Galatians 6:12
12 As many as [hosos] desire [thelo] to make a fair shew [euprosopeo] in [en] the flesh [sarx], they [houtos] constrain [anagkazo] you [humas] to be
circumcised [peritemno]; only [monon] lest [hina me] they should
suffer persecution [dioko] for the cross [stauros] of Christ [Christos]. KJV-Interlinear
12 Those who desire to make a
good showing in the flesh try to compel you to be circumcised, simply that they
may not be persecuted for the cross of Christ.
NASB
There are many believers in Christ, who do not pursue
their spiritual life in the proper way, and they end up as spiritual losers in
life. Works and faith are mutually
exclusive and cannot be combined. Trying
to observe works while at the same time promoting faith, is playing both sides
of the fence and is a false pursuit. Trying
to avoid criticism and to please everyone, too, is an almost hopeless and
impossible pursuit.
And as Paul states here, those who promote works,
and herein using circumcision as the example, do so only to avoid criticism or
persecution from their peers.
They do not engage in a daily study, and therefore
they do not learn the proper attributes of the Christian life.
With that failure to learn and failure to
understand, many believers pursue false ideas.
And any idea or belief that is not legitimate, amounts to works. All works are false when it comes to the
spiritual life.
In this example, the Jewish leadership tried to
make circumcision a requirement of salvation.
And as stated here, they did so in order to avoid ostracism
from their Jewish peers. Therefore they
promoted faith on the one hand, but only when combined with circumcision in
order to make salvation complete. And
that idea is a false idea.
They were Christians and Jewish, therefore the
phrase, for the sake of Christ. But
their fear was not of God, but of other Jews who were locked on to the idea of
circumcision as being a mandatory component of salvation.
No one can be saved by means of works. No one can be saved by means of any overt thing
that they do.
Likewise, no one can advance in their spiritual
life by means of their own works design, which basically means they reject Gods
mandate to study, while believing that they are not required to follow Gods
mandates, that they have their own way of doing things.
This too, is a cheap attempt to get out of obeying
Gods commands, by making their own beliefs more important than Gods process for
learning and growing.
While the Jews of old tried to comply with peer
pressure, in order to escape criticism, so too, people even in our current day,
try to seem spiritual, but in reality do nothing more than say the right things
in an effort to impress people rather than God.
But too, pursuing works is also an attempt to avoid or get out of ones
spiritual obligations, by simply deciding that they are unnecessary.
Ignorant people can easily fool ignorant people
with their false fronts of spirituality.
Wise people, on the other hand, are not fooled by
others, because they are not impressed by what others say or do. They are impressed with the doctrine within
their own soul, which is what really matters.
Works and faith do not go hand in hand. To pursue one means that you reject the
other. The spiritual life functions in a
specific way and you cannot define your own way of growing up in the spiritual
life.
Neither can you blend together works with faith and
have a good result.
You cannot do a wrong thing in a wrong way, for it
is wrong.
A wrong thing done in a right way is likewise
wrong.
A right thing done in a wrong way is also wrong.
You must do a right thing in a right way in order
for it to be right.
