SLIDES

The Epistle to the Galatians

Part 1

Introduction

We all want to be accepted—by our family, by our friends, and most of all by God. Sometimes people accept us only if we are attractive, smart, wealthy, or powerful. So, we work hard to project the right image and to conceal our faults, even among believers we know. When we greet most people, even at church, and they ask how we are doing, most people will say, “good or great,” even though that may not be the case at all. That’s human nature.

We often transfer this attitude to our relationship with God. We feel we must earn His acceptance. If we could only work harder, live better, pray longer, witness to more people, give more donations, go to church more, etc. - then we might get on God's good side.  As we shall see during our study of Galatians, that is not biblical because it’s not God’s way for the believer to grow in Christ. Also, the majority of people, even some people who call themselves Christians, think that salvation is by being a good person and/or doing good works or deeds that pleases God. In Judaism these good works or deeds are called mitzvahs and are the foundation of maintaining a relationship with God.

In Galatians Paul challenges this kind of thinking. He exposes the futility of men and women trying to earn God's acceptance by works when we are saved and after we accepted Christ as our Savior. Paul’s message in Galatians frees us from living out of a sense of guilt of not doing enough. Paul stresses that pleasing God is by faith not by doing and by believing not by working.  What is faith?  Faith is trusting God. The author of Hebrews in 11:6 says, “And without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him.” A rendering from the Greek says that one who comes to God must believe (trust) that He exists and believe or trust that He continually rewards those who continually seek Him. The word seek means to exert considerable effort and care in learning something — “to make a careful search, to seek diligently to learn, to make an examination.” Therefore, the believer who has the desire to please God must first of all believe that He exists, and then believe that God will fellowship with those who by faith diligently and continually examine the Scriptures and pray to determine how best to serve the Lord as the Holy Spirit leads. It’s not about trying to keep some set of laws for the sake of keeping them. That’s what the Jews were doing Jesus’ day, and this mindset continues today with the Jews and some in the Christian community. However, this does not mean that the believer is against laws in the New Covenant which is called antinomianism or that he can do anything he wants to in his Christian life which is called licentiousness. It’s about allowing the Holy Spirit to enable the believer to love (commitment) by continually serving others (Galatians 5:13) and by showing the fruit of the Spirit in our daily lives (Galatians 5:22-23).

During our study of Galatians, we are not only going to discuss from Scripture what the definition of the gospel is and exactly what a lost person has to do in relation to the gospel to have their sins removed so they can spend in eternity with Jesus. We will also discuss how to present the gospel clearly and discuss some clear and unclear gospel presentations.

Before we can begin studying the Book of Galatians, we must first discuss some important issues such as who wrote Galatians, to whom was it written, why was it written, when was it written, and where was it written. These issues are always important when studying any book of the Bible to get a handle on the mindset of the author and the situation in which it was written.

Who wrote the Book of Galatians – Let read verses 1 & 2.

1 Paul, an apostle (not sent from men nor through the agency of man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised Him from the dead),

2 and all the brethren who are with me,

  To the churches of Galatia:

Paul identified himself twice in the Book in 1:1 & 5:2. He also gave autobiographical information about his life and ministry in this epistle.

To whom was the Book of Galatians written – In verse 2 note that Paul said he was writing to the churches (plural) in Galatia. These are Pisidian, Antioch, Iconium, Lystra, and Derbe. These were newly planted churches in the Southern part of Galatia which was a Roman province.  In each of these churches there were Jewish and Gentile believers. As we shall see, some sections were written specifically to Jewish believers, some sections were written specifically to Gentile believers, and other sections were written to all believers in these churches.

When was the Book of Galatians written – In about AD 48-49 when Paul and Barnabus went on their first evangelistic journey to South Galatia. A report about this journey is recorded in Acts 13-14.  Galatians was probably the first book Paul wrote and the second New Testament book written. He probably wrote it just before Jerusalem Council convened. (Acts 15) The first New Testament book written was James about AD 34.

Where was the Book written – There are four epistles Paul wrote from prison called the prison epistles. Is the book of Galatians one of them? No! The Prison epistles are Ephesians, Colossians, Philemon, and Philippians. He also wrote the Pastoral Epistle, 2 Timothy, from prison as well. 2 Timothy was the final book he wrote. He was beheaded not long after writing the 2 Timothy.

