But what about the Gentiles? Jewish elements were borne with in a Jew. "A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump." The apostle urges that all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. The inferior trinity is spirit, soul and body of man. He's just whacked me with the rod. take heed that ye be not consumed one of another; that is, either beware lest each other's particular peace and comfort be destroyed, which is oftentimes done this way, though a person's state and condition God-ward may be safe; or lest their church state should be destroyed and come to nothing, since love is the cement of it, which being loosened, threatens a dissolution; for as no civil community, either public or private, divided against itself, can stand long, so no religious one; and for want of love the Lord threatens to remove, and sometimes does remove, the candlestick out of its place. For the desires of the lower side of human nature are the very reverse of the desires of the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are the very reverse of those of the lower side of human nature, for these are fundamentally opposed to each other, so that you cannot do whatever you like. He through law died to law, that he might live to God! There can be no compromise; but to be exclusive in any sense save as the expression of the truth in Christ would be in its own way an utter and heartless falsehood. He speaks of "the grace of Christ." They're covered by the fact that you're walking in love. The apostle's discerning eye at once judged by Christ and by that gospel which he had learned from Him. He revealed that Jesus was the Christ, the Son of the living God. The enemy had ensnared them by crying up circumcision, in order to betray them into a link with Judaism; but they had no thought of bearing the real burden of the law. Legal activity is but labouring in the fire for vanity; and if, alas! What a subversion, not only of the truth of God revealed in the gospel, but also of redemption, which is its basis! For it stands written, "Rejoice, O barren one, who never bore a child; break forth into a shout of joy, O you who know not the pangs of bearing a child; for the children of her who was left alone are more than those of her who had a husband." He acts on this in faith; he understands it with an energy and a brightness that increased even in his Roman prison. So it came to mean work done for pay. They're contrary, and I do not always walk after the Spirit. Chrysostom said that it is the grace of the man who could revenge himself and does not, the man who is slow to wrath. Then the apostle at once explains, as annexed to this, the real state of the case. the Christian dooms himself to such hard labour instead of resting in the faith of Christ, whom has he to blame? 17 For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would. Self-control; the word is egkrateia ( G1466) which Plato uses of self-mastery. What he preached was the truth as to this matter. Another reason inducing to love is taken from the pernicious The allusion is to Partisan strife will be fatal to the Christian community as a whole. The message of redemption through the cross was offensive. (14) An exhortation to the duties of charity, by the profit that follows from it, because no men proved worse for themselves than they that hate one another. Eternal life is spoken of in this double way in scripture (Romans 6:22-23); and I also press this as a truth of no small importance and but too much forgotten. It was they who had changed, not he. The world of spirits can never be comfortable to those who plunge themselves in the filth of the flesh; nor will the righteous and holy God ever admit such into his favour and presence, unless they be first washed and sanctified, and justified in the name of our Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God,1 Corinthians 6:11. He saith not, And to seeds, as to many; but as to one, And to thy seed, which is Christ. Strife; originally this word had mainly to do with the rivalry for prizes. Secular Greek uses it of the virtue of an Emperor who never lets his private interests influence the government of his people. But though the apostle here only mentions the crucifying of the flesh with the affections and lusts, as the care and character of real Christians, yet, no doubt, it is also implied that, on the other hand, we should show forth those fruits of the Spirit which he had just before been specifying; this is no less our duty than that, nor is it less necessary to evidence our sincerity in religion. The readers ( Galatians 1:2b ) c. The greeting ( Galatians 1:3-5 ) i. So, "do not use your liberty for an occasion to the flesh, but by love," the real key is love, "serve one another.". Oh, I'm comforted by that. 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. One of these covenants--the one which originated on Mount Sinai--bears children who are destined for slavery--and that one is represented by Hagar. It was something painful to bear. 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. (2.) The meaning of Galatians 5:1 is an incredible verse that has a powerful lesson for us today. 236.]. "Well, yeah, I read that book but, you know, God showed it to me." These things are not allowed in the kingdom of God. For all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this; Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself ( Galatians 5:14 ). So Paul argued that if a man were circumcised he had put himself under an obligation to the whole law to which circumcision was the introduction; and, if he took that way, he had automatically turned his back on the way of grace, and, as far as he was concerned, Christ might never have died. He does not condescend to reason about their place in the matter, but puts them at once in their due relationship. 