By now you are waiting for Paul to turn a corner and deliver the limitations of all this freedom. You are waiting for him to say, "but. . ." and tell you where all of these things stop. But he never does! He never even slows down. Perhaps you were expecting him to say, "Yes, you are free, but you are not supposed to live like it. You should give up your freedom in order to follow the Law willingly, rather than for earning God's favor." But hear Paul's unequivocal words: "It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery"(5:1). His passion to see the Galatians liberated reminds one of the description which was applied to Christ: "Zeal for the Lord's house has consumed me" (John 2:17). Nothing is more important to the Lord than the building of His house, and anything which jeopardizes the Bride of Christ will be removed. When cancer corrupts the human body nothing short of a complete surgical removal will do. Likewise legalism resembles the "little yeast which leavens the whole lump"(5:9), and it must be thrown out.

Paul's words will become more caustic in the next few sentences than they ever have been (or ever will be again). If you return to the Law you are treating the sacrifice of Christ as if it meant nothing at all! You have alienated Christ and have "fallen from grace"(v.4). Have you ever wondered if you could lose your salvation? Scripture seems to teach that it is impossible because salvation is by grace alone. If you could do something bad enough to lose it then it wouldn't be by grace at all (see Rom.11:6). The few places where it seems to suggest that one could fall away are speaking about treating the blood of Christ as if it were of no value. The Scriptures never back down from grace, and if they ever describe "falling away," you can be sure that it involves turning to something besides God's grace. In other words, the best way not to be saved is to trust in anything that you do for God towards your own salvation, be it circumcision, or going to church, or even praying for salvation. Your redemption is a gift of God and you did nothing to obtain it. It was, and still is, by grace. The men who have been teaching otherwise do not speak from God. That leaves only one other option, and Paul is not afraid to point that out.

Paul's opponents told the Galatians that he teaches circumcision and law everywhere else but Galatia. But the apostle responds, "If I am, then why am I still being persecuted?"(v.11) Paul is directing our attention to the source of his persecution. He is being beaten everywhere he goes because he teaches 100% grace. Rest assured that this response will always follow the man who teaches grace alone, and it will come from the enemies of grace, even though some of them may be Christians! Grace is an offense to self-righteousness because it takes away from us all room for boasting. Other times persecution comes because organized Christendom often depends on legalism for its own survival. If men and women learned that they were free, then who would do all the work? The answer is that God's Spirit would move them to do any work which He desires them to do, but that may or may not fit into the goals and plans of the institutions in question. Ministers expend a great deal of energy to motivate Christians to support the aims of these institutions (mostly churches), and if they were to ease up on them the entire enterprise might fall apart. Granted, these men and women are not evil, they are trying to serve the Lord and bring the world to Christ. The problem is, however, that their work does not operate on the principle of the leadership of the Spirit. And I'll say it again: all this work is useless to Him (see Matt.15:8-9).

"As for those agitators, I wish one day the knife would slip and they would be castrated!!"(v.12) Wow. What do you say to comment on that one?

Moving right along. . . Paul says something which at first appears to be a qualification--but it isn't. "Do not allow your freedom to give opportunity to the flesh"(v.13). There are two things which can bind a Christian: the Law and the flesh. Neither one should get control of you. He didn't say keep the Law just close enough to you so that you won't go wild with this stuff. He says don't let anything move you from your freedom in Christ. You are now "in Christ" and therefore "in the Spirit." Living as if you are still "in the flesh" will never work, you'll just get stuck in bondage again. Paul takes this opportunity to describe the difference between these two worlds of existence, because it's possible that one may not even see a distinction.

The Spirit loves at all times. Anything which is not love is not the Spirit. That's it. It's not very complicated. The irony of the whole situation is that, while men spend so much energy trying to teach people to observe all the minute requirements of the Law, you actually are fulfilling the Law when you live in dependence on the Spirit, because He loves without fail. Paul is saying, "You want to follow the Law? Live by the Spirit, and you will find that the Law was just a description of the behavior of the Holy Spirit." The Law is not prescriptive, it is descriptive. Even the Ten Commandments never said "Do not. . .," they actually said "you will not. . ." They were actually a prediction of what sort of behavior will result in one whom the Spirit of Christ indwells. Stop trying to become something you already are.

"So I say, live by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh"(v.16). We tend to read this verse backwards: You'd better not gratify the desires of the flesh or you'll never be able to live by the Spirit. But that is not what it says. It says, "Put all your attention on living by the Spirit, and you will find that you won't gratify the desires of the flesh."

There is entirely too much sin-consciousness among Christians today. Some preachers think about nothing but sin. When our attention is on "not sinning" rather than on Christ, we will never grow in our relationship with him. All we care about is sin, and whether or not we have it on us or in us. This should not be. Our life is about learning to behold Christ in all of his glory. But how can we behold him when our performance consumes our minds and hearts?

Our preoccupation with righteousness and sin reflects Adam and Eve's preoccupation with the Tree of the Knowledge Good and Evil. That tree prefigured the Law of God, which we were never meant to need. It makes us wise towards sin and righteousness and "opens our eyes" to see what we are. But our Christian life is not primarily a matter of morality, it is a matter of Life. We live by the Spirit, and we find that the flesh does not get the upper hand. Nor do we spend our time studying the do's and don'ts of our particular traditions, because "if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under law"(v.18). That time it didn't say "you won't give in to the flesh," it said that you aren't under law. The latter is as important (if not more so) than the former.