Chapter 10
The faith of the first Christians was simply called "The Way" — as if it were a path to travel, a journey. It was a narrow road that went through a small gate. Paul likens it to a running race. Previously the Galatians had been doing great under God's grace.
You were running so well. (Galatians 5:7a)
Most of us would be reasonably pleased to receive such an endorsement from the Apostle Paul, and I would have thought the Galatians no exception — but note what running a good race actually means. It means embracing the message. It means having faith in the saving work of Christ and expressing it in love. It means doing that on a daily basis. That's "running a good race."
However, this race is more like an obstacle race, and like any obstacle race, you can be great at one challenge but trip up at another. In this way I liken the "good race" to a steeplechase — a long running race filled with different sorts of obstacles.
Around the world there is a race called Tough Mudder, which is an extreme steeplechase with obstacles that, in the words of Wikipedia, "play on human fears such as fire, water, electricity and heights." In the last obstacle of the race that came to my home town, each participant had to run through a forest of live wires that delivered an electric shock every time they brushed against one — which was frequent. In fact, the obstacles in Tough Mudder are designed so that many of the barriers need other people to help you get over, under and through them. It is a team event.
That's what it's like running the race for a Christian.
So what are the obstacles when "running a good race"? Persecution? Ridicule? Doubt? Drifting? Trauma? It could be any of these. But for those in Galatia the obstacle was trickery. It was bewitchment.
The race had been interrupted. Someone had "cut in" on them and made them run in a different way — exactly like someone at a formal race directing runners off the track and into some random path that isn't part of the course. For the Galatians, going down this path was serious. It meant they were no longer obeying the truth. They were no longer in the race.
Who has obstructed you from obeying the truth? (Galatians 5:7b)
How does someone "cut in" on someone running a good race? How does it come about? What does it look like? Clearly Paul is not referring to someone physically directing runners. So what does this metaphor mean?
The obstacle was a change in the message. Or, to put it another way, the obstacle was another idea. It comes about by persuasion — being talked round to other ideas. That's all. Someone cuts in with a new idea, a new message, and persuades you.
Ideas.
I recall being at school when I heard a minister of religion teach the idea that Jesus was not the Son of God. People only thought he was, this minister said. He did not actually rise from the dead; people only used that sort of language to express what they hoped for. It was in fact his teachings that rose again. It was the spirit of Jesus that lived on. In this modern world of electricity, the minister argued, it was impossible to believe in miracles. The Bible was full of contradictions and could not be relied upon. Paul was earnest, but mistaken.
This minister worked very hard, in the most reasonable manner, to persuade us, and to most of his students he was very persuasive. He was, after all, an ordained minister, and his ideas seemed to make a lot of sense. He was like a man on the race track directing people down what his students were persuaded was the right track.
So that's one idea about Paul's message: Jesus didn't actually rise from the dead, and it was the "movement" he started that's the good news. The Galatians were being told a different idea. There was no debate about whether Jesus rose from the dead, but about how to follow him. Paul got it wrong, they said. What the Galatians had to do was to circumcise themselves to prove they were truly the people of God and trust in Jesus to maintain right relationship with God.
So this is where it gets a bit tricky, because circumcising and persuading is exactly what Paul has done to the Galatians (with the Holy Spirit). He has come with a message — an idea, if you will. He has persuaded them with that message. They have embraced it. Now another group has come along and persuaded them of other ideas.
This is the issue.
In our modern world we now have what amounts to an entire shopping mall of ideas. There are so many on offer that we are almost idea-weary. There are so many obstacles, so many people cutting in on us to keep us from obeying the truth, that we can easily get tired of messages. However, this very weariness is to acquiesce to the background bewitchment of the ideas that surround us. Holding up our hands in despair and saying, "Well, I don't know what to think," doesn't get us off the hook. Whatever we think, knowingly or unknowingly, we will form a view about God — and that view affects how we live and breathe and have our being. Unwittingly, it affects everything we do. And Paul is saying that despite the multitude of messages that may cut in on us, despite the shopping mall, despite the obstacles, despite the weariness, there is a genuine article out there. There is a true path. Ask any parent of a troublesome teenager — there is a right track.
