Life With Others

Today, we receive this word from Paul which reminds us how we can be in relationship with those around us.

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Galatians 5:13-15 13 You were called to freedom, brothers and sisters; only don’t let this freedom be an opportunity to indulge your selfish impulses, but serve each other through love. 14 All the Law has been fulfilled in a single statement: Love your neighbor as yourself. 15 But if you bite and devour each other, be careful that you don’t get eaten up by each other! 

Even though we are free in Jesus Christ, we should be careful not to take advantage of this incredible gift. There is always the chance that those who Christ has set free, will begin to think any way of life is okay and begin indulging into acts and temptations that should be stayed away from. Just because we are free does not mean we can do anything we want. This is what we should be careful of.

Paul reminds us here that the entire law can be summed up with this one phrase: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” This seems easy enough, in theory; but it can be excruciatingly difficult to show love to someone who is acting very unlovable. We all know people who are unlovable and are around them daily, and we will do everything we can to either get away from them or make their day as bad as possible.

Here are some things to consider. Even those that we consider unlovable are loved by someone; and, even though we find someone else unlovable, we are considered to be unlovable by another person. Sometimes the same thing we find hard to manage or bad qualities, others may feel the same way about us. How does this sit with you? This really makes me think about how I am viewed in society and how I should treat others with more grace.

These verses end with this warning: “But if you bite and devour each other, be careful that you don’t get eaten up by each other!” This is something we may not take as seriously, or we may have skimmed all together and not have paid that much attention to these words. Paul is arguing not to let the freedom we have in Christ go to our head and make us think we are more valuable than another person. We are all equal in Christ and Paul reminds us of this throughout Galatians.

What Paul is saying at the end of these verses is that we can destroy each other (emotionally, spiritually, physically, mentally, relationally, etc). Paul is warning against this. If we think more highly of ourselves, another person could feel the same way about themselves and them trouble can happen. With this warning, Paul reminds us we should work to live in peace and allow love to build up the community, not having knowledge puffing up our egos.

Paul can give some harsh words in his letters, but they are words we need to hear and allow to make a home within our hearts and minds so that we can be transformed with the peace and presence of Christ within us to make transformations in the world around us.

#LiveFreeInChrist

Faith vs Works

One of the things I appreciate about Galatians is that Paul seems to repeat himself in a few places. It is almost as if he knew his readers would need to hear the content more than once. I believe the same is true for us today. We go along and think we have everything figured out, but then we get of track and need to be reminded. This is what I see Paul doing over and over throughout this letter.

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Galatians 5:2-12 2 Look, I, Paul, am telling you that if you have yourselves circumcised, having Christ won’t help you. 3 Again I swear to every man who has himself circumcised that he is required to do the whole Law. 4 You people who are trying to be made righteous by the Law have been estranged from Christ. You have fallen away from grace! 5 We eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness through the Spirit by faith. 6 Being circumcised or not being circumcised doesn’t matter in Christ Jesus, but faith working through love does matter. 7 You were running well—who stopped you from obeying the truth? 8 This line of reasoning doesn’t come from the one who calls you. 9 A little yeast works through the whole lump of dough. 10 I’m convinced about you in the Lord that you won’t think any other way. But the one who is confusing you will pay the penalty, whoever that may be. 11 Brothers and sisters, if I’m still preaching circumcision, why am I still being harassed? In that case, the offense of the cross would be canceled. 12 I wish that the ones who are upsetting you would castrate themselves! 

So Paul is telling the people who have themselves circumcised (outward works) for the purpose of being accepted, they are missing the point. It is very easy to begin our life in faith strong, but then we encounter people who, we think, we need to be approved by, so we’ll try to copy them in our lives instead of living the life God is calling us to live…in faith.

Paul continually reminds the people in his letters that God’s grace is given to us; but we do not earn it, we just live in it. But then we encounter periods of life where we feel like we want to go deeper in our faith, and so we find people who seem like they have the answers. If we’re not careful, we will pay more attention to the crowds or the flashiness in their appearance or delivery, and we won’t take time to listen to what they’re saying.

We will be drawn to a God who will give us everything materially, if we have faith, or even do everything for us IF we do certain tasks. But this is not the truth of the Gospel. The truth of the Gospel reminds us that God is with us and walks with us in every aspect of our lives. We also have the Holy Spirit residing in us and we do not have to earn it, just accept it.

