Galatians 5

Galatians 5:17

Gal. 5:17. “For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other; so that ye cannot do the things that ye would.” By this, with the context, it seems that grace in the heart is no other than the Spirit of God dwelling in the heart, and becoming a principle of life and action there, acting and exalting its nature in the exercise of men’s faculties. (1.) By the Spirit here spoken of, that lusteth against the flesh, seems plainly to be meant grace in the heart, or the gracious nature in man or man’s regenerated and renewed part, which is opposite to the flesh or to the corrupt part. For that by the flesh is meant the corrupt nature, is most evident by Galatians 5:19-21, and Romans 7:5-18. By the Spirit, therefore, is doubtless meant the spiritual or gracious nature that is begun in man in his regeneration. Doubtless by the flesh and Spirit, that the Apostle says lust one against another, he means the same as by the “law of the members and law of the mind,” that he says war one against another, in the 7th of his Epistle to the Romans, at the 23rd verse (Romans 7:23). “But I see another law in my members warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members;” which is further evident in that the Apostle there, in the continuation of the discourse of the same things, he uses the very terms of “flesh and Spirit” so much after the same manner as in this context, as may be seen by comparison, that it is most evident that he means the very same thing. (2.) That the Spirit spoken of here, and in other parallel texts, as signifying the gracious or holy nature in the regenerate, is the Spirit of God, seems plain by the context. For no doubt but the same is meant by the Spirit here, as in Galatians 5:16; Galatians 5:18-25; but is more clearly evident by the 8th chapter of Romans (Romans 8), where the Apostle is speaking of “flesh and Spirit” in like manner as here, and as we have shown already by “flesh and Spirit” he there intends the corrupt and the gracious nature. And it is evident that the Spirit there spoken of is the Spirit of God or Christ, by the 9th, 10th, 11th verses, and by the 13th and 14th verses.

Those extraordinary principles of operation that Christians in those days were endued with, were called the spirit of the persons that had them, because they were nothing but the Spirit of God dwelling in them, and becoming a principle in them of such a sort of operation. (See Note on 1 Corinthians 14:32.) So the principle of grace or gracious nature that all Christians have, is called the Spirit, because it is nothing but the Spirit of God dwelling in them, and becoming in them a principle of gracious and holy exercises. For the better understanding why the corrupt nature and the gracious or regenerate nature are called “flesh and Spirit,” it is to be considered that man, as he was first created, was endued with two kinds of principles, natural and spiritual.

By natural principles, I mean the principles of human nature, as human nature is in this world - that is, in its animal state, as human nature is in this world - that is, in its animal state, or that belonging to the nature of man as man, or that belonging to his humanity, or that naturally and necessarily flow from the inner human nature. Such is a man’s love to his own honor, love of his own pleasure, the natural appetites that he has by means of the body, etc. His spiritual principles were his love to God, and his relish of Divine beauties and enjoyments, etc. These may be called supernatural, because they are no part of human nature. They do not belong to the nature of man as man, nor do they naturally and necessarily flow from the faculties and properties of that nature. Man can be man without them; they did not flow from anything in the human nature, but from the Spirit of God dwelling in man, and exerting itself by man’s faculties as a principle of action.

So that man’s entire nature, in his primitive state, was constituted of “flesh and spirit,” that part of his entire nature that consists in the principles of the mere human nature, or that is the human nature in its perfect animal state, simply and absolutely considered, is flesh. The human nature or humanity, in that animal state in which it is in this world, is often called flesh in Scripture - Genesis 6:12; Psalms 65:2; Isaiah 40:5; Isaiah 40:6; Isaiah 49:26; Isaiah 66:16; Matthew 24:22, and John 1:14.

