Results tagged “Slavery”

Galatians 4:1-7 - I've read this over maybe 4 times just now. It feels like there's some profound truth in there that's eluding me, but maybe it's simply this:

Jesus changes everything. Everything.

We were once enslaved children, now free men. Once slaves, now sons and heirs. Once under law, now adopted as sons.

I think I tend to operate as if nothing has changed when in reality everything has changed under Jesus.

Galatians 4:9 - As if on cue, Paul gives me a spiritual dope slap. "... how can you turn back again to the weak and worthless elementary principles of the world ... ?" Indeed, but I am so forgetful.

Galatians 4:21-31 - Paul contrasts the sons of Abraham's two wives, one a slave and one free. He pleads with them to remember that they are children. like Isaac, of the promise, children of freedom.

Yet Christians today pile rule upon rule, attempting to live right by becoming slaves to them instead of embracing the undeserved freedom from Christ and letting it compel them to live by righteousness.

Galatians 2:1-2 - Paul in chapter 1 insists that the Gospel he preaches came not from men but from Jesus, yet here he says that he went to Jerusalem to present his Gospel to the leaders there, "in order to make sure I was not running or had not run in vain". Even though he was confident in what Jesus had given Him, knowing that Jesus had spoken also to them (and first), he wanted to be sure that they were in agreement.

Galatians 2:4-9 - He who once a zealot for the law, to the point of punishing law breakers with death, now just as zealously defends the Gospel of freedom and refuses to allow those who would claim we must still submit to the law any ground.

Galatians 2:11-14 - The church needs men of boldness like Paul, who for the sake of the purity of the Gospel will stand up, publicly, to leaders whose "conduct [is] not in step with the truth of the gospel". Paul paid a price for his convictions as do those today who dare to call false gospel false. Of course, Paul's standing for the Gospel ultimately cost him his life at the hands of those outside the church, but I imagine that day he ruffled a few feathers among the brothers that day.

Galatians 2:20 - "I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me." I struggled with this before becoming a Christian and I've since heard others express the same struggle. The commitment to Christ is complete and total surrender. From the outside, it seems as if you will loose your very identity, becoming some religious clone of every other Christian, robotically living the same life as any other disciple. As this verse says, we are no longer ourselves, but Jesus in the flesh. It's scary and it sounds boring.

But while there is truth to those ideas, that I die and succumb to Christ, that does not produce like Jesus like duplicates in the way that a photocopier does. The beauty of God's creation in humanity is that His will and Jesus can be expressed in a huge number of ways. We are still individual expressions of the will of the Father, when we surrender to Him and live out Jesus instead of us, the real us He created is revealed. on two disciples are alike, just like no two sinners are and none of us are a complete expression of who He is. Only when we come together as the church to we begin to fully experience and express Him.

Far from being boring, when we let go and surrender to Jesus, only then we are able to live up to our potential, becoming, finally, all that He created us to be.

Galatians 4:1-7 - The ESV continues the 'guardian' theme here, relating it to an heir as a child. Until the time set by the father, the heir is practically no different than a slave. Until then, he is under guardians and managers. His coming of age frees him from thier control and protection. Paul says that we were once slaves to 'elementary principals' (the law, I assume) until Christ came and we became sons and co-heirs with Christ. As cool as this concept sounds, I get the feeling that I'm somehow still missing the majesty and impact of it. It seems that it ought to feel more profound than it does, if that makes sense.

I'm a son of God, with all the rights that implies as a mature heir, not simply a servant or a child. What do you think that should mean in our lives? If I really understood this, I guess what I'm asking is, how would I live?

Galatians 4:9 - Not that we have found God, but He has found us.

Galatians 4:8-11 - Paul criticizes them here for returning to their old ways, specifically observing special days. Thinking about the general state of the church in the US, where Easter and Christmas are so important, it makes me wonder what Paul would say to us? Do we really get what Christ came for? Did he come that we should have nice buildings, egg hunts and Christmas plays? That we would light candles in wreaths and stop drinking for lent? Don't get me wrong, I appreciate these things too, but if this is what our religion is, and for too many that is what it is, then we have completely missed the point.

Galatians 4:12-20 - You can feel Paul's anguish about the Galatians, that they have returned to the old ways when he has seen, and taught them, of the freedom to worship God as an heir. Looking around, when I see folks falling back into traditional patterns, missing the grace of Jesus and not living in it's freedoms, am I in anguish? It seems that we can get worked up about major sin, but we tolerate folks missing out on the full freedom and joy in Jesus far too easily. I wonder if that's because we are too far removed from it ourselves? That's convicting right there, wow.

Galatians 4:21-27 - The implications of this passage hit me harder than it has in the past. Abraham had two son, one born through the rules (man and woman come together, sperm meets egg, baby is born), but for the other the rules, if you will, didn't work. No matter how many times step one was performed, steps two and three didn't follow. But God stepped in and, through a promise, fixed the process. It was only through the promise that Issac was born.

It's the same for us. The theory holds that through following the law, we can see God. Follow the rules, be with God. But the rule don't work. No matter how many times we try, the process fails as we cannot keep the law. But God steps in, and through the promise of Jesus, He fixes the process and in the promise we are reborn.

I ought to be ashamed at how often I fail to be amazed at what God has done for us - for me - in Jesus.