Gal 5:1-15 FREED TO BE LIKE CHRIST
Paul concluded chapter 4 emphasizing the truth that we, as Christians, are no longer living under the slavery to the law.
• We are children of the promise, living in the freedom that Christ has obtained for us through the cross.
• He uses the allegories of Hagar and Sarah to emphasise that we are free from the law and should not return to trusting it for our righteousness.
Paul summed it up with this beautiful line in 5:1 “For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to the yoke of slavery.”
• FOR FREEDOM – that’s the goal of God in redeeming us through Christ, to set us free from the bondage of sin and its punishment, freeing us from death to life in Christ.
• CHRIST has set us free – only through Christ. Who set us free? Not the Law, not our efforts to keep the Law or the rites like circumcision. Christ alone redeemed us.
• STAND FIRM therefore and do not submit AGAIN to the yoke of slavery – which is to return to the practice of the law.
This verse can be used to sum up the whole book of Galatians. That is Paul’s theme for the book.
THE DANGER TO WATCH OUT FOR
Do not SHIFT from where you are – trust in Christ – and return ‘AGAIN’ to the previous practices of trusting the law for salvation.
• Paul has been belabouring this point at length in this book because false teachers have come and were enticing the Christians to return to Judaism.
• We could feel Paul’s concern in the text. Some believers might be contemplating returning to their old ways and Paul said, “No, stand firm.”
5:2 Look: I, Paul, say to you that if you accept circumcision, Christ will be of no advantage to you.
5:3 I testify again to every man who accepts circumcision that he is obligated to keep the whole law.
5:4 You are severed from Christ, you who would be justified by the law; you have fallen away from grace.
THREE POINTS he made:
1. If you return to your old “faith”, then you do not need Christ. Christ is useless to you. You are cut off from Christ.
2. If you accept circumcision and decide to keep the law, then are obligated to keep the whole law, not some of it. Failure in one means you are a transgressor.
3. If you want to be justified by the Law, then you have fallen away from grace. You are either righteous by the Law or by God’s grace.
So, are you going to return to the works of the law for your salvation?
• Do you want to return to being “children of the bondservant Hagar” and try to achieve God’s purpose through human efforts? “Try to get a baby yourself?”
• Or are you the children of the promise, born again through a miracle and the gift of God?
5:5 For through the Spirit, by faith, we ourselves eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness.
5:6 For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love.
We are saved by faith in Jesus Christ through the help of the Holy Spirit. We have this hope of righteousness because of Christ.
• It does not matter whether you have been circumcised or not, Jews or Gentiles, we are all saved by faith in Jesus Christ, expressing itself through love.
Paul painted the choice starkly – either Christ is everything or Christ is nothing.
• You either trust Him completely (and that is under grace) or you are cut off from Him completely (under self-effort and without grace).
Our problem today might not be circumcision but other forms of beliefs or rites.
• We elevate some things to the same level as the work of Christ, like doing good works, giving to charity, or you need to be a member of a church to be saved.
• You need to live a perfect and sinless life before God can accept you.
• Or adding Christian rites like water baptism. We raise the importance of baptism to the level of being saved only when we are baptised. “Not baptised, not saved.”
• Or the reverse, when you are baptised, you are automatically saved. Then if I dump myself in the water more, I shall be ‘more saved’!
• Or the over-emphasis on the modes of baptism – which one saves you more - immersion, sprinkling or pouring of water.
Our trust is in Jesus Christ and Jesus Christ alone. He alone changes us.
THE DECEIVERS TO GUARD AGAINST
5:7 You were running well. Who hindered you from obeying the truth?
5:8 This persuasion is not from Him who calls you. 5:9 A little leaven leavens the whole lump. (A proverb).
• Someone is trying to mislead you. Be careful, a little poison can destroy you.
5:10 I have confidence in the Lord that you will take no other view, and the one who is troubling you will bear the penalty, whoever he is.
• There seems to be one “Indian Chief” among the Judaizers.
5:11 But if I, brothers, still preach circumcision, why am I still being persecuted? In that case, the offence of the cross has been removed.
• Apparently, Paul was charged for still preaching circumcision, which he likely did in the past before his conversation.
• But not now because if it was so, then he would be singing their same tune and would not be persecuted.
