A Bible which is coming apart is usually owned by a person who is not!

GALATIANS 1

Here are more danger signs along our path through the world... (the believer's wilderness). 1 Corinthians was a series of warnings against moral and doctrinal dangers. Galatians is about spiritual (or religious) dangers. Both books have one verse (danger sign) which is the same - 1 Cor. 5:6 and Gal. 5:9. Read Phil. 3:6 and 1 Tim 1:15 to see what Paul had been like before he was saved. Outwardly and morally, Paul had been blameless, but spiritually he was sinning, because he was sinning against Christ. All religious or doctrinal error is against Christ. The apostle Paul was so upset by the religious error into which the Galatian believers had fallen, that he does not say one good word to them, but plunges immediately into the subject which bothered him so much.

Gal 1:1 Paul proves his authority as an apostle, not given to him by men, but by Jesus Christ.

Gal 1:6-9 He warns about "another gospel", for teachers had already come with false doctrines. Even if an angel were to present any other doctrine than that which Paul was giving out, he was to be accursed. The bad doctrine that was being taught was that believers had to keep the law to keep being saved. And there are many today who try to do this. They carry Bibles and can quote many verses but they would try to put us under the law.

Gal 1:11-20 Paul did not receive the gospel from other believers, or even other apostles, but from the Lord Himself. He tells us this so that the warnings would be as from the Lord.

#268

To bind together the Word of God and the Spirit of God, requires my eye to be fixed on Christ.

GALATIANS 2

Gal 2:4 Two words important in understanding the Epistle. "Liberty" and "bondage" - the liberty of the gospel of our Lord Jesus, and the bondage of the law.

Gal 2:9 Paul explains that the Lord had specially sent him to preach to the "uncircumcised" (the Gentiles or heathen). Peter was sent to the "circumcised", (the Jews). Satan wants to divide these two companies, but the Spirit of God has united all into one.

Gal 2:11-12 At first Peter mingled with either Jew or Gentile, but later he separated from the Gentiles, and there was danger of a sad division. Paul sternly corrects him for this.

Gal 2:16 He goes on to show that we are not saved by trying to keep the law, but by the faith of Christ. By His death and by His living now for us in heaven.

Gal 2:19-20 Paul is dead to the law, then he is able to go on and say "nevertheless I live". That is the way God delivers us for ever from the bondage of the law. We are dead to it, through the death of Christ. It doesn't mean we don't bother about it, for the believer is to live a godly life.

Gal 2:21 The terrible error of teaching that righteousness comes by the law.

#269

Unbelief of the truth is natural... reasoning against it is not difficult... but the Word of God remains as plain and sure as ever.

GALATIANS 3

"O foolish Gal..." It was foolish for them to listen to teachers that would put them under the law.

Gal 3:3 "Having begun in the Spirit..." that is, you were saved by the Spirit through the work of Christ - "are ye now made perfect by the flesh?" That is, are you going to try to live your Christian life according to the law?

Gal 3:10 If you are trying to keep the law, it can only curse you, for it continually finds you guilty, even though you may be trying hard. If you want something not yours, you are guilty of breaking all the commandments! (Jas 2:10).

Gal 3:13 What good news! We are delivered - not by our own trying, but by the death of Christ Who took that curse upon Himself.

Gal 3:21 The law required obedience and righteousness, and promised life if they obeyed, and death if they sinned. It could not give life because every one sinned.

Gal 3:22 The law is like a mirror that shows how dirty we are.

Gal 3:24 "Justified by faith". What the law could not do, Christ has done, for He took the punishment we deserved as lawbreakers.

Gal 3:25 We are no longer under that schoolmaster, the law. No longer under bondage, but enjoying liberty. Not liberty to do what our old nature might want, but liberty to live to please the Lord. We have a life capable of this - (2 Pet 1:3) and which delights to do it.

#270

God records the past and reveals the future in His Word, to affect me in the present.

GALATIANS 4

Gal 4:3 The slavery to the things of this world in which we once were held.

Gal 4:5 What a contrast! Here we are redeemed, we are adopted into God's own family and are sons. A servant is under slavery but a son is free.

Gal 4:6 Under the control of the law, we could not call God "Father". But as free sons, we enjoy this relationship.

Gal 4:7 We are not only sons, but heirs of God. No wonder Satan wants to spoil all this by bringing us back under the law.

Gal 4:9 Paul marvels that they could be deceived and turn back again to the slavery of the law. Many believers today do the same.

Gal 4:21 In other words, "don't you know that the law can only condemn you and curse you and pronounce the sentence of death?"

Gal 4:22-31 The story of Abraham and his sons Ishmael and Isaac. Ishmael must be cast out so that Isaac can be enjoyed as the only son. Ishmael is a picture of our old position under the law, and Isaac the son of promise, a picture of our position under grace.

#271

There never will be a time, till the Lord comes, when there will be no light in God's Word to guide the believer.

GALATIANS 5

Gal 5:1 In the strongest language yet, Paul urges them to stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ had made them free. Satan is so clever that he has turned many back from listening to the gospel of liberty to listening to that which puts men under slavery.

Gal 5:4 If anyone professes to be saved by grace, then turns to law keeping, Paul says such an one has fallen from grace. Let us be careful.

Gal 5:10 Paul expresses confidence that the Galatians would not be deceived by these law-teachers, and says that such teachers, will be held responsible.

Gal 5:13 We are delivered from slavery of sin and brought into liberty, but not to act in self-will and carelessness. Think what it cost the Lord Jesus to bring us into this new life!

Gal 5:16-17 Living in the Spirit is our power to avoid indulging our own will.

Gal 5:19-23 The works of the flesh and the fruit of the Spirit contrasted. Surely we ought to be showing the fruit of the Spirit in our life.

#272

The Bible was not written for the information of scientists, but there has been no discovery of science which can overthrow the truth it contains.

GALATIANS 6

Gal 6:1 If a careless believer committed some fault, it was the responsibility of spiritual ones to help him, remembering that any one of them could have committed the same fault.

Gal 6:2 If we really want to have a law for our times, here is one "Bear ye one another's burdens". The Lord Jesus did this when He was here - for that is what is meant by "the law of Christ".

Gal 6:7-8 What we sow, we are sure to reap, even as believers, with all our sins forgiven and on our way to heaven! Look at 2 Tim 2:12, 13.

Gal 6:9 Let us therefore serve, and sow and wait. For the Lord takes notice of all that is done for Him in obedience to His Word and He will reward it later on.

Gal 6:10 Perhaps we forget this.

Gal 6:14 The world gave our Savior a cross. And Paul says that cross stands between him and a world that still hates the Lord. "I am crucified", says Paul - in other words, the world does not want me because I belong to the One they despise. And the world is crucified to me, says Paul, "for I don't want the friendship of those who crucified my Savior".