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. But at the same time it is plain that the apostle Paul here starts with the instructive fact, that the very thing for which some Judaizers then blamed him was the distinctive glory of that to which the Lord had called him. Nor did they understand the prophets better. . 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. This epistle, as those to the Corinthians, opens with an assertion of his apostolic place. According to the prince of the power of the air, among whom we all had our manner of living. Not so. Even if people put themselves under the law, rebellious human nature produces only those evils that the law forbids and that exclude people from Gods kingdom (19-21).If, on the other hand, Christians allow Gods Spirit to control them, their lives become full of the most pleasing virtues - the opposite of those things that the law forbids (22-23). And the mind of the flesh is alienated from God; it cannot know God. Peace; in contemporary colloquial Greek this word (eirene, G1515) had two interesting usages. He warns against "another gospel," i.e., a different one, which was really none at all. David said, "Thy rod and thy staff they comfort me" ( Psalms 23:4 ). You ever seen a person in love and all of the joy that they have? That would not be a good example of Christian love. Now, as a means of engaging them to the one and preserving them from the other of these, he here cautions them against being desirous of vain-glory, or giving way to an undue affectation of the esteem and applause of men, because this, if it were indulged, would certainly lead them to provoke one another and to envy one another. Of these and such like, says he, I tell you before, as I have also told you in times past, that those who do such things, how much soever they may flatter themselves with vain hopes, shall not inherit the kingdom of God. But it works through love. And if you have interpreted it that way, you have completely missed the message of the scripture. Now Paul said. Euripides called it "the greatest of all diseases among men." All question of natural ties drops in death; as the cross is the disproof of any right to Christ in either. It is not enough that we cease to do evil, but we must learn to do well. In my spirit, in the realm of the Spirit. then is the offense of the cross ceased ( Galatians 5:10-11 ). One of the lawyers one day challenged Jesus as to the greatest commandment. He intimates also how vain a thing is legalism, because those that were pleading for circumcision in no case carried out their own principle. But meanwhile, under the gospel, there is an express promise of the blessing of the Gentiles when God spoke of the one seed, which is Christ. If you are circumcised, Christ is no value to you. 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. "God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world." Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these ( Galatians 5:18-19 ). Galatians 5:16-17 says, "But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. Why can't the Mormons tell you that? There was no insult to him, nor injury done, in saying that he did not acknowledge the law for a Christian. If I am walking in the Spirit, if I am walking in love, then there can be no law to regulate my life. Strange as all this may seem to us, it enshrines one great truth. Nothing that God afterwards introduced annulled this. And no wonder. 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. And, doubtless, God had all this in view when He pledged Himself with an oath to Abraham. Everything lost then would be gained when promise has its way. If I sow to the flesh, I shall of the flesh reap corruption; if I sow to the Spirit, I shall reap life everlasting. When Jerusalem is humbled by the mercy of God, and betakes herself to her Messiah and the new covenant, she will "hear the law," and the prophets will be accomplished in her blessing, and in the largeness of love the present children of promise (even Christians, as being in a certain mystical sense children of Jerusalem) will be her boast. If any of them believe in the Crucified, they were God's Israel. This is not a word which classical Greek uses commonly. "Tell me, ye that desire to be under the law, do ye not hear the law?" For these two women stand for two covenants. "They gave to me and Barnabas the right hands of fellowship; that we should go unto the heathen, and they unto the circumcision." He gives us a catalogue of evil things. Those who lived in Jerusalem were too prone to preserve the clothes and the cradle which had their place and use at first, but had no claim to be kept up among the Gentiles. But now, after that ye have known God, or rather are known of God, how turn ye again to the weak and beggarly elements, whereunto ye desire again to be in bondage?" The truth of the gospel, to the apostle Paul's mind, was at stake. 