Paul more than once uses this word picture, or is it simply a reality?

Our becoming “new creatures,” when we are born again!

We all remember 2nd Corinthians 5:17. “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a NEW CREATURE: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.”

And the Apostle (actually earlier than the Corinthians Quote I just shared, earlier in time) uses this metaphor with the Galatian Christians as well.

And he does so (still) refuting  the false teaching that physical circumcision “saves” or “helps save” or even “keeps one saved!”

Now our Text verse for today: “For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth any thing, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature.” Wow, Galatians 6:15!

Yes, the very moment we were saved we were placed “in Christ!” 

This happens “by grace through faith,” Ephesians 2:8.

(I now live “in Jesus,” and yet Jesus also dwells “in me!” O glorious thought! See here Colossians 1:27. “To whom God would make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles; which is CHRIST IN YOU, the hope of glory.”)

The verb “availeth” in our Text is “ischuo” in Greek, one of that language’s great “power” words. It means “enabling, prevailing, serving,” perhaps even “having physical applicability!” (This is a present tense, active voice verb. This “neither availing” is an ongoing truth, situation, durative in nature.

For sure: to get saved, it does not matter one iota (a Greek letter) if a person has been (or has not been) circumcised! All that matters is Jesus, believing in Him!

In fact, gathering from this Verse, I conclude a person is not longer simply a Jew (circumcised) or a Gentile (uncircumcised) in God’s Eyes …  but now a “new creature!” Spiritually this is an absolute truth! (Though please understand … God’s promises to Israel as a Nation are still in effect!)

“For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth any thing, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature.”

We all should be (and some perhaps are) running around shouting “Hallelujah” right now!

It empowers (this “new creaturehood” does) us … not by any of our physical (health) conditions … but rather enables us by means of the Holy Spirit of God … Who made us new creatures (“newborn babes” according to Peter) when we were regenerated, washed in the Blood of Jesus!

My surgical history/record does NOT aid in my walk with God!

The renewing Holy Spirit sure does, though! 

By the way, the adjective “new” means “fresh,” or at times “unworn!”

Nothing stale or boring here!

Now I must say, WOW!

— Dr. Mike Bagwell

Notice too how Paul here just took one more “swipe” at the Judiazers, at the fleshly circumcisers who had infiltrated and confused his beloved Galatian converts!

The Apostle often does that at the end of his Epistles, restates his major premise for writing! Here in Galatians … that would be “God’s Grace versus human works, versus legalism!”

 

This is the third lesson!

From Galatians 6:14 … “But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world.”

Now let me demarcate today’s text, the specific phrase we need to notice this morning. “But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, AND I UNTO THE WORLD.”

Paul just declared himself “crucified unto the world!” By means of the Cross on which Jesus died! Which, obviously, still has not lost its Power!

To me through these years … “crucified” has only held one meaning. What else could it possibly imply? It is in Greek “stauroo,” and means “to stake.” As in driving a stake into the ground. And it describes (as well as defines) what this old world did to my Saviour. They beat Him then hung Him on a stake (a pole, a tree) and left Him there until He died. Hence, the Cross!

But this morning, earlier, I have learned a new meaning for “stauroo.” And it (of necessity) still involves a “stake.” That can’t be changed, not honestly.

But imagine a line of stakes, one after another (each say about three or four feet tall). Now let those stakes surround a man’s field, a vineyard let’s imagine it. Then we connect those stakes one to another with some wire or rope or wooden planks … and we have “a fence!”

Well … I just read a Greek scholar saying that an alternate meaning (a legitimate meaning as well) for “stauroo” can be “to fence off” something! To effectively “separate” yourself from an undesirable environment! To erect a fence!

Wow!

Thus, if I am right, Paul uses the Cross “to cut himself off” from the world! To “fence” himself “into” Jesus … “into” Calvary, “into” the things of God … and to fence himself “away from” the carnal or selfish or detrimental things of the world!

Wow, again!

A permanent Barrier!

If Paul ever even thought about returning to some element of the world … the Cross prohibited him! (No going back to that Pharisaical way of life, to that pride, to that “bragging on one’s works” mentality! No going back to some “sin” which so easily beset him!

No going back to anything that smacked of the world! (“Abstain from all appearance of evil.” 1st Thessalonians 5:22, even the “appearance!” In Greek “eidos” means “shape, fashion, or sight.”)

