Paul finally arrives at his official greeting. He has already staked out part of the purpose for this letter: to defend his authority as a genuine apostle of Jesus Christ and, therefore, to defend the truthfulness of his message.

"Grace and peace to you" was a standard greeting for many people writing letters during this era. Paul includes the words in all of his New Testament epistles. Paul's letters, however, almost always include the true source of both grace and peace. In this case, he states outright that grace and peace come from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

In the following verse, Paul will use that standard greeting to quickly describe exactly what the simple gospel message, or "good news," of Jesus Christ is.

Galatians 1:1–5 begins Paul's letter to the Christians in Galatia with a brief greeting. Paul immediately defends the fact that he has been made an apostle of Jesus Christ by the same God that raised Christ from the dead. He is not a ''man- made'' apostle, as his accusers are saying. His authority is genuine. Next, Paul gives a quick, beautiful explanation of the trustworthy gospel that he preaches: Jesus gave Himself for our sins to deliver us from this age of evil according to God's will.

Paul begins his letter to the Galatian churches abruptly, compared to his other writings. He has heard they are deserting the gospel which he preached and they believed: the good news that Jesus died to fully pay for all our sins on the cross. The Judaizers taught that these Gentiles must also follow the law of Moses to be saved and openly questioned Paul's authority. Paul makes the case that he has been made an apostle by Christ, who appeared to him and revealed the truth to him apart from the other apostles.

Galatians 1 begins one of the most-loved books about God's grace in all of Scripture. This and the following chapter detail Paul's biography, as he makes the case that he has been made an apostle by Christ and therefore his message is trustworthy. Chapters 3 and 4 go into depth about exactly what the gospel of God's grace is and why it is true. In chapters 5 and 6, Paul teaches about how Christians should live in the world as people who have received the grace of God through faith in Christ.

Galatians is sometimes called “a short Romans” for its similar themes of justification and sanctification through faith. A group of Christians known as “Judaizers” were preaching a gospel of legalism, rather than grace. Paul’s main purpose in writing the letter to the Galatians was to reiterate the true nature of the gospel: we are justified (made righteous) and sanctified (made more Christlike) through our faith in Jesus Christ alone. This letter was probably written shortly before the church elders in Jerusalem issued their official refutation of the Judaizers, commonly called the Jerusalem Council.

Accessed 5/3/2024 1:34:09 AM

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