Reader’s Guide: “The Word for Today” Friday, July 19, 2013 Read – Galatians 2:15-21 These concluding verses provide us with no further autobiographical information about Paul, but they are one of Paul’s clearest expressions of the gospel. Justification by grace through faith is articulated no clearer anywhere else in Paul’s letters than here. This is the gospel Paul proclaimed. This is also one of Paul’s clearest articulations of his understanding of the law. The law always kills. Attempting to keep the law in order to be right with God is futile – in fact the attempt drives us further from God. Luke was not as keenly aware of the power of the gospel as Paul was. That is not to say that his words are not useful and true. In his own way, Luke has given us a powerful witness. And Paul would have agreed completely with the core of the message that Luke relates through the speeches of Peter, Stephen, Philipp, and Paul – “this Jesus who you crucified, God raised from the dead so that repentance and the gift of new life might be proclaimed in his name.” Paul said almost the same thing in 1 Corinthians 15. “I handed on to you as of first importance what I in turn had received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures, and that he appeared …” (1 Corinthians 15:3-5). The cross of Jesus was the center for Paul so he could say, “I have been crucified with Christ and it is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not nullify the grace of God; for if justification comes through the law, then Christ died for nothing” (Galatians 2:19-21). Perhaps we need to appreciate just how difficult it was for Christian Jews to comprehend the work of God in Jesus Christ. The old was passing away and the new was arriving. It was no small thing that God should be understood to have grafted Gentiles into the people of God. It was no small thing that old practices were set aside. We need to appreciate the struggle and we can be thankful that the Bible reveals to us this great struggle. We can come to love the Word of God even more. And we can appreciate the great gift that writers of the Bible are to us. They reveal to us their genius and also their weakness. And in the process of wrestling with their words we can come to love God all the more. Luke is a gift – and so is Paul!