There is a line in here that can be troubling: “You have fallen away from grace!” I do not believe that we can lose out salvation. I believe God holds on tightly to us and will not let us go. But I do believe we can stop living in grace and knowing that God is with us. The challenge here is to find our way back to being in constant communion with God. God will never stop pursuing us, but we should continually pursue God. God never changes and will never leave us, but we can live our lives as if God does not exist.

Paul desires the people of Galatia to keep living in the grace and truth of God and desires the people who are perverting the Gospel to go away. The punishment he says he wants for them seems harsh; but if you or I spent hard work teaching them and desired for them to live wholeheartedly in Christ, we most likely would have the same anger that Paul has.

It is not by “proving ourselves” that God accepts us. It is because God accepts us that we are accepted. Jesus Christ already did everything for us. We just need to live into the grace that God has given.

Our challenge is to continually live in the freedom the Christ gives.

#LiveFreeInChrist

I Am Free

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Galatians 5:1 Christ has set us free for freedom. Therefore, stand firm and don’t submit to the bondage of slavery again. 

This is, I believe, the letter to the Galatians summed up in one sentence. Every time I have read this verse this month, it has been an incredible reminder that Christ has set me and has set each one of us free. We do have the opportunity to turn away from him (more on this tomorrow); but Christ is always with us and has broken us free! That is an incredible message we all need to hear and to remember each day.

One of the things I have been asked is, “How is your soul?” We could go into how we have messed up or there has been stress and turmoil in our lives, but I felt God leading me to think different about the question. As I began to listen to other people, I felt a single word entering my mind: freedom. My life is nowhere near perfect, and I try to not pretend like I am perfect; but I began to think about this word, freedom, and how my soul really is free.

Each one of us can slip back into a mindset of being overwhelmed and controlled by the situations around us, or we can remember and believe that Jesus Christ actually sets us free. So how does Christ sets us free? This is a question I have heard several times throughout this month and this is how I have answered:

I am free to love.

I am free to be patient.

I am free to be generous.

I am free to follow Christ and into His calling on my life.

I am free to forgive and be forgiven.

I am free to fail, and to receive grace.

I am free from wanting people’s approval.

I am free to be accepted by God and accept God.

I am free to live like Christ.

I am free to be kind and gentle.

I am free to be thankful.

I am free to run Christ.

I am free to walk with Christ.

All of this, and much more, gives me great peace.

I am free and so are you.

To anyone who reads this, I invite you to accept the freedom that life in Christ can bring. There is a sense of peace and joy that enters into our soul that allows us to handle any situation that arises because Christ is with you and is with me.

#LiveFreeInChrist

New Life

Galatians 4:28-31 28 Brothers and sisters, you are children of the promise like Isaac. 29 But just as it was then, so it is now also: the one who was conceived the normal way harassed the one who was conceived by the Spirit. 30 But what does the scripture say? Throw out the slave woman and her son, because the slave woman’s son won’t share the inheritance with the free woman’s son.31 Therefore, brothers and sisters, we aren’t the slave woman’s children, but we are the free woman’s children. 

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Upon first reading this, we may think it is a little harsh. After all, Paul is using the same phrase that Sarah said to Abraham to get rid of Hagar and her son Ishmael. Sarah was jealous and fuming that Ishmael would receive, even a part of the inheritance, so she had them thrown out of the safety of the camp. Isaac, after all, was the child God promised would come.

As I have been reflecting on this passage for today, one thing keeps standing out. “Throw out the slave…the slave won’t share the inheritance.” If we think about this in context to our lives, what do we need to “throw out” that would keep us from living in the grace God gives? I think there are things in our lives (things we are holding on to) that we should let go of. Pride. Envy. Jealousy. Hypocricy. Trying to impress other people. Allowing things to control our lives. Whatever it is, this could be something we are doing to ourselves and actually making us “slaves.”

How can we break out of the hold? “Throw out” whatever it is. I have found that if we are able to find at least one person we can communicate with, we can have people supporting and “fighting” with us to be free from whatever it is that’s holding us back. Actively living in the grace of God is incredible. By no means am I perfect or even have everything put together in my life perfectly. But I do know and have experienced pieces and time frames in life that can help us see what life with God is like.

We do not need to be bound by the Law. We are free because of Jesus Christ. We do not have to let things and attitudes define us, except for the love of God working through us. Because of Jesus Christ, we are free! And we can live free and experience grace daily.

