02.17. ESSAY NO. 17

ESSAY NO. 17 The book of Galatians champions Christian liberty and nobility, and challenges legalistic bondage and bigotry; it is a comparative study of the religion of the Spirit and the religion of the flesh. Galatians 5:1-26, Galatians 6:1-18, especially, warn against the perversions and abortions into which legalism sinks the church. To correct the strange misunderstanding that Christian liberty gives license to indulge the flesh, Paul discusses four points under the heading, "Use not your freedom for an occasion to the flesh": first, do not be lawless and consume one another; second, do not be unclean and wallow in the filth of the flesh; third, do not be proud and despotic; fourth, do not be avaricious and parsimonious. The legalistic Christian in falling "away from grace," inevitably falls into some or all of these fleshpots. The assertion that the addition of the legal principle would promote good morals and spirituality in the Galatian churches is not being fulfilled. Rather, the flesh is running riot to the peril of clean living and Christianity. Paul shows that the pride of the flesh causes much of their abuse of Christian liberty.

Gaining a Brother

"Even if a man be overtaken in any trespass, ye who are spiritual, restore such a one in a spirit of gentle­ness; looking to thyself, lest thou also be tempted" (Galatians 6:1). Even a Christian over whom the flesh does not reign, may be so pursued by the flesh, which ever stalks him, that he sins. This verse does not contem­plate a reckless sinner who overtakes sin, or meets it head-on. This man, like Adam in Eden, is "afraid" and ashamed. He needs a kind, understanding brother to lift him out of the remorse that leads to despair up to the repentance that restores. In such cases, legalists, smug and secure in their false self-competency, thinking they cannot fall and that all should be just like them, are stern, exacting and incapable of being gen­tle and tender with others. Paul wrote the church at Corinth about the restoration of penitent brothers who had fallen: "Forgive him and comfort him, lest by any means such a one should be swallowed up with overmuch sorrow" (2 Corinthians 2:7-11). In the event his recommendation concerning an of­fending brother should work, Christ says, "Thou hast gained thy brother" (Matthew 18:15). Gaining the brother is the first purpose of discipline. The self-righteous bigot, who cannot see his brother for whom Christ died with a brother’s eye, and who thinks the way to restore him is to "talk down" to him with an air of, "I never would have even thought of doing such a thing," had better not attempt it. I have read of a prisoner who resented all "church workers" until a meek Christian man went to his cell, sat beside him with an arm about him, and said: "Was it not good in God to send his Son to die for poor sinners like you and me?" That thawed the ice at his heart. This man could understand the prisoner because he understood himself and the gospel of grace. He did not deceive himself by thinking he was "something" when he was "nothing." Not until a man realizes that he has no merit before God, and can never have, can he be really gentle with men. Without compromising truth or wink­ing at sin, spiritual men can correct brethren without offending or humiliating them.

Bearing Burdens

"Bear ye one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ" (Galatians 6:2). To sympathize with and help each other bear the common infirmities of mortal life should be as natural for Christians, who are parts of the same organism and who share the same nature, as for the various members of the human body to help each other. Christians may also share with one another the burdens arising from the troubles and sins of oth­ers, as, for instance, a mother brokenhearted over a sinful child. All such bearing of burdens fulfills the law of Christ, which reads: "A new commandment I give unto you that ye should love one another; even as I have loved you." Of course too, Christians are happy to follow and fulfill up to their measure, the life of Christ, the great burden Bearer.

There is an undercurrent of thought here, which comes more to the surface in Romans 15:15-21 and 2 Corinthians 10:12-18. Throughout his missionary career, Paul, res­olutely refusing to build on another’s foundation, sought out new fields. After he had planted the church in Galatia, Judaizers came in to take over. They thought they were very superior to Paul, gave them­selves airs, loaded men down with "burdens grievous to be borne," which they would not so much as touch with their little fingers, and lorded it over the church generally. That Christians should "mutual burdens bear" never once entered their minds. Are not these Galatian Judaizers much like some pre-Christian Pharisees and lawyers, whom Christ encountered in Jerusalem? Paul’s having once been an unbending legalist himself gives him their number precisely. Legalism, because it makes man the center and meas­ure, never has made, nor can it ever make, spiritual men. The religion of the flesh is destructively and fatally off center.

Paul is setting the Judaizers in their place and res­cuing the church from their strangle hold. Let them cease being puffed up with fictitious self-importance, and, with envious scorn, setting better men aside; cease boosting the defunct power and glory of Judaism, and, bloated with ignorant pride, cease imposing an impossible legal yoke on the neck of God’s free sons. Let them get out and "prove," not just think, they are something; let them do some real honest, independent Christian work, because after all, a Christian is known by his own work and character, not his neighbor’s. The Greek word translated "burden" (Galatians 6:5) is not the word rendered "burdens" (Galatians 6:2). The practical lesson is that a Christian’s own life is the basis of his standing and reward. Concerning this class of men in Corinth, Paul wrote: "For we are not bold to number or compare ourselves with certain of them that commend them­selves: but they themselves measuring themselves by themselves, and comparing themselves with them­selves, are without understanding" (2 Corinthians 10:12). Men’s comparing themselves with other men is idle and wholly of the unwholesome flesh. It is like a child’s thinking he is nine feet high because a, false yardstick which he made himself says he is. If they want a standard of comparison, let them use Christ, the proper standard and touchstone of life and work; if they must have law, let them fulfill his law of love.