In fact, Paul's agitation is strong evidence that this is the case. His message is from God. If he didn't think these "details" were important, he wouldn't be firing off this letter. The Apostle has night-vision goggles in a dark world. He can see the track clearly. So what can we look for to tell whether we are running on the right track? How can we gauge these ideas? Apart from his own testimony, which he set out in chapters 1 and 2, he gives a further clue — and that is to find out the root source of the ideas, where they come from.
Such persuasion does not come from the One who calls you. (Galatians 5:8)
This persuasion comes from another source. It did not come from the One who called the Galatians with the message that was originally taught them. Was that "One" just Paul? The Apostle doesn't think so. It was God the everlasting Father, through the Holy Spirit, calling them with the message about his Son and his saving work.
So trace it back. Where does the idea hail from? Does it claim to come from God — the everlasting Father, through the Holy Spirit, about his Son and his saving work — or does it come from a different god, the remote being who watches from afar and never does any miracles?
It's interesting to note that Jesus himself was tempted in this way. He was approached with ideas.
If You are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread. (Matthew 4:3)
Many of us are very familiar with this story of temptation, which appears in Matthew and Luke. At the time of the temptation, Jesus was on his own. But imagine, for a moment, that someone else had been with Jesus during it — someone who had accompanied him on his fast. On hearing the temptation to turn stones into bread, that person might have exclaimed, "What a great idea! Why didn't we think of it sooner? You're hungry. I'm hungry! We're in need. This could be God's way of helping us. I mean — you are the Son of God, right?"
But trace the source. Where is this idea coming from? Sure, Jesus could have made the stones into bread. (Actually, he didn't even need stones. Later in the Gospels, when he fed the five thousand, he made bread out of almost nothing.) But in this situation, making bread out of stones would have meant that Jesus was not living "under the law." He would not be trusting God the Father. This idea did not come from the One who called him.
Man shall not live on bread alone. (Matthew 4:4)
Tracing the source of that idea showed that it led to making the individual and his immediate needs the top priority.
There are some wrong ideas that can spread like cancer. An idea can be like phosgene gas that suffocates and injures. Paul describes it in terms of baking.
A little leaven works through the whole batch of dough. (Galatians 5:9)
This wrong teaching, however "little" it might appear, affects everything. It permeates the whole, just like a little yeast in dough. It cannot be contained. This is especially true with Paul's message. If you think you need to add to salvation — like circumcision — then that will affect your whole worldview.
In this way, Paul's metaphor lines up with Jesus.
When Jesus was in Dalmanutha by the shores of the Sea of Galilee, the Pharisees arrived and decided to test him by asking him for a sign from heaven. It is recorded that Jesus sighed deeply — a description that gets pretty close to a groan of frustration. He refused to do any sign. They headed for home, and as Jesus and his disciples took their boat back across the lake, Jesus was clearly still thinking about the incident and used it as an opportunity to teach.
Watch out! Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and of Herod. (Mark 8:15)
Jesus was telling them — and us — to be careful. To watch out. Watch out for what? To watch out for ideas. In the disciples' case, it was the teaching of the Pharisees and of Herod.
However, the story is not over. This teaching about ideas, and the warning to watch out for them, went straight over the disciples' heads. They had forgotten to bring supplies (that is, bread), and when they heard Jesus talking about yeast they thought it was a dig about their lack of planning.
So they began to discuss with one another the fact that they had no bread. (Mark 8:16)
Before we laugh at the disciples and consider how dim they were, we should first take a good look at ourselves. It is amazing how many people — myself included — behave exactly like them. We totally miss the point, and we can even be unaware that we have missed it.
What was the yeast of the Pharisees and the yeast of Herod? By all historical accounts, these two didn't have a lot to do with one another. You could make a case that they hated one another. Was there an area of common ground? Was Jesus speaking specifically, or just in general terms, telling them to watch out?
I believe there is a clue to the nature of the yeast. It is what these two asked of Jesus. The Pharisees asked him for a sign from heaven. They felt that they were the judges of everything. They did not feel that all the signs happening around them were enough. They did not feel Jesus had done enough to persuade them. They sat (metaphorically) on their own throne, demanding proof.
This is very similar to Herod. Later on, when Jesus actually meets Herod, what does the puppet despot want from Jesus? He wants Jesus to perform a miracle. He wants a sign.
He had wanted to see Him for a long time, because he had heard about Him and was hoping to see Him perform a miracle. (Luke 23:8)
Herod sat on his (literal) throne, demanding proof.