Paul wrote Galatians from Antioch of Syria. It was his first book to write.  Antioch of Syria his was Paul and Barnabas's home church and headquarters.

Why was the Book of Galatians written – Paul wrote this epistle to encourage the believers in the churches in the cities of Southern Galatia to hold tightly to the gospel, the good news, he proclaimed to them earlier. There were a group of false teachers called Judaizers who were teaching in the Galatian churches that in addition to faith in Messiah a person also had to keep the Mosaic law to be saved, as well as to be sanctified i.e. to mature in Christ. 

The term sanctified means to separate or to set apart. It is sometimes translated to be holy. We are to set apart or separate ourselves from sin and sept apart and separate ourselves to God. This how we grow spiritually as a believer in Jesus. Also, these Judaizers were questioning that Paul’s apostleship came from God. The questioned whether his apostleship from God, then they questioned his message of the good news that did not include keeping the works of the Mosaic Law.  

To correct those errors, Paul asserted his apostolic authority in his letter to the churches in Galatia. He declared in no uncertain terms that salvation is:

 BY GRACE ALONE

THROUGH FAITH ALONE

IN CHRIST ALONE

Salvation is entirely apart from keeping laws or by doing any other kind of works. Also, as we shall see, sanctification is by obedience that comes from faith. Sanctification or growing spiritually as a believer in Christ is through the power of the indwelling Holy Spirit and not by working. It’s not about doing good works with the wrong motive in our own power. He would also demonstrate that his apostleship came from both the Father and the Son working in unison together.

The nature of the letter to the Galatians - J. Vernon McGee writes. “It is a stern, severe, and solemn message (Gal. 1:6–9; 3:1–5). It does not correct conduct, as the Corinthian letters do, but it is corrective—the Galatian believers were in grave peril. Because the foundations were being attacked, everything was threatened.

This letter to the Galatians contains no word of commendation, praise, or thanksgiving. There is no request for prayer, and there is no mention of their standing in Christ. No one with him is mentioned by name (1:2). Compare this with the other epistles of Paul.

The heart of Paul the apostle is laid bare, there is deep emotion and strong feeling. This is his fighting epistle—he has on his war paint. He has no toleration for legalism. Someone has said that Romans comes from the head of Paul while Galatians comes from the heart of Paul. ‘Galatians takes up controversially what Romans puts systematically.’

It is the declaration of emancipation from legalism of any type. …. It has been called the Magna Charta of the early church, the manifesto of Christian liberty, the impregnable citadel, and a veritable Gibraltar against any attack on the heart of the Gospel. ‘Immortal victory is set upon its brow.’

It is the strongest declaration and defense of the doctrine of justification by faith in or out of Scripture. It is God’s polemic on behalf of the most vital truth of the Christian faith against any attack.

(A polemic is an aggressive attack on or refutation of the opinions or principles of another. A biblical polemic is usually against another god or beliefs of another person, group of people, or nation.)

Not only is a sinner saved by grace through faith, but the saved sinner lives by grace. Grace is a way to life and a way of life.” (Thru the Bible, p. 108)

Before we begin our study of the Letter to the Galatians, I want to discuss several terms that are pertinent to our study that I will be using frequently during our study.

Justification – Justification is a judicial act of God in which He declares a sinner righteous. He is not righteous because he is still a sinner but declared righteous because a believer in Jesus is in Christ.  We usually say a person who is declared righteous as one who is saved. Salvation is instantaneous. It is not a process!

Galatians 2:16 - “nevertheless knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the Law but through faith in Christ Jesus, even we have believed in Christ Jesus, so that we may be justified by faith in Jesus and not by the works of the Law; since by the works of the Law no flesh will be justified.”

Sanctification – Sanctification, however, is the process of being made righteous. It is also called progressive sanctification. The goal is to grow in Christ and be Christlike daily. When a person believes in Christ as Savior, he or she is declared righteous. They are justified before God. On the other hand, sanctification is a lifelong process of maturing, growing, or becoming more like Christ from the power of the Holy Spirit. 

