Fallen from Grace (5:2-12)

Fallen from Grace
(5:2-12)

Behold I, Paul, say to you that if you receive circumcision, Christ will be of no benefit to you. And I testify again to every man who receives circumcision, that he is under obligation to keep the whole Law. You have been severed from Christ, you who are seeking to be justified by law; you have fallen from grace. For we through the Spirit, by faith, are waiting for the hope of righteousness. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision means anything, but faith working through love. You were running well; who hindered you from obeying the truth? This persuasion did not come from Him who calls you. A little leaven leavens the whole lump of dough. I have confidence in you in the Lord, that you will adopt no other view; but the one who is disturbing you shall bear his judgment, whoever he is. But I, brethren, if I still preach circumcision, why am I still persecuted? Then the stumbling block of the cross has been abolished. Would that those who are troubling you would even mutilate themselves. (5:2-12)

This passage begins the third section of the letter. After defending his apostleship (chaps. 1-2) and his message of justification by faith (chaps. 3-4), Paul now applies that doctrine to practical Christian living (chaps. 5-6), emphasizing that right doctrine should result in right living. His subject is the sanctification that should result from justification. The life of genuine faith is more than the belief in divine truth; it is also the bearing of divine fruit.

Especially in chapter 5 (w. 5, 16-18, 25), the apostle emphasizes the personal ministry of the Holy Spirit in the life of a believer, without which genuine Christian living would be impossible. It is the Holy Spirit who makes the life of faith work. Were it not for the indwelling power of the Holy Spirit, the life of faith would be no more spiritually productive or acceptable to God than the life of law

The freedom for which Christ sets us free (v. 1) is the freedom to live a life of righteousness in the power of the Holy Spirit. God’s standard of holiness has not changed. As Jesus makes clear in the Sermon on the Mount, it requires not simply outward performance but inner perfection. Through His Holy Spirit, believers have the ability to live internal lives of righteousness.

The final two chapters of Galatians are a portrait of the Spirit-filled life, of the believer’s implementing the life of faith under the control and in the energy of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit-filled life thereby becomes in itself a powerful testimony to the power of justification by faith.

In making his appeal for living the Spirit-filled life of freedom rather than reverting to the futile works-bound life of legalistic self-effort, Paul begins with the negative, a warning first against false doctrine (w. 2-6) and then against false teachers (w. 7-12). He shows the spiritual dangers of the first and the corrupt character of the second.

THE DANGERS OF FALSE DOCTRINE

The basic doctrinal error of the Judaizers was works righteousness, the same error that is the heart of every other man-made religious system. Jews were often referred to simply as the circumcised (Acts 10:45; 11:2; Gal. 2:7), because that was their most distinctive outward mark and the one in which they had the greatest pride and confidence. Rather than looking on circumcision as God had given it—as a symbol of His covenant of promise (Gen. 17:9-10)—most Jews looked on it as having spiritual value in itself. To them it was not a reminder of God’s gracious and sovereign blessing but a means of humanly guaranteeing His favor.

It should be noted that the symbolism of cutting off the male foreskin was to be a constant reminder to all generations of Jews, for whom God desired to cut away the evil from their hearts (cf. Deut. 30:6; Jer. 4:4; 9:24-26). Every child circumcised was a dramatic symbol of God’s desire to cleanse the heart by faith in Him and to impute His grace to the believer.

Paul’s objection here is not to circumcision in itself. Like all Jewish boys, he himself had been circumcised as an infant (Phil. 3:5). He did not object to a Christian’s being circumcised if, as in the case of Timothy (Acts 16:1-3), the act would open doors for ministry. Because Timothy was half Jewish, Paul had him circumcised in order that they might together have greater opportunity to witness to Jews. And had he known of the possible health advantages of circumcision, he would not have objected to it for that purpose either.

