Feb. 5, 2012

Background Scripture: Galatians 1:1-2:21

Devotional Reading: Luke 18:9-14

Galatia, an area that became a Roman province in what is today Turkey, was a place of perpetual conflict during the days of Paul’s missionary activity. That was true before he arrived there, while he was there and also after he left.

It was after Paul left it that he learned of the conflict taking place and fired off  this “hot” letter confronting the Galatian churches. Instead of beginning in his usual style, he jumps right into the fray in verse 1:6: “I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting him, who called you in the grace of Christ and turning to a different gospel.”

Those causing the trouble are not named, but he describes the damage they are causing: “But even if we or an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel contrary to that which we preached to you, let him be accursed”! (1:8,9).

Those are strong words, but we must realize his concern with what is going on there: People are coming and attacking the very grounds of the gospel, insisting that before Gentiles become Christians, they must first become Jews – males must be circumcised and all must know and live by the Jewish law.

This is directly contrary to the gospel that Paul preached to them and which he encapsulates in 1:3-5: “Grace to you and peace from God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself from our sins to deliver us from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Fathers” The key to their salvation is not the law, but the “grace and peace from God the Father through the self-sacrifice of Christ.”

Paul goes on to speak of “some who trouble you and want to pervert the gospel of Christ” (1:7,8). Apparently, they are attacking Paul and the gospel he preached and taught in Galatia. This gospel was nothing received from any other apostles or teachers, but came to him through a revelation that changed him from a persecutor of the Church to a true apostle.

At first an avid student and practitioner of the law, he knows the Jewish law cannot enable anyone to achieve salvation. God saved him and gave him a new life and the foundation was and is grace.

When Paul went to Jerusalem to meet with the apostles there, he took with him Titus, an uncircumcised convert to Christ, and was opposed by “false brethren secretly brought in, who slipped in to spy out our freedom which we have in Jesus Christ, that they light bring us into bondage …” (1:4). This “bondage” is submission to the Jewish law.

But Paul did not yield to their influence and eventually a compromise was worked out: That Paul and Titus “should go to the Gentiles” and the Jerusalem apostles to the circumcised (Jews). But, when Peter went to Antioch he was influenced by these “false brethren” not to eat with Gentile Christian converts because they were uncircumcised.

Paul confronted Peter and opposed his surrender to the “false brethren.” The grace of God, not the Jewish law, accepted in faith is the key to salvation. Belief can lead us to God’s grace, but it cannot supplant that grace. The Greek noun can mean “faith” and “ faithfulness,” as well as “trust” and “trustworthiness.”

This problem with the Galatian Christians is still with us. There are still “false brethren” and those who pervert the gospel,” and, as in Paul’s time, they teach a contrary salvation dependent upon beliefs, creeds and doctrines that are presented as superior to grace.

Paul’s gospel recognizes that no rule or doctrine can give life. John Wesley said, “A string of opinions is no more Christian faith, than a string of beads is to Christian practice.” The “faith” of which Paul writes was more than “belief” and affirmation of propositions. It is belief, of course, but it goes beyond mental belief to whole-life trust. Faith is believing and trusting God and living life accordingly. Belief that is not lived is a denial of God’s grace.

The sin that so often separates us from God’s grace is that which divides God’s church. “Real faith,” writes de Harsanyi, “never divides men. Divisions are created by men themselves. They talk of dogmas – and then at once they talk of heretics. They watch each other instead of watching God.”

Dividing the Church is the work not of Christ, but those “other apostles.”

The views and opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and not necessarily those of Farm World. Readers with questions or comments for Rev. Althouse may write to him in care of this publication.