Galatians 1

Among the numerous trials which affectionate and successful ministers of Christ are called to encounter, the disappointment of their hopes with regard to many who for a time promised well, is by no means the least. Often they are called to deep anguish under the apprehension that some of their professed converts may, after all, be impenitent and sink into the horrors of the second death.Not of men; not deriving my office from men.

Neither by man; not appointed by man. Being about to contend against a fundamental error, he asserts in the strongest terms his full apostolical authority, and goes on to show that he has received not his office alone, but the gospel which he preaches directly from Christ. Christians in any house, town, or city who met together on the Lord's day to worship him and observe his ordinances, were regarded by the apostles as in a sense a church of Christ. As Paul was chosen to be an apostle, and commissioned to preach the gospel, by Jesus Christ, and prayed to him as he did to the Father for the highest spiritual blessings, it is evident that he viewed him as divine. Who gave himself for our sins; he asserts at the outset the fundamental doctrine of redemption through Christ, in opposition to the Judaizing teachers, who taught the Galatians to seek salvation through the works of the law.

Deliver us from this present evil world; from both its corruption and its misery. This he does by making us citizens of a better world, and thus enabling us to live above the present. Him that called you; God, who by Paul called them to embrace the gospel. Any plan of salvation except that of free grace, through faith in Christ, is opposed to the gospel, and they who preach it are in danger of an awful condemnation. For do I now persuade; seek to gain the favor of. As much as to say, Wonder not that I speak with such severity; for I seek not man's friendship, but God's. Not after man; not of human, but divine origin. I neither received it of man--was I taught it; lest the false teachers in Galatia should disparage Paul's apostleship, as being only of a secondary character, he takes pains to show that he has received the doctrines which he preaches immediately from Christ. Conversation; manner of life. Profited; made progress.

Equals; in age, standing, and privileges. Who separated me; set me apart from my birth for the work to which he afterwards called me. Reveal his Son in me; make known to me Jesus Christ, and lead me to believe on him.

I conferred not with flesh and blood; took no counsel with men, and sought not instruction from them. Arabia; a country south of Damascus, a city of Syria. God assigns to all his people their appropriate work in life, and so orders events in his providence and grace as to fit them to perform it. Syria; a country north of Palestine.

Cilicia; a province of Asia Minor, north-west of Syria. Glorified God in me; praised God for the change which he had wrought in me. When persecutors of Christ become his friends, and labor to promote the cause which before they sought to destroy, they strikingly manifest the grace of God, and furnish occasion for thanksgiving and praise.