Gal. 5:5-6,13-15, The Way of Walking

A second result of standing fast in the liberty in which Christ has made us free.

2.    5:6: Faith working through love.  The Jewish approach to righteousness was to try to identify a rule for every situation in life.  This, of course, took them well beyond the Torah.  The “Halakha,” literally meaning “the way to behave” or “the way of walking” was provided the myriad of rules necessary.  Jesus showed how this approach was terribly abused by the Jews.  For example, read Mark 7:8-13 where he showed how their traditions actually caused them to lay aside the commandment of God.  Not to mention the impossibility of knowing every rule for every event in life. 

a.     What does Christ offer to us in terms of how we are to walk? 

                   i.      The answer begins with our faith: As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him (Col. 2:6).  

                ii.      Then He gives to us the indwelling Spirit.  When we are filled with the Spirit (i.e. when He controls us; when we have yielded ourselves to Christ, Rom. 12:1) He leads and empowers us to walk: that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man (Eph. 3:16). 

             iii.      He calls us then to His Word, to set our minds on the things of the Spirit: For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit.

              iv.      And there we find one command: to LOVE.  To love God!  To love our enemy! To love our brother in Christ! To love our neighbor!  Did you see this in Gal. 5:14: for all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself’.  Let me remind you of something so very crucial.  This is not a call to self-effort.  Remember, 1) God is love; 2) God’s love has been shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit (Rom. 5:5); and 3) this love of God in us generates love for those around us: But concerning brotherly love you have no need that I should write to you for you yourselves are taught by God to love one another (1 Thess. 4:9).

Now reflect on Paul’s words in 5:13: liberty describes the grace by which we live our lives; love keeps us from taking advantage of others (i.e. living by the flesh) and instead leads us to serve others.  When we immerse ourselves in the Word of God, and yield ourselves to the Spirit, we will grow in love.  More and more we will mature and understand how to act and react in life’s adventures.  And we will not just “know” what to do.  We will long to do it because of the hope of righteousness.  And we will be empowered to do it by the Spirit of God. 

No doubt about it: faith works, and it works hard!  But it works by the love of God shed abroad in our hearts, not by the flesh.