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. And here we may observe that as sin is called the work of the flesh, because the flesh, or corrupt nature, is the principle that moves and excites men to it, so grace is said to be the fruit of the Spirit, because it wholly proceeds from the Spirit, as the fruit does from the root: and whereas before the apostle had chiefly specified those works of the flesh which were not only hurtful to men themselves but tended to make them so to one another, so here he chiefly takes notice of those fruits of the Spirit which had a tendency to make Christians agreeable one to another, as well as easy to themselves; and this was very suitable to the caution or exhortation he had before given (Galatians 5:13; Galatians 5:13), that they should not use their liberty as an occasion to the flesh, but by love serve one another. How apt the illustration for exposing the judaizers! #2 "were called" We should take great joy in the truth that we belong to the God who calls us chosen. And "Titus," as he says here, "who was with me, being a Greek," etc. When they first knew him, there was no difficulty felt on this score; they heard him as an angel of God. Old wine is called chrestos ( G5543) , mellow. Christ is your liberty and life. And they ate, giving over to their fleshly appetites and in so doing, the flesh dominated. When He had anything unfailing to do or say, He loved to appear in grace; He said it Himself, and did it for Himself. The truth is, that they had their relationship to the twelve tribes of Israel. That would not be a good example of Christian love. It doesn't really matter, I'm going to walk after the Spirit and I'm going to please God in this. 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. He was given, whether in power or in person, not by the law, but by the hearing of faith. But we have a good deal more. Let us not be desirous of vainglory ( Galatians 5:24-26 ), Now, these men who were coming with this teaching were really out to get notches on their belts. In my attitude towards life. Witchcraft; this literally means the use of drugs. It is used of the athlete's discipline of his body ( 1 Corinthians 9:25) and of the Christian's mastery of sex ( 1 Corinthians 7:9). Need it be added that he was right and Peter wrong? You got to be circumcised." Those in Christ must stand firm against anyone who would try to drag them into slavery under the law (Galatians 5:1). . No doubt this might be provoking to human importance sometimes. Galatians 5:15 - John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible BUT IF YE BITE AND DEVOUR ONE ANOTHER,.. Just let our books explain for you." . 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. 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. Salem Media Group. "Cast out the slave girl and her son, for the son of the slave girl must not inherit with the son of the free woman." "I through law am dead to law, that I might live unto God." That is not what Christian liberty is about. He is a new creature in Christ. Do you know what happens? As we go down these things here, these are the things that God will exclude from His kingdom. As in their baptism they were obliged hereunto (for, being baptized into Christ, they were baptized into his death, Romans 6:3), so they are now sincerely employing themselves herein, and, in conformity to their Lord and head, are endeavouring to die unto sin, as he had died for it. 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. The history of the flesh its sad and humbling history is soon over; but the history that faith opens into never closes. Thus, going up with Barnabas, he took Titus, a Gentile, along with him; and even so by revelation. And then concludes the chapter with a caution against pride and envy. There is no mention here of grace, nor even of any special powers conferred by the Spirit of God. How do they stand related? Take heed that ye be not consumed - As wild beasts contend sometimes until both are slain. another; No effort, no work on your part. Thus, clearly, in the law man becomes the prominent and responsible party, not God. God is a superior Trinity; man is an inferior trinity. For every man shall bear his own 'burden." (Read Galatians 5:13-15) The gospel is a doctrine according to godliness, 1 Timothy 6:3, and is so far from giving the least countenance to sin, that it lays us under the strongest obligation to avoid and subdue it. You are saved through the finished work of Jesus on the cross. You are bound to carry it out consistently. And so with the Mormons. 5) Psalm 88:13 (NIV) But I cry to you for help, LORD; in the morning my prayer comes before you. That is, he links on the heavenly character of Jerusalem for us before touching on the desolate place of Jerusalem after the flesh, or of the predicted change of heart and blessing in grace, when she will be glad to appropriate, as it were, the Christians born now after the Spirit. Of course the same persons who are here in present view belonged to the church of God; but then they are not contemplated in their heavenly relationship, but as the children of promise, as we shall see in the end of this very chapter. "Hey, that old nature, that old Chuck is dead. For the world there is nothing yet executed, any more than the great results of grace for the saints as yet appear in their fulness. It was a misuse of the respect naturally accorded to some who came from Jerusalem; and so God took care to correct the evil by a formal, public, authoritative sentence of the body there, instead of a pure and simple rejection of the error among the Gentile churches, which might have looked like a schism, or at least a divergence of feeling between them and the apostle Paul. Thus a decisive blow is struck at the principle of connection with the law; and it was evident that they did not truly "hear the law." 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