Paul’s warning about circumcision pertained only to the false idea that in itself it carried spiritual benefit or merit. The Judaizers were saying, in effect, that faith in Jesus Christ, although important, was not sufficient for complete salvation. They taught that what Moses began in the Old Covenant and Christ added to in the New Covenant had to be finished and perfected by one’s own efforts—the centerpiece of which was circumcision.

The Jerusalem Council was convened to deal with this false teaching, which declared, “Unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved. . . . It is necessary to circumcise them [Gentiles], and to direct them to observe the Law of Moses” (Acts 15:1, 5).

As he combats that heretical notion, Paul points out four of its tragic consequences. The person who trusts in circumcision forfeits benefit from Christ’s work on his behalf, places himself under obligation to keep the whole law, falls from God’s grace, and excludes himself from God’s righteousness.

CHRIST IS OF NO BENEFIT

Behold I, Paul, say to you that if you receive circumcision, Christ will be of no benefit to you. (5:2)

Behold I, Paul, say to you undergirds the apostolic authority (see 1:1) by which Paul makes this serious assertion. He may also have been emphasizing his own Jewishness, indicating that he, Paul, a former Pharisee and “Hebrew of Hebrews” (Phil. 3:5), was obviously not speaking against trust in circumcision because of any personal or racial bias against Jews. Both as an apostle and as a circumcised and redeemed Jew, he declared that to receive circumcision for the purpose of gaining merit before God was to make Christ. . . of no benefit. The atoning sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ, perfect and complete though it was, cannot benefit a person who trusts in anything else, because that something else, whether circumcision or any other human act or effort, then stands between him and Christ.

All the people to whom Paul was writing had made a profession of Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord or they would not have been part of the churches of Galatia. Many, perhaps most, of them had genuinely trusted in Him for salvation. The truth Paul presents here applied to both groups. To those who were not saved, he was saying that they could not be saved, they could not gain any eternal, saving benefit from Christ if they trusted in circumcision. To those who were saved he was saying that such behavior was inconsistent with their salvation and that certainly they could experience no benefit of growth in their spiritual lives if they began trusting in circumcision in addition to God’s grace (cf. 3:1-3).

To trust in Jesus Christ for salvation is to acknowledge that one cannot save himself. To trust in circumcision or any other personal effort as a means of grace is to supplement His divine work with human work; and a supplemented Christ is a supplanted Christ. To trust in human effort is to trust in law, which is totally incompatible with grace.

A person becomes acceptable to God only by placing his full trust in His Son, Jesus Christ, and after he is saved he perseveres in living a life acceptable to God only by continuing to trust in Christ alone. Whether before or after conversion, trust in human works of any kind is a barrier between a person and Christ and results in unacceptable legalism.

Paul explained to Roman believers “that Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, attained righteousness, even the righteousness which is by faith; but Israel, pursuing a law of righteousness, did not arrive at that law Why? Because they did not pursue it by faith, but as though it were by works” (Rom. 9:30-32). The Gentiles who were not seeking righteousness nevertheless found it when they believed in Jesus Christ, whereas the Jews who were zealously seeking righteousness did not attain it, because they were seeking it in themselves. The believing Gentiles gained Christ’s righteousness, which is perfect, whereas the unbelieving Jews had only their self-righteousness, which was worthless.

OBLIGATED TO KEEP THE WHOLE LAW

And I testify again to every man who receives circumcision, that he is under obligation to keep the whole law. (5:3)

A second consequence of trusting in circumcision is that the person who does so obligates himself to keep the whole law. To live by part of the law as a means of attaining righteousness demands living by all of it.

Marturomai (testify) often carried the idea of strong protestation, and that seems to be Paul’s meaning here. Again could refer to the previous verse, to a previous occasion, or to both. In any case, this declaration is given with added urgency.

“Whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point,” James says, “he has become guilty of all” (James 2:10). Because God’s standard is perfect righteousness, fulfillment of only part of the law falls short of His standard. Even if a person were somehow able to keep all of the law for all of his life, if he broke a commandment during his last minute on earth, he would forfeit salvation. Or if he managed to keep all of the laws perfectly except one, he would suffer the same fate. It is easy to understand why Paul declared that “as many as are of the works of the Law are under a curse; for it is written, ‘Cursed is everyone who does not abide by all things written in the book of the law, to perform them’” (Gal. 3:10). Because God’s standard was so obviously impossible to attain, that truth quoted from Deuteronomy 27:26 should have driven every Jew to seek His mercy.

FALLEN FROM GRACE

You have been severed from Christ, you who are seeking to be justified by law; you have fallen from grace. (5:4)

A third consequence of seeking to be justified by circumcision or any other form of the law, is that it causes a person to become severed from Christ and thereby become fallen from grace. Severed is from katarge, which, when followed by the preposition, means to be separated or loosed from (cf. Rom. 7:2, 6). Fallen is from ehpipt, which means to lose one’s grasp on something. Simply stated, a person cannot live by both law and grace. To attempt to be justified by law is to reject the way of grace.

Paul is not dealing with the security of the believer but with the contrasting ways of grace and law, works and faith, as means of salvation. He is not teaching that a person who has once been justified can lose his righteous standing before God and become lost again by being circumcised or otherwise legalistic. The Bible knows nothing of becoming unjustified. Those “whom [God] predestined, these He also called; and whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified” (Rom. 8:30).

Paul’s primary point in this passage, as throughout the letter, is that law and grace cannot be mixed. As a means to salvation they are totally incompatible and mutually exclusive. To mix law with grace is to obliterate grace. For a believer to start living again under the law to merit salvation is, in fact, to reject salvation by grace. Contrary to the teaching of the Judaizers, to add circumcision and other works of the law to what Christ accomplished by grace is not to raise one’s spiritual level but to severely lower it. Legalism does not please God but offends Him. It does not bring a person closer to God but rather drives him away.

Applied to one who was really an unbeliever, the principle of falling from grace has to do with being exposed to the gracious truth of the gospel and then turning one’s back on Christ. Such a person is an apostate. During the time of the early church many people, both Jews and Gentiles, not only heard the gospel message but witnessed the miraculous confirming signs performed by the apostles. They became attracted to Christ and often made professions of faith in Him. Some became involved in a local church and vicariously experienced the blessings of Christian love and fellowship. They were exposed first hand to every truth and blessing of the gospel of grace but then turned away. They had “been enlightened,” had “tasted of the heavenly gift,” and had even “been made partakers of the Holy Spirit” by witnessing His divine ministry in the lives of believers. But they refused to stand fully with Christ by placing their trust in Him, and they fell away, losing all prospect of repentance and therefore of salvation (Heb. 6:4-6). They came to the very doorway of grace and then fell away, back into their works religion.

Applied to a believer, the principle of falling from grace has to do with a person who genuinely trusts in Christ for salvation but then outwardly reverts to a life of legalism, of living under external rituals, ceremonies, and traditions that he carries out in his own strength, instead of living with a spirit of obedience to Christ. He exchanges life by grace for life back under law, life by faith for life again by works, life in freedom for life back in bondage, life in the Spirit for life back in the flesh. It is a major matter of concern to God whether we live in outward obedience and submission to the externals of religion or in heart obedience and submission to the internals of righteousness. In the former way, a person is prompted and sustained by the flesh to try to earn righteousness. In the latter way, a person is prompted and sustained by the Spirit to demonstrate righteousness.

Obviously true Christians will not reject the true way of salvation, but they confuse themselves and others when they try to live by works, because the mark of true discipleship is continuing obedience to Christ (John 8:31). The security of salvation from the divine side is guaranteed by God to His own (cf. v 10; Rom. 8:28-39; 11:29), but from the human side it is manifested by perseverance in grace (see John 8:31; 15:4-9; Acts 11:23; 13:43; 14:21-22; Rom. 2:7; Heb. 2:1; 3:14; 4:14; 10:23; 1 John 2:19). Paul is here calling for such perseverance in grace by the genuine believer.