Both parties asked for a miracle to prove Jesus' credentials. Both asked for a sign from heaven. Both saw themselves as the judge. Both behaved as if their agenda was the most important of all. If Jesus had actually performed a sign for them from God's agenda, it was never going to be enough. Healing a man covered in leprosy might have piqued their interest, but it wasn't what they considered the clincher. They were looking for a sign that matched up with their own arrogance and cruelty. Imagine if Jesus had said, "You people want a sign? All right, I'll give you a sign. Bring your local tax collector here and I will bring fire from heaven down on the traitor." If that had happened, the Pharisees would have had no problem following Jesus. They would have pushed Peter and the other apostles out of the way to jostle for a place next to him. Herod would have handed him his crown. Satan would have given him all the kingdoms of the world.
The yeast of the Pharisees and that of Herod — the "idea," if you will — was their attitude. They thought they knew enough to make the final call, even over the Almighty. Even when the image of the invisible God was standing right in front of them, there was nothing in their philosophy that would bend.
The philosopher Bertrand Russell lines up with Herod the tetrarch. Russell once said that if he died and met God, and God asked him, "Bertrand, why didn't you believe in me?" he would respond, "Not enough evidence, God — not enough evidence." Just like Herod, he asked for a sign and none was given. And, just like Herod, he would not bend because Jesus didn't dance to his philosophical tune.
This is the "yeast" that believing Christians should guard themselves against.
This doesn't mean we should try to barricade ourselves against the Tough Mudder of ideas, as some people have suggested. Jesus never did, and neither did his apostles. Paul himself was well versed in many of the current ideas of his day. (When the Apostle was speaking at the Areopagus, he quoted Greek poetry to his listeners, which means he had not only read it but committed it to memory.) So this is not about trying to prevent exposure to ideas. In this world, that would be impossible. It is about which ideas we should reject and watch out for, and which ideas we should accept — those that line up with God and his Son Jesus Christ, who has called us into his kingdom.
But we are like the disciples. We can so easily get hold of the wrong end of the stick and start thinking that all this talk about yeast is because we forgot to bring bread. We can easily drift into Pharisaical and Herodian thinking, and beat ourselves up over some lack of planning, instead of concerning ourselves with a deeper attitude.
What followers of Jesus are asked to do is to be alert, to watch out. Watch out for ideas — yeast — that make us puff ourselves up. We are to accept that there is a right path that God has given, and a multiplicity of wrong paths. But that path is obvious to those who have ears to hear. It is obvious to those who have eyes to see.
I am confident in the Lord that you will take no other view. (Galatians 5:10a)
The reason Paul can be so confident is that this whole life of faith is a team event. Just as the obstacles in Tough Mudder are designed for a team, so too are the trials and tribulations of living out Paul's message.
There is no other view. There is no pluralism. There are no different but equally valid pathways up to the same mountain top. There is one view and no other — an idea that many in the modern Western world find particularly offensive.
And here's another curve ball that the Western world finds appalling.
The one who is troubling you will bear the judgment, whoever he may be. (Galatians 5:10b)
What? People will have to pay a penalty for their erroneous teaching? There will be consequences for teaching wrong ideas? But what if they were sincere? What if they genuinely thought they were doing the right thing? What if they were just trying to make people happy? What if they were just being honest?
Doctors have to pay a penalty when they sincerely cut off the wrong leg. Teachers must pay a penalty when they honestly teach racism.
Sincerity is not enough. Honesty is not enough. In matters of faith, this really unnerves the modern world — as it should. It should give all of us sober consideration. It means there is indeed a message that is true, and there are other messages that are not.
And what kind of penalty does Paul refer to? He does not elaborate. But this really highlights where our modern world is curious. There doesn't seem to be any thought that the Almighty might have a say in what is being taught about him. When the Pharisees mocked Jesus as he hung on the cross —
He saved others, but He cannot save Himself. He is the King of Israel! Let Him come down now from the cross, and we will believe in Him. (Matthew 27:42)
— there was no thought in their minds that he actually would. And the fact that he didn't come down from the cross proved their own position, or so they thought. Likewise, when an unbelieving minister teaches that, once you consider electricity, it is impossible to believe in miracles — that is, that God doesn't perform miracles — there is no thought that one will occur. The fact that he doesn't experience any miracles proves his own position, or so he thinks.
