Can you give me, you know, a hundred dollars for this watch?" 5:16-21 I tell you, let your walk and conversation be dominated by the Spirit, and don't let the desires of the lower side of your nature have their way. For God considers the poor; He has regard to the simple; He has children in His eye. take heed that ye be not consumed one of (2) b. Circumcision obligates you to the law. The Fruit of the Holy Spirit (sometimes, incorrectly, referred to as the Fruits of the Holy Spirit) is a biblical term that sums up nine attributes of a person or community living in accord with the Holy Spirit, according to chapter 5 of the Epistle to the Galatians: "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, . He had been himself (could they deny it?) Liberty comes first, mark; power and love afterwards. The gospel had given him to sanction in his ways and words the overthrow of the partition wall. Grace brings out the faithful promise of God, and His goodness to him that deserves nothing. Undoubtedly such is the assurance of God's word to His children; and thus Galatians 5:1-26 is in contrast withRomans 7:1-25; Romans 7:1-25. We invite you to crucify our flesh every day so that we may walk in step with your Spirit. But it was true from the first. The promise is therefore entirely distinct from the law, which was not heard of for four hundred and thirty years after. The prosperity doctrines of the gnostic heresy of the early church. When we seek to interpret a passage like this we must remember that for the devout and scholarly Jew, and especially for the Rabbis, scripture had more than one meaning; and the literal meaning was often regarded as the least important. Do you want a law? [For] if we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit. Thus he accepts the challenge that was given by unbelief. You ever seen a person in love and all of the joy that they have? But God took care that the call of Paul should be delayed till the whole order of the Jewish apostleship should be complete. Thus the law was ordained by angels in the hands of a mediator. We celebrated that today in the observance of the Lord's Supper. It's sort of comforting, you know. And what was the effect of God's giving him to have an application of law in his own conscience? Uh-huh, you did that five minutes. California - Do Not Sell My Personal Information. The mind of the flesh is death.But if my life is dominated by the Spirit, then I have the mind of the Spirit. Nothing more in keeping with the wants of those addressed, who had so soon turned aside from the grace of Christ to a different gospel. Thank God Jesus Christ has set me free from my bondage to my flesh. Note, If we should approve ourselves to be Christ's, such as are united to him and interested in him, we must make it our constant care and business to crucify the flesh with its corrupt affections and lusts. It was a misuse of the respect naturally accorded to some who came from Jerusalem; and so God took care to correct the evil by a formal, public, authoritative sentence of the body there, instead of a pure and simple rejection of the error among the Gentile churches, which might have looked like a schism, or at least a divergence of feeling between them and the apostle Paul. Successor to Paul there is none; if so, who and where? The legal mischief had emanated from Jerusalem: the remedy of grace must be applied by the apostles, elders, and brethren there. Heathenism! That is, the most simple and most obvious truth is just the last thing a man thinks about. The readers ( Galatians 1:2b ) c. The greeting ( Galatians 1:3-5 ) i. 22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, 23 Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law. They had followed Jesus in His earthly path of presentation to Israel. Ignorant or false men had made them hanker after circumcision. That you're not going to be otherwise minded.". heard of the law. It is liberty and not law that the Christian stands in. To report dead links, typos, or html errors or suggestions about making these resources more useful use the convenient, Hastings' Dictionary of the New Testament, International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, , . "We, when we were children, were in bondage under the elements of the world; but when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons." Not at all, says the apostle, you are returning straight into your old heathenism without knowing it yourselves. No doubt also his line of procedure did not at all consort with their desires, who were sticklers for earthly order, and a line that looks safe and respectable to natural eyes. Again it is worth while to look at each word separately. In Paul's case there was nothing of the sort. I'm going to walk in love." But in this he could glory. In the case of the twelve, we do find an apostle chosen to supply the gap of Judas chosen, I admit, of God, though after a Jewish sort, as Chrysostom justly remarks, for the Holy Ghost was not yet given. How could it be otherwise with one persecuting at the moment that he was arrested, in hot deadly opposition to God's church up to his most unexpected call from heaven? And they say, "Oh, well, I was just waiting upon the Lord and reading the Scriptures, and the Lord showed this to me." Paul always triumphantly satisfies that test, just as here the whole matter is brought to the acid test of daily living. Both sides of