Paul’s letter to the churches of Galatia opens like no other in his surviving correspondence — no thanksgiving, no commendation, straight to a rebuke. Teachers had moved in behind him insisting that Gentile believers needed circumcision and the law of Moses on top of faith in Christ, and Paul answers by defending, first of all, the one thing that entire argument depends on: that his gospel came directly from Christ, not from any human source, and cannot be altered by anyone, even an angel from heaven.
A study in Galatians 1 · Arthur Baldwin · StandUp4Jesus.Org · 15 min read
Who Gave Himself For Our Sins
“Paul, an apostle, (not of men, neither by man, but by Jesus Christ, and God the Father, who raised him from the dead;) And all the brethren which are with me, unto the churches of Galatia: Grace be to you and peace from God the Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Galatians 1:1-3
Paul’s very first sentence already contains the letter’s whole argument in miniature — his apostleship is “not of men, neither by man,” a credential no rival teacher arriving later from Jerusalem could claim to override.
“Who gave himself for our sins, that he might deliver us from this present evil world, according to the will of God and our Father: To whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.”
Galatians 1:4-5
“When we ask for deliverance from sin…It is His will to cleanse us from sin, to make us His children, and to enable us to live a holy life. Christ ‘gave Himself for our sins, that He might deliver us from this present evil world, according to the will of God and our Father.’”
Ellen G. White · The Ministry of Healing, p. 70
This study’s own source reaches for the healing of a leper as its picture of what this verse actually promises — not a distant doctrinal statement but an immediate, granted request, since deliverance from sin, unlike some other prayers, is always in harmony with God’s own revealed will.
Let Him Be Accursed
“I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto another gospel: Which is not another; but there be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ.”
Galatians 1:6-7
“So soon” reveals real personal hurt underneath the sharp tone — this defection did not take generations, but happened almost immediately after Paul’s own founding visit, and to a gospel he calls, tellingly, not really “another” at all, since a perverted gospel is no gospel.
“But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed. As we said before, so say I now again, If any man preach any other gospel unto you than that ye have received, let him be accursed.”
Galatians 1:8-9
“Christ said, ‘My doctrine is not Mine, but His that sent Me’ (John 7:16); and Paul declared that should he preach any other gospel than that which he had received, he would be accursed (Galatians 1:8). ‘How, then,’ said the Reformer, ‘shall others presume to enact dogmas at their pleasure, and impose them as things necessary to salvation?’”
Ellen G. White · The Great Controversy, p. 243
This study’s own source shows Paul’s warning being invoked fourteen centuries later by Olaf Petri, a Swedish Reformer, against the very same error in a new form — church tradition being imposed as a requirement for salvation alongside Scripture, the identical structure of the Galatian crisis playing out again in the Reformation.
Not After Man
“For do I now persuade men, or God? or do I seek to please men? for if I yet pleased men, I should not be the servant of Christ. But I certify you, brethren, that the gospel which was preached of me is not after man. For I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ.”
Galatians 1:10-12
Paul draws a hard line between pleasing men and serving Christ — the very sharpness of this letter, uncomfortable as it clearly was to write, is itself proof that he is not simply telling the Galatians what they want to hear.
“For ye have heard of my conversation in time past in the Jews’ religion, how that beyond measure I persecuted the church of God, and wasted it: And profited in the Jews’ religion above many my equals in mine own nation, being more exceedingly zealous of the traditions of my fathers.”
Galatians 1:13-14
Paul’s own former zeal for tradition becomes part of his argument — he understands the pull toward law-keeping as a path to standing with God better than almost anyone writing this letter, having lived at the very top of that system before Christ overturned it.
I Went Into Arabia
“But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother’s womb, and called me by his grace, To reveal his Son in me, that I might preach him among the heathen; immediately I conferred not with flesh and blood: Neither went I up to Jerusalem to them which were apostles before me; but I went into Arabia, and returned again unto Damascus.”
Galatians 1:15-17
“A messenger from heaven bade him leave for a time, and he ‘went into Arabia,’ … where he found a safe retreat. Here, in the solitude of the desert, Paul had ample opportunity for quiet study and meditation. He calmly reviewed his past experience and made sure work of repentance. He sought God with all his heart, resting not until he knew for a certainty that his repentance was accepted and his sin pardoned.”
Ellen G. White · The Acts of the Apostles, p. 125
This retreat into Arabia is easy to read past as a mere travel note, but this study’s own source treats it as essential preparation — not wasted time between the Damascus road and public ministry, but the very place where Paul’s own repentance was made sure and his understanding of the gospel he would defend in this letter was first settled with God alone.
“Then after three years I went up to Jerusalem to see Peter, and abode with him fifteen days. But other of the apostles saw I none, save James the Lord’s brother. Now the things which I write unto you, behold, before God, I lie not.”
Galatians 1:18-20
Paul’s meeting with Peter came a full three years after his conversion, and even then involved almost none of the other apostles — a timeline he insists on, under oath, precisely because it proves his gospel could not have simply been copied secondhand from Jerusalem.
“Afterwards I came into the regions of Syria and Cilicia; And was unknown by face unto the churches of Judaea which were in Christ: But they had heard only, That he which persecuted us in times past now preacheth the faith which once he destroyed. And they glorified God in me.”
Galatians 1:21-24
The chapter closes on an image worth sitting with — churches that had never even seen Paul’s face, glorifying God simply because of what they had heard he had become. The most persuasive argument for the gospel’s power, in the end, was not an argument at all, but a changed life reported secondhand.