Tomorrow we begin Galatians chapter 5. 🙂

#LiveFreeInChrist

Life in Peace

One of the things I enjoy about Paul is how he can bring the Old Testament to life in profound ways. When we read his writings we can learn more about the Old Testament and begin to look at it as important to our faith today.

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Galatians 4:21-27 21 Tell me—those of you who want to be under the Law—don’t you listen to the Law? 22 It’s written that Abraham had two sons, one by the slave woman and one by the free woman. 23 The son by the slave woman was conceived the normal way, but the son by the free woman was conceived through a promise.24 These things are an allegory: the women are two covenants. One is from Mount Sinai, which gives birth to slave children; this is Hagar. 25 Hagar is Mount Sinai in Arabia, and she corresponds to the present-day Jerusalem, because the city is in slavery with her children. 26 But the Jerusalem that is above is free, and she is our mother. 27 It’s written:

Rejoice, barren woman, you who have not given birth.
        Break out with a shout, you who have not suffered labor pains;
because the woman who has been deserted will have many more children
        than the woman who has a husband. 

I believe we can learn something from this passage today. The questions that come to mind is “How do we want to live?” and “How do we ask others to live?” I believe these are important for us to consider.

Paul is quoting Isaiah in this passage and also telling the story from Genesis about Sarah and Hagar and Abraham. I also think this is telling us that we have a couple of options when it comes to our faith: we can live legalistically (meaning we have to live with every rule and are not allowed to break any of them); or we can live as redeemed people from the rules and the Law because of Jesus Christ.

Life already has many rules, why would we want to try to add more rules to our life? I love how Jesus summed up the Law in two phrases. This is in Matthew 22:37-40

“You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your being,[c] and with all your mind. 38  This is the first and greatest commandment. 39  And the second is like it: You must love your neighbor as you love yourself. 40  All the Law and the Prophets depend on these two commands.”

He is telling us how we can live as free people in our faith. When we truly love God, we can love people more. (We love because He first loved us. 1 John 4:19). Then when we love people, we show our love of God. It’s almost too simple, really. The rest is just thinking and other things we want to add to our lives.

So we do not need to create rules (though we should follow the rules and laws we have); and we should not impose hardships on people. Paul fights this throughout his letter. He is making sure the motives for living the life Christ desires us to live is not done to earn any favor. Paul desires that the people, including us today, realize we are free. We should live our lives as redeemed, forgiven, Holy Spirit led people who live our life in peace because we are not trying to earn anyone’s favor or grace, including God’s.

#LiveFreeInChrist

Influence

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Galatians 4:12-20 12 I beg you to be like me, brothers and sisters, because I have become like you! You haven’t wronged me. 13 You know that I first preached the gospel to you because of an illness. 14 Though my poor health burdened you, you didn’t look down on me or reject me, but you welcomed me as if I were an angel from God, or as if I were Christ Jesus! 15 Where then is the great attitude that you had? I swear that, if possible, you would have dug out your eyes and given them to me. 16 So then, have I become your enemy by telling you the truth?17 They are so concerned about you, though not with good intentions. Rather, they want to shut you out so that you would run after them. 18 However, it’s always good to have people concerned about you with good intentions, and not just when I’m there with you. 19 My little children, I’m going through labor pains again until Christ is formed in you. 20 But I wish I could be with you now and change how I sound, because I’m at a loss about you. 

Throughout the letter to the Galatians, Paul is emphasizing the point and the truth that faith in Jesus Christ brings freedom. He was such a good leader that he made sure he lived like the people he served. This is an important point for us today. When reaching out and serving others, we can gain more influence by living life with the people hand in hand, and not just going in and leaving after we served.

This kind of lifestyle and living faith of Paul was so encouraging to the Galatians, they did not want to see him suffer and would have done anything to make sure he would get healed, even giving their eyes. So now we ask the question, who are we trying to influence for Christ and what are the methods we are using? Is life being shared and community being developed?

But, it seems that every time something good comes along, there is someone or something there to try and dismantle the work being done. This is something that Paul has been arguing against throughout the letter. This time he adds something interesting. He makes the point that the only way the Galatians will be accepted by the people is if they begin acting like them. How often this happens today. Paul accepted the Galatians because Christ accepted them. He brought them to faith in Christ and worked with them so they can have their lives transformed by Christ, not by trying to earn God’s favor. The new people coming in, that changed Paul’s message, are only trying to make themselves look so good by making the Galatians feel bad.