the dispute are guilty. He had made as much proficiency as any of his day it may be, more. And it proclaimed the full and equally blessed standing of those who received Christ. Therefore the apostle adds, ,And as many as walk according to this rule [that is, the rule of the new creation], peace be on them, and mercy, and upon the Israel of God." The Spirit of God can employ it to make a man feel that all is over with him; but He goes farther in grace, and by that very law brings the man in dead to the law, and not merely condemned. You got to walk the tight rope. The Stoics defined it as "grief at someone else's good." But there is more for us. Outline of Galatians 5:1-15. We'll send you an email with steps on how to reset your password. He makes one first thoroughly happy in the sense of His grace and the liberty Christ has won, and then the Holy Ghost becomes an indwelling spring of power, though His power is put forth in us only as we have Christ kept before us. To this the apostle endeavours to persuade these Christians, and there are two considerations which he sets before them for this purpose:-- (1.) If ye bite and devour one another These Churches seem to have been in a state of great distraction; there were continual altercations among them. By the Spirit here may be meant either the Holy Spirit himself, who condescends to dwell in the hearts of those whom he has renewed and sanctified, to guide and assist them in the way of their duty, or that gracious principle which he implants in the souls of his people and which lusts against the flesh, as that corrupt principle which still remains in them does against it. "Immediately I conferred not with flesh and blood.". Not so. It cannot and ought not to spare sinners. There was no doubt or difficulty on this head in these early days. Every word he uses has a picture behind it. There it is not traced to God the Father, that raised Christ from the dead; but it descends from Christ ascended to heaven (which, we shall soon see, perfectly fits in with that epistle). I just refer to it for a moment, because it adds much to the beauty of the reasoning in Galatians. Now, let us not believe or think that this liberty that we have is the liberty to do anything we might want to do in the flesh. There is such a thing as, by patient continuance in well doing, to seek for eternal life. See Luke 9:54. For the world there is nothing yet executed, any more than the great results of grace for the saints as yet appear in their fulness. Rather, if man had been able to obey the law and so acquire a title, then two systems would have interfered with each other as being to the same end. He gives freely the Holy Ghost on their acceptance of Christ's name; or, as it is here written, "He sent forth the Spirit of his Son in your hearts, crying, Abba, Father." Legal activity is but labouring in the fire for vanity; and if, alas! In either case "let him be accursed.". The fate of any group permitting such a development issues inevitably in that of "The Gingham Dog and the Calico Cat": The apostle said as much in this very passage. And mark how the Holy Ghost turns Abraham into an additional and most unexpected proof of the grace of God and the truth of the gospel. After one of his great victories Nelson attributed it to the fact that he had the happiness to command a band of brothers. having begun in the Spirit, are ye now made perfect by the flesh? And so Paul is standing against this teaching in his letter to the Galatians, and in chapter five, he said. Some guy comes up and says, "Hey man, I got a watch, genuine made, you know. Men of, disposition, careless and unthinking, consume othersthose of, But if ye bite and devour one another, take heed that ye be not consumed one of another, , but if ye be biting and eating up one another. The law is never life to the dead, but kills morally those who seem alive. It describes the deliberate effort--which we can make only with the help of God--never to seek anything but the best even for those who seek the worst for us. "Desirous of vainglory,". "Yet undergirding all of Pauls admonitions regarding love and service is the reality of life lived by the Spirit, with references to the Spirit being more frequent in Galatians 5:13 to Galatians 6:10 than references to either love or service." 5:13-15 As for you, brothers, it was for freedom that you were called, only you must not use this freedom as a bridgehead through which the worst side of human nature can invade you, but in love you must serve one another; for the whole law stands complete in one word, in the sentence, "You must love your neighbour as yourself." He had the faith that could by grace cleave to God if he had not a companion; but God blesses that faith, and acts by it on the conscience of others, even on those that, alas! Because you'll never come to their beliefs by just reading the Bible. And now your spirit is alive. Thus, then, God directed and ruled that the apostle should go up and have the evil condemned on the spot, and at the centre from which it had emanated. He specifies the works of the flesh, which must be watched against and mortified, and the fruits of the Spirit, which must be brought forth and cherished, and shows of what importance it is that they be so, ver 19-24. It's Jesus only. Now take care that you do not use your wonderful . Next he turns to direct exhortation, the chief salient points of which will call