Spend time in prayer and silence with God, asking Him to meet with you and speak to you.
Bible Reading
You foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? Before your very eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified. I would like to learn just one thing from you: Did you receive the Spirit by observing the law, or by believing what you heard? Are you so foolish? After beginning with the Spirit, are you now trying to attain your goal by human effort? Have you suffered so much for nothing—if it really was for nothing? Does God give you His Spirit and work miracles among you because you observe the law, or because you believe what you heard?
– Galatians 3:1-5
Devotion
Paul’s letter to the Galatians was a notice of warning. The Galatian believers were in peril because the foundations of their faith were being attacked. In this letter, Paul has no toleration for legalism. This letter is a declaration of emancipation from legalism. Galatians is the strongest defense of the doctrine of justification by faith in or out of Scripture. Paul not only declares that a sinner is saved by grace through faith, but the saved sinner lives by grace. Grace is a way to life and a way of life. In the above passage, Paul reminds the Galatians of how they were saved. He basically asks them if they were saved by keeping the law or by faith in what Christ had done. He points out the folly of beginning this spiritual journey by faith and then trying to maintain this faith walk by keeping the law. He calls this thinking “foolish” or senseless. In summary, we have seen that justification by faith was the experience of the Galatians. They were to beware of anybody that was teaching a doctrine other than justification by faith. Human effort is a temptation that appeals to our flesh. Self-effort is the thinking and way of our culture. Like the Galatians, we must resist the urge to let the culture influence our theology.
The Big Question
Have you been saved by grace through faith in the person and work of Christ? Are you trying to live out your faith by keeping the law? Are you living out your faith by walking in step with the Spirit of God? Do you lean in the direction of legalism or do you lean into the grace of God?
Conclude your time in prayer and silence, reflecting on what God revealed to you today.