pat loughery

The fine folks of Ohana Project have begun to work through the Biblical letter of Galatians. Last weekend was chapter 1; next weekend is the monthly community service project and then we’ll look at chapter 2, so I wanted to reread the little book to remind myself how it all fits together.

Galatians is pretty short; 6 chapters in all, 5 pages in the bound book I have in front of me. Written by St. Paul to a church in modern-day Turkey, there’s one major theme at play. Paul is arguing desperately that the church he established on the basis of the freedom that we have in the person and work of Jesus not be sabotaged by latecomer teachers who believe that the people in the church must first convert to Judaism in order to be Christ followers.

Specifically, they’re being told that they must be circumcized, or they’re out of the club.

In first century Palestine, to be Jewish in a culture dominated by the Romans meant that you had to follow very strict guidelines: You had to keep the Sabbath; you had to keep the dietary laws (no shellfish or pork sausages – shrimp gumbo was right out); you had to celebrate the Jewish feasts (themselves an incredibly subversive political maneuver), keep to the moral laws regarding purity and holiness and the sacrificial system. And, males had to be circumcised – an identity marker established by God to Abraham as a sign that the people of God were different than the other tribes.

Those things were identity markers – do them and you’re in; reject them and you’re out. For an oppressed people under the thumb of the Romans, they took on cultural significance that enabled a subjucated people to feel unique, special. Children of God’s promise to Abraham.

Paul’s idea was that Jesus fulfilled all those requirements, and by nature of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection, he once and for all completed those requirements. For Paul, identifying with Christ’s life, death and resurrection meant turning away from your old worldview that you had stuff you had to do in order to please God, to simply receiving and then acting upon Jesus’ offer of a new identity. The word we use, repent, wasn’t so limited as we currently think of it (decide not to do anything morally and ethically wrong anymore; stop sinning) – it was a whole change of mind, viewpoint, action, and identity. Paul describes it elsewhere as a requirement that our mind be made new.

This offer, for the new followers of Jesus, was mindblowing in its simplicity. Law – legalistically keeping to the rituals and requirements of a former lifestyle – gave way to God’s gracious offer of relationship, intimately established by the embodiment of pure love. Embrace the creator of life, and life is granted – both here and now, and evermore.

So that’s the story that he told the people in the province of Galatia – not Jews, but pagans. Pagans, now invited into the family of God by the free gift of grace offered by God through the life of his son Jesus. The Galatians enthusiastically responded. For a time.

Then, apparently some years after Paul established a community of believers in the region and moved on to tell others about this good news of God’s grace, other proselytizers came to town. Their message, however, was different. God is God of the Jews; in order to commune with God and his offer in Christ, a transitional stage must occur; You must take on the identity markers of Judaism.

Men, you must be circumcised.

Every time I read that word, I squirm. I was present for my son’s circumcision in the hospital – actually, they don’t let parents into the actual room and understandably so. I was in the next room over and can still remember Brogan’s screams. When the doctors and nurses tell you that the sugar water they use will numb the area, don’t believe them. Forgive me, my son.

Anyway, where was I. Oh, yeah. Circumcision. So these people have come to town telling Paul’s converts via grace that grace isn’t enough. Grace plus law is enough. You need both-and.

Paul is understandably infuriated. Not able to hop a plane and confront them directly, he must write a letter to be couriered to them.