Freedom!
Galatians 1:1-5
Many of you know that my all-time favourite movie is Braveheart. Every time I watch it (and I”I’ve watched it too many times!), I find myself inspired by the absolute desire to be free.
Freedom is an incredible thing to experience. Some of you reading this know first hand what it is like to be free of a destructive habit or burden. You know what’s it like to finally feel free. There is truly nothing like it.
For first Century Christ followers, spiritual freedom brought that type of feeling. It was an incredible thought: to be accepted by God unconditionally. For Jews, the burden of obeying the Law was lifted. For Gentiles, the notion that they will never be good enough was erased. Both groups were free.
But old habits die hard. They sneak back into our lives and before we know it, we are once again caught up with that behaviour or burden. Suddenly our freedom is gone and we fall into the trap of doing what we did in our past.
That’s exactly what was happening at the time Paul writes this letter to the church in Galatia. Galatia (or Southern Galatia to be exact) was an area that Paul visited during his first missionary journey. Many Galatians were introduced to the message of God’s love and grace during this trip. Both Jews and Gentiles turned to God.
Shortly after Paul left, factions began to develop between these two groups. Some of the Jewish Christ followers began to fall back on their religious traditions. A group was formed, called the Judaizers. They began to teach that the Gentile Christians had to submit to Jewish laws and traditions as well as believe in Christ in order to be accepted by God.
This letter is Paul’s response to the Judaizers. As we will see, there are times when he clearly gets frustrated at their teaching. To suggest that one must do anything other than accept God’s gift of grace infuriated Paul.
It was all about freedom. As we launch into this study, I want you to pray a prayer: Father, if there are things in my life that have made rules in order to be accepted by you, reveal them to me. Show me anything in my life that may reflect the attitude of the Judaizers.
It will be interesting to see what he reveals to you over the next few weeks.
Until tomorrow.