The human nature, as it is after the resurrection, is not called flesh, being then no longer in its animal state: 1 Corinthians 15:50. “Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption.” That spiritual nature which he had, consisting in those holy principles that he had, was quite a distinct thing, and it was only the Spirit of God dwelling in man, and exerting its nature by man’s faculties. Man’s natural principles, or those principles of humanity that man had, were in his primitive state very good; because that man’s spiritual principles that he had were to that degree as the Spirit dwelt and acted in him to that degree, that the natural principles were entirely subordinate to them. Then the flesh did not lust against the Spirit. These two natures, or two sorts of principles, were, by an entire, an absolute subordination of one to the other, united, so as to be, as it were, one nature. The spiritual principles bare absolute rule, and therefore man was then wholly spiritual, because he lived in the Spirit, and walked wholly in the Spirit, and the flesh was only a servant to the Spirit. But when man fell, then the Spirit of God left him, and so all his spiritual nature or spiritual principles; and then only the flesh was left, or merely the principle of human nature in its animal state.

They were now left alone, without spiritual principles to govern and direct them, so that man became wholly carnal, and so wholly corrupt. For the principles of human nature, when alone and left to themselves, are principles of corruption, and there are no other principles of corruption in man but these.

Corrupt nature is nothing else but the principle of human nature in its animal state, or the flesh (as it is called in Scripture) left to itself, or not subordinated to spiritual principles; and so far as it is unsubordinate, so far is it corrupt. When a man is regenerate, then again the Spirit is restored to him, and spiritual principles in a degree; so then again there is “flesh and spirit.” But so little of the Spirit is given, that the flesh, or principles of human nature, are not absolutely and perfectly subject and subordinate, so that the flesh, or the principles of human nature, lust against the Spirit. And this is the reason that these two natures in the saints, the corrupt nature, and the gracious or regenerate nature, are called “flesh and Spirit,” - viz., because the corrupt nature is only the principles of the human nature (which is often in Scripture called flesh), yet in great measure not subordinated to spiritual principles. And the regenerate, or gracious nature, is only the Spirit of God dwelling in the heart, and acting and exerting His own nature by man’s faculties. There are two things that do confirm that, by the “flesh” in this text and parallel places, is meant human nature left in a measure to itself. The first is that the natural man and the carnal mind are evidently synonymous in Scripture (1 Corinthians 2:14; 1 Corinthians 2:15).

There we find natural and spiritual opposed one to another. “The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God.” “But he that is spiritual judgeth all things;” and then in the next verse but one - viz., in the first verse of the third chapter (1 Corinthians 3:1) - we find carnal and spiritual in like manner opposed, and as signifying the same - “And I, brethren, could not speak unto you as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal, even as unto babes in Christ;” where it is most evident that, by carnal and spiritual, he means the same as he did before by natural and spiritual. I would argue thus from it, that if natural and carnal are synonymous, then nature and flesh are synonymous.

A natural man is one that has only the principles of human nature; the word in the original seems to hold forth thus much, and this is the carnal man. And then, secondly, which strengthens this, and is strengthened by it, is that the Apostle in the same context explains what he means by carnal - viz., walking as men, or, as it is in the original, according to man. 1 Corinthians 3:3, “Are ye not carnal, and walk according to man?” or according to the humanity, or the principles of the human nature in its animal state as the governing principles. To the same purpose is that in 1 Peter 4:2. “That he no longer should live the rest of his time in the flesh to the lusts of men, but to the will of God.” (See note in the place.) Corruption of heart is called “flesh” in Scripture, not chiefly because the corruption of man’s nature in great part consists in the inordinancy of bodily appetites, as appears, because the Apostle in Colossians 2:18 does call the mind fleshly, particularly on account of its being corrupted with the other sort of lusts - viz., the lusts of the mind intruding into those things that he hath not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind. It is therefore not so much on this account that corruption is called flesh, as because it is from human nature left to itself. The Scripture does expressly explain itself as to the meaning of the word natural - that it is being destitute of the spirit of God, and so having nothing above human nature, Jude 1:19. “sensual, having not the Spirit.” The word in the original is the same that is translated natural in other places. That, by flesh or fleshly, as the words are used in the New Testament, as opposite to Spirit and spiritual, respect is not only had to those lusts or appetites that are appetites of the body or desires of the objects of the external senses, is evident, because these terms are applied to pride, the most special of all lusts.

