Here again chapter divisions do not adequately communicate content and continuity. Verses 24—26 of Chapter 5 could easily be a part of this chapter because Paul is talking about how the Spirit governs our lives in our social relationships.
As indicated in our commentary on Gal. 5:13—15, Paul calls us to be servants. This requires more than service when, where and to whom we choose; it is a style of life. We willfully become servants. The constraining force of Christ love replaces the binding force of law which is no longer operative.
Thus Paul talks about “crucifying the flesh” and “walking in the Spirit.”
I. BEARING AND SHARING BURDENS
“Brethren, if a man is overtaken in any trespass, you who are spiritual restore such a one in the spirit of gentleness, considering yourself lest you also be tempted Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ. But if we think ourselves to be something, when we are nothing, we deceive ourselves.
But let each one examine his own work and then4 will have rejoicing in A alone, and not in another For each one shall bear his own load. Let him who is taught the word share in all good things with him who teaches (Gal. 6:1—6).
In Truman Capote’s Other Voices, Other Rooms, the hero is about to walk along a heavy but rotting beam over a brooding, murky creek. Starting over, stepping gingerly . . . he felt he would never reach the other side: always he would be balanced here, suspended between land and in the dark and alone. Then feeling the board shake as Idabel started across, he remembered that he had someone to be together with. And he could go on.
Isn’t this our experience? It certainly has been mine. I shiver at the thought of having to go it alone. I get chills when I consider where I might be if at the right time I had not felt the board shake because someone was walking with me!
The Christian walk is a shared journey. We do not walk alone; others walk with us. Paul is given some guidance for our journey together. We will come back to Vs. 1, but let’s begin with Vs. 2: Bear one’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.
Paul is talking about interrelatedness and interdependence. This principle is laced throughout Paul’s epistles. If one member suffers all suffer together; if one member is honored, all rejoice together (1 Cor. 12:26 R.S.V.). We who are strong ought to bear the failings of the weak (Rom. 15:1 R.S.V). The new life into which we have been born through Christ is a shared life.
The Greek word used to describe the shared life of the people of God was koinonia. Our best word for it in English is fellowship but the English word is far too limited to encompass the meaning of it. Koinonia means sharing, all kinds of sharing: sharing in friendship (Acts 2:42), being partners in the Gospel (Phil. 1:5), sharing material possessions (2 Cor. 8:4), having fellowship in Christ (1 Cor. 1:9), and sharing life together in the Spirit (2Cor. 13:14). Above all koinonia is fellowship with God. That which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so
your fellowship is with the Father. (1 John 1:3).
Because we belong to Christ, we belong to each other. In koinonia we are bound to each other, to Christ, and to God. Our life is a shared life, we hear one another’s burdens.
A second truth - Crucial to living this shared life is learning to listen As much as any thing else persons need to be listened to. Is there anything that enhances our feelings of worth more than being listened to? I think not. When you listen to me you say to me “I value you. You are important. I will hear and receive what you say.”
When you really listen to a person, listen with ears and a heart that hears, it becomes revelation, and the Spirit comes alive in the relationship. Martin Buber, a great Jewish thinker, spent his life seeking to share with others the importance of relations between I and Thou. For the clue to this meaning he referred to the role of Spirit. “Spirit is not in the I but between the I and Thou.” One sentence with a world of meaning. The Spirit is known in relationship - Buber would say only in relationship.
Perhaps not only but certainly that is the primary mode and place of revelation of Spirit—in relationship. So when I listen, the gap between me and the person to whom I listen is bridged. A sensitivity comes that is not my own. I feel the pain, the frustrations, the anguish—sometimes feeling these and identifying a problem even when the other is not actually sharing the problem or these feelings. I listen in love and the miracle of I/Thou takes place, the sharing moves to the deep and intimate levels where the person and I really live. The Spirit opens doors, hearts and effects change.
The miraculous thing is that I do not have to have an answer for the person with whom I am sharing. In my listening I become the answer. Have you had that experience? If something specific is needed the Spirit reveals the “answer” in the listening relationship.
