Adult Sunday School Study - Paul’s Letters

Introduction to Paul's Letter to the Galatians

“ In my heart reigns this one article, faith in my dear Lord Christ, the beginning, middle and end of whatever spiritual and divine thoughts I may have, whether by day or by night. The epistle to the Galatians is my epistle. To it I am as it were in wedlock. It is my Katherine.”

[Martin Luther, Commentary on the Book of Galatians, 1538;
Translated into English by Theodore Graebner; St. Louis, Missouri, 1937...]

Martin Luther considered Galatians the best of all the books in the Bible. It has been called “the battle-cry of the Reformation,” “the great charter of religious freedom,” “the Christian declaration of independence,” “The Magna Carta of Christian Liberty.” It is called these things because the reformers in the 16th century used this book especially to show that Salvation is by Faith Alone!

There are two generally held views on the recipients of this letter and therefore the date it was written... The majority of NT scholars today, hold that Paul wrote this letter to the churches in the Roman political province of Galatia. This province included cities substantially to the south of the geographical region of Galatia, including Lystra, Derbe, and Iconium. Paul had visited these cities on his first missionary journey (Acts 13 – 14)... That suggests that this letter was the first of Paul's inspired letters, written in 49 AD or so...

Until recent times, biblical scholars assumed that this letter was sent to the churches in the geographical region known as Galatia, in north central Asia Minor. Paul would have visited the region on his second missionary journey (Acts 15 – 18)... If that's accurate, then this letter would have been written in 57 or 58 AD after the Thessalonian letters... For this study, we will follow a timeline assuming the earlier date...

Paul's letter begins in a very unusual manner... After the initial greeting and salutation, he rebuked the Galatians... In most of his letters, Paul offers some form of commendation following the greeting... Not here! The Book of Acts tells us that there were Jewish people who went into the areas that Paul evangelized to not only refute his teaching but also to dispute his role as an Apostle... The bulk of this chapter is Paul's very strong argument that he was called by Jesus Christ to be an Apostle...

Galatians “sets the table” for many of the themes and teachings that Paul developed and expanded in his later letters… Many of those are helped by studying the words and phrases that he used… Part of each lesson will be devoted to those studies… You are encouraged to suggest terms that you would like to look at more carefully…

You can download and print the handouts for our lessons in PDF format… Please click the appropriate button below for either our current study in Paul’s letters or our previous study in the Book of Revelation… You can also check out the resources that have been consulted to prepare our lessons…