Contrary to justifying grace, sanctifying grace is interruptible. Living by the flesh interferes with living by the Spirit, and living by the flesh may even involve doing the right things for the wrong reasons or in the wrong way. For example, to worship God from the heart and for His own sake is to live by the Spirit. But to worship Him only outwardly or to impress others with our supposed spirituality is to live by the flesh. To witness to a person while trusting in God to convict and convert him is to live by the Spirit. To witness with the intention of converting a person through our own knowledge of Scripture and powers of persuasion is to live by the flesh. No matter how worthy and God-ordained a person’s outward activities may be, to perform them by the flesh is to live by the way of law and to forsake the way of grace.

EXCLUDED FROM RIGHTEOUSNESS

For we through the Spirit, by faith, are waiting for the hope of righteousness. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision means anything, but faith working through love. (5:5-6)

A fourth consequence of trusting in works is to be excluded from the righteousness for which the believer has hope, to forsake the true life of blessing God desires for His children.

The Judaizers’ hope of righteousness was based on adding imperfect and worthless works of law in a vain attempt to complete the perfect and priceless work of Christ, which they assumed to be incomplete and imperfect. We, that is, true believers, Paul says, through the Spirit, by faith, are waiting for the hope of righteousness that is based on God’s grace.

Believers already possess the imputed righteousness of justification, but the yet-incomplete righteousness of total sanctification and glorification still awaits them. “For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us. . . . The creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God” (Rom. 8:18, 21). In this life, believers are still waiting for the completed and perfected righteousness that is yet to come.

Paul here mentions three characteristics of the godly life, the life that continues to live by the grace through which salvation was received. First of all, it is a life lived through the Spirit rather than the flesh. Second, it is a life lived by faith rather than works. And third, it is a life lived in patient waiting and hope rather than in the anxious uncertainty of bondage to the law

Nothing that is either done or not done in the flesh, not even religious ceremony, makes any difference in one’s relationship to God. In Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision means anything. The outward is totally unimportant and worthless, except as it genuinely reflects inner righteousness.

Life in the Spirit is not static and inactive, but it is faith working through love, not the flesh working through self-effort. Believers are “created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them” (Eph. 2:10). But their working is the product of their faith, not a substitute for it. They do not work for righteousness but out of righteousness, through the motivating power of love. In so doing they “walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, to please Him in all respects, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God; strengthened with all power, according to His glorious might” (Col. 1:10-11).

Love needs neither the prescriptions nor the proscriptions of the law, because its very nature is to fulfill the law’s demands. As Paul declares a few verses later, “the whole Law is fulfilled in one word, in the statement ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Gal. 5:14; cf. Rom. 13:8). A person does not, for instance, steal from or lie to someone he truly loves. He certainly does not kill someone he loves. The person who lives by faith works under the internal compulsion of love and does not need the outward compulsion of law.

The story is told of an aspiring artist who was commissioned to do a large sculpture for a famous museum. At last he had the opportunity to create the masterpiece he had long dreamed of. After laboring over the work for many years, he saw it grow not only in shape but in beauty. But when it was finished he discovered to his horror that it was much too large to be taken out a window or door and that the cost for tearing down part of the building in order to remove it was prohibitive. His masterpiece was forever a captive to the room in which it was created.

That is the fate of all human religion. Nothing a person does to earn God’s favor can leave the room of this earth where his self-made works are created.

THE CHARACTER OF FALSE TEACHERS

You were running well; who hindered you from obeying the truth? This persuasion did not come from Him who calls you. A little leaven leavens the whole lump of dough. I have confidence in you in the Lord, that you will adopt no other view; but the one who is disturbing you shall bear his judgment, whoever he is. But I, brethren, if I still preach circumcision, why am I still persecuted? Then the stumbling block of the cross has been abolished. Would that those who are troubling you would even mutilate themselves. (5:7-12)

After exposing the dangers of the false doctrines that threatened the Galatians, Paul exposes the wicked character of the men who espoused the doctrines.

