Chapter 22
“Until Christ
Be Formed in You”
“Brethren, I beseech you, be as I am; for I am as ye are: ye have
not injured me at all. Ye know how through infirmity of the flesh I preached
the gospel unto you at the first. And my temptation which was in my flesh ye
despised not, nor rejected; but received me as an angel of God, even as Christ
Jesus. Where is then the blessedness ye spake of? for
I bear you record, that, if it had been possible, ye would have plucked out
your own eyes, and have given them to me. Am I therefore become your enemy,
because I tell you the truth? They zealously affect you, but not well; yea,
they would exclude you, that ye might affect them. But it is good to be
zealously affected always in a good thing, and not only when I am present with
you. My little children, of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be
formed in you, I desire to be present with you now, and to change my voice; for
I stand in doubt of you.” Galatians 4:12-20
God’s saints in this world are often compared to
sheep. Pastors are called “shepherds” because it is their responsibility to
tend the sheep. God’s people are sheep. Like sheep they must be guided,
protected, and cared for. They frequently leave the prescribed path. They are
easily led astray. They are in danger because of deceptive wolves. It is the
duty of God’s appointed shepherds to feed his lambs, to protect them from the
dangers they face, instruct them in the way of righteousness, and to faithfully
restore them when they fall, when they turn aside, or when they are taken in a
snare.
The
Galatian saints were foolishly turning aside to Judaism, the works of the law,
being taken in the snare of Satan’s messengers of self-righteousness. They had
been flattered into thinking that their good works could supplement the
free-grace of God in Jesus Christ. And they had foolishly accepted this
doctrine of will-worship to the great dishonor of Christ and the gospel, and to
the grief and anguish of the man who first brought the gospel to them. Paul had
been the instrument of their conversion and he loved their souls. He was a
faithful shepherd to their souls. Therefore, he sharply rebuked them for their
sin. Rather than loving Paul for his faithfulness to God and to their souls,
the Galatians were treating him as though he were their enemy.
Paul
would not allow their abuse of him to hinder his love and faithfulness to them.
In verses 8-11 he had sharply reproved them. Here, he makes an urgent,
intensely personal plea, appealing to them as one who loved them and as one
they had once received “as an angel of God” to their souls. He writes as one
who is in agony because he cannot endure the thought that a people, who at one
time had treated him with so much sympathetic consideration and received the gospel
preached by him with such enthusiasm, were continuing to wander farther and
farther away from the truth. Therefore, he lovingly pleads with them as a
parent to his children.
“As I Am”
Verse 12 “Brethren, I beseech you, be as I am; for I am as ye are:
ye have not injured me at all.”
― Paul addresses the Galatians as his “brethren” in Christ, taking
them at their word. They professed to be his brethren. They professed faith in
Christ. And, though they had gone so far backward and appeared to have departed
from the faith, yet hopes the best concerning them. His hopes are truly born of
God. Because he tenderly loved them and cared for them, he wanted them to be as
he was, completely free from the tyranny and bondage of the law. He wanted them
to reckon themselves dead indeed to the law (Gal.
“For I
am as ye are” ― Anxious lest he should do more harm than good, Paul
carefully shows the Galatians that his heart is with them, that he loves them
as himself, as one with him. He wants them to know that his sharp rebukes have
come, not from a man who despises them but from one who loves them. Commenting
on this phrase, Martin Luther wrote…
“Like Paul, all pastors and ministers ought to have much sympathy for their poor straying sheep, and instruct them in the spirit of meekness. They cannot be straightened out in any other way. Over sharp criticism provokes anger and despair, but no repentance. And here let us note, by the way, that true doctrine always produces concord. When men embrace errors, the tie of Christian love is broken.
At the
beginning of the Reformation we were honored as the true ministers of Christ.
Suddenly certain false brethren began to hate us. We had given them no offense,
no occasion to hate us. They knew then as they know now that ours is the
singular desire to publish the Gospel of Christ everywhere. What changed their
attitude toward us? False doctrine. Seduced into error
by the false apostles, the Galatians refused to acknowledge
Paul knew
that the false apostles would misconstrue his censure of the Galatians to their
own advantage and say: ‘So this is your Paul whom you praise so much. What
sweet names he is calling you in his letter. When he was with you he acted like
a father, but now he acts like a dictator.’ Paul knew what to expect of the
false apostles and therefore he is worried. He does not know what to say. It is
hard for a man to defend his cause at a distance, especially when he has reason
to think that he personally has fallen into disfavor.”
