The Pure Gospel
My wife and I bought an older home last year and soon acclimated to the small town we settled. I am impressed by the architecture of our house, the structure, and the spaciousness in the yard to plant a garden or host a friendly gathering. With an older home comes maintenance and concern for wear and tear. Fortunately, the previous owners renovated before we moved in.
One of the concerns many local new homeowners have is tap water quality. Questions such as, “Is it safe to drink?” or “are there contaminates that could adversely affect our health?” We had our water tested, and it is safe to drink, but I could tell by the taste that it was not as pure as I’d prefer, so I bought a water filter nestled neatly under the sink to ensure years of good clean drinking water. Sadly, many homes cannot access clean drinking water, so necessary and costly repairs alleviate such concerns.
In the book of Galatians, Paul is concerned for the health of the churches of Galatia. He’s not worried about polluted water but a polluted Gospel. Pure water and the pure Gospel are essential to life - physical and spiritual. For Paul, intervention is necessary to maintain a healthy church.
A lot can be learned about what is said and not said in the introduction to a letter. Think of the introduction as offering clues to what may lie ahead. The letter begins as most do, with an opening salutation introducing the audience to the writer Paul, an apostle. The word apostle comes from the Greek apostolos, which carries the idea of agency. Paul is an agent to whom God has delegated authority to carry out His purposes and intents. Paul points out that his agency does not come from man nor through man but from Jesus Christ. He then goes on to qualify Christ as the One whom God raised from the dead. Unlike most of his letters, he doesn’t offer any thanks as he usually does for some quality or aspect of the recipients, such as their faith, example, or love. Could this be a clue to a problem with the character or behavior of the church?
Next, we find our usual Pauline greeting - grace and peace. Grace is unmerited favor from God that produces peace with God and with others. Again, we see a qualifier for Jesus - “the One who gave Himself for our sins to deliver us from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father” (Gal 1:4). The word for deliver here comes from the Greek verb exaireō, meaning to take out, remove, choose, or rescue. We are not taken out of the present evil age but rescued in it. Dr. Ben Witherington makes an excellent point that this is not some human self-help program since rescue is required. Salvation belongs to God alone. Finally, Paul ties Jesus’ resurrection to our salvation - again, something we could never accomplish alone.
The resurrection of Jesus began a new age, a new creation that will culminate with the return of Jesus to establish His Kingdom on earth. But, as many scholars like to put it, we live in the already and not yet. The way of approaching God in the Old Covenant is incompatible with the New. Our salvation must be grounded in a pure Gospel, not contaminated with the requirements of Law.
~ Shan Norwood and his wife Rina have been members at LIFE Fellowship for seven years. Shan is a graduate of Gordon Conwell Seminary and holds degrees in Biblical Studies and Christian Thought. He serves as a LIFE University instructor and as a stepdad to Micah and Caleb Godsey.