Devotionals

WHAT IS YOUR LIFE?

A Factory or A Garden?

By Henry Jaegers

This I say then, walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would. But if ye be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law. (Galatians 5:16-18)

1. The problem that Paul faced in Galatia.

At the beginning, the church of Galatia received the ministry of Paul in a very positive way. It appears that they were very gracious and eager to receive the message of grace through faith that he gave to them. But something happened from that time on. We do not know how long it took, but the people began to change their attitude toward Paul and hold him with suspicion, wondering if he had declared to them the truth.

You see, someone had thrown a monkey wrench in the works, so to speak. Some very articulate and influential Jewish converts, who held to the Jewish teachings, began to integrate the message of grace with the law. They were telling the Galatian Christians that receiving Christ by faith was important but it was not enough. On top of salvation, they needed to be circumcised. What these people were doing were placing their misunderstanding of the law of God upon these Christians, confusing them by causing them to think that it was not enough to be saved by grace. They needed to do something more and that is where the problem began.

Without going into a lot of details, it is through this teaching, this problem is prominent in many churches today who claim to be Bible-believing-evangelicals. We have those that teach you salvation is not complete unless you have something else added to it.  Some, even go so far as to say that you must do something to keep your salvation. When Jesus was hanging on the cross, and he said those words "It Is Finished", he was not saying that something else must be added to the work that he completed by dying for our sins. Jesus never taught, and neither did Paul and the apostles, that you had to do something else besides “believing”. It is salvation by faith, not faith plus something else. It is a message that defies all logic but it is clear to those who understand the goodness and grace of God in doing so.

Some say you are not a full Christian until you have become baptized. Or you don't know what true Christianity is until you spoken in tongues or did some other external thing to prove that you are saved. All of this is similar to the problem that Paul faced in Galatia.  I am intentionally trying to keep this message brief. By being familiar with the book of Galatians, this misunderstanding can be corrected, so I will make this portion as introductory to the message contained in the verses above.

Many years ago, I heard a good preacher explain the difference between “the works of the flesh and the fruit of the spirit”. He said the words of the flesh are like a factory and the fruit of the spirit is like a garden. Now that is a good explanation. We are either living in the flesh demonstrated by the following words of Scripture that describe the works of the flesh, or we are walking in the spirit which is illustrated by the fruit of the spirit. Notice the introductory words of these two descriptions. "The works of the flesh are: the fruit of the spirit is: Now that's something to think about! We shall consider more as we progress.