A second essential for the share of the people of God to be realized is that persons must be available to each other——available in love. This is what Paul is talking about: Bear one another’s burdens
One of the most available persons I have known is Leo Fessenden, a Christian layman. Now retired, Leo once owned and operated a music store in San Clemente, California. Scores of young people were in and out of his store every day. I saw Leo as a sort of priest to these young people. He wouldn’t have seen himself in that fashion. I’m sure the young people didn’t think of him in that light, either. But they went to him to share their problems and needs, their hopes and dreams, their failures and disappointments. During a five year ministry in San Clemente, scores of young people who had no contact with our church at all came to see me because of Leo. In most cases, I discovered that Leo had already performed the most important ministry, and I simply added my supportive concern.
I remember a group of these young people coming to see me when they learned I was moving to another city. They were a motley crew, really. Many of the fellows had long hair and beards; the girls were dressed in the rebellious garb of the day. On the street they would have been stereotyped as “hippies,” “dropouts,” or “delinquents.” They would have felt out of place in our congregation on Sunday morning, and many of my parishioners would have felt out of place with them. They were not the kind of youth that are usually in church on Sunday morning. Through misty eyes I looked at those young people and remembered a significant involvement with almost all of them. There was a young woman who had had a baby out of wedlock. There was a fellow who had spent three months in juvenile hall. There was a second fellow who had been caught in the tentacles of drugs. All of them had experimented with marijuana, and many of them had gone on to try LSD and different barbiturates. One had spent a week in our home as a runaway. One of them was, even then, paying me $25.00 per month on a loan 1 had arranged for him to pay the hospital bill of the young girl he had made pregnant (he repaid the entire amount). One of them had gone through a long period of depression because his mother had committed suicide.
My relationship with these young people had come primarily through Leo Fessenden. Because he was available to them, listened to them, cared about them, did for them what he could, they trusted me when I was recommended by him as a person with whom they could relate.
They gave me a going-away present that day, and I treasure it. But most of all I treasure a note which accompanied the gift. It read:
“We don’t really know how to say it - but because “you cared” we are going to miss you. We never attended - much less belonged to your church - but we always felt you were one of us. You never had easy answers for us, but you were there to help when we needed help, and as you will remember the help we needed wasn’t simple to give, but you gave it and we are grateful. As we say farewell. We hope that your God is standing outside your window smiling, because we know he is as proud as we are of you. We wished that we could have made this presentation to you before your congregation, but we are sure you understand. With all our love.”
I have had a lot of honors in my life, more than I deserve, but no honor has exceeded the honor those young people paid me. I miss the mark of the high calling of Christ much of the time in my life. I am rather tough on myself and know that I often fall far short of the glory of God. So memories like this of these young people are important, reminding me that that is the point at which God will ultimately judge me - whether I have been available in love. Which is a way of asking whether I have been Christ to others.
What does it mean to be available? We may best answer that by looking at its opposite. The unavailable person can’t give themselves to others. They are too preoccupied with their own little world. Their own functioning, their own reputation, event their own “spiritual health.” They are encumbered within themselves. They have well defined dimensions to this private world. Others are judged, accepted, related to on the basis of how they fit into this tight little circle. Gabriel Marcel explains.
“Life is understood by the unavailable man on the model of a limited bank account which must be maintained judiciously if it is to be kept to the end. Since only a limited amount of emotional and physical capital is available, one must calculate how it is to be spent and refuse all appeals which would deplete the balance at an unwise rate. To squander love, to sacrifice, is an unwise policy which may lead to bankruptcy. Life is a possession which the unavailable man hoards.”
The unavailable man guards himself against involvement. He protects himself from intimate relationships, lest too many demands are placed upon him.
