I’ve been puzzling over Galatians 5.16 – 18 since last June when the Spring Canyon speaker challenged us to memorize verses 16 – 24. I was rocking along with the Holy Spirit versus sinful nature contest just fine until verse 18 dropped the law of Moses into the mix. 

So I say, let the Holy Spirit guide your lives. Then you won’t be doing what your sinful nature craves. The sinful nature wants to do evil, which is just the opposite of what the Spirit wants. And the Spirit gives us desires that are the opposite of what the sinful nature desires. These two forces are constantly fighting each other, so you are not free to carry out your good intentions. But when you are directed by the Spirit, you are not under obligation to the law of Moses. (Galatians 5.16 – 18, NLT, verse 18 in bold.)

I’ve been asking myself, how did the law get in there, and what does it have to do with anything? I think I’m beginning to see, and it has to do with what I wrote yesterday about “outside the wall” sins and “inside the wall” sins. Verse 18 may be echoing what Paul wrote to the Romans:

For while we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death. But now we are released from the law, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit and not in the old way of the written code. (Romans 7.5, 6, ESV, emphasis mine)

Sinful passions aroused by the law: I’m beginning to understand that the law arouses sinful passions in two ways. First, there is the universal human tendency to do what we’re told not to do. “Do not throw rocks at this window!” “Where is a rock that I can throw!?” Paul speaks to this tendency in the last part of Romans 7.

But there is another way that law arouses sinful passions: I can be so rigidly passionate about the law that I am angry or hostile toward those who don’t keep it. Westboro “Baptist” Church is an extreme example. In other words, law brings out those “inside the wall sins” I wrote about yesterday. Saul’s zeal for the law led to his violence toward Christians. Religious leaders crucified Jesus.

So verse 18 may be saying, when you’re directed by the Spirit and not under obligation to the law of Moses (or any other law), you’re free to love and be kind to others even when you don’t like their behavior. 

You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love. For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” (Galatians 5.13, 14, NIV)