for but few words. He did not forget His people Israel; but He had always the glory of Christ before Him; and the moment we rise up to this blessed Seed of all blessing (the true Isaac, dead and risen really, as the son of Abraham was then in figure), the blessing of the Gentiles is secured in that one sole person, before the Jews are multiplied in their land under the new covenant, and possess the gate of their enemies. Why, to feel himself a dead man. There is no approach to a vaunt about his dignity. It isn't a liberty to live after my flesh. If we are living in the Spirit let us also keep step with the Spirit. It is . But the most famous portion of Galatians 5 contains Paul's reference to the fruit of the Spirit: 22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faith, 23 gentleness, self-control. First, we must guard it, especially from those who would pressure us to follow the law. Remember what it must have been to one like Paul to censure the most honoured of the twelve. "Now," says he, "if we profess to be of this number, and as such to have obtained this privilege, let us show it by a temper and behaviour agreeable hereunto; let us evidence our good principles by good practices." He acts on this in faith; he understands it with an energy and a brightness that increased even in his Roman prison. Paul takes that old story and allegorises it. The noun GALATIANS has 1 sense: 1. a New Testament book containing the epistle from Saint Paul to the Galatians Familiarity information: GALATIANS used as a noun is very rare. They danced and laughed and sang his praises. Be led by the Spirit, you're not under the law. "If righteousness come by the law," (he does not merely say, "come of the law," but come by it,) "then Christ is dead [died] in vain." It is a lovely word. It had tainted among others the Galatians; for although, in point of fact, what had converted them was the heavenly testimony of the apostle Paul, nevertheless they had in time become acquainted with Christians who had not been so favoured, perhaps from the churches in Judea. And this leads to another point, the relation of the law to the promises. But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother's womb, and called me by his grace, to reveal his Son in me, that I might preach him among the heathen; immediately I conferred not with flesh and blood: neither went I up to Jerusalem to them which were apostles before me; but I went into Arabia, and returned again unto Damascus.". Thus it wrought among the Galatians. "If you keep the whole law yet offended in one point, you're guilty of all. As far as this temper prevails among Christians, they will be ready to slight and despise those whom they look upon as inferior to them, and to be put out of humour if they are denied that respect which they think is their due from them, and they will also be apt to envy those by whom their reputation is in any danger of being lessened: and thus a foundation is laid for those quarrels and contentions which, as they are inconsistent with that love which Christians ought to maintain towards each other, so they are greatly prejudicial to the honour and interest of religion itself. It brings in deliverance for man in the accomplishment of God's purpose in Christ. And you find that these people espousing them are plagiarizing from other people who have espoused them, and it goes back and back and back. "You don't know how long I've been taking it, Lord. Thus, whatever may be the energy that seeks souls in love, there is nothing after all like Christianity for maintaining individual responsibility intact. They thus acted and pronounced according to the evident intention of God conveyed in the character of their apostolates respectively. But, further, he refers in a very affecting manner to some personal circumstances how in his own body he was a witness of having nothing to do with flesh; for what God had been pleased to put upon him as serving Him in the gospel was not great power of nature, but that which made him contemptible in his preaching. How impossible, therefore, to add the law to the promise! So, love is the fulfilling of the law. It was the practice that priests and really devout worshippers of Cybele mutilated themselves by castration. When the prophet speaks of any one living, it is by faith "The just shall live by faith." but he that troubleth you shall bear his judgment, whosoever he be. There are times when I lapse into the flesh. And, as this would be the best means of preserving them from fulfilling the lusts of the flesh, so it would be a good evidence that they were Christians indeed; for, says the apostle (Galatians 5:18; Galatians 5:18), If you be led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. The apostle concludes this chapter with a caution against pride and envy, Galatians 5:26; Galatians 5:26. And as, by specifying these works of the flesh and fruits of the Spirit, the apostle directs us both what we are to avoid and oppose and what we are to cherish and cultivate, so (Galatians 5:24; Galatians 5:24) he informs us that this is the sincere care and endeavour of all real Christians: And those that are Christ's, says he (those who are Christians indeed, not only in show and profession, but in sincerity and truth), have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts. "The theme of love . Now Paul said. 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