Like his Lord, Paul had great patience with those who were caught in even the deepest moral sin. As much as they condemned the sin itself and warned against its consequences, their love for the sinner was always evident.

For the oft-divorced woman at Jacob’s well and the woman caught in the act of adultery, Jesus’ rebukes were gentle, and His offers of help were kind and encouraging (John 4:7-26; 8:3-11). And even before the hated and larcenous Zaccheus repented and came to saving faith, Jesus was not ashamed to eat with him (Luke 19:1-10). But for the self-righteous scribes and Pharisees—whose outward lives were ceremonially impeccable, but who refused to recognize their spiritual need and who continually corrupted the people’s minds with their legalistic perversion of true Judaism—Jesus had only condemnation.

The scribes and Pharisees were the primary teachers and interpreters of Scripture. When a man was initiated into the scribal office, he was given a key that symbolized his qualification to teach. Yet Jesus called them hypocrites, deceivers, extortioners, misguided proselytizers, blind guides, fools, inwardly corrupt and foul, partners with those who killed the prophets and murderers themselves, serpents and vipers, and future persecutors of His church (Matt. 23:13-36). Their worst evil, however, was one that Isaiah had prophesied of them more than six hundred years earlier: “In vain do they worship Me, teaching as doctrines the precepts of men” (Matt. 15:9; cf. Isa. 29:13).

Paul, too, was longsuffering with those who were caught in sin, as his letters to the immature, factious, and immoral believers at Corinth attest. But also like the Lord, the apostle’s most scathing denunciations were reserved for those who pervert God’s truth and lead others into falsehood. In Galatians 5:7-12 he presents six characteristics of the Judaizers that are general enough to fit all other teachers of ungodliness, ancient or modern.

THEY HINDER THE TRUTH

You were running well; who hindered you from obeying the truth? (5:7)

The first and most obvious characteristic of the false teachers was that they distorted and hindered . . . the truth.

You were running well reflects the figure of a race, which Paul frequently used (see Rom. 9:16; 1 Cor. 9:24; Gal. 2:2). While Paul had ministered among them, the Galatian believers had no trouble living their Christian lives by faith. They were running well until, apparently soon after Paul left, the Judaizers began leading them away from the way of grace and faith back into the way of law and works (see 1:6-7), which was crippling in its inconsistency.

Because Paul had already made clear who their spiritual enemy was, the question Who hindered you . . . ? was rhetorical. The question was not about the identity of the false teachers but about their having been able so easily and quickly to deceive and mislead the Galatian believers. “How could you have allowed those men to overturn what I carefully taught and you eagerly accepted as God’s Word?” he was asking. “Who do they think they are and who do you think they are, that they can arrogantly undermine my own apostolic authority (see 1:1; 5:2) and the clear teaching of the Old Testament (3:6-29; 4:21-31), which they claim to revere?”

Obeying the truth could refer to the true gospel, that is, the way by which men are saved (cf. Acts 6:7; Rom. 2:8; 6:17; 2 Thess. 1:8). Or the phrase could refer to the true way in which the saved live out their redeemed lives in obedience to God’s Word and Spirit (cf. Rom. 6:17; 1 Pet. 1:22). Paul seems to be using the phrase in both senses, because the legalism of the Judaizers was preventing the unsaved from coming to Christ in faith and the saved from following Him in faith.

The church has always faced the danger of legalism, because the inclination of the flesh is always to live for its own purposes and in its own power. But “though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh,” Paul warns, “for the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but divinely powerful for the destruction of fortresses” (2 Cor. 10:4).

