Year 2, Day 141: Galatians 5 & 6

Sola Fide

As quickly as it started, we end the book of Galatians.  Paul starts off chapter 5 with a pretty important paragraph that begins and ends really nicely.  “If you accept circumcision Christ will be of no advantage to you.”  “For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love.”

What is Paul talking about?  Is he really concerned about circumcision?  Yes, and no.  Paul is concerned about circumcision because that is the topic at hand in Galatia.  People have come to Galatia (from Jerusalem) and have told them that unless they are circumcised they cannot be saved.  So contextually, Paul is very concerned about circumcision.  For Paul, the Galatian question is: does salvation come through Christ or through works of the Law (in this case … circumcision)?

More generically, Paul is saying these words with an eye to anything that we put up as an obstacle to faith.  A person who is circumcised purely to obey some law and who neither cares about God nor cares about faith is not guaranteed to be saved.  Salvation comes through Christ and through Christ alone.  I can be saved with or without being circumcised.  I can receive the Holy Spirit whether or not I am circumcised; and we know from other places in the Bible that the Holy Spirit is the guarantor of our salvation.  What I do has no impact on my ability to be saved.  I cannot keep the whole Law perfectly, thus I must rely wholly upon someone who can: Jesus Christ.

Of course, we should pull this into a modern perspective.  The reality is that in our modern culture we don’t fight about religious circumcision much anymore.  But that doesn’t mean we don’t argue.  Ever meet a person who says that you don’t really have the Holy Spirit within you unless you speak in tongues?  Or ever meet a person that says if you weren’t baptized under the right guidelines that your baptism wasn’t valid?  Or what about those people who claim that a particular translation of the Bible is the only correct translation?  Or what about the people who say communion is only valid if it is real wine or even those who say you can’t have real wine at communion at all?

The reality is we live in a religious age where people want to put all kind of restrictions on who is “really saved” and who is “in Christ.”  But there is only one qualification: has the person received the grace of God and have they become crucified with Christ so that it is Christ who lives in themselves?  If Christ lives in a person, who are we to say that they have not met our qualifications?

Life In The Spirit

Paul then moves on to what it looks like when someone is living in the Spirit.  Take a good long look at those lists.  They can be generalized by one comparison: self-monger or Christ-monger?  What is the self-monger?  The one who strives after his own desires!  The self-monger is the one who is involved in “sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these.”  The self-monger is interested in his or her own satisfaction that they use other people, hurt other people, divide other people, get angry with other people, manipulate other people, and things like these.  The self-monger is interested in manipulating the things around them (even God’s Word!) to get their way.

However, what is the Christ-monger?  The Christ-monger has allowed God to crucify him or her with Christ so that God’s agenda shines through!  The Christ-monger is the one who is involved in “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.”  The Christ-monger puts aside his or her own desires so that God’s desires and the needs of the other person can rise to the top.  The Christ-monger is humble towards God and categorically accepts His agenda instead of our own agenda.

Christian Community

As we move into Galatians 6, Paul has much to say about community.  We should be bearing one another’s burdens.  We should help restore people when they have fallen into sinful behavior.  But remember that in order to do these things it is necessary to be in relationship.  We cannot bear a burden that we know nothing about.  We cannot restore a person when we have no knowledge of their struggle.  Christian living is by definition communal.  It is hard to live a genuine Christian life when we are “private” about the struggles that we are facing.  It is hard to let people care about us in Christian love when we keep everything to ourselves.

As my space here comes to a close, I am reminded of a verse in Galatians 6 that I should have painted on my office wall at work and I should have etched into a mirror at my house: “Do not grow weary of doing good things, for in due season we shall reap if we do not give up.”  I don’t know about you, but I could stand to hear that verse far more often than I actually do.  It is hard living in a world that hates faith and especially hates God.  It is hard living in a world where people (myself included!) succumb to their flaws so regularly.  Living the life of a Christian is tough.  We need to remember to not grow weary.

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