What about the available person? He is not encumbered with his possessions. He doesn’t set up too many categories, restrictions, or requirements for relationship. He isn’t preoccupied with his own self-image. He is freed from the constraints of “proving himself” so he has the capacity to listen and respond to the appeals made by others to him. Jesus is our model for availability. If there is one principle that characterized His life more than any other it was this. It didn’t matter that the crowd was pressing around Him, He gave His attention to the woman with the hemorrhage who touched the hem of His garment. It didn’t matter that He had come to the cool shade tree at the well for rest, He entered into a totally personal relationship with that woman who came to the well at mid day to escape the cold stares and vicious words of his fellow citizens. It didn’t matter that Zacchaeus was a scorned man for his cheating, for his exacting every possible cent in taxes from the now over-taxed people; Jesus was available to him. This was the pattern of His life.
The marvelous aspect of this principle of availability is that we have to bring to a relationship only ourselves. It doesn’t require particular skills and training. We simply have to be open and honest, willing to listen and share ourselves. Above all, we have to love the person, and that completes the principle: We are to be available in love
Self-understanding, self-appreciation and self-affirmation: the integrity of the people of God. For if anyone thinks himself to be some j he deceives himself. But let each one examine his own work, and then he will have rejoicing himself alone, and not in another (Gal. 6:3—4).
Unfortunately the message that many of us have heard as the “Christian” message gives us little encouragement for self—appreciation. The message has come through as self—depreciation. To be sure self denial is at the heart of the Gospel but self—denial is not to be seen as self—depreciation or any form of devaluating of the self.
Akin to misunderstanding this dimension of the Gospel is a limited grasp of true humility. Christian humility is not a groveling “I’ll be your door mat” stance. We have thought of humility only as a recognition and affirmation of weakness and limitation. Not so. The truly humble know who they are—— they know their strength as well as their weakness.
So Paul does not stop by admonishing us not to deceive ourselves by thinking we are something which we are not. He goes on to urge us to examine ourselves so that we will rejoice in ourselves. We need to learn to affirm strength. Christian character is not to be thought of in terms of weakness, of self—loss, and/or anemic living. To be forgiven and accepted by God, to realize that He knows us thoroughly and loves us thoroughly, to and commissioned, to be made a son and an heir is to be made a new person in Christ, to be given a vocation. All of Thus “to be Christian is to be strong in God, God, and with God.”
Thomas Langford has given us a sharp perspective on this dimension of the shared life of the people of God.
“Such self-affirmation is always fraught with the danger of confusing derived strength with self-engendered strength. It is subject to a substitution of personal achievement for gracious endowment But a reverse temptation must also be recognized, namely a denial of strength, which is actually possessed under the guise of pretended weakness or false humility. The danger of misplaced confidence should not undercut the reality of strength which is actually possessed. False self-assessment from either direction must be overcome by clear and proper self-understanding.
“Our strength, as Christians, comes from our relation to God and to the people of God. We are directly related to and in that relationship we find our ability to move to action and to live for others. Indirectly we receive the strength of God through sharing in Christian community. This is a sharing which empowers, guides, corrects, and renews our ability to be and to serve.
“Emphasis upon Christian strength is often neglected for fear of abuse, and the strength given by community is often neglected because it is so meagerly realized in contemporary experience. Yet the church is the Body of Christ; it is the special embodiment of the Holy Spirit. The church is the community graciously given by God to persons who need and who intensely seek community. Into our solitary, isolated style of living there comes a concrete community of persons who are willing to bear one another’s burdens, to enhance one another’s living, to be together in joy and in sorrow, in hope and in hurt, at ordinary moments and in critical junctures of human experience.
“In the context of the church, strength comes from lives which are bound together. The chief binding is not that of a desperate clinging to one another in a dangerous and frightening world, although there is some truth in the claim that one can endure the stench of the ark only because of the tumultuous waves outside. The deeper truth, however, is that persons in Christian community are bound together by a common love, by a common worship, and by a common mission. The church is the community of persons who are in community with Jesus Christ. It is a community of persons precisely because there is a common center for their lives.”
The power that comes to people who live with others around Christ Lord of their lives is not a bullying power. It is not a power that has to prove or display. It does not seek control, thus it isn’t bent on always testing who is strong and who is weak. People who sense this power have about them what John Ruskin called “an under sense of powerlessness.”
