Galatians 2:19

"For through the law I died to the law so that I might live for God." (NIV)

This verse was kind of confusing to me at first, but again, the ESV Study Bible notes helped a lot.  Paul says that he died to the law, meaning that he is no longer bound by his obligation to strictly obey the law.  This freed him up to live for God—he is no longer bound by legalism, so he is able to serve God joyfully and thankfully.  Here's an analogy that applies to my own life: When I am required to practice my trumpet and I have to practice a certain boring song, I don't like to play at all; but when I'm able to play something fun because I want to, and when I'm not bound by time requirements, I actually enjoy playing.  Or maybe this applies more to you and makes more sense: I hate reading for school—they just always pick boring books; but I love reading.  So if I'm freed from ever needing to read for school again, I can actually enjoy reading on my own time whenever I want.  It's the same with the law: Since we are no longer required to obey the law to save ourselves, we can now freely obey God out of thankfullness and love, and we can serve Him joyfully.

What does it mean that Paul died to the law "through the law"?  How was he freed from the law by the law?  Did the law willingly let him go free?

As I write these questions, it's starting to make more sense to me.  Because Jesus perfectly obeyed the law and served as a holy sacrifice for our sins, His righteousness freed us from needing to be righteous on our own.  Because Jesus fulfilled the law in our name ("Behold, I come in the name of My Father and of My son Michael.  I have lived a righteous life, and My Father now deems Michael blameless and holy.  His debt has been paid"), we don't have to because we already have by accepting Christ's sacrifice and His forgiveness.  Through His obedience to the law, we have been freed from the law so that we can gratefully and joyfully live only to please Him.  We no longer have to worry about saving ourselves, so we can now devote all our efforts to pleasing God.

Galatians 2:18

"If I rebuild what I destroyed, I prove that I am a lawbreaker." (NIV)

The ESV Study Bible notes helped me a lot on this one.  If faith in Christ requires an admittance of guilt and failure according to the old law, reintroducing the old law would show a man to be condemned.  If you accept the new Law and claim to be saved despite your failures then return to the old law, trying to earn your salvation even though you know it's futile, you are setting yourself up for disaster.  It's only by faith in Christ that we can be saved.

Galatians 2:17

"If, while we seek to be justified in Christ, it becomes evident that we ourselves are sinners, does that mean that Christ promotes sin?  Absolutely not!" (NIV)
"But if, in our endeavor to be justified in Christ, we too were found to be sinners, is Christ then a servant of sin?  Certainly not!" (ESV)

Paraphrased:

"If, in order to be justified in Christ, we must acknowledge our inability to keep the law and see our need for a Savior, does that mean that sin is a requirement for obtaining justification?  Of course not!  Jesus Himself is sinless, and He is the Justifier!"

Or:

"If, in seeking to obtain salvation through Christ, we must see and admit our failures, and Jesus came to save the sinners, does that mean that where sin is, salvation must inevitably follow?  No!  As I said, Christ replaced the old law, making it obsolete; however, although failure in terms of the old law does not affect justification by the new Law, failure in terms of the new Law (unbelief) is total failure to uphold both the new and old laws.  Strict adherence to the old law with a single slip us is of no value if you reject the new Law."

Galatians 2:16

"—know that a man is not justified by observing the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ.  So we, too, have put our faith in Christ Jesus that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by observing the law, because by observing the law no one will be justified." (NIV)
"—yet we know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, so we also have believed in Christ Jesus, in order to be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law, because by works of the law no one will be justified." (ESV)

The two translations put this verse in a slightly different light, but the final message is the same.  The NIV essentially says, "We who have grown up with the law know that it is impossible to uphold the law perfectly, so we put our faith in Jesus because He came as a substitute for the law—because we are incapable of keeping the law, and in turn reaching heaven, Jesus fulfilled the law and became the law, so that whoever puts his faith in Christ has become blameless in God's sight."  The implied message is that, since the Jews know that it is impossible to keep the law, they should not force the Gentiles to learn for themselves before they can receive Christ.  The Jews should teach the Gentiles so that they don't make the same mistakes.  Because Jesus took the place of the law, the Gentiles should be able to go directly to the new Law.

