In our first sermon from the series on Galatians we introduced ourselves to the importance of the book and to the suggestion of what would be our main themes of study, the first of which we said would be Pauls understanding of justification by faith, in fact in truth the teaching of this particular theology was the very reason that Paul composed the letter in the first place.

You will remember that the letter itself was born out of conflict, that is a conflict of ideas caused through the introduction of the Gospel by the Paul himself to the gentile or non Jewish world along with his insistence that not only was the Gospel destined for the world outside of Judaism but also that Judaism with all its rules and laws was no longer required by those who chose to follow Christ, a teaching that some within the original Jewish Church objected strongly too.

 Ambassadors from the Jerusalem Church then made this protest to the Apostles at a council in the city of Antioch, the issue was debated and eventually these protests were  rejected in favour of Pauls position. Not content with that however these Jewish Christians set out on a personal campaign to persuade the gentiles church’s founded by Paul that as well as their faith they had also to be circumcised and follow the Judaic Law in order to be saved. And this team of ‘Judaiasers’ as Paul called them had visited Galatia and it would appear persuaded at least some of them to also accept this way of thinking: 

So the issue at the heart of Pauls letter is simply……… are we saved because of our Faith in Jesus alone or do we also need to have certain add-ons as well and in this case the add-ons of obedience to the old Mosaic Jewish law and circumcision. 

And as we can see from our reading today Paul attacks this issue without any subtlety at all.

 You Foolish Galatians…….. who has bewitched you!!!!! 

Now in Bible speak this is about as blunt as you get……If Paul was a man who swore you would find it here……….. you idiots… you morons how could you be so stupid as to fall for this nonsense??

Who has bewitched you with this evil garbage………. And he supports this rant for the belief in justification by Faith alone with two distinct arguments firstly; 

The argument of the Spirit:  

“Did you receive the Holy Spirit by Observing the Law of Moses?” asks Paul……answer of course NO……and then he states………..

Are you so foolish that beginning with the Spirit you are now trying to attain your Goal by Human Effort?” 

Pauls point here you see is that the Goal of all Judaism, the goal of the Law and circumcision  was to bring men and women into a closer and redemptive or saving relationship with God and the culmination of all that Judaism pointed too, the aim of it all if you like, was that it would be Israel’s guide until God initiated an sort of end of time event which the Old testament calls the ‘Day of the Lord’ or the ‘Last day’ a great and final day when everything that the Old testament had promised and pointed too would come true  and the great promise from God to his people was that on the ‘last day’ His Spirit would pour out upon all flesh bringing all men into intimate communion with their God…… and descriptions of this ultimate event could be found in the form of prophecies all through their old testament scriptures like for example the passage we read from Joel 2……page 914 in your Bibles…..  So you see the giving of the Spirit and the establishment of the new kingdom of God was the ultimate and final achievement which the Law was aimed to guide Israel towards …… now where do we read that Prophesy again…………but this time as being fulfilled ….????? No well turn to page 1093 in your Bibles………. 

Acts Chapter Two at Pentecost……..and because it has been fulfilled …because the Spirit has now been made available through Christ to all men…when the Galatians accepted Christ they received it….. the ultimate gift….. the aim of all that was the Old testament and the Judaic laws had arrived…..  

The possession of Gods life giving Spirit in their hearts was theirs already……So why the Law???????? Why Circumcision????? All that that was meant to promise, they had received !!  the Laws role, its aims, its purpose, had been therefor superseded by Christ, his death and hid resurrection which had fulfilled all that Judaism had sought to achieve, Judaism and all its old ways then was now redundant………The Spirit had come through Christ at Pentecost and with it their salvation by Faith alone.

 The second argument that Paul uses to convince the Galatians of their stupidity is the argument from Abraham Who was as we know the Father of the whole Jewish Nation. 

So, Paul asks, why was Abraham, the very Father of the Jewish Nation, first considered to be a righteous person by God? Was it because of his goodness? Because of anything he had done? No, argues Paul, the O/T says quite clearly that “Abraham believed and it was credited to him as Righteousness”  and what’s more Paul goes on to argue, did he receive this gift of righteousness after he accepted circumcision and the Law of Moses….No of course not… God pronounced him as righteous years before he was circumcised, and as far as the Law was concerned well, that didn’t arrive until 430 odd years later when Moses came along so, both were, in regard to him being put right with God, irrelevant, he believed and  was credited with this righteousness..

 Faith not works then was the deciding factor in Gods decision to grant holiness even in regard to Abraham himself …He wasn’t even Jewish when he was considered by God to be righteous Judaism hadn’t been born then he was a gentile both uncircumcised and ignorant of the Law which they claim so saves men’s souls.

 The Law then for Paul is not and never was the conduit by which righteousness was given it was no more than a temporary fix given to remind/warn the nation of Israel that works-righteousness would always be a thoroughly inadequate means of reaching their God, its aim was really to persuade Israel to watch out and wait for the coming of their Messiah Jesus who had brought in the age of the Spirit

 How does this affect us……… well at the end of my First sermon I asked you to consider your answer to the question

 “If I was to die tonight and stand before god and he were to ask me why should I let you into my heaven? What would your answer be……

 “Because I have been a Good person” 

“Because I have been faithful to my Church ?” 

“Because I have believed in Jesus and tried my best?” 

“Well I was a Priest so you’ve got to let me in” 

Would your answer contain any add—onn’s ???? 

That’s the issue and we may think that well that’s simple but how often do we tie ourselves up because of our failures?

 How often do we think deep down that God doesn’t really quite love us completely, do we split ourselves or our lives into bits and think well I am Good here but not so good there and hopefully I have more good bits than bad so I will be alright?

God loves this bit in me but he couldn’t love all of me because of that bit………………. Where I am a sinner?? 

Well this is wrong…………… In Christ we have salvation we are justified and COMPLETELY justified by our Faith and to think otherwise because we are sinners is to deny the effectiveness of the Cross and to think otherwise must also mean that we believe that as well as our Faith we need other add-onn’s not the Jewish Law or circumcision…. but maybe Christian ones instead………more repentance, more prayers, more self sacrifice……more liturgy remember our Catholic Monk Luther…that’s what he believed. Faith  PLUS all these other Christian virtues…….Not the Old testament Jewish add-onns but new ones?????? 

“You foolish Galatians…who has bewitched you with this garbage?

Are you so foolish that beginning with the Spirit you are now trying to obtain your Goal by Human effort?”

 May God give us wisdom to know that we are Loved.

Amen.