Colossians 2:18. “Vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind.” So 1 Corinthians 3:3; 1 Corinthians 3:4. “For ye are yet carnal: for whereas there is among you envying, and strife, and divisions, are ye not carnal, and walk as men? For while one saith, I am of Paul; and another, I am of Apollos; are ye not carnal?” - Coroll. 1.

Hence we may learn Christ’s meaning in what He says to Nicodemus, John 3:6. “That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.” There are then two natures in man - the flesh, or the mere human nature, and the spiritual nature. The aim of Christ is to inform which nature is of the first generation, and which of the second. By “flesh” Christ does not mean only the body, for there is more born by the first generation than that. - Coroll. 2. Hence we may learn what is the meaning of the word spiritual as it is often used in the New Testament. It is not intended in contradistinction from corporeal; but things are said to be spiritual as relating to the Spirit of God, especially as dwelling in the hearts of the saints. Thus the godly man is called spiritual because he has the Spirit of God dwelling in him, and acting by his faculties, as is evident by 1 Corinthians 15 compared with the context, beginning with the tenth verse. (See “Mastricht Theologia de Regeneratione,” p. 661, a.) - Coroll. 3.

Hence we may learn in what sense the body at the resurrection is said to be a spiritual body. 1 Corinthians 15:44, “It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body;” not spiritual in opposition to material or corporeal - for a spiritual body in that sense would be a contradiction - but spiritual in this sense that has been mentioned in coroll. 2 - not in opposition to corporeal, but to natural or animal. “It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body.” It is sown with animal faculties and appetites suited to the needs and purposes of the animal, frail, corruptible nature.

But when it shall be raised again, it shall be raised without these faculties and appetites; but all the faculties and properties that it shall be endowed with shall be directly suited and subservient to the purposes of the Spirit, of His gracious principle, or of that Divine and holy nature which God hath imparted to His saints. It is evident that the body in its present state is called a natural body, and in its future a spiritual body, with relation to that animal nature that we derive from the first Adam, and that quickening Spirit, or holy and spiritual nature, that we derive from the second Adam, by the following verse: “But if ye be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law.”

