Galatians 5

Paul has used two comparisons to show his readers what the law is really like: a schoolmaster or guardian (Gal. 3:24; 4:2), and a bondwoman (Gal. 4:22ff.). Now he compared it to a yoke of slavery. You will recall that Peter used this same image at the famous conference in Jerusalem (see Acts 15:10).

The image of the yoke is not difficult to understand. It usually represents slavery, service, and control by someone else over your life; it may also represent willing service and submission to someone else. When God delivered Israel from Egyptian servitude, it was the breaking of a yoke (Lev. 26:13). The farmer uses the yoke to control and guide his oxen because they would not willingly serve if they were free.

When the believers in Galatia trusted Christ, they lost the yoke of servitude to sin and put on the yoke of Christ (Matt. 11:28–30). The yoke of religion is hard, and the burdens heavy; Christ’s yoke is “easy” and His burden is “light.” That word easy in the Greek means “kind, gracious.” The yoke of Christ frees us to fulfill His will, while the yoke of the law enslaves us. The unsaved person wears a yoke of sin (Lam. 1:14); the religious legalist wears the yoke of bondage (Gal. 5:1); but the Christian who depends on God’s grace wears the liberating yoke of Christ.

It is Christ who has made us free from the bondage of the law. He freed us from the curse of the law by dying for us on the tree (Gal. 3:13). The believer is no longer under law; he is under grace (Rom. 6:14). This does not mean that we are outlaws and rebels. It simply means that we no longer need the external force of law to keep us in God’s will, because we have the internal leading of the Holy Spirit of God (Rom. 8:1–4). Christ died to set us free, not to make us slaves. To go back to law is to become entangled in a maze of “do’s and don’ts” and to abandon spiritual adulthood for a “second childhood.”

Sad to say, there are some people who feel very insecure with liberty. They would rather be under the tyranny of some leader than to make their own decisions freely. There are some believers who are frightened by the liberty they have in God’s grace; so they seek out a fellowship that is legalistic and dictatorial, where they can let others make their decisions for them. This is comparable to an adult climbing back into the crib. The way of Christian liberty is the way of fulfillment in Christ. No wonder Paul issues that ultimatum: “Do not be entangled again in the yoke of bondage. Take your stand for liberty.”

Paul’s doctrine of grace is dangerous!” cried the Judaizers. “It replaces law with license. Why, if we do away with our rules and abandon our high standards, the churches will fall apart.”

First-century Judaizers are not the only ones afraid to depend on God’s grace. Legalists in our churches today warn that we dare not teach people about the liberty we have in Christ lest it result in religious anarchy. These people misunderstand Paul’s teaching about grace, and it is to correct such misunderstanding that Paul wrote the final section of his letter (Gal. 5—6).

Paul turned now from argument to application, from the doctrinal to the practical. The Christian who lives by faith is not going to become a rebel. Quite the contrary, he is going to experience the inner discipline of God that is far better than the outer discipline of man-made rules. No man could become a rebel who depends on God’s grace, yields to God’s Spirit, lives for others, and seeks to glorify God. The legalist is the one who eventually rebels, because he is living in bondage, depending on the flesh, living for self, and seeking the praise of men and not the glory of God.

No, Paul’s doctrine of Christian liberty through grace is not the dangerous doctrine. It is legalism that is the dangerous doctrine, because legalism attempts to do the impossible: change the old nature and make it obey the laws of God. Legalism succeeds for a short time, and then the flesh begins to rebel. The surrendered Christian who depends on the power of the Spirit is not denying the law of God or rebelling against it. Rather, that law is being fulfilled in him through the Spirit (Rom. 8:1–4). It is easy to see the sequence of thought in these closing chapters: 1. I have been set free by Christ. I am no longer under bondage to the law (Gal. 5:1–12). 2. But I need something—Someone—to control my life from within. That Someone is the Holy Spirit

(Gal. 5:13–26). 3. Through the Spirit’s love, I have a desire to live for others, not for self (Gal. 6:1–10). 4. This life of liberty is so wonderful, I want to live it to the glory of God; for He is the One making it possible (Gal. 6:11–18).

Now, contrast this with the experience of the person who chooses to live under law, under the discipline of some religious leader: 1. If I obey these rules, I will become a more spiritual person. I am a great admirer of this religious leader, so I now submit myself to his system. 2. I believe I have the strength to obey and improve myself. I do what I am told and measure up to the standards set for me. 3. I’m making progress. I don’t do some of the things I used to do. Other people compliment me on my obedience and discipline. I can see that I am better than others in my fellowship. How wonderful to be so spiritual. 4. If only others were like me! God is certainly fortunate that I am His. I have a desire to share this with others so they can be as I am. Our group is growing and we have a fine reputation. Too bad other groups are not as spiritual as we are.

No matter how you look at it, legalism is an insidious, dangerous enemy. When you abandon grace for law, you always lose. In this first section (Gal. 5:1–12), Paul explained what the believer loses when he turns from God’s grace to man-made rules and regulations.

