Galatians Journal: Chapter 4, Verse 18

Galatians 4:18: It is fine to be zealous, provided the purpose is good, and to be so always and not just when I am with you.

Here, Paul is taking the position of a frustrated parent.

“It is fine to be zealous” The tone here seems sarcastic, as if Paul is the typical parent of a teenager, and the Galatians are collectively his adolescent child. Indeed, that would appear to be an apt comparison for where the Galatians are at – these were not new believers, no “babes in Christ” – but an established, mature church. Yet, they were not mature believers. Paul had probably helped establish the churches of Galatia and lived with them for a time because of his illness (probably caused by being stoned and left for dead in Acts 14:19) sometime around 46-49 A.D. Most scholars date this letter as just 2 or 3 years later. The Galatians obviously had a great start as a church, but were struggling as spiritual adolescents. The “fine to be zealous” comment smacks of an attitude not unlike a typical 21st century American parental trite phrase, e.g. “ if your friends jumped off a bridge, would you too?”

“provided the purpose is good” Obviously, the zeal of the Judiazers was not good, both in their zeal for a works based theology, and a Christian community defined by race, culture and ethnicity.

“and to be so always, and not just when I am with you.” Paul’s final comment is multi-layered. One the one hand, it still smacks of a scolding. An immature child will misbehave and disobey when unsupervised. An immature believer will be swayed more easily when separated from their comfortable, established, and more mature relationships. (a most sad statistic is the large number of children raised in the faith who have a faith crisis with Christianity when they go away to college).

On the other hand, the context makes the last comment seem sad. Verses 11-15 explain the closeness and intimacy of Paul’s history with the Galatians. The fact that the Galatians could apparently just throw it all away so easily – not their faith alone, but the friendship and kinship they had with Paul – it must have broken his heart. I have personally experienced this kind of hurt – when a close friend leaves the fellowship of the body of Christ because of sin or a change of heart, This is a double devastation. You grieve your friend’s rejection of Christ. But you also grieve at a more basic, even childish level – you grieve because you miss him; you have lost a friend.