Galatians 5:18

Gal. 5:18. “But if ye be led by the Spirit, ye are not under the law.” Here inquire, 1. In what sense they are not under the law; and, 2. Why it is said, Ye are not under the law, if ye are led by the Spirit; or wherein is the connection between being led by the Spirit, and not being under the law. Inq. I. In what sense Christians are not under the law? Answ. In one word, They are not under the law as servants; for this is what the apostle insisted on, in the 4th chapter, and latter end of the 3rd, that Christians are not under a schoolmaster, but a father, Galatians 3:25; Galatians 3:26; Galatians 4:2; that they are not servants, but children, Galatians 4:1-7, especially the 7th verse; that they are not the children of the bond-woman, but of the free, and so are not in a state of bondage, but in a state of liberty, as Galatians 4:9-31; and it is the argument the apostle is still upon in this chapter, as verse 1, etc. And it is evident, that, by being under the law in this verse, the apostle means, being under the law as a servant; or as being under the law, is opposite to a state of liberty; by the immediate context, and by the manner in which this and the intermediate verses are introduced, by Galatians 5:13, “Brethren, ye have been called unto liberty, only use not liberty for an occasion to the flesh,” etc. which may be seen. So the apostle opposes being under the law to liberty, in the beginning of this chapter, and so in the latter part of the foregoing chapter: see the 21st verse (Galatians 4:21), compared with the allegory, Galatians 4:25. He tells us that Agar the bond-woman represents mount Sinai, the mount where the law was given. So being under the law, is called being under a schoolmaster, and under tutors and governors; which is opposed to being children, Galatians 3:24-26 and chap. 4:2 with context. Yea, a being under the law is expressly opposed to being children, chap. 4:5 and is called being servants, verse 7. By these things it is most evident that the apostle here, when he says Christians are not under the law, means only that they were not under the law as servants or bondmen, or in any sense wherein a being under the law is opposite to liberty, or the state of children. I. They were not under the ceremonial law at all; which was a yoke of bondage, a law adapted to a servile state of the church, or the state of the church’s minority, wherein it differs nothing from a servant, as Galatians 4:1-3; where it is evident the ceremonial law is especially intended, by the expression of the elements of the world there used. It is evident that, by being under the law, the apostle has a special respect to the ceremonial law, from Galatians 4:9-11 and Galatians 5:3; Galatians 5:6; Galatians 5:11 and from the occasion and drift of the whole epistle. II. They are not under the moral law, as servants. Not only the ceremonial but the moral law is intended in the words; as is evident from the context, as particularly the Galatians 5:14; Galatians 5:23. Children in a family, where things are in their regular order, i.e. where the father has the proper qualifications and spirit of a father, and the children, of children, are not so properly under law, as the servants. The commands of a father in such a family to his children, especially if the children be not in their minority, is not called law, in the same sense, as the edicts of an absolute monarch to his subjects. Laws are not made for children, and for intimate and dear friends, but for servants.

A being under the law, in the more ordinary use of the expression among the apostles, was inconsistent with liberty; a being under the law, and enjoying liberty, were opposites; and therefore the phrase, the law of liberty, is used by the apostle James as paradoxical. To be under law, is to be under the declaration of the will of another, not only as an instruction or doctrine for our direction in acting, but to be under it as a rule of judgment, or a being under the justifying or condemning power of it. A being under the law in this sense is the apostle’s meaning as is evident by the 4th verse of this chapter (Galatians 5:4), and by Galatians 3 per totum: vid. Romans 8:1. For what is said in that 3rd chapter, introduces what follows in these two succeeding chapters. They cannot be said to be under the law where the breaches of the law are not imputed to them; sin is not imputed where there is no law; and, vice versa (in a sense), there is no law, or persons are not under the law, where sin is not imputed. The doctrine of the holy will of God, as revealed, and directed to those that are in Christ, is improperly called giving law: where we find it so called, that word is used out of its strictly proper sense. The giving law to another is the exacting conformity to the declared will of the lawgiver. There may be a command without a law: a declaration of another’s will, without an exaction, is not a giving law: a being under the law, is being under such an exaction. God may be said to exact obedience of men to the commands of the law, when he signifies, or makes known to them, that they are by his power held bound either to obedience or the penalty of the law. And they that receive a declaration of another’s will, but at the same time have it not exacted of them, have it not as a law, but only as an instruction or doctrine. A declaration of a superior’s will without its being signified or supposed that it will be exacted by power, may be called a doctrine, a rule, a precept, or command, but not a law, unless improperly, as God’s declaration of his will to his saints is called the law of liberty: the expression shows that the word is not designed to be used in this strictly proper sense. Object. But is not sincere obedience exacted of believers, though perfect obedience be not? The Scripture often gives us to understand that no man can be saved, and that every one shall perish, without sincere obedience. Ans. I. If sincere obedience be exacted of them, yet it is not by the law by which it is exacted of them. The thing that the law exacts is perfect, and not sincere, obedience. It is a contradiction to suppose that any law requires and exacts any other than conformity to itself, or, which is the same thing, perfectly as much, or full as much, as it requires or exacts. Sincere obedience, or sincerely aiming at obedience, is not required or exacted by the law, in any other way than as we consider it as a part of perfect obedience, or a part of that conformity to the law, and so it is no more exacted by the law than the perfect obedience is. If the whole is not exacted, a part is no more exacted than the whole; a part of the conformity to the law cannot be exacted by the law any more than conformity, because it is not exacted at all only because it is a part of conformity and included in it; and therefore if conformity is not exacted of believers by the law, or which is the same thing, perfect obedience, no more is a part of conformity. So that no obedience at all is exacted of believers of the law. They are not under the law in whole nor in part, for conformity is by the law exacted of all that are under it; Christ has freed them from the whole law, by fulfilling the law for them.

