The Treatment Of Titus Series

September 11, 2013

The Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the Galatians

Tom Lowe

II. Personal: Defense of Paul’s Apostleship (1:11–2:21)

II.B: Independent of Jerusalem Apostles (1:13-2.21)

II.B.3: Confirmed by the Jerusalem Apostles (2.1-10)

Chapter II.B.3.a: The Treatment of Titus (2.1-5)

Galatians 2.1-5 (KJV)

1 Then fourteen years after I went up again to Jerusalem with Barnabas, and took Titus with me also.

2 And I went up by revelation, and communicated unto them that gospel which I preach among the Gentiles, but privately to them which were of reputation, lest by any means I should run, or had run, in vain.

3 But neither Titus, who was with me, being a Greek, was compelled to be circumcised:

4 And that because of false brethren unawares brought in, who came in privily to spy out our liberty which we have in Christ Jesus, that they might bring us into bondage:

5 To whom we gave place by subjection, no, not for an hour; that the truth of the gospel might continue with you.

Commentary

1 Then fourteen years after I went up again to Jerusalem with Barnabas, and took Titus with me also.

Then fourteen years after I went up again to Jerusalem with Barnabas,

Paul has given us the timetable for his third trip to Jerusalem. It is, either fourteen years after God called him by His grace, and revealed His Son to him on the road to Damascus; or, as I take it to mean, fourteen years after he had been at Jerusalem to see Peter (his first trip to Jerusalem.), with whom he stayed fifteen days, and then went into Syria and Cilicia (His time there was spent chiefly in preaching the gospel); so that it was seventeen years after his conversion that he took this journey to Jerusalem; and he seems to refer to the time when he and Barnabas went from the church at Antioch to the apostles and elders about the question of whether circumcision was necessary to salvation. Some persons from Judea who had come among the Gentile converts had insisted on the necessity of being circumcised in order to be saved. Paul and Barnabas had opposed them; and the dispute had become so heated that it was agreed to submit the subject to the apostles and elders at Jerusalem. For that purpose Paul and Barnabas had been sent, with certain others, to lay the case before all the apostles. The background for that particular trip is given in Acts 15.1, 2, where it says: “And certain men which came down from Judaea taught the brethren, and said, except ye be circumcised after the manner of Moses, ye cannot be saved. When therefore Paul and Barnabas had no small dissension and disputation with them, they determined that Paul and Barnabas, and certain other of them, should go up to Jerusalem unto the apostles and elders about this question”—which entirely agrees with the account the apostle gives of this journey. The next two verses give more details of this journey which took place around A.D. 50: “And being brought on their way by the church, they passed through Phenice and Samaria, declaring the conversion of the Gentiles: and they caused great joy unto all the brethren. And when they were come to Jerusalem, they were received of the church, and of the apostles and elders, and they declared all things that God had done with them.” It was a successful occasion, because the council of the apostles and Church decided that Gentile Christians do not need to be circumcised. He does not mention that decree, however, and the reason he does not may be:

1. Because his purpose here is to show the Galatians his own independent apostolic authority, which is not likely to be supported by the council. Thus we see that general councils are not above apostles.

2. Because he argues the point upon principle, not upon the authority of the council’s decisions.

3. The decree did not go as far as far as Paul thought it should: the council did not impose Mosaic ordinances; but the apostle maintains that the Mosaic institution itself is at an end.

4. The Galatians were following the false teachers who were Judaizers, not because the Jewish law was imposed by authority of the Church as being necessary to Christianity, but because they thought it was necessary for those who aspired to higher perfection to observe the Law of Moses in addition to Christian faith and doctrine—“Are ye so foolish? having begun in the Spirit, are ye now made perfect by the flesh?” (Gal. 3:3); also “Tell me, ye that desire to be under the law, do ye not hear the law?” (Gal. 4:21). The decree would not help him refute their view, and therefore would have been useless to quote. Paul provides them with a far more direct repudiation, "Christ is of no effect unto you whosoever are justified by the law" (Ga 5:4). His argument is that those who sought to be justified by their obedience to the law, or who thought they were, and believed they were in fact righteous, were in reality otherwise, because no one has ever been, or ever will be, justified by the deeds of the law.