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6.15 Galatians -- Summary of Galatians Racial Teaching

           a. Racism sometimes wears a religious veneer, and justifies prejudice as God's will.
           b.  Racism also attempts to perpetuate and institutionalize itself by gaining legal authority.
           c.  Many racists claim both religious and legal sanctions:  eg. Judaizers, white supremacists.
           d.  Natural descent (biology, family) is of no advantage or disadvantage for a Christian: true circumcision is of the heart (Rom 2:29).
           e.  All mankind has equal access to the Father through the Spirit by faith in Jesus Christ: this is also the sole criterion for membership in the local church.
           f.  The Christian is not governed by either the sin nature or the Law.  Rather, he is set free from both tyrants so that he can serve others in love.
           g.  The Spirit of God active in the individual and the local church is Paul's alternative to the Law.
           h.  Jesus is not the means by which Gentiles are grafted into the Jewish scheme of salvation.  Rather, He is the means by which both Jews and Gentiles enter into God's plan of worldwide redemption.
           i.  Every age produces false variations of the Gospel, where the eternal message is accommodated to the particular culture.
           j.  The danger of the ethnic Gospel is that it focuses inward and cuts itself off from the larger Christian community and mission.
           k. We should do good to all men, but especially to believers of any background.
           l. Paul used physical means (money) to build inter-racial bonds of friendship among believers.
           m.  "I became like you."  The objective of inter-racial Christian relationships is not domination, vindication, retribution, or even justice.  It is "family."  The walls of race and culture dissolve, to be replaced by ties of love, sharing and mutual submission, lasting even into the Coming Age.

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