Martin Luther King witnessed to this. He described the power dynamic of the shared life of the people of God. In this instance Mother Pollard, an elderly Negro of simple but deep faith was the channel. King described it:
“On a particular Monday evening, following a tension - packed week which included being arrested and receiving numerous threatening phone calls, I spoke at a mass meeting. I attempted to convey an impression of strength and courage, although I was inwardly depressed and fear—stricken. At the end of the meeting Mother Pollard came to the front of the church and said,
“Come here, son.” I immediately went to her and hugged her. “Something is wrong with you,” she said. “You didn’t talk strong tonight.” Seeking to further disguise my fears, I answered, “Oh, no, Mother Pollard, nothing is wrong. I am feeling fine as ever.” But her insight was discerning. “Now, you can’t fool me, she said. I knows something is wrong. Is it that we ain’t doin’ the things that please you? Or is it that the white folks is botherin’ you?” Before 1 could respond, she looked directly into my eyes and said, “I done tole you we is with you all the way.” Then her face became radiant and she said in words of quiet certainty: “But even if we ain’t with you, God is gonna take care of you.” As she spoke that promise, thing in me quivered power.”
At the heart of the shared life of the people of God is the ministry of spiritual support, guidance and restoration. This is what Paul is talking about in Vs. 1. Brethren, if a man is overtaken in any trespass, you who are spiritual restore such a one in the spirit of gentleness, considering yourself lest you also be tempted. (Gal. 6:1).
As Christians we are not incapable of sinning. While we do not live in the “domain of sin,” we do sin. We are often “overtaken in trespasses.” The word for trespass is paraptoma and means literally “false step.” It could mean a slip that comes in walking on an icy or otherwise dangerous path. Paul is giving us some clear signals.
We are all vulnerable. Any of us may slip. The church should never take the stance of being a “pure” people, a people without sin. We should be careful about spiritual overconfidence. Just when we think we are solidly in the saddle, with firm clutch on the reigns, the wild horse of our nature may take a sudden turn or make a dramatic buck sending us sprawling to the ground. Or, like Peter, we may be betrayed by overconfidence and end up denying Christ.
Confusion also plagues us. It is not always easy to decide what is right. So Paul says, be careful how you think of others sins, consider yourself, lest you also be tempted.
Within the shared life of the people of God we are to judge each other, but this judgment is an assessment of love, not condemnation. When we are involved with each other, knowing the love we share and our mutual commitment to each other’s growth, we can speak the truth in love, we can assist each other in recognizing and acknowledging faults and weaknesses. Without this kind of involvement with/and mutual concern for each other we remain locked in our own worlds and there is little chance for change and growth.
Paul defines the kind of mutual support and correction we should provide for each other restore him in the spirit of gentleness Remember, nt1eness is a fruit of the Spirit. Our supporting, correcting, guiding and restoring activity is in the Spirit of Christ. He is gentle and calls us to gentleness. We handle each person with the kind of gentle care with which we would handle a piece of precious fragile crystal. We seek to be sensitive to the brittleness of persons, to their high emotional pain threshold. We are firm, seeking never to fall in the ditch ourselves in order to help the sinner, but we are gentle, recognizing that the stakes are high—— in fact, eternal. We don’t burst down doors to make our case. We respect privacy and dignity and self—esteem. We know that what is worthwhile is not accomplished by mere denunciation and rebuke. Our duty is not to condemn but to restore.
One of the most dramatic instances of this ministry of support, guidance and restoration I can recall came in the congregation I last served as pastor. A fellow in that congregation, married and the father of three children, was a homosexual. He had been arrested for aggressive overt homosexual behavior and was under the care of a psychiatrist. Only his wife knew. Then he confided in me. He was finding meaning in his marriage, and his homosexual tendencies were latent. Still he was overcome with feelings of guilt and unworthiness. He was impotent in interpersonal relationships and was verging on becoming a recluse. I invited him to share with me is a small prayer/share group of men who met weekly, promising, of course, to keep his confidence always. Reluctantly he came, but something began to happen. People began to care for him, share their lives with him, never demanding more of him than he wanted to give.