Romans 6:19 “I am speaking in human terms because of the weakness of your flesh. For just as you presented your members as slaves to impurity and to lawlessness, resulting in further lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness, resulting in sanctification.”

Glorification – Glorification is what occurs when one becomes perfectly righteous. Being glorified means that Christ will change Christians into His likeness at His return. Perfective sanctification is another term for glorification. It means being fully conformed to the image of God’s Son when we reach heaven. In 1 Thessalonians 5:23, Paul showed the close connection between being glorified and Christ’s return.

23 Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be preserved complete, without blame at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

A study of the book of Galatians

1.     Salutation (1:1-5)

Paul's greeting to the Galatians is different from his greetings to other churches. He was writing under heavy stress and strain. False teachers and critics had arisen in the church who were criticizing and attacking him. They were questioning his call to the ministry and his authority as God's messenger. They were even questioning the very good news he was preaching. Therefore, the usual affection expressed toward churches and individuals is missing. From the very first sentence his writing is abrupt. He attacked the Galatian churches vigorously with words straight to the point: he was a true minister of God, a true apostle and a special messenger of the Jesus the Messiah, and the good news he was preaching came directly from God through Revelation, not through man. Let’s read Galatians1:1-2.

1 Paul, an apostle (not sent from men nor through the agency of man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised Him from the dead),

2 and all the brethren who are with me,

  To the churches of Galatia:

In verse 1 Paul introduces himself as the writer of the letter. Paul did not change his name from Saul to Paul when he was saved and given his ministry to the Gentiles by Jesus on the Road to Damascus. He was given two names at birth. His Jewish name was Saul since he was born Jewish, and his Roman name was Paul since he was born a Roman citizen. If you run down the two names in Acts, you will see that Paul used the name Saul when he was persecuting the church. When he was given his ministry to take the Good News to the Gentiles, He began using his Roman name.

Rabbi Albert Slomovitz in his book, A New Look at Rabbi Jesus said, “…most Jews have two names: their secular one and a Hebrew one. The choosing of names takes much deliberation by families and their rabbis. Often, parents decide to select names with similar sounds. Thus, Rabbi Slomovitch’s Hebrew name Abraham. Someone named may have the Hebrew name of Gail, a Hebrew name of Gilah. In the case of Jesus, his Hebrew name was Yeshua ben Yosef (Jesus, son of Joseph). The name of Yeshua means ‘The Lord shall save.’” As a matter of fact, Rabbi Slomovitz was talking about himself when referred to Albert having the Hebrew name Abraham. Two other examples from Scripture are Matthew and Peter. . Mathew, who was a Roman Tax Collector before following Jesus, also was given the name Levi at birth.  Peter’s Hebrew name was Cephas.

Paul called himself an apostle. The word apostle means one who is sent. In this case, an apostle was an ambassador who was called and sent to represent Jesus and His’ mission. He was also like a very special messenger who was sent forth to proclaim the good news of the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. Therefore, an apostle was a combination of ambassador, representative, and special messenger.

The twelve disciples of Jesus were, of course, also apostles. While Jesus was here on earth, He personally selected from His many followers twelve men and gave them an apostleship—special responsibility to receive and spread His message after He returned to heaven. They were disciples, learners first, and then were elevated to the ministry of apostleship.

They were not just sent to pass along His’ teaching, but Jesus gave them the authority to represent His very person. They healed the sick, cast out demons, preached the good news of the Kingdom, and later the good news of the dearth, burial, and resurrection of the Jesus, etc. That’s why Jesus told the disciples,” He who receives you receives Me, and he who receives Me receives Him who sent Me.” (Matthew 10:40)

There were several qualifications for being an apostle of Jesus. These are found in Acts 1:21-22.

22 beginning with the baptism of John until the day that He

was taken up from us—one of these must become a witness

with us of His resurrection.”

23 So they put forward two men, Joseph called Barsabbas

(who was also called Justus), and Matthias.

 There were other apostles, who had the necessary qualifications, but they were just not part of the close nit twelve.  Paul did not follow Jesus from John the Baptizer to His’ accession, but he did qualify as being an apostle who was a bit different as we see in 1 Corinthians 15:8.