All that unprofitable stuff … fenced off by the Cross!

So … one could really say that the old rugged Cross … separates two worlds! Eternally so! One is heavenly, the other hellish!

Fenced off … because of Calvary!

Fenced in … because of Calvary!

No wonder an old Bible Preacher (A. C. Dixon) years ago wrote a Book (based on a Series of Sermons he had preached in the Church he pastored) entitled “The Glories of the Cross.”

And one of those “glories” is … “by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world.” Or would that be two?

Crucify … “to fortify with driven stakes,” the exact commentary quote!

— Dr. Mike Bagwell

Fenced in today!

 

Paul is (in our Text today) speaking of the “Cross,” that cruel means of execution devised by the ancients to torture a person to death, and that by the most humiliating/shameful way possible.

But not just any Cross … “the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.” The very means God has ordained for the salvation of lost souls! Via the shed Blood of our Lord!

Then the great Apostle adds, concerning that “old rugged” Cross … “by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world.” Galatians 6:14, the second half of the verse.

That’s why I have labeled the Text … “the Cross and me.” I could have as easily said, brothers and sisters in Christ, “the Cross and you.”

Let’s this morning personalize this great Truth of genuine Christianity!

Let’s talk about the “practicality” of Jesus’ Cross, two thousand years after the Fact, in 2018 (soon to be 2019, the Lord willing).

Here Paul makes (in a way) the Cross of Jesus into the Cross of “Paul!” (As shameful as that Cross was, in Greek/Roman society.) He still applies its mighty power to himself, not power in the sense of mere enjoyment, but power for spiritual growth!

Starkly, for “death” in certain areas of Paul’s life!

Here’s what I mean … “Jesus Death on the Cross” procures Paul’s “death” to the world! The world as the seat of Satan, the center of darkness. “By Whom the world is crucified unto me.” 

Jesus died that Day to the world, for sure. In fact, after Calvary He (our Lord) only stayed here another 40 days! Then He was ascended to Heaven, where yet today He sits and reigns and intercedes!

And by that same Cross … somehow I can die to the world as well!

Paul did.

To the point he could testify … “I die daily.” 1 Corinthians 15:51

The world, via Calvary and the One Who gave Himself there, had lost its power to allure the Apostle!

Other things had assumed more (attracting, magnetizing, drawing) Power! Well, another Thing! JESUS and His Death!

“But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me …”

Amen!

The Cross has brought about for Paul “a whole new world, a new creation!” Old things have passed away! Including what used to matter to Paul … ” If any other man thinketh that he hath whereof he might trust in the flesh, I more. Circumcised the eighth day, of the stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, an Hebrew of the Hebrews; as touching the law, a Pharisee; concerning zeal, persecuting the church; touching the righteousness which is in the law, blameless. But what things were GAIN to me, those I counted loss for Christ.” He crucified his worldly life!

Wow, because of Jesus!!

He continues: “Yea doubtless, and I count all things but LOSS for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do COUNT THEM BUT DUNG, that I may win (better know) Christ.” Philippians 3:3-6

The world is now dead to Paul!

Then tomorrow (the Lord willing), we shall look at the final phrase of Galatians 6:14. Where Paul declares: “and I unto the world.” 

More fully: “But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, AND I UNTO THE WORLD.”

— Dr. Mike Bagwell

 

“But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world.” Galatians 6:14

Paul the Apostle is NOT a man much given to “glorying,” a Greek verb (“kauchaomai”) meaning “to boast, to brag” and 5 times in the New Testament “to rejoice” in something.

Now this does NOT mean Paul was a *dour, sad man either! His Letter to the Philippians uses the words “joy” or “rejoice” nearly 20 times. I just counted! It is called by some Preachers “the Joy Book” of the Bible! (* In Latin “durus” means “hard!”)

Still, Paul was not a braggart.

A few times in his life he was (he felt) forced into defending the very authenticity of his ministry. This apologetic move he called “boasting” or “glorying” a time or two. Still, this great man was not a self-centered Christian, an oxymoron really.

So he writes in today’s Text, today’s Verse: “But God forbid that I should glory …” (Again, Galatians 6:14, but only its first clause, using the aforementioned “kauchaomai.”)