Finally, the power of the Spirit in that fellowship gave him the courage to share privately with another man in the group. I was surprised when he told me about it. I was especially surprised at the person with whom he had decided to share—a sort of “macho” man, a stereotype of masculinity, the last person I would have thought would understand Tom’s struggle. But he did understand. He accepted Tom in this new revelation of struggle, treated him with gentleness, continued to love him, and redemption took place. Tom was restored, emerged from his guilt arid self—condemnation, and became a dynamic redemptive force in that congregation.
II. THE LAW OF THE HARVEST
“Do not be deceived, God is not mocked: for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap. For he who sows to his flesh will of the flesh reap corruption, but he who sows to the Spirit will of the Spirit reap everlasting life And let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart. Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all, especially to those who are of the household of faith.” (Gal. 6:7—10)
The Interpreter’s Bible refers to this section as Paul’s call for Christians to engage in “the agriculture of the Spirit.” That is a colorful and suggestive thought which aptly describes what Paul is talking about. The law of the harvest is relevant to our spiritual development and describes our destiny.
A. Judgment is certain.
A well—known Baptist preacher, R. G. Lee, had a famous sermon he preached hundreds of times, all over America, “Payday Someday.” The title alone is gripping and captures the truth.
God has established a law of identical harvest: Whatever a man sows, that he will also reap (Vs. 7). And Cod is not mocked the laws by which He governs the universe cannot be evaded. We cannot hoodwink God. His judgment is as inevitable as His love is redemptive.
Paul does not describe the process, but he is clear about the fact: he who sows to the flesh will reap corruption…he who sows to the Spirit will reap everlasting life (Vs. 8).
It is probable that Paul knew Jesus’ picture of the separation of sheep and goats in Mt. 25
So he is talking about a final judgment when we will be rewarded with “life” or “death” according to how we have sown.
But there is more here
B. To Live is to choose.
Life on earth is life in the making. It involves constant choice and constant conflict, conflict between the different facets of our nature that struggle for dominance, conflict between the causes that vie for our allegiance, conflict between a false suggestion from our exterior world and a true intuition of the inner self, conflict between self—dominance and self— surrender. Through the continuous making of resolute decisions we pattern our life and we mold our character. William James was right in saying that the hell to be endured hereafter of which theology tells, is no worse than the hell we make for ourselves by habitually fashioning our character in the wrong way.
We can’t escape this aspect of our existence. To be alive is to be faced with decision. Jesus confronts us with this immutable fact of life. ‘Enter by the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is easy, that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard, that leads to life, and those who find it are few’” (Natt. 7:13—14 RSV).
C. Life is determined by the choices we make.
The spiritual life is one of growth rather than of anxious human endeavor. It is a process, not an episode from one phase to another.
In the development of personhood, it is also true. We mature by process. To really be alive means more than simply passing through the different stages of physical development, more than being pushed along the natural corridor of living and dying. It means embracing life and taking responsibility for it.
In Herb Gardner’s A Thousand Clowns, an uncle tells of what he wants for his nephew:
“I just want him to stay with me till I can be sure he won’t turn into a Norman Nothing. I want to be sure he’ll know when he’s chickening out on himself . . . I want him to stay awake and know who the phonies are, I want him to know how to holler and put up an argument. I want a little guts to show before I let him go. I want to be sure he sees all the wild possibilities And I want him to know the subtle, sneaky, important reason he was born a human being and not a chair.” (Be Your Whole Self pp 62—63) This is the crux of it. In “the agriculture of the Spirit” we cannot afford to “chicken out” on ourselves. There are two big alternatives, sowing to the flesh or sowing to the Spirit, and in each of those alternatives life is determined by the choices we make.
While there is an ultimate judgment when we will be given “life” or “death,” we reap all along the way. The due season does not have to wait for the day of judgment. Our reaping in due season is the harvest of the multiplication of identical deed. The works of the flesh carry with them the germ of their own decay; the work of the Spirit carries with it the fruit of the Spirit is multiplied.