So that if any obedience at all be exacted of believers, it is not by the law, but it must be by some other constitution, or superadded law. But, II. It is not properly by any other constitution made since the law. There is indeed nothing properly exacted of any man whatsoever by any other constitution than the law. Indeed faith, and so sincere obedience, which is virtually implied in it, are by a new constitution made the conditions of salvation. Salvation is promised to them, and they are declared to be the only conditions of salvation, so that without them we still lie under condemnation, and must perish. Yet it will not hence follow that any new constitution or law does exact faith and sincere obedience, or require them upon pain of perishing, or suffering any punishment at all of any man whatsoever; because it is not by virtue of the new constitution, which was only an offer or promise, that he perishes or suffers in unbelief, but by virtue of the law only that he was under before.

If a criminal is to be put to death for his breach of the law, and his prince offers him a pardon if he will accept of it at his hands, acknowledging his grace in it; if he refuses the king’s offer, he is not pardoned but suffers, and the law is executed upon him. But the prince cannot be properly said by a new law or edict to exact it of him, that he should thankfully accept of pardon; for his execution is by virtue of a law made before that he had broke, and not by any new law, nor by that new act of his prince, his offering him pardon. It is not by virtue of any threatening contained in that new act, but the threatening of the law that he had before broke, that he suffers. Yea, though besides his suffering for all that breach of law, the pardon of which he refused, he may also suffer for his refusal, he may receive an additional punishment from his affronting the king in his contemptuous rejecting his gracious offer. Yet it will not follow that acceptance of pardon was properly exacted of him as by law, for that additional suffering for his affront may also be by virtue of the law that he was under before, and the threatening of that, and not any threatening implied in the king’s offer: that may be contained in the law, that whoever by his behavior affronts or casts contempt upon the king, shall be punished according to the degree of the affront: and he may be punished for his rejecting of the king’s offer, by virtue of this, and not by virtue of any threatening contained in that new act of the king in offering pardon. Accepting the offer, indeed, is exacted of him; but it is exacted by the law and not by the offer. So faith and repentance, and sincere obedience, are indeed exacted of sinners, upon pain of eternal damnation, but not by the gospel. Eternal life is offered upon these terms by the gospel, and eternal damnation is threatened for the want of them by the law. Unbelief in the present state of things is a great immorality, and as such forbidden by the law, and faith is strictly commanded, and as a duty of the law is exacted of all that are under the law. It is not by the gospel, but by the law, that unbelief is a sin that exposes to eternal damnation, as is evident, because we have the pardon of the sin of unbelief by the death of Christ, which shows that Christ died to satisfy for the sin of unbelief, as well as other sins, but Christ was to answer the law, and satisfy that: he in his death endured the curse of the law. Galatians 3:10-13 and Romans 8:3; Romans 8:4. It is absurd to say that Christ died to satisfy the gospel, or to bear the punishment of that. Inq. II. Why is it said, “If ye are led by the Spirit, ye are not under the law?” or what is the connection between being led by the Spirit, and not being under the law? Ans. The connection consists in two things: 1. As this evidences their not being under the law. 2. It renders them not the proper subjects of law. I. Their being led by the Spirit, is an evidence of their being in Christ, who has fulfilled the law, and delivered them from it. The Spirit is given in Scripture as the proper evidence of being in Christ, 1 Corinthians 1:22; 1 Corinthians 5:5; Ephesians 1:13; Ephesians 1:14; Ephesians 4:30; Romans 8:9; 1 John 3:24; 1 John 4:13. It is the proper evidence of their being children, for it is the Spirit of the Son, Galatians 4:6. “As many as are led by the Spirit of God are the sons of God, because it is the Spirit of adoption.” Romans 8:14. “But the children are not under the law as servants.” II. A being led by the Spirit is a thing that causes that alteration with respect to them, that renders them unapt to be the subjects of law.