Paul is
saying, “I am as you are, and you are as I am with respect to things
spiritual.” We are alike in Christ, chosen in him, and redeemed by him. We are
equally regenerated by his Spirit. We are all the children of God by faith in
Christ. We are no more servants, but sons. We are all equally his free men.
Therefore, be as I am, free in Christ.
“Ye have
not injured me at all.” ― Paul has shown them how that their doctrine
injures the character of God, the work of Christ who fulfilled the law, the
gospel of God’s grace, and their own souls; but he wanted them to know that
they had not injured him. Their rejection of Paul was not injury to him. It was rather a
rejection of Jesus Christ, whose servant Paul was (1 Sam. 8:6-7; Ex. 16:8). They must not imagine that the things he wrote in this
epistle were written out of resentment. Paul desired that the Galatians be bound to him as their
faithful and loving pastor. He acted toward them as though he and they were
one. Above that, Paul wanted these Galatians once again to be bound to Jesus
Christ (Gal.
“An Angel of God”
Verses 13-16 - “Ye know how
through infirmity of the flesh I preached the gospel unto you at the first. And
my temptation which was in my flesh ye despised not, nor rejected; but received
me as an angel of God, even as Christ Jesus. Where is then the
blessedness ye spake of? For I bear you record, that,
if it had been possible, ye would have plucked out your own eyes, and have
given them to me. Am I therefore become your enemy, because I tell you the
truth?”
When he first came among them, the Galatians had received Paul “as
an angel of God, even as Jesus Christ.” They received him as God’s
messenger to their souls, as though Christ himself spoke to them by him.
Indeed, that is exactly what God’s servants are to his people. Faithful pastors
are described as God’s angels to his churches (Rev. 1-3), through whom God
speaks to chosen sinners by the gospel (2 Cor.
When he first preached the gospel of God’s free and sovereign grace in
Christ to them, he did so in much weakness, humility, persecution and bodily
afflictions. They were to be commended for receiving the gospel and God’s
messenger to them. Wherever he preached the gospel both Jews and Gentiles were
enraged against him. All the influential and religious people of his day
denounced him. But the Galatians were different. That was greatly to their
honor. And Paul does not neglect to praise them for it. This praise Paul
bestows on none of the other churches.
When he speaks of the infirmity of his flesh he does not mean some
physical defect or carnal lust, but the sufferings and afflictions he endured
in his body. Paul tells us what these infirmities were in 2 Corinthians
12:9-10. ― “And he said unto me,
My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is
made perfect in weakness. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my
infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Therefore I take
pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in
distresses for Christ’s sake: for when I am weak, then am I strong.”
He speaks
in a similar manner in 2 Corinthians 11:23-25. ― “Are they ministers
of Christ? (I speak as a fool) I am more; in labours more abundant, in stripes
above measure, in prisons more frequent, in deaths oft. Of the Jews five times
received I forty stripes save one. Thrice was I beaten with rods, once was I
stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I have been in the deep.”
These are the afflictions he is talking about when he speaks of his “infirmity
of the flesh.” He reminds the Galatians how he was always in peril at the
hands of the Jews, Gentiles, and false brethren, and how he suffered hunger and
want.
Now, the afflictions of the believers always offend people. Paul knew
it and, therefore, has high praise for the Galatians, because they over looked
his afflictions and received him like an angel. Our Savior said, “Blessed is
he, whosoever shall not be offended in me” (Matt. 11:6). It is no easy
thing to confess him as Lord and Savior who was a reproach of men and despised
of the people and the laughing stock of the world (Ps. 22:7). To prize Christ,
so spitefully scorned, spit upon, scourged, and crucified, more than the riches
of the richest, the strength of the strongest, the wisdom of the wisest, he
calls “blessed.”
Paul had those outward afflictions and inward, spiritual afflictions as
well. He speaks of them in 2 Corinthians 7:6. ― “Without were
fightings, within were fears.” In his letter to the Philippians he speaks
of the restoration of Epaphroditus as a special act of mercy from God, “lest
I should have sorrow upon sorrow.” He commends the Galatians for not being
offended at him in the past, for receiving him as “an angel of God, even as
Christ Jesus.” They received him with all that reverence, respect, and high
esteem, veneration, and affection, that might have been given to an angel sent
down from heaven to bring them the gospel, as one that had his mission and
commission from God.
They had received Paul “even as Christ Jesus,” as his
ambassador, as representing him, as speaking to them in his stead, as if Christ
himself had been personally present as man among them. They could not have
shown greater respect to him. The Galatians did not look upon Paul and his
infirmities as offensive things. Far from it. They
were so glad to hear the gospel of Christ from his lips that had it been
possible they would have plucked out their own eyes and given them to him. By
reminding them how much they had loved him and how highly they had honored him
before the invasion of the legalists, he tenderly urges them to so receive him
now.