One of T. S. Eliot’s characters in The Cocktail Party describes what happens to a person by his choices. Edward, the discouraged husband, is pictured groping through the darkness of his own soul. No longer able to love his wife, all relationship destroyed, unable to overcome his self-condemnation, he agonizes,
There was a door
And I could not open it.
I could not touch the handle.
Why should I not walk out of my prison?
It was only yesterday that damnation took place,
And now I must live with it...
Day after day, month after month
Forever and ever.
But was it only yesterday that damnation took place? No Every decision, restricts the opportunity f or other decisions, and narrows the range of choices.
Every day we are confronted with choices: to speak out or stay silent in the presence of evil. To hear the silent pleas of a neighbor and become involved, or retreat into my safe family circle. To sense the heartache of the poor and lonely and respond with time and money, or draw back and become more calloused. To accept the assessment of a friend about my own weakness as an act of tough love or as a act of judgment to which I respond in resentment. (Matt. 7:13—21)
Knowing that while there is the ultimate “payday someday,” we also know that the due season of harvest comes regularly all along the way, so let us not grow weary in well doing (Vs. 9)
D. The Household of Faith
In reminding us the law of the harvest, Paul calls us to do good as we have opportunity By this phrase he does not mean “on such occasions as are opportune,” but rather “as long as we have the opportunity to do so.”
Then he adds especially to those who are of the household of faith (Vs.10). Do not misread this. Paul is not talking about exclusive concern. The Gospel is universal. Paul has underscored that fact throughout the epistle. Even so, the focus of Paul’s ethics is pastoral. He is oriented to and motivated by his concern to “build up” the body of Christ. He is not limit ing “doing good” to the household of faith alone, but underscoring the need for people to be attentive to the needs of one another in their shared life as the people of God.
Those are children of God by faith in Christ (Gal. 3:26) must remember that they form a family. As Paul was concerned that there be no factions and rivalries in a Christian family, so he was concerned that the focus of our “doing good” was exercised there. He knew that we are not likely to do good elsewhere, if we do not do good in our own household. And the law of the harvest works here as well: doing good in one place flows out in goodness to other places.
III. GLORY ONLY IN THE CROSS
“See with what large letters I have written to you with my own hand As many as desire to make a good showing in the flesh, these try to compel you to be circumcised, only lest they suffer persecution for the cross of Christ. For not even those who are circumcised keep the law, but they desire to have you circumcised that they may glory in your flesh But God forbid that I should glory except in the cross Of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world has been crucified to me and I to the world. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything, but a new creation (Gal. 6:11—15).
Ordinarily Paul dictated his letters to a scribe, then added his signature. But in the Galatians letter he does more. At least from verse 11 on were written in his own hand. How are we to picture this? Did he take the pen in hand to add a personal greeting, a benediction, and his signature? If so, he cannot contain himself with that. His love for the Galatians overwhelms him again. He is carried away with surging thoughts and swelling emotions, so he adds another summarizing appeal - intimately personal one, restating the claim that neither circumcise nor uncircumcision avails anything, but a new creation and putting his life on the line with the crucified Christ.
Some commentators like George S. Duncan (The Moffat New Testament Commentary) believe that Paul at least began writing in his own hand as for back as Ch. 5, Vs. 2, and perhaps wrote the entire letter. Duncan argues that style and content alike argue that the letter was not dictated, but all of it was written by the hand of Paul. Others believe that it was only these last verses. Whatever the case, these last verses are a pinnacle of conviction, emotion, and expression.
Why large letters for these last verses? Again we can only conject. It could have been the result of physical difficulty. Paul may have had to strain even to write this much because of eye trouble, or nervousness, or excruciating headache to which believe he was very prone. Some have suggested that physical labor had made his fingers stiff. I prefer to think that his large letters would serve the same purpose as underlining. Those who read the epistle, especially those who would read it aloud in the church would give this special attention.
