II. Defense of Paul’s Apostleship and of the Gospel (Galatians 1:11–2:21)

II. Defense of Paul’s Apostleship and of the Gospel (1:11–2:21)

1:11-12 Paul emphasizes again (see 1:1) that the gospel he preached was not of human origin (1:11). He didn’t receive it from another preacher or invent the message himself. Jesus Christ revealed the gospel message directly to Paul and called him to be his apostle to the Gentiles (1:12; see Acts 9:1-19; 26:12-23).

1:13-14 Paul goes on to give evidence to support his claim that he received the message directly from God. When Paul visited the Galatians on his missionary journey, he was not the same person he used to be. In his former way of life in Judaism, he persecuted God’s church (1:13). When Stephen was martyred, Paul (Saul) “agreed with putting him to death” (Acts 8:1). He sought out Jewish Christians so that he might drag them off to prison (see Acts 8:3; 9:1-2). He wanted nothing more than to destroy the church (Gal 1:13), which he believed was corrupting his Jewish religion. Furthermore, Paul was a rising star in Judaism. He was surpassing his peers in his zeal for the traditions of his Jewish ancestors (1:14). When it came to Pharisaical law keepers, Paul was the cream of the crop (see Phil 3:4-6).

1:15-17 Given Paul’s zeal as a superior Pharisee and his hatred for the church, it would take something spectacular to turn him around and make him a follower of Jesus. And “something spectacular” is exactly what he got. God graciously and miraculously revealed his Son to Paul on the road to Damascus (1:15-16; see Acts 9:3-9). Paul even talks of God planning this long ago when he was in his mother’s womb, using the same kind of language used to describe Jeremiah’s ministry calling from God (Gal 1:15; see Jer 1:4-5).

When God revealed Jesus to Paul and commissioned him to preach him among the Gentiles, Paul didn’t immediately consult with anyone—not even with the other apostles (1:16-17). Why would he? He had received marching orders from the Lord Jesus himself when he went to Arabia for further instructions (1:17). He needed no confirmation from man. He went out right away to preach the gospel.

1:18-20 Three years later, he went to Jerusalem to get to know Cephas—that is, Peter—and stayed with him for two weeks (1:18; see John 1:42). The only other apostle he saw at that time was James, the Lord Jesus’s brother (Gal 1:19). Paul insisted, I am not lying (1:20). He wanted the Galatians to know that his apostleship was not derivative from the other apostles. He had not been “ordained” by them. When he did finally meet the other apostles, he spent a short amount of time with only two of them—not to gain their apostolic approval but simply to get acquainted with them. Paul didn’t get his gospel authority via Peter; he got it directly from Christ.

1:21-23 After this, Paul preached the gospel in Syria (north of Judea) and Cilicia (southern Asia Minor) (1:21). The Judean churches didn’t even know Paul as an apostle because his God-ordained ministry was elsewhere (1:22). They simply kept hearing that this famous persecutor of the church was now preaching the faith he once tried to destroy (1:23). What a glorious testimony! It’s a reminder that no one is beyond the grace of God. The vilest sinner can repent and believe. The heart that hates Christ can be softened and filled with love.

1:24 They glorified God because of me. When the churches in and around Jerusalem heard that Saul the persecutor had become Paul the evangelist, they gave glory to God. He had received an authentic apostolic calling from God and was preaching the authentic gospel of Christ. Though Paul was unknown to these churches personally, they were united with him by the joint mission to proclaim the same good news he’d once sought to destroy.

2:1-2 Fourteen years after his new birth in Christ, Paul made another visit to Jerusalem. This time, he went with two of his ministry partners, Barnabas and Titus (2:1). He met privately with the church leaders and presented to them the gospel that he preached to the Gentiles (2:2), a gospel of justification before God and of growth in sanctification.

2:3-5 False brothers who pretended to be true followers of Christ had infiltrated the church to spy on them. They wanted to take away the liberty they had as Christians that freed them from the Mosaic law to live under the rule of Christ (2:4). Though these false brothers sought to enslave the church to legalism—the attempt to earn salvation and sanctification by keeping the law—Paul refused to yield to them. He preserved the truth of the gospel, insisting that salvation and sanctification come through faith and not through law keeping (2:5). Even Titus, a Greek, was not compelled to be circumcised (2:3). He knew submitting to it could add nothing to the standing Christ had obtained for him before God. Thus, Titus serves as an object lesson of Gentile salvation and ministry involvement apart from the law.

