Galatians 5:1-26

August 5, 2018

Evening Service

Sean Higgins

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Or, Faith Working through Love

Galatians 5, or at least the second half of it, is perhaps what Galatians is known for. In other eras of church history, say, the 16th Century Reformation, Galatians was more needed for sake of it’s teaching on justification by faith alone. Martin Luther loved it; his love was to such a degree that he called St. Paul’s epistle to the Galatians “my Katherine von Bora,” and that was after saying that Luther would give up almost everything to have her. In a day when the church taught salvation by faith, not alone, but along with other measurable, external deeds (such as circumcision, Sabbath keeping, Law keeping), Paul’s teaching hits the target.

There is a connection between law-keepers, or at least those who talk about keeping certain parts of the law, and those who don’t love one another. The freedom that comes by faith is a freedom that results in loving others. The slavery that comes by adhering to the law as the way to please God manifests itself in our attitude toward others. This is the connection between the first half of chapter 5 and the second half. I had not noticed it until this week.

We emphasize the Spirit over law, and we emphasize walking in the Spirit and the fruit of the Spirit. But spiritual productivity is relational. We are made to work and take dominion and get things done. We bear God’s image as we bear fruit in our labor. But, and this is important for the task-oriented among us, our life in God’s Spirit is one that brings corporate peace, not just internal, personal peace. We are not saved by faith and works, but we are not finished until faith is working through love. Without faith, there won’t be love, there is only law, and the law continues to point out that we can’t produce love on our own apart from the Spirit.

Running Freely (verses 1-15)

In chapter four Paul contrasted the free woman and the slave woman, Sarah and Hagar, and used them and their offspring to illustrate our nature as children of promise. We do not have what we have because we took it, we have what we have by God’s grace.

Free from the Law (verses 1-6)

Therefore, we should not return to the practice of depending on ourselves. That is returning to slavery. For freedom Christ has set us free, which is both a “Duh” principle and a defining truth. Christ did not set us free so that we could choose to go back under the law, He set us free so that we could be different from the inside out.

The language is devastating. Look, I, Paul, say to you that if you accept circumcision, as in believing that that a ceremony will make God more happy with you, then Christ will be of no advantage to you. The works make Christ worthless, and if Christ is worthless, then there is no salvation.

Then Paul repeats a previous point, that it doesn’t work to single out just one all-pleasing work. I testify again to every man who accepts circumcision, as in the man who asks circumcision into his heart, that he is obligated to keep the whole law. It’s more than all or nothing, it’s all or Christ. Christ is all, or we must keep all the law. We haven’t, and we can’t, keep all the law, and even the attempt rips us away from Christ. You are severed from Christ, who you would be justified by the law, you have fallen away from grace. This is not a comment about losing one’s salvation, but a spatial way of describing how near one can be and yet still miss by a mile.

It’s the flesh, the natural man, that wants the law. But through the Spirit, by faith, we ourselves eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love.

To say that circumcision doesn’t count for anything is fighting words, at least to many in Paul[...]