Paul is emotional because the congregation he formed is now doing things and living a certain way to impress another group and not living for Christ. He longs for them to be free from having to impress others. Part of the freedom Christ gives is the freedom to look to Christ as the example and not try to change our lives to emulate another flawed person.

The final thing I notice is that Paul longs to be with the Galatians in person. It is easy to try to communicate with people via text, call, email, Facebook, etc; but it is more important and more impactful to communicate face to face. When we communicate face to face we will be able to examine and find the true motives behind the actions.

Christ breaks us free to follow him.

#LiveFreeInChrist

Don’t Turn Back

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Galatians 4:8-11 8 At the time, when you didn’t know God, you were enslaved by things that aren’t gods by nature. 9 But now, after knowing God (or rather, being known by God), how can you turn back again to the weak and worthless world system? Do you want to be slaves to it again? 10 You observe religious days and months and seasons and years. 11 I’m afraid for you! Perhaps my hard work for you has been for nothing. 

Paul is saying something here that I think we can’t overlook. After we have faith in Christ, it is easy to forget about the faith and go on living our old way of life.

One of my favorite sayings goes something like this, “Christ meets us where we are but doesn’t leave us as we are.” I think this is a telling reminder of how the presence of Jesus Christ in our lives really can and does make all the difference. We are different people after an encounter with Jesus the Christ. Or something else can happen. We can be so zealous of the faith that we begin to follow a prescription for how to live for God and we can actually create a set of rules that make it difficult to be a Christian unless they are followed. Or the person is not worshipping Christ “correctly.”

To order our lives around a set of “rules and regulations” can enslave us again. Jesus Christ calls us and invites us to live in freedom. Here we do not focus on what we cannot do (or what we are against). We instead focus on what we can do (or what we are for). For us to be enslaved to the “world’s system” means that we will care more about what other people think or are doing than we think about God’s desires. It is easy to go with the crowd, but w should be careful not to have the crowd bind us into something we cannot be or know is not true.

We should also take time to pray for and encourage our leaders. They may not always get everything right, we are all human after all; but they have worked to bring us to a place in our faith that it would break their hearts to know we have fallen away. This is the tone in Paul’s voice and attitude toward the people of Galatia. He is heartbroken they are more easily swayed by the winds of something new and exciting, than to be firm in their faith and live in freedom.

Paul is asking the people to remember who they follow, Jesus Christ, and asking them to re-examine their lives and faith. I believe we should do this as well. It is important for us to stand firm in our faith in Jesus Christ, because his message is the only one that keeps us free.

Remember, we are FREE from trying to be like everyone else. We are FREE to be like Jesus Christ in all we say and in all we do.

#LiveFreeInChrist

Heirs

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Galatians 4:1-7 I’m saying that as long as the heirs are minors, they are no different from slaves, though they really are the owners of everything. 2 However, they are placed under trustees and guardians until the date set by the parents. 3 In the same way, when we were minors, we were also enslaved by this world’s system. 4 But when the fulfillment of the time came, God sent his Son, born through a woman, and born under the Law. 5 This was so he could redeem those under the Law so that we could be adopted. 6 Because you are sons and daughters, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba, Father!” 7 Therefore, you are no longer a slave but a son or daughter, and if you are his child, then you are also an heir through God. 

When I read the first few verses of this, I am reminded that before I learned and knew about Jesus Christ, I would allow what everyone around me to tell me what was right. This, to me, is “being enslaved by this world’s system.” So what do you think enslaves you? This is something I do not think we consider very often.There are many things that attempt to “enslave” us: TV, money, sex, being better than everyone else, not feeling any value, etc. These are some of the world’s systems that try to hold us down.

Then we get to verse four and everything changes. “But when the fulfillment of the time came, God sent his Son.” From this point on in the passage for today, there is new hope. There is something new that is about to happen. God, Himself, is claiming us by becoming one of us. He sent His Spirit to us so we would cry out to Him and recognize Him as our Creator, our Redeemer, and giver of Life. This allows us to be “heirs” and be adopted into the family of God.

This is a family like no other. In this family there is freedom from the Law. We are no longer bound to do what “the world” tells us to do, or believe in what everyone else says is truth. We are free to live differently and experience the inheritance of eternal life and the riches of God that He generously wants to give. This is not always what we think it may be.