The ESV gives the same message, but with a different undertone: "We Jews grew up with the law, striving to keep it to the best of our ability.  Despite our best efforts, we found ourselves unable to uphold the law, yet we continued to work to obey God.  When Jesus came to save us, rather than being prideful and refusing to believe that all our efforts were worthless, we joyfully and thankfully accepted the justification God offered us in Christ.  Since we so joyfully received Him despite our lives of fruitless efforts, we should not now scorn the Gentiles and make them endure a lifetime of insignificance, but should eagerly accept them into faith in Christ and encourage them to enter into a life of significance immediately so as not to experience the same dread and suffering we did."

Galatians 2:15

"We who are Jews by birth and not 'Gentile sinners'—" (NIV)
"We ourselves are Jews by birth and not Gentile sinners;—" (ESV)

This verse seems to refer to the fact that "Jews by birth," unlike "Gentile sinners," have been taught from a very early age to obey God's commands.  The Gentiles, however, grew up, supposedly, with no knowledge of the Law; so unwittingly, they grew up in their sins.

Galatians 2:14

"When I saw that they were not acting in line with the truth of the gospel, I said to Peter in front of them all, 'You are a Jew, yet you live like a Gentile and not like a Jew.  How is it, then, that you force Gentiles to follow Jewish customs?'" (NIV)

Today was the perfect day to take notes on this verse because I heard something yesterday that explains this really well.  Peter, who was born a Jew and had always lived by Jewish practices, was acting in such a way that implied that Gentiles had to obey Jewish customs in order to be saved.  But Peter knew that Jesus was the only way to heaven, and he "[lived] like a Gentile," meaning he lived according to the message that salvation comes from "Jesus plus nothing."  Having already been circumcised before coming to faith, Peter had nothing left in the Law that he was required to obey.  It was Paul's reasoning, then, (and Peter's original reasoning) that not even circumcision was required.  Yet Peter had turned to join the Judaizers in requiring circumcision from the uncircumcised.  In other words, one had to be a Jew by the Law in order to be Jewish by faith.  Paul pointed out this flaw in the Judaizers' "gospel" to Peter publicly.  This was the same false message that had come to the Galatians, so Paul used the same argument to bring the Galatians back to the truth that Jesus saves and nothing else is required but faith.

Galatians 2:13

"The other Jews joined him in his hypocrisy, so that by their hypocrisy even Barnabas was led astray." (NIV)

I see a chain of consequences here.  When the men from James came, Peter became afraid of creating conflict, so he fell back on his old ways as a Jew without Christ.  His fear led to hypocrisy, and the masses saw and imitated his example as a leader.  Then Barnabas, a strong Christian, was "led astray" because of the masses, who were following their leader.  Paul saw the consequences of this path of digression away from the gospel, and he knew he had to put an end to the hypocrisy immediately, particularly Peter's hypocrisy.  Once the leader's faith is reestablished, the masses (including Barnabas) would follow his example.

Galatians 2:11-12

"When Peter came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he was clearly in the wrong. Before certain men came from James, he used to eat with the Gentiles. But when they arrived, he began to draw back and separate from the Gentiles because he was afraid of those who belonged to the circumcision group." (NIV)

Paul justifies this passage very clearly later in his letter to the Galatians when he says, "Brothers, if someone is caught in a sin, you who are spiritual should restore him gently" (Galatians 6:1). Peter's sin that Paul had to correct was that he (Peter) was refusing to dine with "unclean" Gentiles. And this was not the first time he had had trouble accepting the "unclean" as actually being clean: even after Jesus had taught that all animals were acceptable as clean food, Peter had to be reminded of this in a vision years later, and now he was being reminded again by Paul. Nothing God has made clean is to be called unclean, and that includes Gentile Christians.

Peter's sin was more than this, however. In verse 12, Paul writes that Peter used to eat with Gentiles, but when the deceivers came, he returned to his old ways. After experiencing God's grace and sharing it with Gentiles, he heard a teaching and changed his mind—he, Peter, the "rock" upon which Jesus would build the church, returned to sin because of something said by someone who had no testimony of a personal encounter with Christ. Why? "[Because] he was afraid of those who belonged to the circumcision group." But Jesus said in Luke 12:4-5, "I tell you, my friends, do not be afraid of those who kill the body and after that can do no more. But I will show you whom you should fear: Fear Him who, after the killing of the body, has power to throw you into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear Him." Obviously, Peter forgot these words, so Paul personally exposed his wrong and restored him to the right path: the path of total acceptance of all who have been saved by faith, not by works.

