When Paul wrote his letter to the Galatian church early in his ministry, he was trying to bring Gentiles into a community rooted in Judaism. One of the defining elements of Jewish identity was circumcision. Some of the Jewish members of the community argued that Gentiles should be circumcised before entering the church. Since this was a stumbling block to Gentiles, who wished to enter the community, Paul argued that neither circumcision nor uncircumcision mattered because “the new creation is everything.” Since the new creation is rooted in God’s grace, this physical marker was unnecessary.
The sixth chapter of Paul’s letter to the Galatians offers a summary of previous topics, while I’m tempted to cover all of them, I promise not to do so. This chapter in Paul’s Galatian letter follows his discussion of the fruit of the Spirit. He closes chapter 5 by telling the Galatians: “If we live by the Spirit, let’s follow the Spirit. Let’s not become arrogant, make each other angry, or be jealous of each other” (Gal. 5:25-26 CEB). Then, in the first two verses of chapter six, Paul follows up by telling his friends:
Brothers and sisters, if a person is caught doing something wrong, you who are spiritual should restore someone like this with a spirit of gentleness. Watch out for yourselves so you won’t be tempted too. Carry each other’s burdens and so you will fulfill the law of Christ (Gal. 6:1-2 CEB).
If we read these four verses together with Paul’s list of the fruit of the Spirit, we see him connecting living by the Spirit with caring for others. This includes restoring those who stumble while carrying the burdens of those who are in need.
This word about caring for others is important because there is increasing talk in our society, even among Christians, about the “problem” of empathy. It seems that empathy makes us weak, even though both Jesus and Paul emphasize the importance of empathy. What Paul does in Galatians 6 is balance caring for the needs of others with taking responsibility for our lives. So, when possible, we should bear our own burdens. But when others need help carrying their burdens, we should help them out. This fits with Paul’s vision of the church as the body of Christ.
If we turn to 1 Corinthians 12, we find Paul telling that community that the Holy Spirit provides each member of the body of Christ with gifts of grace that contribute to the common good (1 Cor. 12:4-7). Every gift, no matter how seemingly insignificant, is important to the health and welfare of the community. This is what it means to do the right thing. Paul’s counsel to us here in Galatians 6, is to not grow weary as we do the right thing in pursuit of the common good.
Paul’s call to do the right thing reflects his vision of the new creation that began to emerge with the coming of Jesus into the world. So, Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 5 that as the new creation comes into being, the old ways pass away and everything becomes new. In other words, whatever has transpired in the past no longer defines who we are as followers of Jesus. Therefore, we can move forward in life unhindered by the past. For that, I am quite grateful!
If we reach back once more into chapter 5 of Galatians, we discover that doing the right thing, which means living according to the new creation, involves embodying the fruit of the Spirit. The fruit of the Spirit is “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control” (Gal. 5:22-23). After Paul gives this list of spiritual fruit, he tells us that “there is no law against such things.”
Of course, human experience reminds us that we haven’t reached perfection when it comes to doing the right thing. This means we will stumble at times and fail to exhibit the fruit of the Spirit in our lives. That is why Paul tells us to gently restore those who stumble and fall to the pathway Jesus has set before us.
To get a sense of what Paul is up to, think about what happens when someone trips and falls. How do we respond? Do we let them lie on the ground, perhaps laughing at their situation? Or, do we help them get back on their feet and then check to see if they’re okay? If we do the latter, then we’re doing the right thing.
Getting back to that embattled word “empathy,” let us remember that to be in Christ involves living in a community where we take responsibility for those who are in need. While we could limit that responsibility to the Christian community, I believe both Paul and Jesus would want us to expand the circle quite a bit. This is especially true in a society where the majority claim to be Christians. After all, Jesus emphasized two commandments. The first commandment focuses on loving God, while the second involves loving our neighbors as we love ourselves. We might want to read that command in light of what Jesus had to say in Matthew 25, where he told the people that they cared for him when they cared for the “least of these who are members of my family” (Matt 25:31-46). So, if we are going to do the right thing, we need to pursue the common good by sharing each other’s burdens.
The problem that Paul sees occurring in the Galatian church and elsewhere is that this support system has broken down. People are not attending to the health of the body. Therefore, the body and its members reap what they sow. As Paul writes in verse 8, using the Common English Bible translation:
“Those who plant only for their own benefit will harvest devastation from their selfishness, but those who plant for the benefit of the Spirit will harvest eternal life from the Spirit” (vs. 8 CEB).
This weekend, we are celebrating the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Although the Declaration of Independence is not the nation’s governing document, it gives voice to the values the signers hoped this new nation would embody. The defining statement of that document is found in these words:
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.
While Jefferson and his colleagues thought these values were self-evident, they had a rather limited view when it came to whom these words applied. We’re still trying to figure out who gets to benefit from these self-evident rights. That’s because the founders applied these words only to white men who owned property. In their mind, these words didn’t apply to Black men and women, most of whom were enslaved. They didn’t apply to Native Americans, even though they were here first. They didn’t even apply to women, who didn’t get the right to vote until 1920.
Getting back to Paul’s Galatian letter, earlier on in the letter, Paul wrote that our baptisms into Christ serve to overcome our social inequities. He wrote to people who lived in a world where a majority of the people were slaves and women were second-class citizens at best. This was also a world where Jews and Gentiles generally didn’t mix. Paul responded by letting the Galatians know that in Christ, things should be different. So he wrote: “There is no longer Jew or Greek; there is no longer slave or free; there is no longer male and female, for all of you are one in Christ Jesus” (Gal. 3:28). While this should be true for the church, I believe that if we’re followers of Jesus, we should do our best not only to embody these values but to find ways of helping the larger community, whether it is a town, a state, a nation, or even the world itself, embody these values that reflect our diversity and seek to bring about inclusion and equality for all. By doing this, we embody Jesus’ command to love our neighbors. If we do this, then we’ll be doing the right thing. Doing the right things requires humility. That’s not easy because there is a human tendency to embrace selfishness.
Since we’re thinking about freedom this weekend, our freedom doesn’t require selfishness. If we’re to be free in Christ, our freedom must be tempered by our responsibilities for the welfare of others, especially the ones who are most in need. So, in the Spirit of the weekend, let us take to heart Paul’s warning to the church in Galatians 5, where he told the church members not to use their “freedom as an opportunity for self-indulgence, but through love become slaves to one another.” In doing this, we fulfill the law to love our neighbors as we love ourselves, and this is the key to finding the right balance (Gal. 5:14-15 NRSV).
As we hear this call to do the right thing as followers of Jesus, we also hear this closing word from Paul: May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit, brothers and sisters. Amen. (Gal. 6: 18 NRSV).
Preached by:
Dr. Robert D. Cornwall
Pulpit Supply
Tyrone Community Presbyterian Church
Tyrone Township, MI
July 6, 2025
Pentecost 4C
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