1. By their having the Spirit given them, they are advanced to that state that does not agree with a state of subjection to the law. 2 Corinthians 3:17, “Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty;” see Note on that verse. For hereby they are regenerated, are born of God, and do become the sons of God; they are hereby assimilated to the Son of God in nature and state. Being sons, it is suitable that they should be dealt with after another manner: to hold them under the law, is to treat them as servants, as in the 6th and 7th verses of the preceding chapter, “And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father; wherefore thou art no more a servant, but a son.”
2. The Spirit of Christ in Christians, or Spirit of adoption actuating and leading, is a principle that supersedes the law, and sets them above law, upon two accounts: (1.) By their having this principle, so far as it prevails, they are above the need of the exaction of the law, and therefore are such as the law was not given for, and are not aimed at in the law. They have a spirit of love and truth that fulfills the law, 1 Timothy 1:9 the thing that is aimed at by the law, as in the 14th and 16th verses of the context (Galatians 5:14; Galatians 5:16). They do not need the exaction of the law to drive them to their duty; for, so far as they are led by the Spirit, they are of themselves naturally inclined to the same things that the law requires, and derive strength from God according to his promises to fulfill them. The fruits of the Spirit are such, as they by the Spirit without the law are inclined and enabled to, such as love, joy, peace, etc.; are such as the law is not against, as in the 22nd and 23rd verses of the context, “Against such there is no law.” The filial Spirit, or Spirit of love and truth, fulfills the law; that is, the law obliges to no other things but what this Spirit inclines to, and is sufficient for. The law was not made for those that are already sufficiently disposed to all things contained it. 1 Timothy 1:9, “The law is not made for a righteous man, but for the lawless and disobedient,” etc. - A filial spirit is law enough. It is a superior sort of law, the law of the Spirit of life is the best law, and makes free from any other law. The spirit is better than the letter. They, that have the Spirit of Christ in them, have the law written in their hearts, according to God’s promise by his prophets. The Spirit of Christ is superior to the law, and sets a person above a subjection to the law, because it is a principle that is superior to a legal principle, or that principle which is the proper subject of the force and influence of the exaction of a law, viz. fear; so far as the Spirit of the Son, or the Spirit of adoption, prevails, so far he is above the need of that principle, and consequently above the need of being under the law. II. The filial Spirit, or Spirit of the son, or Spirit of adoption, is a principle that, so far as it prevails, excludes and renders the saints incapable of fear, or a legal principle, or spirit of bondage. 1 John 4:18, “Perfect love casteth out fear.” It casts it out as Sarah and Isaac cast out the bond-woman and her son, that we read of in the chapter preceding the text that we are upon. It is in Christians a principle of love, of childlike confidence and hope, as in the 6th verse of the foregoing chapter, it cries, “Abba, Father.” It evidences to them their being the children of God, and begets that trust and assurance that renders them incapable of a legal principle. Romans 8:15; Romans 8:16, “For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again unto fear, but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirits, that we are the children of God.” If a person has not that legal principle, or principle of fear, he has not that principle which the law, or that constitution which exacts obedience was made to influence and work upon; and therefore is not a proper subject of law, because, being destitute of that principle, the law takes no hold of him, for it finds no principle in him to take hold by. A being led by the Spirit of the Son of God, as a Spirit of adoption, is inconsistent with a state of bondage, as sonship is inconsistent with servitude. 2 Corinthians 3:17, “Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.”