Thoughts on Galatians 1
Galatians
is not one of the more accessible books.
It has a lot of verses that are taken out of context because they sound
good and promising, and they are, but being out of context hurts our
understanding of the fullness of their meaning.
I am reading it now, after having taken a long hiatus in devotional
literature and deciding its time to get back into the actual scriptures.
In
Galatians 1, I would say the core truth is that we can choose to please God or
men.
Paul
has to defend his apostolic authority in this book, as in others. Here his defense is
1.
The significant,
radical turnaround in his life, to which everyone is a witness;
2.
The seclusion of three years in Arabia before he
tried to contact the apostles in Jerusalem; in other words, he spent that time
learning and studying and didn’t try to pass himself off as something before
the time;
3.
His own record of rejection and persecution, not
elaborated on her but alluded to;
4.
His deferral to Peter and James early on;
5.
His statement, “If I change from what I preached
before—a gospel of total grace—I should be accursed.” False teachers say, “I am evolving. . . . so
what I believed before is no longer valid . . . “ When speaking as an apostle, you don’t get
that privilege.
6.
That he did not look for a position of prominence in
the “megachurch center” at Jerusalem, but went into the hinterlands, to the
Gentiles, and let his critics be his critics.
7.
At the same time, when it came to a confrontation,
he did not back down for the the gospel of total grace.
Paul
also starts, and stays, theological and Christological. He is not so much angry as aggrieved by the
Galatians defection to Judaistic practices; it is understandable in a way that,
even as Gentiles, or especially as Gentiles, they would be taken in by
ceremonialism and ritual. This is a continual fight. We humans love ritual, as long as it doesn’t
extract anything from our self-will, from our love of money, sex, self, and
power.
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