• And the “offence of the cross” would not be there, referring to the message that salvation is by grace and not by man’s efforts…
• Which was what Paul has been preaching now. Man contributed nothing to his salvation.
5:12 I wish those who unsettle you would emasculate themselves!
• Paul ended with a strong remark in a sarcastic way:
“If cutting (circumcision) will make you righteous, why don’t you do like the pagan priests, go all the way and castrate yourself?”
• In another sense, Paul wished that these legalists would be cut off from the church and not cause further harm.
Know the truth and do not be deceived by these false teachers.
D. L. Moody shared this story about a former slave woman who lived through the Civil War. In 1862 Abraham Lincoln signed the “Emancipation Proclamation” freeing all slaves in the States. But as a former slave, she was confused about her status.
She would ask, “Now am I free, or am I not? When I go to my old master he says I ain’t free, and when I go to my people they say I am. And I don’t know whether I’m free or not. Some people told me that Lincoln signed a proclamation, but my master says he didn’t; he didn’t have any right to.”
Many Christians are confused on the same point. Jesus Christ has given them an “Emancipation Proclamation,” but their “old master” tells them they are still slaves. They live in bondage because their “old master” has deceived them.
We stand firm in the freedom that Christ has gained for us on the cross.
• Legalism can never make us good. It can only put us back into bondage and back to human efforts that cannot save us.
• When we start to trust our good works and self-efforts, our faith will not be in Jesus. That’s the danger.
• We begin to see Christians not living like Christ. Legalism takes the glory away from Christ and the cross.
So what defines this new life in Christ? What does freedom in Christ look like?
• I consider the rest of the book the most important part of Galatians.
• Paul concludes with an explanation of Christian freedom and describes it to us in very practical terms.
This is important because most have difficulty understanding this.
• When we say we are not going to return to the law and be legalistic, people tend to swing to the other extreme and think that it means, we can do anything we want.
• In our mind, we swing from under the “law” to being “lawless”; from slavery (bondage) to freedom (licentiousness), that is, the license to do anything.
That’s NOT the Christian freedom. That’s not the freedom Christ has given us.
• If we do that, we are swinging from one wrong to another wrong, because both extremes are wrong.
• The truth is, we are freed to become righteous like Christ. In the past, we could not because of sin but now we can.
[Paul is going to stress this in the section after this, on living by the Spirit.]
THE DEFINITION OF FREEDOM IN CHRIST
5:13 For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.
5:14 For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: “You shall love your neighbour as yourself.”
5:15 But if you bite and devour one another, watch out that you are not consumed by one another.
The first point that Paul made of this freedom in Christ is that it is a life of love.
• Sadly we can still use freedom “for the flesh” which is the danger. Hence his warning not to let this freedom become a license to do what we want.
• If we are not careful, we can take this freedom, spin it and use it to please ourselves at the expense of others. This is sad but is happening.
The truth is, even this Christian freedom has certain “restrictions” so to speak – governed by the character of Christ.
• “I am not doing what I like. I am doing what Christ likes and what He does.”
• Paul said earlier 2:20 “It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.”
• We are to walk by the Spirit, live by the Spirit and keep in step with the Spirit.
• Sin is no longer our master, but the Spirit is. He dwells IN us and WITH us.
As Paul said well, this Christian freedom is not “I will do what I want” but “I will do what others need”. “I will love them and serve them.”
• This is the antidote to a selfish, self-centred and self-absorbed life.
• With the freedom we have, we live to serve others and love them! And this is exactly the pattern set by Jesus. Our freedom is IN Christ and FOR Christ.
Paul was telling the Judaisers:
“You want to keep the law? Here you have it:
Love your neighbour as yourself and you have fulfilled the whole law.”
• You boasted about keeping the Law, but why am I seeing you legalists biting and devouring one another?
• You can fulfil the Law in one word: “Love your neighbour as yourself.”
I like the way Martin Luther puts it:
“You do not need any book of instructions to teach you how to love your neighbour. If you want to know how you ought to love your neighbour, ask yourself how much you love yourself.”
[paraphrased from his Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians (1535)]
That’s the number one virtue of someone born-again with the freedom and a new life in Christ is the desire to love and serve others!
• Do I see in yourself? Do we see that here?