Eternal life and salvation are for right now, not just a future time. For God’s riches, mercy, grace and blessings to come through us for us to live in, we should be open to receive and allow these to be evident in our lives. So what is it we can receive? God can and does bless in many ways; but we can and do receive peace, hope, joy, love, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, wisdom, the presence of God Himself, and much more.

Remembering this is what God is wanting to give us and live through our lives, we can know we are His child, call upon Him and receive all He wants to give so that we can live differently in a world that really wants to hold us down and think only of ourselves and keep us addicted to something so we are held back.

What enslaves you? Technology? Now we go back to the beginning, but this time we remember that we are FREE from being in bondage of anything that keeps us from Jesus Christ.

#LiveFreeInChrist

Family

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Galatians 3:25-29 25 But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a custodian.26 You are all God’s children through faith in Christ Jesus. 27 All of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. 28 There is neither Jew nor Greek; there is neither slave nor free; nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. 29 Now if you belong to Christ, then indeed you are Abraham’s descendants, heirs according to the promise. 

Here is one of the things I love about the letter to the Galatians. In Christ everyone is equal. What an amazing thought. Those who do not have are equal with those who do have because of Christ. Those who are uneducated are equal with those who are educated because of Christ. Those who are ___(fill in the blank   are equal with those who are        (fill in the blank)   because of Christ.

When we are baptized into the faith, we have been clothed with Christ. What does this mean to be clothed in Christ? Colossians chapter 3 gives a good definition of this. “12 Therefore, as God’s choice, holy and loved, put on compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience. 13 Be tolerant with each other and, if someone has a complaint against anyone, forgive each other. As the Lord forgave you, so also forgive each other.”  And because we have been clothed in Christ, we are reminded we are children of God along with the people we may not like or agree with.

Another thing that I find amazing, again, is that when we are baptized into the faith, we join all of the other believers through history, even down to Abraham and Noah! We are part of a huge family of God. We do not always get along with our own family members but we can still love them and do what we are able to to guide them in their life and faith.

Let’s see this verse again (which also appears in Colossians 3): There is neither Jew nor Greek; there is neither slave nor free; nor is there male and female; Aggie or Longhorn; black or white; purple or gold; American or (other country), for you are all one in Christ Jesus. 

God’s family is bigger than we sometimes want to think about. But we are free to live as a family, especially as a family of God.

#LiveFreeInChrist

Released by Faith

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Galatians 3:19-24 19 So why was the Law given? It was added because of offenses, until the descendant would come to whom the promise had been made. It was put in place through angels by the hand of a mediator. 20 Now the mediator does not take one side; but God is one. 21 So, is the Law against the promises of God? Absolutely not! If a Law had been given that was able to give life, then righteousness would in fact have come from the Law. 22 But scripture locked up all things under sin, so that the promise based on the faithfulness of Jesus Christ might be given to those who have faith. 23 Before faith came, we were guarded under the Law, locked up until faith that was coming would be revealed, 24 so that the Law became our custodian until Christ so that we might be made righteous by faith. 

Without rules and law, would we know what is right or wrong? The book of Judges says over and over that everyone did what was right in their own eyes. Does having law keep us down and keep us from receiving God? No, in fact it point us to a life of faith and freedom.

Paul can be confusing in his writing. The Apostle Peter even says that Paul is hard to understand. But I think Paul is saying something awesome here. The Law was there to cover up (forgive) offenses against God and people. This meant a series of required sacrifices. I don’t know if we can fathom how many animals were killed and sacrificed as a way to receive forgiveness from God. Can you imagine if we had to still do that today?

So were the sacrifices enough to receive forgiveness of God? No. What was there, with the sacrifice offerings, was the faith of the people that God would forgive them. We can look at this as a precursor to Jesus Christ.

Today we do not need to offer any animal or grain sacrifices because Christ was the final sacrifice that we can look back upon in faith. So it is really by faith that we are free and it is by faith we can trust Jesus with our whole being. The Law was not meant to give live, but to show us we cannot live by our own righteousness, we need someone who can make us clean and holy. That person is Jesus Christ who fulfilled the Law by removing our requirements to earn God’s forgiveness and favor and instead we receive it by faith.

The people in the book of Judges did what was right in their own eyes. We have the faith to be able to see life as God sees and gives us freedom to voluntarily (not out of obligation) to live as Jesus lived.

#LiveFreeInChrist