“1 O foolish Galatians, who hath bewitched you, that ye should not obey the truth, before whose eyes Jesus Christ hath been evidently set forth, crucified among you? 2 This only would I learn of you, Received ye the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith? 3 Are ye so foolish? having begun in the Spirit, are ye now made perfect by the flesh? 4 Have ye suffered so many things in vain? if it be yet in vain. 5 He therefore that ministereth to you the Spirit, and worketh miracles among you, doeth he it by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith? 6 Even as Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.”
(Galatians 3:1–6, KJV)
I am afraid that people have today lost the ability to think logically. We have become information vaults. Our brains have become like hard drives in a computer that can only store up information without an ability to process the information. The central processing parts of our brains are being numbed to the point that we cannot critically examine and process the information stored there.
What is the result of this? We quickly allow others to sway our thinking. We are too prone to take their ideas and accept them without any examination. Thus, we draw false conclusions and are swayed in our core beliefs in dangerous ways.
We can see many examples of this in our world today. The media feeds us tons of information. We take it into our brains and accept what we hear and see without any critical examination. We value the pseudo-journalists of our day without thinking as they spin their personal convictions as absolute fact. Many are led astray today by this practice.
This ability to brainwash people is not new. It is a practice that has gone on throughout the ages. It is the problem to which Paul addressed his letter to the Galatians. The Judaizers, legalists, had come into their midst and taught that they must follow works of the law to experience the spiritual blessings of God in salvation. This undermined the gospel of grace. Unfortunately, the Galatians were falling for this teaching. They failed to process the information they received and discern the truth.
Paul needed to wake up the foolish Galatians. He needed to engage their brains. He wanted them to process the information that they received. They needed to reboot their central processors. The best way to do this was to ask them some serious questions in order to stimulate their thinking processes once again.
To this end, Paul asks them five rhetorical questions. These are five questions that they are to ponder. The first is this. “Who hath bewitched you?” This brought them to a place of questioning the source of the information. Obviously, it was Paul who brought them a message of hope and freedom. The legalists brought them a contrary message.
Second, Paul asked, “Received ye the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith?” In other words, they were to think about how they started this Christian adventure. Did they receive the Spirit by works or by faith?
Third, “Are ye so foolish? having begun in the Spirit, are ye now made perfect by the flesh?” They needed to consider the process of sanctification. If they began their journey of the faith by the Spirit, did they expect that they could grow in the faith in a contrary way? No, both their initiation into the faith and their growth in the faith would be by the same power.
Fourth, “Have ye suffered so many things in vain?” When they believed, they entered into a spiritual conflict. It was one of conflicting ideologies. This is spiritual warfare that resulted in persecution. They were to consider why this happened and if it was all for naught.
Last, “He therefore that ministereth to you the Spirit, and worketh miracles among you, doeth he it by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith?” Paul challenged the Galatians to look at the practical outworking of God around them. He supplied to them the Spirit and did mighty works among them. This did not happen by works of the law, but by trusting in Him alone, that is by faith.
Paul here used a powerful method of connecting with the heart of people. He challenged them with poignant questions. They were to engage their brains in processing information. Today we need to do the same.
Many today believe things because they have been influenced by the conflicting messages offered by this world’s system. There is one source of absolute truth. It is God from whom all truth flows. He has given us His word, the Bible. We must examine it, its truths, and process them. We must examine every teaching to see if it aligns with God’s word. If we do not, we run the risk of being led astray by the wiles of our adversary the devil.
Renewing the Heart 