But what the Pharisees and that minister don't seem to consider is that the Almighty might be listening. That God himself might have his own view on these issues. They appear to think that because things remain unchanged, that proves their position. Yet — says Paul — the things that have hitherto remained unchanged will indeed change. The due penalty awaits.
In 1984 the new Bishop of Durham was interviewed by the BBC. In defence of his lack of belief in the empty tomb on the first Easter Sunday, he famously said that "God doesn't play conjuring tricks with bones." At the time it caused a small uproar in the UK. Many learned theologians rushed to the Bishop's defence. He had been misunderstood by the media, they said, and by the general public, and this uproar was not worthy of such a kerfuffle. These things had been thought by previous bishops, and life had gone on. It was all a storm in a teacup.
There was no comment from the senior clergy about the distress the Bishop had caused. There was no comment that here was a person who was supposed to be leading the faithful, yet lacked belief. But, to be fair to the Bishop, he was clearly unused to the media or to the effect his words would have, perhaps trotting out a slogan he never thought would be given so much scrutiny.
Even so, no one at the time seemed concerned that the Bishop appeared to be pretty sure about what God did or didn't do. On what authority did he speak? Did he really believe he was speaking for God? Did he really think that going to lectures and tutorials and writing essays at a prestigious English university gave him the right to say what God does or does not do? Does God look at a degree and learning with that much respect? As far as I was aware, no one mentioned the repeated scriptural warning that God can — and does — hide things from the learned.
How are we to know that we are teaching and receiving the right message? Fortunately, we are not left alone. We have the Bible, we have the Apostle Paul, and we have each other. And we have one other to help us — the Holy Spirit.
But Paul gives the most extraordinary reason as to why he is not for the idea of circumcision.
Now, brothers, if I am still preaching circumcision, why am I still being persecuted? (Galatians 5:11a)
He's being persecuted. If Paul were claiming that they should all follow the Jewish law, then things would be fine with those who think that's important. The outrage would have gone. It would have mattered who you hung around with. The dinner tables would have been separated, with Jews at one and non-Jews at another. Those who followed the Jewish law would be shown to be more godly. If Paul had said that we could do stuff to gain right relationship with God, then that would perfectly satisfy those who think they are pretty good at doing stuff. They would be getting their slide rule of humanity out to see where they fit.
But he's not. That's why he's being persecuted. Paul's message strikes a death blow to human pride in our ability to achieve. And so it has been through the ages. People get outraged by Paul's message. There is an offence in a message that says we are helpless prisoners of sin on death row. As soon as you say, "But you can do something to save yourself," the offence goes.
In that case the offense of the cross has been abolished. (Galatians 5:11b)
The offence goes, and so does the message.
Which brings Paul to address those who speak against him. His opponents.
As for those who are agitating you, I wish they would proceed to emasculate themselves! (Galatians 5:12)
If God is pleased with circumcision, then why not go the whole way — like the pagan cult around Galatia — and castrate themselves to show their devotion? That's doing stuff on a really sacrificial level. Just like those in the cult, that must really demonstrate that you mean business with the deity.
I've seen many an individual unhappy with that last phrase, distressed that an Apostle of God would use such seemingly vindictive language in such crude terms. "It's uncool," said one. "God doesn't speak like that."
Doesn't he? One wonders what God does speak like. An Oxford don? James Earl Jones? David Suchet? Is Paul truly being ungracious and vindictive to the agitators?
The agitators are saying that a surgical procedure is required to be part of God's family. Paul responds by saying, "OK then, why stop there? Go the whole way — emasculate yourselves."
How do we feel about doctors who in their arrogance keep performing incompetent surgery? How do we feel about child molesters who destroy a child's life — particularly if they show no remorse, but only try to justify themselves?
We are outraged. We want justice. We want them punished in some way. We want them stripped of any licence.
But what the agitators in Galatia are doing is far worse. Truly it is. They are loading people up with burdens, and refusing to enter the kingdom of God themselves. If anything, Paul is being restrained. The agitators were "correcting" the message by destroying it. Like every person who distorts Paul's message, they didn't know what he was talking about. It was no longer a message of grace, but one of doing stuff — and messing it up like that has terrible consequences. Ruined lives. They will have to pay the penalty for their teaching.
This is why, in the Tough Mudder of ideas, it is so important to beware. To keep on the right track. Not to deviate. To watch out.