A. Paul comes back again to the issue of controversy—circumcision. Even more pointedly than in 4:17 and 5:10—12, he states the motives of the Judaizers. One, to make a good showing in the flesh They want to put on a good outward demonstration. Two, to avoid persecution. The Romans recognized the Jewish religion and officially allowed its practice. Since circumcision was the mark of a Jew, it could provide escape should persecution arise. Three, they wanted to get credit for their influence. If they could convince the Galatians to be circumcised, they would be able to boost what they had done.
All these reasons are perverted motives and betray the Gospel. There is only one reason for glorying: the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Francis Asbury, the father of American Methodism, knew this was so. Near the end of his notable and fruitful life, he said:
“Were I disposed to boast, my boastings would be found true. I was converted at the age of sixteen. At the age of eighteen I began to preach, and traveled some in Europe. At twenty-six I left my native land, bade adieu to my weeping parents, and crossed a boisterous ocean to spend the rest of my days in a strange land, partly settled by savages. in thirty years I have crossed the Allegheny Mountains fifty-eight times. I have slept in the woods and been without food and covering. Through the Southern states I have waded swamps and led my horse for miles, and in these journeys took cold that brought on the diseases that now prey on my body and must soon terminate in death. But my mind is still the same, that through the merits of Christ and by the grace of God I am saved.”
I am sure Asbury remembered Paul and his “reasons” for boasting (11 Cor. 11:21—30): a religious man, persecuted for his faith - five times forty lashes, three times beaten, shipwrecked, sleepless nights, imprisoned - but if I must boast, I will boast of the things that show my weakness (11 Cor. 11:30). Like Paul Asbury knew that there was nothing to boast in, only the cross. Do we?
B. Not only individuals but the whole church needs to learn this. There are few churches that do not have the cross at some focal point with in their building. But what does the cross really mean in the life of those congregations? Robert McAfee Brown found in a cross not within but outside a church the challenging meaning of the cross. It was at the Episcopal Theological Seminary of the Southwest in Austin, Texas.
“Sitting in the chapel one is inescapably aware of the cross as the focal point of the building. The cross is an uncomfortably life—sized cross, rather than an aesthetically pleasing ornament. But the cross is not inside the chapel at all. It is outside the walls of the chapel, outside the camp, plainly visible through the large window behind the altar, but planted firmly in the world beyond, the world in which there is also a high—energy physics laboratory, a university, snarled city traffic, and slums. That is where the Christian drama is played out. This is the place to which the Christian is summoned.”
It is a cross style of life to which Christians are called. The God who so loved the world that He gave His Son for it expects the church to likewise love the world and give itself for it. The words of the Lord’s Supper commission us body my blood The Spirit of Christ is given to us to enable us to love with His love, to die in His death, to give our body and blood for others. The great expression of the Spirit each day is to get the cross out of the church and into the world; to have the power and presence to say not only in liturgy but in life, “This is my body this is my blood.”
C. A New Creation
Paul comes back to it, and almost sings it. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything, but a new creation (Gal. 6:15).
Paul himself is the witness. In Gal. 2:20 he said he had been crucified with Christ. Now he declares that by the cross the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world (Vs. 14). All the things in life which are imposing and appealing to the “natural” man have lost their attraction and significance for him. He is a new creation in Christ could say, For his (Christ) sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as refuse, in order that I may gain Christ (Phil. 3:8).
Paul did not mean that he was severed from the physical world. He continued to live in the present world and used its good things for the service of the Lord. But the best and the worst of this world which led to trust in self instead of God had no pulling power; he was crucified to that, and that to him.
Paul’s testimony is repeated aver and aver again as persons respond in faith to God’s gift of Christ, they are given His Spirit and became new creations. I heard of such a miracle recently. The American Red cross was gathering supplies, medicine, clothing, food and the like, for the suffering people of Biafra. Inside one of the boxes that showed up at the collecting depot one day was a letter. It said, “We have recently been converted and because of our conversion we want to try to help. We won’t ever need these again. Can you use them for something?” Inside the box were several Ku Klux Klan sheets. The sheets were cut down to strips and eventually used to bandage the wounds of black persons in Africa.
It could hardly be more dramatic - from symbols of hatred to bandages of love because of the new creation. Nothing else matters, says Paul.