2:6 Those who were recognized as important, including the other apostles, didn’t intimidate Paul. He knew that God does not show favoritism. These leaders added nothing to Paul (2:6). Though he had come to make clear to them the gospel he preached (2:2), he did not need their validation. God had revealed the message of the gospel directly to Paul through Christ. He needed no human endorsement or permission to preach it.

2:7-8 The church leaders in Jerusalem recognized Paul’s apostolic authority. They recognized that just as Peter had been entrusted and empowered by God to preach the gospel to the circumcised, the same was true of Paul on behalf of the uncircumcised. Though each was ministering primarily to different audiences (Jews and Gentiles), their gospel was the same: circumcision was not required to be saved. Salvation is by grace apart from works (see Titus 3:5).

2:9-10 James, Cephas (Peter), and John—those who had been part of Jesus’s original inner circle of apostles, the pillars of the Jerusalem church—fully acknowledged Paul’s gospel ministry and extended the right hand of fellowship to Paul and Barnabas (2:9). Thus, they were all in full agreement on the gospel. James, Peter, and John only asked one thing of Paul—not that he would modify his message, but that he would remember the poor. To this Paul gladly agreed, for it was something he himself made every effort to do (1:10).

Not only should we observe the unity that the apostles had on the gospel message of salvation through faith in Christ apart from keeping the law, but we should also notice their unity in the outworking of the gospel in society. In the Old Testament, God regularly showed concern for the poor and oppressed. He commanded Israel to show compassion and care to the marginalized, including widows and orphans (see Exod 22:22; 23:6; Lev 19:10; Deut 10:18; 15:7-8; Prov 22:22-23; 28:27; Isa 1:17), and he commands the church to do the same (see Jas 1:27; 2:15-16; 1 John 3:17). His agenda should be our agenda. We should “remember the poor.”

2:11 Unfortunately, the unity among the apostles was broken when Cephas (Peter) started going the wrong way down a one-way street. When that happened in Antioch, Paul opposed Peter to his face. When Peter was in the wrong, Paul loved God, Peter, and others enough to confront his fellow apostle and try to reverse his direction.

2:12-13 Peter regularly ate with the Gentiles (2:12), which is a detail that sounds rather mundane until we have a grasp of related historical and biblical background. Jews didn’t eat with Gentiles for religious and racial reasons. Both Gentiles and their food were considered unclean, unholy. To fellowship with Gentiles over a meal would make Jews spiritually unclean before God. But one day God showed Peter a vision of various unclean animals and commanded him to eat (see Acts 10:9-13). Even though Jesus had “declared all foods clean” (Mark 7:19), Peter hadn’t yet gotten the message. He refused the Lord’s command (see Acts 10:14). As a faithful Jew, he had never eaten unclean foods and wasn’t about to start. But to his hesitation God responded, “What God has made clean, do not call impure” (Acts 10:15).

God wasn’t merely teaching Peter that he could eat any kind of food, but that he could eat with any kind of person. All are equal before God. Peter learned this when God directed him to the home of a Roman centurion who believed the gospel and received the Holy Spirit (see Acts 10:44-46). God was willing to give his Holy Spirit even to Gentiles who would repent and believe in the atoning sacrifice of Jesus. This, in fact, was the point of the vision. “Now I truly understand,” Peter declared, “that God doesn’t show favoritism” (Acts 10:34). Peter adjusted his agenda to God’s.

That’s why Peter “regularly ate with Gentiles.” The gospel had broken down the racial barrier between Jew and Gentile. But then certain men came, those of the circumcision party, devout Jews. Whatever they said to Peter, they clearly found his behavior inappropriate. Perhaps they said, “Of course we ‘accept’ the Gentile Christians, Peter. But we need to maintain our Jewish identity. Sure we’re all equal. But we need to be ‘separate but equal.’” And at that moment, because he feared these Jews (2:12), Peter failed. He separated himself from his Gentile brothers in Christ, and the rest of the Jews. Even Barnabas, a Jew who had grown up in Cyprus among Gentiles (see Acts 4:36), joined his hypocrisy (2:13). They thus became hypocrites, preaching about the unifying nature of the gospel message but living contrary to that message.

