Read the passage carefully.
The theme of Galatians 5:1-12 is that of a warning that his readers need to stand firm in their Christian liberty, thereby rejecting the way of circumcision and Law.
Tolmie says that 5:2-6 are a strict warming against circumcision, while verses 7-12 vilify the opponents. Here is the first time he mentions circumcision, even though it has been in the background of the conversation throughout. Paul makes the point that one cannot satisfy the demands of the Law with a token fulfillment of particular requirements. The Law demands total compliance. The opponents of Paul will have much for which to answer. It also appears that in this section Paul is responding to the charge of inconsistency regarding his position on circumcision.
As Paul sees it, to give up this freedom that Christ has won, and thereby giving up justifying faith, is the temptation into which false teachers have led these people and won some success among them.
The point Paul is making is that even if you kept the whole Law, the Law is not a way of salvation. He would say this, based upon his personal experience. In this vein, Luther notes, “When I was a monk I tried ever so hard to live up to the strict rules of my order. I used to make a list of my sins, and I was always on the way to confession, and whatever penances were enjoined upon me I performed religiously. In spite of it all, my conscience was always in a fever of doubt. The more I sought to help my poor stricken conscience the worse it got. The more I paid attention to the regulations the more I transgressed them.”
In verse 4, Paul is emphasizing the incompatibility of faith and works, divine grace and human merit, when it comes to the justification of the sinner before God. Pannenberg[1] notes in the one act of baptism the ship of the new Christian life becomes ready. If Christians can also fall from grace, as this passage suggests, they can always regain it. Baptism is there all their lives.
In verse 5, F. F. Bruce may have it right when he says that justification by faith and life in the Spirit are two sides of the same coin. Neither can be present without the other. As Luther puts it, Works based on faith are wrought through love, but humanity is not justified through love.
In verse 6, Paul clarifies that faith is the principle of new life. Yet, living faith shows itself in the practice of love. As Luther puts it, “In this terse manner Paul presents the whole life of a Christian. Inwardly it consists in faith towards God, outwardly in love towards” human beings. Loving service is measured by one's response to the neighbor - not the self. Love, as demonstrated through service to others, is the fruit of Christian freedom. Paul brings into close relationship what later Christian tradition called the theological virtues of faith, love, and hope. The law convicts all the backbiting factions of denying the very law they are seeking to follow. There is no other faith than that which works by love. The faith to which he refers is in fact a definite act, the entire life-act of the Christian.
In verse 8, Luther notes that “The devil is a cunning persuader. He knows how to enlarge the smallest sin into a mountain until we think we have committed the worst crime ever committed on earth.”
We should also note the use of sarcasm in verse 12. However, the cult of Cybele practiced castration.
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