from Jesus Christ himself.
I’m sure you’ve heard how I used to live when I was a member of the Jewish faith, how I persecuted those I now realize to be God’s people. I was dead set on destroying that misguided bunch of heretics. It was widely known that I was far more zealous to preserve the traditions of my ancestors than were my fellow Jews. But when God, who had set me apart from birth and called me by his grace, decided to reveal his Son to me so I could take the message to the Gentiles, I didn’t go to some group of people for advice. I didn’t even go up to Jerusalem to consult with those who were already apostles. Instead, I went to Arabia. After preaching there I returned to Damascus.
Actually, three years had gone by before I went up to Jerusalem to get acquainted with Peter. In the two weeks we were together, the only other apostle I met was James, the brother of Christ.
Then I went north to preach in various parts of Syria and Cilicia. As for the Christian assemblies in Judea, they still didn’t know me on a personal basis. All they heard was that the one who used to persecute the followers of Christ was now preaching the faith he had tried so hard to destroy. So they began to praise God because of me.
Chapter 2
Fourteen years later I returned to Jerusalem with Barnabas, taking Titus along. I went in response to a revelation and met in private with the leaders to explain in detail the message I’d been preaching to the Gentiles. I wanted to make sure that we were in agreement and that my work had not been in vain. Even though Titus was a Greek, they didn’t require that he be circumcised. The issue had come up because some false believers had slipped into the group to spy out the freedom we were enjoying in Christ Jesus. Their intention was to enslave us once again in the chains of legalism. But we didn’t yield to their pressure, not even for a moment, because we were determined to preserve the truth for you.
Those who apparently were leaders in the Jerusalem church had nothing to add to my message. (Whatever role they played makes little difference to me; God doesn’t separate people into categories.) Quite the contrary, when they realized that God had chosen me to take the gospel to the uncircumcised, just as Peter had taken it to the circumcised, they gave Barnabas and me the right hand of fellowship. They understood that God, who had prepared Peter to be an apostle to the Jews, had prepared me to be an apostle to the Gentiles. So when James, Peter, and John, acknowledged leaders in the Jerusalem church, recognized God’s gracious act in choosing me, they agreed that we should go to the Gentiles while they would go to the Jews. They only thing they asked was that we remember the needs of the poor, and that was something we are certainly eager to do.
When Peter first went to Antioch he used to eat with the uncircumcised Gentiles believers. But when some men sent by James arrived from Jerusalem, Peter quit eating with the Gentiles for fear of what the circumcision party might say. Then the other Jewish Christians joined him in this hypocrisy. Even Barnabas played the hypocrite.
When I saw that these believers were acting in a way that violated the truth of the gospel, I opposed Peter face to face. What he was doing was clearly wrong. I said to Peter right there before them all, “If you who were born a Jew set aside Jewish law and began to live like a Gentile, on what basis are you now trying to force these Gentiles to fulfill a Jewish practice?”
“You and I are not ‘Gentile sinners,’ but Jews, people of the law. Even so, we know that a person is made right with God by faith in Christ Jesus, not by obeying the law. We have come to put our faith in Christ Jesus so we might be made right with God by faith in Christ and not by doing every last thing the law requires. No one will be declared righteous by doing what the law requires.
But if while trying to be set right by faith in Christ alone we add a legal requirement, then when we sin, and we will, it could be said that Christ is promoting sin. What blasphemy! If I were to make circumcision a requirement for righteousness, I would be rebuilding a system that was replaced by faith in Christ. In that case, my actions would show that I was wrong.
It was through the law that I died to the law so that I might live for God. I have been crucified with Christ so it is no longer I who lives but Christ who is living in me. The life I now live here on earth, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not devalue the covenantal grace of God for if righteousness could have been gained by keeping the law, then Christ would have died for no good reason.
Chapter 3
You thick-skulled Galatians! Someone must have cast an evil spell on you. There was a time when you understood the meaning of Christ’s death as if he’d been crucified right before your eyes. Let me ask you this: On what basis did you receive the Holy Spirit? Was it because you were doing what the law required or because you believed the message of Christ? You can’t be so foolish as to think that while the Christian life begins with the Spirit it can be perfected by human effort? So much has happened; has it all been for nothing? God didn’t give you his Holy Spirit and work miracles among you because you obeyed some laws but because you accepted by faith the message of Christ.
It was the same with Abraham. Scripture says that Abraham believed God and God credited this to his account as righteousness. So the true sons of Abraham are those who, like the patriarch, put their faith in God. Knowing that God would accept Gentiles as righteous on the basis of faith, scripture announced the good news to Abraham, “It is through you that I’m going to bless all the nations.” So those who put their faith in Christ receive the same blessing as did Abraham, the man of faith.
But those who seek a right standing with God by trying to keep the law are under a curse; for scripture says, “Cursed is everyone who does not continue to live up to everything that is written in the Book of the Law.” It is clear that no one is made right with God by trying to keep his commands, because scripture teaches, “It is only through faith that the righteous person can experience new life.” Law is based on a principle totally different from faith; it holds that a person can find life by doing what the law requires. But Christ rescued us from the curse of the law by accepting that curse on our behalf. Again, as scripture says, “Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree.” Christ Jesus was cursed so that the blessing promised to Abraham might come to the Gentiles and that we who believe might receive by faith the promised Holy Spirit.
Here’s a parallel that may help you understand: When two people come to agreement and sign their names to a legal document, neither one can change it or pretend it doesn’t exist. Now God made a promise to Abraham and his descendant. Scripture doesn’t say “descendants,” plural, but “descendant,” singular, and that one descendant is Christ. God doesn’t break his promise, so it would be contrary to his character for the law he gave to Moses to annul the covenant he had made with Abraham 430 years earlier. If a person must keep the law in order to receive his inheritance, then the inheritance was not based on promise. But the inheritance intended for Abraham was based on promise, a promise made by God himself.
You might ask, “Then, why did God give the law?” The answer is that the purpose of the law is to point out human sinfulness until the descendant promised to Abraham would come. The law was given through angels, using a man as a mediator. A mediator is necessary when more than one party is involved, but God, who is one, delivered the promise to Abraham himself.
Does this mean that there is conflict between the law and the promises of God? Absolutely not! If law were able to impart life, then we could become right with God by obeying the law. But scripture declares the whole world to be under the control of sin, so what was promised through faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe.
Before faith in Jesus Christ became an option, we were held in custody under the law, imprisoned until the coming way of faith in Christ would be revealed. The law was our disciplinarian until Christ came; then we could be made right with God by faith in him. Now that faith is here, we no longer need law to watch
