galatians 5

Last week, thanks to Paul, we read Galatians 4 aloud during class, and talked about various verses as we went through....those we had questions about or wanted to go deeper in to. It went pretty well, so we'll do the same thing next week with Galatians 5. To get prepared, go ahead and read Galatians 5 during the week.

Here are some topics that came up during our class time last week (Galatians 4). Ponder them as you continue to read...

v9 - "But now that you know God--or rather are known by God"
We had two different reactions on this:

1) the question: Weren't we known by God before we were believers? Isn't he all-knowing?
After some discussion, we agreed that because of the sin that separated us from God, we couldn't be fully known by God, because he wasn't able to be around it...in a sense of relationship or communion. After doing some digging around the original language, I found that this is most likely the case. The original Greek is ginosko, which means "allow, be aware (of), feel, (have) know(-ledge), perceived, be resolved, can speak, be sure, understand." That kind of says to me its not a 'know' in a strictly knowledge sort of way...but 'know' in a relationship sort of way, which we know is made possible only by the blood of Jesus. So, that, when we do become believers, God is able to know us in a way that wasn't possible before.

2) the emotion: We are known by God? WHAT?!? That's crazy and amazing, seeing how all of us desire to be known...for someone to understand everything that is in us.

Both result in praise....and actually the first, after understanding it, results in the second. He is amazing.

v21-31
For these verses, we talked about the analogies Paul used to make his point. There is the free woman (Sarah, heavenly Jerusalem), who has free children (believers); then there is the slave woman (Hagar, earthly Jerusalem), who has slave children (people under the law). The difference between them is only that one is by the promise of God, the other by human effort. But we are CHILDREN OF THE PROMISE. There is, of course, more to understand here, but for summary purposes, there you go. If you like, go back and read about Sarah and Hagar and God and Abraham and the promise in Genesis 15-18, 21.

There was more talk of more things, but for now, think about those things. See you next week!

LOVE and the promise...