“and last of all, as to one untimely born, He appeared to me also.”

He did see the risen Messiah, but he considered himself born untimely or born prematurely because he lacked the "gestation" period of having been with the Messiah during His earthly ministry. He did not feel he was qualified to be an apostle. But since He was called by Jesus to be one, as we shall see in the next phrase, he considered himself the least of the apostles because he had persecuted the church. In time, the other apostles would recognize that Jesus Himself had appointed their former enemy to be one of them.

There is no evidence in Scripture to suggest there are apostles today, even though some men and women call themselves by that title. No biblical evidence exists to indicate that these thirteen apostles were replaced when they died or that apostles exist today. Jesus appointed the apostles to do the founding work of the Church, and foundations only need to be laid once. After the apostles’ deaths, other offices besides apostleship, not requiring an eyewitness relationship with Jesus or His resurrection, would carry on the work.

The authority of the apostles today is seen in the New Testament writings of the apostles. The authority of the church is not found in a human being but in Scripture. That is why we as believers should invest time in studying Scripture, which is God’s authoritative Word for us today. We should measure everything we do by the Scriptures. That is why we should study them carefully.

Even though Jesus has not commissioned any apostles today, each believer is commissioned as a witness. (Acts 1:8) We are to be a witness as the subject in sharing the Good News with people and a witness as the object because people are looking at us and evaluating us. Also, according to Paul in 2 Corinthians 5:20, we are also ambassadors for the Messiah. We represent Him wherever we go and whatever we do! How are each of us doing as witnesses and ambassadors?

In contrast to an apostle was a disciple. I want to now distinguish a disciple from an apostle. In Israel in Jesus’ day, there were many disciples. A disciple was one who followed and submitted himself to rabbi to learn from him. The word rabbi means teacher. John the Baptizer and the Pharisees had disciples. Paul was a disciple of the well-known and respected Pharisee Gamaliel as seen in Acts 22:3 but is never called a disciple of Jesus. The word disciple is used 285 times in the four gospels, but is not used again in the New Testament, because the act of physically following a teacher was difficult in other cultures and may have been replaced by the word Christian in Acts 11:26 that says, “The disciples were first called Christians in Antioch.”  So, The word Christian means follower of Christ. Isn’t that what a Christian is? I am not in any suggesting way that we stop using the word disciple. I’m just giving you a little history on how the term disciple evolved. We do use the word disciple a lot today. It is patterned after the fact that believes in Jesus should submit themselves to Jesus and the New Covenant way of life. Even though Paul never uses the word, the discipleship pattern is found in 2 Timothy 2:2. “The things which you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses, entrust these to faithful men who will be able to teach others also.”

Willian Barclay asked several questions cornering being a disciple in his commentary on Luke. “It is possible to be a follower of Jesus without being a disciple; to be a camp-follower without being a soldier of the king; to be a hanger-on in some great work without pulling one's weight. Once someone was talking to a great scholar about a younger man. He said, 'So and so tells me that he was one of your students.' The teacher answered devastatingly, 'He may have attended my lectures, but he was not one of my students.' It is one of the supreme handicaps of the Church that in it there are so many distant followers of Jesus and so few real disciples.

 The New Daily Study Bible - The Gospel of Luke. Counting the Cost, Luke 14:25-33

Each of us should ask ourselves, since we refer to our self as a Christian, a follower of Christ, do we really live up to that name by actually submitting to and following Jesus and the New Covenant way of life or are we just attending class?

Paul asserted his apostleship in this salutation because he had learned that the Judaizers had sown seeds of legalism after he had planted the churches in Galatia and departed.  The Judaizers tried to discredit Paul as an impostor. If they could instill distrust among the Galatians regarding the accuracy or completeness of Paul's message or if they could drive a wedge between Paul and the other apostles, then the Galatians would readily listen to a more "Jewish" version. This version by the Judaizers emphasized doing the works of the Law to be saved and to grow as a believer in Jesus.

