How Free Are We
Galatians 5:1,13-15
Chomping mad
Something really stuck with me in this verse as I was beginning to prepare for this
week’s sermon
There is a lot to chew on in this section
I had to really choke down some tough ideas
I really got my teeth into something that seems important, though
Verse 15 says, “If you bite and devour one another, watch out that you are not
consumed by one another”
This phrase has seemed challenging to me in the past, but it never really
caught my attention
In the 61 “one another” passages of the NT, it is the most graphically negative
It also seems very difficult to grasp the imagery in the surrounding context
Paul is talking about freedom through Christ
Specifically, he addresses freedom from being slaves to the tradition of
circumcision
In a broader sense, he is talking about the liberty we have to live
within the relationship with have with Christ
But Paul points out that we should not use our liberty from constraint to be
allowed to create a position of opportunity to be attacked
Instead, we should fulfill the law of loving our neighbor as yourself by
serving one another
From verse 16 on, Paul speaks about our relationship with the Spirit and
how that impacts our lives
This whole subject of biting, devouring, and consuming one another really has a
weird connection to the surrounding passages
More importantly, what does that have to do with the freedom that we
have through Christ?
There is a lot of what I perceive to be wordplay going on in this part of Galatians
We don’t see as much of it in English, but it really pops out in the Greek
Words that have a double meaning, words that are similar sounding,
words that are paired up and related to each other
For example, the list of works of the flesh has a lot of this present
What Paul seems to be driving at in that list is that the works of the flesh
are a lack of public restraint, a lack of inner self-control, a rejection of
doctrine, and disruption of koinonia
But all of those words, and the bigger meaning Paul is driving at, fulfills
the image of biting, devouring, and consuming one another
Which is where the double meaning comes into play
Biting has another meaning - harming
Devouring’s other meaning is using up something
Consuming is another word for killing or destroying
When we read this verse with the second meanings, then the list of works
of the flesh becomes more serious - if you hurt and use up one another,
be careful you are not killed by one another
The works of the flesh are destructive to bodies, minds, hearts, and souls
To abide in those works is to slowly hurt one another, use up the life resources
that we have, and eventually lead to the destruction of our spiritual and
physical lives
Okay, that’s obvious, but what does that have to do with our freedom
through Christ?
Remember of prime importance that Paul is talking about freedom from the
constraint to suffer through circumcision as necessary for faith
He is also talking about living without constraints that would bind us under
a yoke of slavery
V17 tells us that we want to do the things of the flesh and the things of
the Spirit
They cancel each other out
The freedom that Christ delivers us to is a deliverance from the need to
want to do things that are destructive to one another
We can choose to live a life where the choices that we make will hurt,
use up, and destroy one another
We can also choose to live a different kind of life
Here is another wordplay
We can choose to not take up the yoke of slavery
We can do this by choosing to be slaves to one another in love
The way we choose to live a different kind of life is by electing to give up
slavery by becoming a slave
We choose to reject slavery to things that hurt one another in body, mind,
heart, and soul
We choose to accept the slavery of fulfilling the law of loving our neighbor
as yourself by becoming a slave to them
That doesn’t mean becoming a household slave or becoming indentured
to them or sold into their care
It does mean that we are to take their lives and give them something to eat
instead of ourselves
Here is the last wordplay: the fruit of the Spirit is not the fruit we bear, it is the fruit
we feed
We are not to bite, devour, and consume one another
We are to give them something to bite, devour, and consume
In love, we bring joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,
gentleness, and self-control to them
We allow them to eat of what the Spirit bears into our lives
We feed them, as servants would feed their masters, in order that their
lives prosper
All of this may have been hard to swallow
Chew on this for a bit - we can continue to live a life where we are free to hurt
people, use them for our own ends, and leave them destroyed and wrecked
spiritually
Or we can come into Christ and become a source of refreshment, joy, and life
for one another
The church is built upon the desires of the Spirit to show restraint in public and
be humbled in self, it is built around the doctrine that binds us and it thrives in
the spirit of koinonia among us
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