Galatia [b] Doctrinal

by G.K. Kennedy, Sydney, Australia | Category: General | Oct 1982

We can be certain that Paul had a deep affection for the Galatians among whom and for whom he had suffered so much. He calls them "my little children" and because he was again in travail for them (Gal. 4:19) we are assured that he had at the first suffered in his work of preaching Christ to them and teaching them the word of the Lord. It would not be long before Satan would try to spoil and upset these churches of God, because they have always been his target that he might rob God of His joy and pleasure in an obedient, faithful and loving people.

False teachers came, challenging the very apostleship of Paul and the truth of the gospel which he preached. Their aim was to obtain a return to Jewish religious practices, especially in the matter of circumcision. Paul wrote his epistle to rebut the wrong teaching, and in it he reveals the character and motives of those who brought conflict to the Galatian churches. "There are some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ" (Gal. 1:7). They were "false brethren privily brought in, who came in privily to spy out our liberty ... that they might bring us into bondage" (2:4). The aim of the false teachers was to make the Galatians feel inferior. "They zealously seek you in no good way; nay, they desire to shut you out, that ye may seek them" (4:17), and "as many as desire to make a fair show in the flesh, they compel you to be circumcised; only that they may not be persecuted for the cross of Christ ... they desire to have you circumcised that they may glory in your flesh" (6:12-13). Paul knew that eventually "he that troubleth you shall bear his judgement, whosoever he be", but for the sake of the Galatians his immediate desire was that "I would that they which unsettle you would even cut themselves off" (5:10, 12), that is, from the churches of God.

The effect of this wrong teaching was to cause division among the Galatian saints, appealing as it did to fleshly pride under a religious cloak. Paul corrects this sad condition by warning them that "if ye bite and devour one another, take heed that ye be not consumed one of another" (5:15), and by exhorting them that they should "not be vainglorious, provoking one another, envying one another" (5:26). Their condition had become so sadly wrong that Paul writes to them that "I am afraid of you, lest by any means I have bestowed labour upon you in vain" (4:11). What a sobering lesson it should be to our own hearts when we read concerning the once-faithful Galatians that they were so quickly removing from Him that called you unto a different gospel" (1:6); and "0 foolish Galatians, who did bewitch you? ... Are ye so foolish?" (3:1, 3). They were turning back again to the weak and beggarly rudiments whereunto they desired to be in bondage over again (4:9), but Paul in the Holy Spirit counsels them to "be not entangled again in a yoke of bondage" (5:1). The false teachers had so affected them that they desired to be under the law, but were become deaf as to what the law said (4:21). In their pursuit of the law they had unwittingly ceased to obey the truth (5:7), and Paul therefore writes his epistle to refute the wrong teaching in a careful presentation of his apostleship, the source of the gospel message which he preached, the fellowship of the other apostles in his ministry, the respective places and purposes of the law and faith in Christ, and the practical issues of these things in their daily lives if they would walk

by the Spirit. Paul wished to be present with them, but we may thank God that he was not so permitted and that thereby we have this divinely inspired epistle which complements the epistle to the Romans in refuting similar erroneous teaching which exists today, for example, by Seventh Day Adventism and Herbert Armstrong's Worldwide Church of God.

G.K. Kennedy, Sydney, Australia | Oct 1982
General