Letter Of Liberty Series

The author of a tract entitled Come To Jesus got engaged in a

theological dispute, and he wrote another publication in which he

cut his opponent to pieces with razor sharp sarcasm. He let a friend

read it and then asked if he had any suggestions for a title. His

friend said, "How about Go To The Devil by the author of Come To

Jesus." The author recognized the inconsistency and responded to

the rebuke by not publishing the product of his anger. Be ye angry

and sin not said Paul. That is a easier thing to preach than to

practice. Many men of God have failed by displaying improper

anger. Moses let out a burst of rage and it cost him the privilege of

entering the promised land. Jonah's character will always be

marred by the fact that he was angry at God's mercy being shown to

those who deserve judgment. The fact is, it is very hard for any

servant of God to keep a proper balance, and be able to hate sin and

love the sinner.

The book of Galatians is an example of the fact that it can be

done. This is the only letter we have by Paul that was obviously

written in anger. Paul was fighting mad as he dictated this Epistle.

He reveals more of his emotions in this letter than anywhere. He is

angry at the Judaisers for trying to get the Galatians to give up their

liberty in Christ and go back under the law. He is angry and

frustrated at the Galatians because they are so foolish as to even

consider such a move.

Henricksen writes of the Epistle, "The spiritual atmosphere is

charged. It is sultry, sweltering. A storm is threatening. The sky is

darkening. In the distance one can see flashes of lightning....when

each line of verses 1-5 is read in the light of the letters occasion and

purpose the atmospheric turbulence is immediately detected."

Every commentary points to the atmosphere of anger surrounding

this letter. Paul uses restraint in the first few verses, but as soon as

he gets through the introduction he lets go with both barrels, and in

verses 6-9 he blasts both the Galatians for their folly in listening, and

the Judaisers for their folly in preaching a perversion of the Gospel.

Let them be cursed says Paul, and then he repeats it for emphasis.

Paul is angry because he loves Christ and the church too much to

see it injured by the folly of man. A study of this letter will not only

help us grasp better what we have in Christ, but it will help us also

to see just what we should get angry about as believers. We are too

often angry at the wrong things, and not angry about the things that

made Paul angry. Jesus and Paul both got angry when other people

were being robbed of their liberty by legalism.

Paul did not thank God for the Galatians, or for anything about

them, as he does in all of his other letters. It is not only what he

writes but what he leaves unwritten that tells us of his anger. There

is a legitimate place for anger in the Christian life, and even toward

fellow Christians. If it is handled properly it becomes a powerful

blessing. Paul's anger that motivated him to write this letter

changed the course of human history. We must grasp something of

the background of this letter before we study its contents, or we will

never come to appreciate its contents.

All of the first Christians were Jews, and as Jews they continued

to live under the law of Moses even as Christians. They did not

immediately throw off the Old Testament, for it was their Bible, and

the law of Moses was still their guide, and the temple was still their

holy place of worship. Most all of the leaders of the early church

were also Jews. When Paul began to bring Gentile converts into the

church, and establish Gentile churches, the Jewish leaders felt it was

their duty to go to these Gentiles and make it clear to them what was

required of them to be good Christians. These Judaisers, as they

were called, were sincere Christians, in many cases, who wanted to

make sure the Gentiles obeyed the law of Moses.

The problem was that they cast doubt on the sufficiency of

Christ. They said that faith in Christ was not enough, for you must

also keep the law. This was confusing to the Gentile Christians, but

they had no basis to argue with men of authority. They assumed

that they must know what they were talking about, and since they

wanted to do what God demanded they began to conform and make