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The Main Theme of the Book of Galtians Is GODS' AMAZING GRACE...
Posted : 28 Nov, 2011 04:20 PM
Theme: The theme expressed in this, one of the preeminent letters from the hand of the Apostle Paul dealing with the doctrines of salvation and sanctification, may be best expressed by the phrase, by faith alone in Christ alone. After the Gospel of John, a Christian, be he young or old, can do no better than to read and study the book of Galatians. Why, you ask? Because since time began there have been but two avenues known to man governing his approach to and relationship with God. There has been God�s way and there has been man�s way. One rests solely upon the principle of faith, the other on the principle of self-effort or works. One is valid and efficacious while the other one is both counterfeit and rubbish. It�s really that simple. The problem lies in the fact that man is inclined, encouraged by his basic (sin) nature and all resident (to this world) satanic forces, to choose his way and ignore God�s way. This applies to both the lost and the saved alike.
The Apostle Paul, deeply concerned with those who had become believers during his missionary journeys throughout the province of Rome called Galatia and who had subsequently been led astray by certain Judaizers, submitted this stern and impassioned letter that in many ways paralleled his letter to the believers in Rome, which outlined clearly and dramatically that a person may only be saved (�born again,� �born from above� or �spiritually born�) and subsequently sanctified (spiritual growth) by faith alone in Christ alone.
This (Galatians) epistle is a �declaration of emancipation� from legalism of any type. It is interesting to note that legalists do not spend much time with Galatians. It is a rebuke to them. It is the manifesto of Christian liberty, the impregnable citadel, and a veritable Gibraltar against any attack on the heart of the gospel.
Galatians is the strongest declaration and defense of the doctrine of �justification by faith� in or out of Scripture. It is God�s polemic on behalf of the most vital truth of the Christian faith against any attack. Not only is a sinner saved by grace through faith plus nothing, but the saved sinner lives by grace. Grace is a way �to� life and a way �of� life. These two go together, by the way.
The churches of southern Galatia were established not by providential circumstance, i.e., by refugees during their flight from persecution resulting from their faith (Acts 8:1-4), but by the deliberate and organized practice of Paul during his purposeful missionary journeys along the principal roads of the Roman Empire. They were the result of a purely missionary enterprise.
Before this first missionary journey, the Christian churches had been predominately Jewish. The teachers were Jewish with an Old Testament background. While interpreting the Old Testament in a new light, they yet fixed their hopes on the future kingdom of a national Messiah. But now, the newly formed churches were predominately Gentile, and the Gentiles recognized the Lord Jesus, not as a world-Savior. Thus, the Galatian Christians were not for the most part, the fickle-minded Gauls of North Galatia, but Greeks and Jews of flourishing cities situated on the highways of commerce and government. (Galatians in the Greek New Testament for the English Reader by Kenneth S. Wuest, Professor of New Testament Greek, The Moody Bible Institute of Chicago, Illinois)
Judaizers represent that element within the Church (Body of Christ) from then until now who refuse to accept that salvation and sanctification of man is based solely on the love and grace of God by faith alone in Christ alone. They do this by insisting that self-effort must be a part of any effort to achieve the approbation (approval) of God and any pathway to eternal and/or temporal spiritual life.
A Judaizer simply cannot believe that salvation is strictly a matter of God reaching down to man in grace with the free-gift of salvation by the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, on the cross of Calvary. To the Judaizer man must participate and help God in the �salvation plan,� thereby denying the sufficiency of Jesus Christ and His efficacious work at Calvary. Specifically in the case before the Galatians there were Judaizers who insisted that non-Jewish believers must adhere to Jewish law and tradition, particularly the Law of Moses with emphasis on circumcision, in order to be fully justified before God.
The root of the Judaizer teaching is found in Genesis 3:7 whereby man in his feeble and inadequate self-effort attempted to cover his shame and nakedness with plant material, only to discover that his fallen state could only be covered by God�s effort of providing him a covering which employed the shedding of innocent blood (Genesis 3:21) and which portended the future sacrifice of the Son of God on Calvary�s cross. The Judaizer model is even better illustrated by the historical and factual account of Cain and Abel, sons of Adam and Eve, in Genesis 4.
From this latter group came two attacks against New Testament truth, inspired by Satan, two attempts of the Adversary to destroy the newly-formed Christian Church. One of these was the attempt to substitute good works for faith in Christ. This was met by the letter to the Galatians. The other was the attempt to invalidate the atoning worth of the Cross by urging the Jewish wing of the Church to return to the Levitical ritual of the Temple. This was met by the Book of Hebrews. The first was aimed at the Gentile wing of the Church, the second, at the Jewish group in the Church. The Judaizers were members of this unsaved group in Israel, seeking to maintain a corrupt form of the Jewish national religion as against the Christian Church which had been formed at Pentecost.
The Judaizers mutilated the message of the gospel by substituting works for grace. They emphasized certain human attainments and merits, such as circumcision and being a member of the nation Israel, in addition to keeping the Mosaic Law and the achievement of ecclesiastical positions within the religious system. Judaizers were a constant problem during the days of the early Church, as seen not only within the book of Galatians, but also in Acts 15:1, Romans 2:17-3:8; 9:30-10:3; Philippians 3:2-6; and various others passages within the New Testament. They constantly endeavored to destroy the work of the Apostle Paul, because he was the chief exponent of grace and he was the �Apostle to the Gentiles.� They attempted to nullify Paul (1) by depreciating his apostolic position, by setting up the Twelve Apostles as the �real interpreters� of Christ in order to discredit Paul�s authority as a teacher of grace; and (2) by substituting a salvation-by-works system for the doctrine of pure grace by faith alone in Christ alone�which was what Paul preached.
This letter to the Galatians may roughly be divided into three sections. First, there are the personal comments from Paul in chapters 1 and 2. Second, there is the doctrinal portion in chapters 3 and 4. Finally, there are the practical applications found in chapters 5 and 6.
A proper understanding of this letter from the hand of Paul will solidify a believer�s understanding of God�s one and only plan of salvation (including sanctification) for all mankind, which is totally of grace by faith alone in Christ alone.
You may read the complete article at: http://www.bibleone.net/print_sbs52.html
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