2:14 Peter hadn’t merely committed a social faux pas. He was deviating from the truth of the gospel. It had been undermined by his behavior. Through Christ’s atoning work, he made peace between Jews and Gentiles, tearing down the wall that divided them and creating “one new man from the two” (Eph 2:14-15). But by his actions, Peter had built the wall again, because others started following his lead. Peter tripped, the rest of the Jewish Christians stumbled over him, and the reconciling truth of the gospel was put in jeopardy. Peter was their spiritual leader, and what happened in this case is a reminder that a mist in the pulpit will always result in a fog in the pew.

Paul swung into action. He confronted Peter in front of everyone. Why the public confrontation? Peter’s sin had been public, and he had led others into sin. Therefore, the public harm to the gospel had to be put right publicly. Paul shone a light on Peter’s hypocrisy. Though a Jew, Peter lived like a Gentile—that is, he didn’t practice Judaism in order to be made right with God. Yet, by his recent actions he was compelling Gentiles to live like Jews. Gentiles watching Peter would have thought, “In order to fellowship with Jewish Christians, I guess we need to adopt Jewish practices like the food laws and circumcision.” Such thinking would have convinced them that the gospel hadn’t really worked and that racial unity and right standing before God would only result from keeping the law. This was the same danger that confronted the Galatians. Legalism leads to hypocrisy, disrupting the gospel’s power to produce racial harmony

2:15-18 Paul couldn’t ignore this. A person is not justified—declared righteous—by the works of the law. We are not made right with God by obedience to the law but by faith in Jesus Christ, whether we are Jews or Gentiles (2:16). Some of Paul’s opponents argued that abolishing the law promoted sinful behavior. Christ would be a promoter of sin, since someone could be justified by faith and then live as he pleased (2:17). But Paul denied this. Rather, the real sin was turning back to the law after one had believed in Christ alone for justification—building up what had been torn down (2:18).

2:19-20 Paul makes clear what happened to him (and to us) at the moment of salvation: Through the law I died to the law. God’s holy law required death for sinners, but Jesus Christ served as our substitute. He bore the wrath of God and died in our place so that we might live for God—not so that we would satisfy our own racial or religious biases (2:19).

Our ethnic identities are part of God’s creation. We should acknowledge and celebrate the various expressions of our common humanity that God has made. The problem comes when our racial identity takes precedence over our identity in Christ. This was Peter’s mistake. By virtue of the gospel, I have been crucified with Christ. Through faith in Christ, I am united with him—both in his death and in his resurrection. Therefore, I no longer live, but Christ lives in me (2:20). This is the substitutionary life of Christ, which is the key to victorious Christian living (see Rom 5:10). My identity in Christ is the most important thing about me. Everything else is secondary. We must die to any identity we have that is independent of Christ.

When I place racial or ethnic identity above my identity in Christ (as Peter did), I forget God’s amazing grace. I forget the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me so that I might be reconciled to God and reconciled to others. We have been called to live by faith in Christ (2:20)—to be visible and verbal followers of Christ in all we do. This kingdom identity in Christ puts my racial identity into proper perspective. The cross is not merely a historical event; it affects contemporary life, as well as social and racial relationships.

2:21 If obedience to the law is sufficient to make us righteous before God, to enable us to successfully live the Christian life, and to unite us as his people, then Christ died for nothing. In truth, the Son of God gave his life on the cross so that we might be justified—declared righteous—before God and become “one in Christ Jesus” (3:28). To claim that both righteousness and identity as God’s people are obtainable through the law is to negate the work of the grace of God. Grace is sufficient for “every good work” (2 Cor 9:8).

By his actions, Peter had unwittingly negated God’s grace. If the Galatians listened to the Judaizers and became law keepers, they would too. And that would be declaring the gospel irrelevant and cancelling the power of grace to work in their lives and ours. Spirituality, then, does not come from performing an external list of rules (this is at the heart of legalism); rather, it comes from the internal flow of grace in and through the life of the believer. In order to live under grace, we must die to the law (see Rom 7:1-4).