In the previous verse (our last lesson) Paul had described some false teachers who constantly bragged on themselves, their “good works” in following the Law of Moses, especially in being their being “circumcised.” And in how many others (Gentiles, Galatians) they had persuaded to be circumcised as well.

Not Paul! “I thank God that I baptized none of you, but Crispus and Gaius. Lest any should say that I had baptized in mine own name. And I baptized also the household of Stephanas: besides, I know not whether I baptized any other.” 1 Corinthians 1:14-16, no heedless “numbering/bragging” here! Nothing mattered to him as much as salvation by Grace!

But our Text today adds another line … “But God forbid that I should glory, save (except) in the CROSS of our Lord Jesus Christ …” What a statement!

Paul will not brag about circumcisions, or baptisms or converts or successes (of any kind) … not normally. But HE WILL UNASHAMEDLY BOAST in the things of the Cross of Calvary! Where Jesus died to save us old, lost sinners!

And Oh, did Paul consistently follow that conviction in his writing!

Dozens of times!

In Romans 5:10 … “We were reconciled to God by the death of his Son.” Soul Salvation through the old rugged Cross!

In 1 Corinthians 1:17 he mentions the “power” (literally the “fulness”) of the Cross of Christ! “Lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect.” (Be made “empty!”)

Here’s one of Paul’s homiletics lessons: “But we preach Christ crucified ….” 1 Corinthians 1:23, always his main Theme!

Elsewhere in the Pauline Corpus: “For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.”

Paul will rather be a “friend” of the Cross, not an enemy! “Of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ.” Philippians 3:18

Paul bragged about the miraculous Peace we enjoy, because of the Cross! “Having made peace through the blood of his cross.” Colossians 1:20

Look at what Paul says Jesus did to our sins, the whole lot of them! “Blotting out (erasing) the handwriting of ordinances (debts, sins) that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross.” Colossians again, 2:14 this time.

How’s this for glorying in the Cross? “Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.” Hebrews 12:2

Over and over again … Paul is a preacher of the Cross!

And all I can write is HALLELUJAH!

Glory to God!

— Dr. Mike Bagwell

No wonder we sing and rejoice about Calvary like we do!  Think of you favorite Cross Song today … and hum it throughout the morning!

 

That’s (the lesson title today) what Paul thinks about the disciples of Moses (as opposed to the disciples of Jesus) who have tried to ruin the little Churches in Galatia, “braggarts!” 

Today’s Study Verse: “For neither they themselves who are circumcised keep the law; but desire to have you circumcised, that they may glory in your flesh.” Galatians 6:13

The “circumcision” (Paul’s name for these men who can only emphasize that surgical rite, to the detriment of the saving Grace of God), that entire group, cannot itself even obey the Law they are so eagerly promoting.  The verb “keep” (in Greek “phulasso” meaning “to guard, observe”) means just that, “to obey.” To plan one’s life “in toto” by its guidelines.

These men themselves do not wholly keep the law, but they sure do want Paul’s new believers to be circumcised, a first step in a life of centering on that law! Of being a slave to that law!

The verb “desire” is “thelo,” they “wish/will” it so! It is the longing of their heart! Their chief aim!

To this crowd … it’s (godly living) not about being saved via the Blood of Jesus, but rather submitting to the Rabbi’s knife! 

Then Paul once again (as he did in the last verse) broaches the subject of motive. And Paul indeed well knows these men, if not personally, at least the type/ilk they represent. After all, as Saul of Tarsus he followed that (preparatory) Old Testament lifestyle for years and years! I suspect Paul had all 613 Mosaic laws by memory. Yes, there are that many!

That motive?  ” … that they may GLORY in your flesh.” The verb “glory” here simply means “to brag!” Or to boast, to rejoice!

Some Preachers counted souls saved.

Other counted baptisms, maybe.

But not these boys!

They counted foreskins!

They boasted in the number of Gentiles they had forced (converted) into “circumcised” practicing Jews!

Wow!

Talk about insincerity!

Talk about hypocrisy!

They are not following through and obeying the whole Law of Moses (which was a good thing as designed by God) but … these people apparently obey just their “chosen” little stipulations! 

Maybe the things that are more outward, more easily seen, more physical? (Not so much the inward things of the heart!)

Oh yes, that’s legalism, all right.

— Dr. Mike Bagwell

Now in our next Lesson we shall see, the Lord willing, something in which Paul glories, brags, boasts, rejoices! And it is NOT circumcision!