The false teachers who were leading the Galatians astray were far from well-intentioned. Their purpose was to gain a following for themselves (Gal. 4:17) and “to make a good showing in the flesh” (6:12). They were forerunners of all the self-promoting false teachers who have plagued the church throughout its history and will continue to do so until the Lord returns. “There will also be false teachers among you,” Peter warns, “who will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing swift destruction upon themselves” (2 Pet. 2:1). Paul warns that “the Spirit explicitly says that in later times some will fall away from the faith, paying attention to deceitful spirits and doctrines of demons, by means of the hypocrisy of liars seared in their own conscience as with a branding iron” (1 Tim. 4:1-2). They are “always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. . . . These men also oppose the truth, men of depraved mind, rejected as regards the faith” (2 Tim. 3:7-8).

THEY ARE NOT OF GOD

This persuasion did not come from Him who calls you. (5:8)

The second characteristic of the false teachers was their ungodliness. Their legalistic persuasion did not come from God, from Him who calls true believers. God is here uniquely identified as the sovereign who has effectually called all who believe and are saved. The work of salvation is entirely God’s doing and none of man’s (Rom. 8:28-30), and any teaching that says the gracious work of God in saving men is insufficient is false.

Legalism is never from God, because He chose believers “from the beginning for salvation through sanctification by the Spirit and faith in the truth. And it was for this He called you through our gospel, that you may gain the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ” (2 Thess. 2:13-14). The Judaizers’ gospel, which was not the gospel at all (Gal. 1:6-7), was not from God.

THEY CONTAMINATE THE CHURCH

A little leaven leavens the whole lump of dough. (5:9)

A third characteristic of the false teachers was that they contaminated the church, spreading their heresy among both true believers and would-be believers. Just as a little leaven leavens the whole lump of dough, so a small amount of falsehood can corrupt the thinking and living of a large group of people.

In Scripture, leaven often represents sin directly, as in Jesus’ warning about “the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees,” which referred to their false teaching (Matt. 16:6, 12). But the figure of leaven is generally used simply to indicate permeating power, whether of something good or evil. In this passage, as in his reference to the gross immorality of the Corinthians, Paul used the figure of leaven in both ways, as representing the actuality of sin as well as its power to infect and permeate that which is good (see 1 Cor. 5:6).

Just as a single cell of cancer can metastasize until it spreads throughout the physical body, a single false doctrine can multiply itself and spread throughout a body of believers. A great forest fire can be started by one spark. “For want of a nail the shoe was lost,” wrote Benjamin Franklin; “for want of a shoe the horse was lost; for want of a horse the rider was lost; and for want of a rider the battle was lost.”

THEY WILL BE JUDGED

I have confidence in you in the Lord, that you will adopt no other view; but the one who is disturbing you shall bear his judgment, whoever he is. (5:10)

A fourth characteristic of the false teachers of Galatia was their destiny of judgment.

Paul introduces this declaration with a word of encouragement to the true believers. I have confidence in you in the Lord, he said, that you will adopt no other view, that is, no other view than the true gospel of grace he had taught them when he ministered among them and that he was so strongly emphasizing in this letter. The apostle had a similar word of encouragement for the Philippian church: “I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus. For . . . you all are partakers of grace with me” (Phil. 1:6-7).

The destiny of believers is secure. “They shall never perish,” Jesus said; “and no one shall snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand” (John 10:28-29). They will not reject their true salvation for a false one (John 10:4-5,14). They will both persevere and be preserved.

But that is not the destiny of ungodly teachers who lead the Lord’s people astray. “Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to stumble,” Jesus said, “it is better for him that a heavy millstone be hung around his neck, and that he be drowned in the depth of the sea” (Matt. 18:6).

The one who is disturbing you shall bear his judgment, Paul declared, whoever he is. Because the Judaizers stood against God and His truth, they would carry the full weight of their own judgment. False teachers often cause many others to “follow their sensuality, and because of them the way of the truth will be maligned; and in their greed they will exploit you with false words,” Peter wrote. But “their judgment from long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep. . . . The Lord knows how. . . to keep the unrighteous under punishment for the day of judgment” (2 Pet. 2:2-3, 9).

