Galatian 5

Map of Galatia

Themelios: Volume 2, No. 3, May 1977 (1. The Destination and Date of Galatians)

Who then were these Galatians? The story must take us some way back into the history of Asia Minor.

King Nicomedes of Bithynia in 278/7 BC invited a horde of marauding Celts across into Asia to serve him as mercenaries. They quickly escaped his control and plundered the cities and states of the area mercilessly until defeated in about 230 by Attalus I, king of Pergamum, and restricted to a territory in North Central Anatolia around Ancyra, now Ankara, the capital of modern Turkey. These people were of the same stock as the Celts of Gaul (France), and their territory, once part of Phrygia, became known as ‘Galatia’, the Greek for ‘Gaul’.

When Rome acquired extensive territories in Asia Minor after 133 BC she came into contact and alliance with the Galatian Celts. Galatia became a client-kingdom of Rome in 64 BC, but in 25 BC Amyntas, its last king, fell in battle against the fierce brigand tribes of the Pisidian Taurus, on the southern border of the territory he had won at that date. Augustus promptly organized his kingdom as a Roman province. This province had no organic unity, ethnic or otherwise. Its boundaries were quite arbitrary, a sheer accident of history. They were evidently unsatisfactory from a purely military and political point of view, for to our knowledge they were repeatedly modified during the first 150 years of the Empire.

1 So Christ has truly set us free. Now make sure that you stay free, and don’t get tied up again in slavery to the law.

We have mentioned this before. Don’t Get caught up in any kind of Slavery to any kind of behavior or actions!

Restore a wayward friend meekly.

2 Listen! I, Paul, tell you this: If you are counting on circumcision to make you right with God, then Christ will be of no benefit to you. 4 For if you are trying to make yourselves right with God by keeping the law, you have been cut off from Christ! You have fallen away from God’s grace.

Keep watch over yourselves

If you're thinking “I don’t do that!” Change it to a face tattoo, or a shaved head, or a clerical collar, or dress like a St. Joseph nun. PICTURE

5 But we who live by the Spirit eagerly wait to receive by faith the righteousness God has promised to us. 6 For when we place our faith in Christ Jesus, there is no benefit in being circumcised or being uncircumcised. What is important is faith expressing itself in love.

Philippians 1:6 And I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns.

Job 17:9 The righteous keep moving forward, and those with clean hands become stronger and stronger.

Who or what is holding you back? Kids? Spouse/marriage, friends? Job? Parents? your head?

7 You were running the race so well. Who has held you back from following the truth? 8 It certainly isn’t God, for he is the one who called you to freedom. 9 This false teaching is like a little yeast that spreads through the whole batch of dough! 10 I am trusting the Lord to keep you from believing false teachings. God will judge that person, whoever he is, who has been confusing you.

The Lord really does not want you to be confused

11 Dear brothers and sisters, if I were still preaching that you must be circumcised—as some say I do—why am I still being persecuted? If I were no longer preaching salvation through the cross of Christ, no one would be offended. 12 I just wish that those troublemakers who want to mutilate you by circumcision would mutilate themselves.

Do you see the way he said that in verse 12?Just wish. Not I Hope or I Pray....

13 For you have been called to live in freedom, my brothers and sisters. But don’t use your freedom to satisfy your sinful nature. Instead, use your freedom to serve one another in love. 14 For the whole law can be summed up in this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” 15 But if you are always biting and devouring one another, watch out! Beware of destroying one another.

Do good with everyone

You are not called to live in freedom to do the frivolous things you had done when you were unsaved.

Living by the Spirit’s Power

How the Holy Spirit leads is not by delivering private information to the mind, but

1.by humbling us to be teachable.

2. by inclining us to Christ as he is revealed in the word.

3. by opening our minds and hearts to be formed by what we see there (in the word).

4. by giving specific illustrations and injunctions in the word of what the Christ formed life is like.

5. by granting us wisdom to act in Christ exalting ways in situations where there are no specific instructions

6, and by telling us to use our thinking and willing us not to be passive, but to pursue all these gifts and enabling us to do this

16 So I say, let the Holy Spirit guide your lives. Then you won’t be doing what your sinful nature craves. 17 The sinful nature wants to do evil, which is just the opposite of what the Spirit wants. And the Spirit gives us desires that are the opposite of what the sinful nature desires. These two forces are constantly fighting each other, so you are not free to carry out your good intentions. 18 But when you are directed by the Spirit, you are not under obligation to the law of Moses.

19 When you follow the desires of your sinful nature, the results are very clear: sexual immorality, impurity, lustful pleasures, 20 idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition, dissension, division, 21 envy, drunkenness, wild parties, and other sins like these. Let me tell you again, as I have before, that anyone living that sort of life will not inherit the Kingdom of God.

Don’t grow weary of doing good.

22 But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things!

24 Those who belong to Christ Jesus have nailed the passions and desires of their sinful nature to his cross and crucified them there. 25 Since we are living by the Spirit, let us follow the Spirit’s leading in every part of our lives. 26 Let us not become conceited, or provoke one another, or be jealous of one another.