Paul was clear that he was not called or appointed to be an apostle by some official or by a search committee of men or the mother church in Jerusalem or his home church in Antioch, Syria. The word “but” is a very strong here and shows that His call was of heavily origin because he was called and sent by Jesus and by God the Father working in harmony with Jesus. Therefore, the good news he proclaimed was authoritative and true. Paul was called, appointed, and commissioned by Jesus on the road to Damascus to bear the name of Jesus before the Gentiles. (Acts 9:15)

Here the Father is said to be responsible for the resurrection of Jesus. However, other verses in Scripture gives to credit to Jesus and others give the credit to the Holy Spirit for the resurrection. The resurrection of Messiah here emphasizes the importance of that event to Paul's apostleship, because he was not called during the earthly ministry Jesus but by the power of the resurrected Messiah.

Vs. 2 – Paul does not mention any names in this verse because he was probably referring a general group of believes in his home church in Antioch who were “with” him. They were with him in two ways. They with him when he wrote this letter. They were also with him in that they agreed with him concerning the truth that salvation and sanctification come only through faith in the Messiah not by works the Mosaic Law.  This should remind us that we are all members of the same local church family at Johnson Ferry. For all practical purposes. most of the time, our Sunday Bible Study class is our church. We should always strive to maintain a family unity in our Sunday Bible Study class and in JFBC as a whole. Even though we do a great job at both, there is always room for improvement.

Notice that Paul wrote this epistle to the churches of Galatia. As mentioned before, Galatia was not a city such as Rome, Corinth, Ephesus, Philippi, or Colossae, but it was a Roman province. In the southern part of this province where the cities of Pisidian Antioch, Iconium, Lystra, and Derbe were located. Paul had planted churches in each of these cities. It is in these churches that the Judaizes were causing havoc among these new believers in Jesus.

Vs. 3 – Even though Paul did not praise the churches in Galatia in any way, he did send them a blessing of grace and peace. Grace and peace are gifts from God. We usually think of grace as unmerited favor, something we cannot earn, and so it is. But there is another meaning of the word grace. In other contexts, it means divine enablement or divine empowerment.  Here it means divine enablement or divine empowerment because these believes in Jesus had already received unmerited favor from God when they were saved.

When Paul used the Greek word for peace, he was probably thinking of the word Shalom that means peace in Hebrew. By trusting in Jesus as Savior, they already have peace or well-being with God.  Paul wanted them to have peace within themselves and peace with each other.

Please notice that Paul did not just say the Father but God our Father. Also, notice that he used the word Lord to describe Jesus the Messiah. The word Lord means master in some contexts. While Jesus was ministering on earth, He was addressed as Lord meaning Rabbi or Sir.  However, in this context and many others in relation to Jesus, it is ascribing divine nature and attributes to Him as Yahweh of the Old Testament as seen in Roman 10:9 which says, “that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord (Jesus as Yahweh of the Old Testament), and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.” So, in Galatians 1:3 Paul was saying that both the Father and Jesus are God. This is not only where grace and peace come from, but Paul’s calling and the good news he was preaching.

Vs. 4 – In this verse Paul gives the foundation for the message of the good news that Paul, the apostles, and that we proclaim today. Jesus who was just described as Lord or Yahweh of the Old Testament died voluntarily for our sins. The preposition “for” means that Jesus died in our place or on our behalf as our substitute and as our sacrifice so we would not have die for our sins. Paul here gives another purpose for Jesus’ sacrificial death – to rescue us from this present evil age. During of study of prophecy, we learned that there are two ages – the present age that ends at the second coming of Jesus and the age to come – the Messianic age. Jesus’ death rescues or delivers us from this present evil age. The word rescue or deliver harkens back to the Lord rescuing His’ people from Egypt. We have to live in this present evil age ruled by Satan, but the Lord delivers us from sin’s slavery and condemnation.  All of this is a result of Jesus’ sacrificial death and the resurrection power that was willed by God the Father. 

Vs. 5 – The saving work of Jesus’ death on the cross leads Paul to say that He deserves all the glory forever. Indeed, He does. The result of Jesus’ sacrificial death will have an eternal impact in many ways on those who put their faith in Him, as well as those who did not. The word glory relates to the Jesus’ splendor, radiance, majesty, and power. The term Amen that we say so many times after praying is an expression of faith that means a strong affirmation of what is stated or just let it be so.