THEY PERSECUTE TRUE TEACHERS

But I, brethren, if I still preach circumcision, why am I still persecuted? Then the stumbling block of the cross has been abolished. (5:11)

A fifth characteristic of false teachers is that they persecute true teachers, in this case, Paul. False religion has always been and will continue to be the most aggressive and dominant persecutor of the church (cf. John 16:1-3; Rev 17:5-6). Satan fights God, and satanic religion fights the true faith.

Among their other deceptions and lies, the Judaizers apparently claimed that Paul preached circumcision just as they did. Because Timothy was half Jewish, Paul had him circumcised in order to minimize criticism from Jews among whom they would minister together (Acts 16:1-3). But Paul never advocated circumcision as having any part in becoming or living as a Christian. “If I still preach circumcision as I did when I was a Pharisee,” he asks, “why am I still persecuted by the Judaizers? If I preached circumcision, I would be one of them.”

As Paul had already explained, he could never advocate circumcision as part of the gospel, because to do so would be to “nullify the grace of God; for if righteousness comes through the Law,” which circumcision represented for the Judaizers, “then Christ died needlessly” (Gal. 2:21). Then the stumbling block of the cross would have been abolished.

The cross was a stumbling block to the Jews partly because they could not accept the idea of a suffering, much less crucified, Messiah. But it was even more an offense to them because it robbed them of their most distinctive outward signs of Jewishness, the Mosaic law and circumcision. If the cross obliterated even the true Judaism of the Old Covenant, how much more did it obliterate the false, man-made Judaism represented by the scribes, Pharisees, and Judaizers?

The early church Father Chrysostom commented that the cross was a stumbling block to Jews primarily because it failed to require obedience to their ancestral laws. When they attacked Stephen, he observed, they did not charge him with worshiping Christ but with speaking “against the holy place, and the law” (Acts 6:13).

Paul confessed that when he “used to persecute the church of God beyond measure, and tried to destroy it,” he did so because he was “extremely zealous for [his] ancestral traditions” (Gal. 1:13-14). The Jews were scandalized by the cross because it nullified not only the Mosaic law but also their highly revered rabbinic traditions.

The cross still offends fallen men for the same basic reason. Whether Jew or Gentile, all men are prone to trust in what they can do for themselves and are offended when told they can do nothing at all to make themselves right before God. To preach the cross invites persecution because it is the supreme offense to works righteousness. But as Peter boldly proclaimed before the Jewish leaders in Jerusalem, “There is salvation in no one else; for there is no other name under heaven that has been given among men, by which we must be saved” (Acts 4:12).

THEY SHOULD BE CUT OFF

Would that those who are troubling you would even mutilate themselves. (5:12)

Paul closes his polemic against false teachers with one of the harshest statements to come from his pen or lips. He was so passionately opposed to the heresy of the Judaizers that he wished they would even mutilate themselves.

Apokopt literally means “to cut off,” especially a member of the body, and hence to mutilate. The word was often used of castration, and that is clearly Paul’s meaning here. He is probably referring to the cult of Cybele, a popular pagan nature goddess in Asia Minor during Paul’s day, Many devout male worshipers in the cult castrated themselves, and all its priests were self-made eunuchs.

Paul was not expressing a crude and cruel desire for the Judaizers’ punishment. God would take care of that (v. 10). He spoke rather of their mutilating themselves. His point was, “If the Judaizers are so insistent on circumcision as a means of pleasing God, why don’t they go all the way and castrate themselves as the supreme act of religious devotion? If, like the pagans, they believe human achievement can earn divine favor, why don’t they go to the pagan extremes of self-mutilation, like the Cybelene priests?”

To add any human effort or act to God’s gracious provision through the death of His Son is to exchange the saving gospel of Jesus Christ for the damning falsehood of paganism.

Fallen from Grace(5:2-12)