Galatians 2:10

"All they asked was that we should continue to remember the poor, the very thing I was eager to do." (NIV)

Like verse 6, this verse can also be interpreted two ways; however, in this case, either interpretation may apply equally. The first interpretation is the obvious surface interpretation: Remember the physically poor, those in poverty. The second is a little deeper: Remember the spiritually poor, the lost and the doubtful.

This is the command of missions in a nutshell, also summed up in James 2:14-17: Preach the gospel to provide for spiritual needs, and provide for physical needs so that 1) the poor may see Christ's kindness in you and want to experience God's love themselves, and 2) those who are both spiritually and physically needy would live long enough to have the gospel preached to them and be able to commit their lives to Christ.

Galatians 2:9

"James, Peter and John, those reputed to be pillars, gave me and Barnabas the right hand of fellowship when they recognized the grace given to me. They agreed that we should go to the Gentiles, and they to the Jews." (NIV)

"Those reputed to be pillars"— As Jesus is the firm Foundation of the church, James, Peter, and John were considered to be the pillars of the church, the first parts of the church laid upon the Foundation before anything else could be built on them. All gospel preaching had to receive their approval in order to be considered the true gospel. So when they gave Paul and Barnabas the "right hand of fellowship," they showed their approval of Paul's message. This again disproves the idea that James' letter to the scattered Hebrews contradicts Paul's gospel in the issue of faith versus works. James was in complete agreement with Paul's gospel, as were Peter and John, so any argument of a dispute between Paul and the brother of Jesus must be ruled out. If any disagreement had arisen, Paul would not have been sent to the Gentiles, and we would not be free to worship God today.

Galatians 2:7-8

"On the contrary, they saw that I had been entrusted with the task of preaching the gospel to the Gentiles, just as Peter had been to the Jews. For God, who was at work in the ministry of Peter as an apostle to the Jews, was also at work in my ministry as an apostle to the Gentiles." (NIV)

Because the apostles recognized the miracle of Paul's arrival at the same conclusion they had reached, they acknowledged God's calling for him to preach to the Gentiles. After all, if a man comes to you saying that he's been sent to teach everything you ever learned from your private conversations with your best friend, how could you do anything but accept the fact that it's God's will for him to preach to whoever he says God told him to preach to? Paul could not have taught himself the ideas the apostles learned from their personal walk with Jesus; it had to be revealed to him by God. So whatever he says God told him must be the truth.

Galatians 2:6

"As for those who seemed to be important—whatever they were makes no difference to me; God does not judge by external appearance—those men added nothing to my message." (NIV)

This verse can be interpreted in two ways, the way I see it. The first way is that the fact that the important men approved of Paul's gospel did not make it any more truthful, because it already was the full truth and couldn't be made any more true. But I interpret it this way more readily: the important men did not change Paul's gospel at all to fit theirs. Paul had arrived at the exact same conclusion of the gospel that the other apostles had, the apostles through personal interaction with Jesus, and Paul through spiritual interaction in the desert. Paul's gospel was the truth—the whole truth and nothing but the truth—and the apostles accepted him as a fellow brother in Christ.

Galatians 2:1-5

"Fourteen years later I went up again to Jerusalem, this time with Barnabas. I took Titus along also. I went in response to a revelation and set before them the gospel that I preach among the Gentiles. But I did this privately to those who seemed to be leaders, for fear that I was running or had run my race in vain. Yet not even Titus, who was with me, was compelled to be circumcised, even though he was a Greek. This matter arose because some false brothers had infiltrated our ranks to spy on the freedom we have in Christ Jesus and to make us slaves. We did not give in to them for a moment, so that the truth of the gospel might remain with you." (NIV)

This next section is confusing to me. After some time, Paul returned to Jerusalem with Barnabas, who had been traveling with him since the beginning of his ministry, and Titus, a relatively new disciple. I think the fact that Barnabas, who was Mark's cousin (Mark was a disciple of Peter), and Titus were the two Paul took with him is significant. Why? When the Jews wouldn't receive Christ, God sent His apostles to the Gentiles to provoke the Jews to jealousy. When the issue of circumcision and obedience to the Law came up, Titus, a newer believer and a Greek, "was not compelled to be circumcised" (v. 3), even though the book of Titus—Paul's version of the book of James in its focus on the importance of living out one's faith—shows that Paul had been teaching him to not disregard the Law (at least, the parts of it that did not involve sacrifice—after all, the Sacrifice had already been made). But when Peter refused to dine with Gentiles, Barnabas, a long-time Christian and a Jew by birth, gave in and joined Peter in "his hypocrisy" (v. 13).