Paul used three phrases to describe the losses the Christian incurs when he turns from grace to law: “Christ shall profit you nothing” (Gal. 5:2); “a debtor to do the whole law” (Gal. 5:3); “Christ is become of no effect unto you” (Gal. 5:4). This leads to the sad conclusion in Galatians 5:4: “Ye are fallen from grace.” It is bad enough that legalism robs the believer of his liberty, but it also robs him of his spiritual wealth in Christ. The believer living under law becomes a bankrupt slave.

God’s Word teaches that when we were unsaved, we owed God a debt we could not pay. Jesus made this clear in His parable of the two debtors (Luke 7:36–50). Two men owed money to a creditor, the one owing ten times as much as the other. But neither was able to pay, so the creditor “graciously forgave them both” (literal translation). No matter how much morality a man may have, he still comes short of the glory of God. Even if his sin debt is one tenth that of others, he stands unable to pay, bankrupt at the judgment bar of God. God in His grace, because of the work of Christ on the cross, is able to forgive sinners, no matter how large their debt may be.

Thus when we trust Christ, we become spiritually rich. We now share in the riches of God’s grace (Eph. 1:7), the riches of His glory (Eph. 1:18; Phil. 4:19), the riches of His wisdom (Rom. 11:33), and the “unsearchable riches of Christ” (Eph. 3:8). In Christ we have “all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” (Col. 2:3), and we are “complete in him” (Col. 2:10). Once a person is “in Christ,” he has all that he needs to live the kind of Christian life God wants him to live.

The Judaizers, however, want us to believe that we are missing something, that we would be more “spiritual” if we practiced the law with its demands and disciplines. But Paul made it clear that the law adds nothing—because nothing can be added! Instead, the law comes in as a thief and robs the believer of the spiritual riches he has in Christ. It puts him back into bankruptcy, responsible for a debt he is unable to pay.

To live by grace means to depend on God’s abundant supply of every need. To live by law means to depend on my own strength—the flesh—and be left to get by without God’s supply. Paul warned the Galatians that to submit to circumcision in these circumstances would rob them of all the benefits they have in Christ (though circumcision itself is an indifferent matter, Gal. 5:6; 6:15). Furthermore, to submit would put them under obligation to obey the whole law.

It is at this point that legalists reveal their hypocrisy, for they fail to keep the whole law. They look on the Old Testament law the way a customer surveys the food in a cafeteria: they choose what they want and leave the rest. But this is not honest. To teach that a Christian today should, for example, keep the Sabbath but not the Passover, is to dismember God’s law. The same Lawgiver who gave the one commandment also gave the other (James 2:9–11). Earlier, Paul had quoted Moses to prove that the curse of the law is on everyone who fails to keep all the law (Gal. 3:10; see Deut. 27:26).

Imagine a motorist driving down a city street and deliberately driving through a red light. He is pulled over by a policeman who asks to see his driver’s license. Immediately the driver begins to defend himself. “Officer, I know I ran that red light—but I have never robbed anybody. I’ve never killed anybody. I’ve never cheated on my income tax.”

The policeman smiles as he writes out the ticket, because he knows that no amount of obedience can make up for one act of disobedience. It is one law, and the same law that protects the obedient man punishes the offender. To boast about keeping part of the law while at the same time breaking another part is to confess that I am worthy of punishment.

Now we can better understand what Paul meant by “fallen from grace” (Gal. 5:4). Certainly he was not suggesting that the Galatians had “lost their salvation,” because throughout this letter he dealt with them as believers. At least nine times he called them brethren, and he also used the pronoun we (Gal. 4:28, 31). This Paul would never do if his readers were lost. He boldly stated, “And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, ‘Abba, Father’” (Gal. 4:6). If his readers were unsaved, Paul could never write those words.

No, to be “fallen from grace” does not mean to lose salvation. Rather, it means “fallen out of the sphere of God’s grace.” You cannot mix grace and law. If you decide to live in the sphere of law, then you cannot live in the sphere of grace. The believers in Galatia had been bewitched by the false teachers (Gal. 3:1) and thus were disobeying the truth. They had removed toward another gospel (Gal. 1:6–9) and had turned back to the elementary things of the old religion (Gal. 4:9). As a result, they had become entangled with the yoke of bondage, and this led to their present position: “fallen from grace.” And the tragedy of this fall is that they had robbed themselves of all the good things Jesus Christ could do for them.

Paul next presented the life of the believer in the sphere of grace (Gal. 5:5–6). This enables us to contrast the two ways of life. When you live by grace, you depend on the power of the Spirit; but under law, you must depend on yourself and your own efforts. Faith is not dead; faith works (see James 2:14–26). But the efforts of the flesh can never accomplish what faith can accomplish through the Spirit. And faith works through love—love for God and love for others. Unfortunately, flesh does not manufacture love; too often it produces selfishness and rivalry (see Gal. 5:15). No wonder Paul pictured the life of legalism as a fall!

