11See with what large letters I have written to you [with]
my own hand?12As many are desiring to make a good appearance in
[the] flesh, these are compelling you to be circumcised, only in order that
they may not be persecuted [on account of] the Cross of Christ. 13For
not even the circumcising ones themselves keep [the] law, but they are desiring
you to be circumcised in order that they might boast in your flesh. 14But
to me, may it never be to boast except in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ,
through which [the] world has been crucified to me and me to [the] world, 15for
neither circumcision nor uncircumcision is anything, but a new creation [is
something]. 16And peace and mercy upon those whoever will keep this
rule and upon the Israel of God.
It is easy to read these verses as casual closing words, as
if Paul were sitting at his desk, having his coffee, and jotting down important
thoughts for the Galatians to know and remember, as perhaps might be the case
in the book of Romans or Ephesians. But we mustn’t forget the context. I would
maintain these are emotionally packed words and we can’t lose sight of this as
we would understand them. Paul is writing this letter with the truth of the
Gospel hanging in the balance and people’s souls as it were suspended between
heaven and hell. One last time, he is wrapping up and summarizing what he has
been saying throughout the book – refuting and exposing the Judaizers.
Who are these people really? Paul exposes them as the same
hypocritical people-pleasers legalists always are. “In order to be saved, you
must be circumcised!” … as if they cared anything about the Galatians’ souls. No.
The truth is they are trying to have Jesus while they attempt to appease the
wrath of their Jewish family and friends. Following this Jesus of Nazareth and
attending church with Gentiles certainly displeased those family and friends,
but, if a man could say, “… but I insist those Gentiles all be circumcised and
keep the Law!” then they can still show up at synagogue and family gatherings
and consort with the same old crew. As Paul found out (not to mention Jesus
Himself), to stand firmly on free grace and to renounce all the ceremonies and
traditions of the Jews induced not just their displeasure but made them positively
murderous.
So the truth is the Judaizers didn’t care about the
Galatians, they were just using them. People-pleasers. Everything for show.
Just like the Pharisees, they “loved the praise of men more than the praise of
God” (John 12:42,43). Just like today, legalists always focus on the externals,
they “wash the outside of the cup.” But, as Paul says, “neither circumcision
nor uncircumcision means anything, but a new creation.” The Cross is not about
how much skin comes or goes or any of our other modern externals that legalists
hold so near and dear. What the Cross is about is a new creation. It’s about a
total transformation of who I am from the inside out. The Spirit indwells us to
make us people of love and joy and peace, people who are who they are and do
what they do, not to please anyone, but because they’re living the heart of
Jesus.
This whole study has been so liberating to me. I never
really understood law and grace and I certainly got swallowed up in
people-pleasing legalism. But I feel like now I really do understand. I never ever
again want to let other people’s approval affect what I do or don’t do and
certainly not what I persuade others to do.
That is the problem with legalism. It is actually a very
deviant way to be “religious” and yet to still live for the lust of the flesh
and the lust of the eyes and the pride of life. Legalism allows me to scruple
over music and clothes and a whole host of traditions and do nothing about my
rotten heart. It allows a man to be highly esteemed at the church building then
go home and feast on pornography (as long as no one knows). It allows a man to
pride himself that he doesn’t put alcohol in his mouth while he stuffs it with
way more food than he needs and gets ridiculously overweight. Out of that same
overstuffed mouth comes negativity and criticism and meanness, but that’s “okay.”
It all comes down to whether my people-group is pleased. If they are, I’m good.
Paul says that real faith means I’ve been crucified to that
world, that world of people-pleasing. The legalists will read about being “crucified
to the world” and immediately congratulate themselves that “they don’t smoke
and they don’t chew and they don’t run with girls that do.” They actually think
they can reduce “the world” to their list of do’s and don’t’s. The Spirit helps
us see the issues are way bigger than those pathetic lists.
The Spirit takes up residence in my heart to give me a new heart. His presence means that,
although I’m still the same rotten selfish proud sinner I ever was, there is
another Spirit present within me who, if I’ll let Him control me, can actually
help me to love – to really love, to be the person God actually created me to
be, to spend my days “doing good” to others and do it sincerely and from the
heart.
It is an incredibly sad truth that, like Paul, Jesus’ worst
enemies were the “religious.” The Pharisees prided themselves that they were “separated”
from the world, yet they were so tied to that world, they could crucify the
Messiah and think they were serving God. They were clueless what “world” was
their problem. I remember when it first struck me that, if Jesus were in town,
I really wasn’t sure He’d want to attend our church, and then, if He did,
whether He’d even be welcome. Then it occurred to me that if a Pharisee and his
family showed up – the man in his coat and tie with his wife and kids all
looking so sharp, carrying their King James Bible, and being people who “knew
their Bible” and who immediately started coming to every service, volunteering
to teach Sunday School and work in the nursery, knowing just how to act and
saying all the right things – (even if the truth is he is a gossiping,
self-righteous, irritable twirp) we’d not only welcome him, we’d elect him a
deacon first chance we got. So Jesus isn’t welcome but the Pharisees are. We
won’t have the Son of God but we embrace His enemies. Yikes!!! I knew then
something was very seriously wrong.
It took me years to finally see all of this clearly and this
study in Galatians it seems has “iced the cake” for me. When Paul called the
Galatians foolish, he could have spelled it with a capital F! Exchanging the
freedom and wonder of grace and Spirit-life to go back to a rotten system of
externals and rule-keeping! Now that’s Foolish!
No wonder Paul is all worked up. No wonder he’s pronouncing
anathemas and wishing those men would castrate themselves!
May our boast truly ever be nothing less than the Cross of
Christ, the amazing grace of a blood-bought substitutionary atonement, of an
indwelling Spirit that allows me to know and live the very heart of the
wonderful loving Father who planned it all -- and may I never ever again settle
for anything less. I’m sure I haven’t even begun to plumb the depth and height and
breadth and length of the love of Christ but I am quite sure I understand it
better now than I did when I embarked on this study. I pray I’ll only grow to
understand it more and once again, that my own life will be a living epistle.
God change me. Really change me and in some way I hope Your Spirit in me might
be a light to someone else.
As we grow in Him, may we really get to enjoy peace and
mercy.
Soli Deo Gloria.
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