They were so happy in Christ and so thankful to have heard the gospel
of God’s free grace to sinners in him that they counted the man who preached
the gospel to them as their dearest friend. Now that the law-preachers had
influenced them, they had not only turned form the gospel of Christ alone, but
had become Paul’s enemies. A more passionate appeal is not to be found in all
of Paul’s writings than this ― “Am I therefore become your enemy
because I tell you the truth?” They treated him as an enemy because he
preached that believers are complete in Christ and have no need to be
circumcised, to keep sabbath days, and to live under
the yoke of bondage.
Verse 17 - “They zealously
affect you, but not well; yea, they would exclude you, that ye might affect
them.” ― Here Paul speaks of the false teachers at
These false
preachers were courting the saints of God, pretending great love and concern
for them, but it was all beguiling flattery. Satan’s messengers soft soap
people “with good words and fair speeches,” to deceive the simple (Rom.
Their “god
is their belly.” They are enemies of the cross, enemies of God, and enemies
to the souls of men (Phil.
Verse 18 – “But it is
good to be zealously affected always in a good thing, and not only when I am
present with you.” Paul is saying, “When I was present with you,
you loved me and received me as an angel of God to your souls. The fact that I
am now absent from you should not cause your attitude toward me to change.
Though I am absent in the flesh, I am with you in spirit. You ought not reject me or my doctrine by which you received the grace
of Christ and his Holy Spirit because of the evil influence of those wicked
men.”
Verse 19 - “My little
children, of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be
formed in you.” ― It appears that when Paul was present with them,
they were devoted to him and to the gospel, but when he left, their affection
to him and to the gospel he preached cooled. They turned to other teachers who
convinced them that Paul had abandoned them. Nothing could have been further
from the truth.
“My
little children” ― Paul speaks in the tender, affectionate language
of a father to his sons. They were, he hoped, sons of God and were still babes
in Christ. Therefore, the term “little children” was appropriate. But
they were also Paul’s children. He was the instrument God used to bring them to
faith in Christ.
“Of whom I travail in birth
again”
― Here Paul compares himself to a woman giving birth. All his pains,
sufferings, and labors in preaching the gospel he compares to the sorrows of a
woman in labor. At such a time, a woman is concerned about just one thing. She
considers her pain and suffering worthwhile if she can give birth to a living,
healthy child. Paul’s concern was not for himself, but for them. All he was
concerned about and dedicated to in prayer, preaching, and suffering was that
Christ might be formed in them.
“Until Christ be formed
in you.” ― To have Christ formed in you is to be saved, to be a new
creature in Christ Jesus. In the new birth we are made “partakers of the
divine nature” (2 Pet. 1:4). “Christ in you” is the hope of glory
(Col. 1:27). A form of religion, with its laws, ordinances, and ceremonies, is
not eternal life. A form of morality, with its laws and commandments, is not
eternal life. A form of religious profession, with its decisions, baptisms and
creeds, is not eternal life. Eternal life is knowing God and Jesus Christ, whom
he has sent (John 17:3). Eternal life is, as Henry Mahan put it, having, “the
life of Christ, the presence of Christ, the Spirit and mind of Christ and the
very glory of Christ begotten, created and formed in us (Gal. 2:20). Until this
is done and unless this miracle of grace is accomplished, our religion is vain.
It is no more than that of the Pharisees of old, of whom Christ said, “They
neither know me nor my Father.” Salvation is Christ in you; the hope of
glory is Christ in you; the life of God is Christ in you (1John 5:11-12).”
Verse 20 - “I desire to be
present with you now, and to change my voice; for I stand in doubt of you.”
― Paul wanted to be present with them. He wanted to speak to them face to
face, and be assured that his concerns were ill-founded. But their concern
about law obedience, circumcision, sabbath days, and ceremonies made him
fearful that they did not know Christ at all. Therefore, he writes, “I stand
in doubt of you.”
It is
significant to note that Paul never expressed such doubt regarding any other
congregation. Nothing, not even the immorality and divisions in the Corinthian
church, caused the apostle to express doubt concerning the genuineness of their
professed faith in Christ. But when men and women embrace self-righteous works
religion, when they turn again to the weak and beggarly elements of the law, it
becomes obvious that they never knew the grace of God and do not trust Christ
(Gal. 5:1-4). When professed believers appear to be turning away from Christ
and the gospel of God’s free and sovereign grace in him, there is grave reason
to stand in doubt of their professed faith in Christ.