When the believer walks by faith, depending on the Spirit of God, he lives in the sphere of God’s grace; and all his needs are provided. He experiences the riches of God’s grace. And, he always has something to look forward to (Gal. 5:5): one day Jesus shall return to make us like Himself in perfect righteousness. The law gives no promise for perfect righteousness in the future. The law prepared the way for the first coming of Christ (Gal. 3:23—4:7), but it cannot prepare the way for the second coming of Christ.

So, the believer who chooses legalism robs himself of spiritual liberty and spiritual wealth. He deliberately puts himself into bondage and bankruptcy.

Paul was fond of athletic illustrations and used them often in his letters. His readers were familiar with the Olympic Games as well as other Greek athletic contests that always included footraces. It is important to note that Paul never uses the image of the race to tell people how to be saved. He is always talking to Christians about how to live the Christian life. A contestant in the Greek games had to be a citizen before he could compete. We become citizens of heaven through faith in Christ; then the Lord puts us on our course, and we run to win the prize (see Phil. 3:12–21). We do not run to be saved; we run because we are already saved and want to fulfill God’s will in our lives (Acts 20:24).

“You did run well.” When Paul first came to them, they received him “as an angel of God” (Gal. 4:14). They accepted the Word, trusted the Lord Jesus Christ, and received the Holy Spirit. They had a deep joy that was evident to all, and were willing to make any sacrifice to accommodate Paul (Gal. 4:15). But now, Paul was their enemy. What had happened?

A literal translation of Galatians 5: gives us the answer: “You were running well. Who cut in on you so that you stopped obeying the truth?” In the races, each runner was to stay in his assigned lane, but some runners would cut in on their competitors to try to get them off course. This is what the Judaizers had done to the Galatian believers: they cut in on them and forced them to change direction and go on a “spiritual detour.” It was not God who did this, because He had called them to run faithfully in the lane marked “Grace.”

His explanation changes the figure of speech from athletics to cooking, for Paul introduces the idea of yeast (leaven). In the Old Testament, leaven is generally pictured as a symbol of evil. During Passover, for example, no yeast was allowed in the house (Ex. 12:15–19; 13:7). Worshippers were not permitted to mingle leaven with sacrifices (Ex. 34:25), though there were some exceptions to this rule. Jesus used leaven as a picture of sin when He warned against the “leaven of the Pharisees” (Matt. 16:6–12); and Paul used leaven as a symbol of sin in the church at Corinth (1 Cor. 5).

Yeast is really a good illustration of sin: it is small, but if left alone it grows and permeates the whole. The false doctrine of the Judaizers was introduced to the Galatian churches in a small way, but, before long, the “yeast” grew and eventually took over.

The spirit of legalism does not suddenly overpower a church. Like leaven, it is introduced secretly, it grows, and before long poisons the whole assembly. In most cases, the motives that encourage legalism are good (“We want to have a more spiritual church”), but the methods are not scriptural.

It is not wrong to have standards in a church, but we should never think that the standards will make anybody spiritual, or that the keeping of the standards is an evidence of spirituality. How easy it is for the yeast to grow. Before long, we become proud of our spirituality (“puffed up” is the way Paul put it [1 Cor. 5:2] and that is exactly what yeast does: it puffs up), and then critical of everybody else’s lack of spirituality. This, of course, only feeds the flesh and grieves the Spirit, but we go on our way thinking we are glorifying God.

Every Christian has the responsibility to watch for the beginnings of legalism, that first bit of yeast that infects the fellowship and eventually grows into a serious problem. No wonder Paul is so vehement as he denounces the false teachers: “I am suffering persecution because I preach the cross, but these false teachers are popular celebrities because they preach a religion that pampers the flesh and feeds the ego. Do they want to circumcise you? I wish that they themselves were cut off!” (Gal. 5:11–12, literal translation).

Since the death and resurrection of Christ, there is no spiritual value to circumcision; it is only a physical operation. Paul wished that the false teachers would operate on themselves—“castrate themselves”—so that they could not produce any more “children of slavery.”

The believer who lives in the sphere of God’s grace is free, rich, and running in the lane that leads to reward and fulfillment. The believer who abandons grace for law is a slave, a pauper, and a runner on a detour. In short, he is a loser. And the only way to become a winner is to “purge out the leaven,” the false doctrine that mixes law and grace, and yield to the Spirit of God.

God’s grace is sufficient for every demand of life. We are saved by grace (Eph. 2:8–10), and we serve by grace (1 Cor. 15:9–10). Grace enables us to endure suffering (2 Cor. 12:9). It is grace that strengthens us (2 Tim. 2:1) so that we can be victorious soldiers. Our God is the God of all grace (1 Peter 5:10). We can come to the throne of grace and find grace to help in every need (Heb. 4:16). As we read the Bible, which is “the word of his grace” (Acts 20:32), the Spirit of grace (Heb. 10:29) reveals to us how rich we are in Christ.

“And of his fullness have all we received, and grace for grace” (John 1:16).

How rich we are!