IV. A BLESSING AND A PLEA.
“And as many as walk according to this rule, peace and mercy be upon them, and upon the Israel of God. From now on let no one trouble me, for I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus. Brethren, the g of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit Amen.” (Gal. 6:16-18).
Paul began his letter with a prayer for peace (1:3) and he closes it with the same. In the beginning peace was combined with grace; here it is combined with mercy, grace being added as the final note. They go together grace, mercy and peace.
A. And upon the Israel of God means more than a first thought may indicate.
The R.S.V. rendering of this verse makes the Israel of God synonymous with the Christian church. Not so with the K.J.V. and the new K.J.V., yet even these differ. Both separate as many as walk by this rule (those who refuse to give any validity for salvation to circumcision or uncircumcision, but trust Christ alone for salvation) from the Israel of God
This distinction seems right. Paul is speaking of two groups. No where else did he call the church the Israel of God but always used “Israel” to designate the Jewish nation. There is no reason to think he would use this designation for this solitary occasion. So Paul is including both the Christians and the Jews who have not yet accepted Christ in this prayer.
Some translations are punctuated in such a way as to make the prayer one for p upon all that trust the new creation as the only way to salvation, and mercy for all the rest. But the new K.J.V. translates and punctuates in such a way as to make the prayer applicable to all. This certainly fits the universality of Paul’s gospel and the encompassing passion he had for all. So he prays for peace and mercy for all.
B. The stigmata
Paul’s opponents had accused him of preaching a man—made gospel and pleasing men. He was forced to defend apostleship because some said his preaching was not valid because he was not recognized as an apostle by the church in Jerusalem. Others took an opposite approach. saying he was sub missive to the hierarchy. Even the Galatians whom he loved, regarded him as their enemy when he told them the truth about themselves Jerusalem and betrayed Christian freedom, lie had to even answer the charge that his preaching encouraged sin.
His opponents and detractors were many, and he was weary. He could not understand why there could be in doubt about his commitment to Jesus Christ. All that he was centered in1 and his very person carried the signs. For I bear in ray body the marks of the Lord Jesus
There is, some challenging mental food for reflection here. What do these marks mean? What is Paul driving at?
The metaphor may have been suggested to Paul, sharp mind that he was, as a constrast with circumcision. “If you are going to have marks on your body, why not have some that have resulted from your battle for the gospel?” Or, “You may wish to be stamped as a son of Israel, I want to be marked as belonging to Jesus——and here are the markings.”
A second stream of reflection flows from the fact that in that day a master often branded his slaves with a mark that identified them as his. Paul had committed himself to be a slave for Christ. The scars, the result of wounds he had suffered in that role, was his badge of identity. Not on his apostolic authority, but through his wounds he makes his appeal.
Another thought is stimulated——the stigmata This is one of the great mysteries of religious history——that the markings of the wounds of Christ actually appear on the person of others.
Tradition says it happened to Francis of Assisi. As he fasted on a lonely mountain top, he received a vision of the cross on which the love of God was being crucified stretching across the entire horizon. As the vision faded, Francis relaxed. Looking down) the marks of the nails were in his hands, and he bore them to his death.
Reading about St. Francis, I can believe that. He so identified with Christ, so intensely sought to reflect the love, poverty, joy, simplicity and openness of Jesus’ life that he actually communicated Christ through his person. No wonder his prayer is the classic summary of the person in Christ.
Lord,
Make me an instrument of thy peace, where hate rules, let me bring love, where malice, forgiveness, where disputes, reconciliation, where error, truth, where doubt, belief, where despair, hope, where darkness, thy light, where sorrow, Joy!
O Master,
let me strive more to comfort others
than to be comforted,
to understand others,
than to be understood,
to love others
more than to be loved! For he who gives, receives, he who forgets himself finds, he who forgives, receives forgiveness,
and dying,
we rise again to eternal life.
But what about you and me, us pedestrian saints who are so far below the mark of St. Francis?
In my prayerful reflections once I raised that question and made a response.