This passage, Galatians 2:1-10 (although I am only focusing on the first five verses for now), relates to Luke's account in Acts 15. (The commentator on my ESV study Bible believes that it actually relates to Acts 11:29-30, but I find this unlikely. First off, Acts 11:29-30 has Paul and Barnabas bringing famine relief from Antioch to Jerusalem, but Galatians would have it that they went in response to a disagreement, which matches the account in Acts 15:2. In addition, Paul deliberately states that, not only Barnabas, but Titus also was with him; Luke, the author of Acts, makes sure to point out in Acts 15 that "some other believers" went with Paul and Barnabas, while Acts 11:30 indicates that only Paul and Barnabas were present. And the biggest indicator that Acts 15 is the corresponding account, rather than Acts 11:29-30, is the mention of the circumcision group and the link between Galatians 2:3-4 and Acts 15:5.)

Before I go on, I just have to say this: God is awesome! When I was looking for the passage in Acts that this section in Galatians corresponds with, at first I thought it was Acts 21:17-26. But when I looked it up online, it turned out that it was actually supposed to be Acts 15. (My proof—at least, proof in my mind—is that Luke includes himself among the travelers in Acts 21:17-26, but not in Acts 15; Paul makes no mention of Luke, and I believe that, since he names Luke in Philemon, if Luke had been with him in Galatia, he would have said so.) This distinction between Acts 15 and Acts 21 makes a big difference because Paul says in Galatians 2:5 that they "did not give in... for a moment," but Acts 21:17-26 clearly shows that Paul obeyed the elders. On the other hand, Acts 15:19-21 shows that the apostles agreed to keep parts of the Law that it would be in their best interest to keep (the parts, as stated before, that did not involve making sacrifices): abstinence from "food polluted by idols, from sexual immorality, from the meat of strangled animals and from blood" (Acts 15:20). Now, why did they choose to obey these points in the Law?

Well, avoiding sexual immorality seems pretty obvious; after all, it's immoral. Man was always intended to only have one wife. That's why Genesis 2:24 says, "For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh." The examples of biblical men with multiple wives (or concubines) shows the truth of the Bible: God isn't afraid to expose man's sinfulness and need for forgiveness.

But why did the apostles agree to abstain from the other three, the potential food items? And why did Paul participate in the purification rites in Acts 21:26?

God answered this for me using two passages. The first (which actually was added to the answer after the second verse, but this order makes it easier to explain) is Acts 15:21: "For Moses has been preached in every city from the earliest times and is read in the synagogues on every Sabbath." Everyone knew the Mosaic Law. According to Jesus, not a single word of the Law was to be abolished (Matthew 5:17-20). So to appease the Jews, Paul "became like a Jew, to win the Jews" (1 Corinthians 9:20). And that brings me to the second passage, 1 Corinthians 8:4-13; I want to focus on verse 13: "Therefore, if what I eat causes my brother to fall into sin, I will never eat meat again, so that I will not cause him to fall." Paul did not "give in" to believing that the only way to be saved is to obey the Law (Acts 15:1). Instead, he kept the Law so that those who tried to follow the Law could relate to him, making witnessing to them much easier. That's why he met privately with "those who seemed to be leaders": his fear that he "was running or had run [his] race in vain" (v. 2) was not a fear that he had been wrong about the gospel, but that his effort to avoid a division between Jewish and Gentile Christians would fail if he spoke of the matter publicly. But because he was a servant of Christ, not trying to please men (Galatians 1:10), he refused to give in to the circumcision group (whom Paul warns against in his letter to Titus, as a reminder of what was decided at the Jerusalem council) so that the gospel could be maintained in all its truth and in the glory of its message of salvation by grace through faith (Ephesians 2:8-9). As Paul says in Galatians 2:4, "[Some] false brother [have] infiltrated our ranks to spy on the freedom we have in Christ Jesus and to make us slaves." This is war, and we must never surrender. After all, why would you surrender when you've already won?