Galatians 5:1-15
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Today's Passage: Galatians 5:1-15
I recommend looking up on YouTube, Dr. Os Guinness: "A Free People's Suicide." In it he discusses the paradox of freedom:
“Freedom cannot be maintained by structures of liberty. It requires the spirit of liberty—it is a matter of the heart. Freedom requires ordering, and the only ordering appropriate to freedom is self-restraint—not restraint imposed from the outside. But self-restraint is precisely what’s undermined when freedom flourishes.
The major reason freedom undermines itself is that it quickly moves down toward permissiveness and then eventually license. Freedom is not the permission to do what you like, it is the power to do what you ought—and that paradox of freedom is demonstrated by all the [no longer] free societies in history.”
For freedom Christ has set us free. We celebrate freedom yet understand so little about it. We often treat freedom in the sense that Dr. Guinness discusses it—license to do what I want. However, Paul said in verse 13, “do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh.” When we lack the self-restraint and use freedom for sin, we return to the shackles held by the master of this world. The evidence of such, you’ll read tomorrow as “the works of the flesh.”
However, outright gratification isn’t the only bondage we see in Galatians. It is not the only yoke of slavery. The gratification listed as works of the flesh aren’t the beginning of sin, but the result of sinfulness. For example, I am not angry, which causes me to sin. Instead, I have a heart enslaved to sin, therefore it gets expressed through anger (the same is true of the other works of the flesh).
So what bondage is Paul fighting against? Much of Galatians is written to the Judaizers who would put the yoke of the Mosaic Law onto Christians—especially Gentile Christians. The yoke of slavery refers directly to the acceptance of circumcisions, but points toward a Christ-less salvation based on good works. If merit is the key to salvation, then one “is obligated to keep the whole law,” which is impossible. Otherwise, I become the standard. Eventually, my “structures of liberty” will fail and I turn to gratification and, ultimately, bondage.
The only key to liberty is through the Spirit, by faith, we eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness. Living by the Spirit—whom we receive by grace through faith in Jesus as our Lord and Savior—is evidence of our relationship with Jesus Christ. We need not return to other acts to gain merit from the Lord other than what our Savior has accomplished for us. Verses 7–12, Paul issues hard words for those that would add such obligations to the Gospel.
Our freedom in Christ isn’t simply freedom from, it’s freedom for. We’re not just free from sin, we’re free for righteousness. Let us not add to the all sufficient merit of Jesus by returning to old ways of thinking or doing. Let us rightly understand and dwell on the grace of the Gospel. Let us celebrate liberty.
Give a listen to this song from 2nd Corinthians 3:17 and share what God is teaching you in this passage.
https://youtu.be/eRdMZrAmCZo
Written By: Tyler Short
Today's Passage: Galatians 5:1-15
I recommend looking up on YouTube, Dr. Os Guinness: "A Free People's Suicide." In it he discusses the paradox of freedom:
“Freedom cannot be maintained by structures of liberty. It requires the spirit of liberty—it is a matter of the heart. Freedom requires ordering, and the only ordering appropriate to freedom is self-restraint—not restraint imposed from the outside. But self-restraint is precisely what’s undermined when freedom flourishes.
The major reason freedom undermines itself is that it quickly moves down toward permissiveness and then eventually license. Freedom is not the permission to do what you like, it is the power to do what you ought—and that paradox of freedom is demonstrated by all the [no longer] free societies in history.”
For freedom Christ has set us free. We celebrate freedom yet understand so little about it. We often treat freedom in the sense that Dr. Guinness discusses it—license to do what I want. However, Paul said in verse 13, “do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh.” When we lack the self-restraint and use freedom for sin, we return to the shackles held by the master of this world. The evidence of such, you’ll read tomorrow as “the works of the flesh.”
However, outright gratification isn’t the only bondage we see in Galatians. It is not the only yoke of slavery. The gratification listed as works of the flesh aren’t the beginning of sin, but the result of sinfulness. For example, I am not angry, which causes me to sin. Instead, I have a heart enslaved to sin, therefore it gets expressed through anger (the same is true of the other works of the flesh).
So what bondage is Paul fighting against? Much of Galatians is written to the Judaizers who would put the yoke of the Mosaic Law onto Christians—especially Gentile Christians. The yoke of slavery refers directly to the acceptance of circumcisions, but points toward a Christ-less salvation based on good works. If merit is the key to salvation, then one “is obligated to keep the whole law,” which is impossible. Otherwise, I become the standard. Eventually, my “structures of liberty” will fail and I turn to gratification and, ultimately, bondage.
The only key to liberty is through the Spirit, by faith, we eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness. Living by the Spirit—whom we receive by grace through faith in Jesus as our Lord and Savior—is evidence of our relationship with Jesus Christ. We need not return to other acts to gain merit from the Lord other than what our Savior has accomplished for us. Verses 7–12, Paul issues hard words for those that would add such obligations to the Gospel.
Our freedom in Christ isn’t simply freedom from, it’s freedom for. We’re not just free from sin, we’re free for righteousness. Let us not add to the all sufficient merit of Jesus by returning to old ways of thinking or doing. Let us rightly understand and dwell on the grace of the Gospel. Let us celebrate liberty.
Give a listen to this song from 2nd Corinthians 3:17 and share what God is teaching you in this passage.
https://youtu.be/eRdMZrAmCZo
Written By: Tyler Short
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