od. He condenses all the laws of
Moses into one brief sentence. Reason takes offense at the brevity with
which Paul treats the Law. Therefore reason looks down upon the
doctrine of faith and its truly good works. To serve one another in
love, i.e., to instruct the erring, to comfort the afflicted, to raise
the fallen, to help one's neighbor in every possible way, to bear with
his infirmities, to endure hardships, toil, ingratitude in the Church
and in the world, and on the other hand to obey government, to honor
one's parents, to be patient at home with a nagging wife and an unruly
family, these things are not at all regarded as good works. The fact
is, they are such excellent works that the world cannot possibly
estimate them at their true value.

It is tersely spoken: "Love thy neighbour as thyself." But what more
needs to be said? You cannot find a better or nearer example than your
own. If you want to know how you ought to love your neighbor, ask
yourself how much you love yourself. If you were to get into trouble or
danger, you would be glad to have the love and help of all men. You do
not need any book of instructions to teach you how to love your
neighbor. All you have to do is to look into your own heart, and it
will tell you how you ought to love your neighbor as yourself.

My neighbor is every person, especially those who need my help, as
Christ explained in the tenth chapter of Luke. Even if a person has
done me some wrong, or has hurt me in any way, he is still a human
being with flesh and blood. As long as a person remains a human being,
so long is he to be an object of our love.

Paul therefore urges his Galatians and, incidentally, all believers to
serve each other in love. "You Galatians do not have to accept
circumcision. If you are so anxious to do good works, I will tell you
in one word how you can fulfill all laws. 'By love serve one another.'
You will never lack people to whom you may do good. The world is full
of people who need your help."

VERSE 15. But if ye bite and devour one another take heed that ye be
not consumed one of another.

When faith in Christ is overthrown peace and unity come to an end in
the church. Diverse opinions and dissensions about doctrine and life
spring up, and one member bites and devours the other, i.e., they
condemn each other until they are consumed. To this the Scriptures and
the experience of all times bear witness. The many sects at present
have come into being because one sect condemns the other. When the
unity of the spirit has been lost there can be no agreement in doctrine
or life. New errors must appear without measure and without end.

For the avoidance of discord Paul lays down the principle: "Let every
person do his duty in the station of life into which God has called
him. No person is to vaunt himself above others or find fault with the
efforts of others while lauding his own. Let everybody serve in love."

It is not an easy matter to teach faith without works, and still to
require works. Unless the ministers of Christ are wise in handling the
mysteries of God and rightly divide the word, faith and good works may
easily be confused. Both the doctrine of faith and the doctrine of good
works must be diligently taught, and yet in such a way that both the
doctrines stay within their God-given sphere. If we only teach works,
as our opponents do, we shall lose the faith. If we only teach faith
people will come to think that good works are superfluous.

VERSE 16. This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill
the lust of the flesh.

"I have not forgotten what I told you about faith in the first part of
my letter. Because I exhort you to mutual love you are not to think
that I have gone back on my teaching of justification by faith alone. I
am still of the same opinion. To remove every possibility for
misunderstanding I have added this explanatory note: 'Walk in the
Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh.'"

With this verse Paul explains how he wants this sentence to be
understood: "By love serve one another. When I bid you to love one
another, this is what I mean and require, 'Walk in the Spirit.' I know
very well you will not fulfill the Law, because you are sinners as long
as you live. Nevertheless, you should endeavor to walk in the spirit,"
i.e., fight against the flesh and follow the lead of the Holy Ghost.

It is quite apparent that Paul had not forgotten the doctrine of
justification, for in bidding the Galatians to walk in the Spirit he at
the same time denies that good works can justify. "When I speak of the
fulfilling of the Law I do not mean to say that you are justified by
the Law. All I mean to say is that you should take the Spirit for your
guide and resist the flesh. That is the most you shall ever be able to
do. Obey the Spirit and fight against the flesh."

VERSE 16. And ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh.

The lust of the flesh is not altogether extinct in us. It rises up
again and again and wrestles with the Spirit. No flesh, not even that
of the true believer, is so completely under the influence of the
Spirit that it will not bite or devour, or at least neglect, the
commandment of love. At the slightest provocation it flares up, demands
to be revenged, and hates a neighbor like an enemy, or at least does
not love him as much as he ought to be loved.

Therefore the Apostle establishes this rule of love for the believers.
Serve one another in love. Bear the infirmities of your brother.
Forgive one another. Without such bearing and forbearing, giving and
forgiving, there can be no unity because to give and to take offense
are unavoidably human.

Whenever you are angry with your brother for any cause, repress your
violent emotions through the Spirit. Bear with his weakness and love
him. He does not cease to be your neighbor or brother because he
offended you. On the contrary, he now more than ever before requires
your loving attention.

The scholastics take the lust of the flesh to mean carnal lust. True,
believers too are tempted with carnal lust. Even the married are not
immune to carnal lusts. Men set little value upon that which they have
and covet what they have not, as the poet says:

"The things most forbidden we always desire, And things most denied we
seek to acquire."

I do not deny that the lust of the flesh includes carnal lust. But it
takes in more. It takes in all the corrupt desires with which the
believers are more or less infected, as pride, hatred, covetousness,
impatience. Later on Paul enumerates among the works of the flesh even
idolatry and heresy. The apostle's meaning is clear. "I want you to
love one another. But you do not do it. In fact you cannot do it,
because of your flesh. Hence we cannot be justified by deeds of love.
Do not for a moment think that I am reversing myself on my stand
concerning faith. Faith and hope must continue. By faith we are
justified, by hope we endure to the end. In addition we serve each
other in love because true faith is not idle. Our love, however, is
faulty. In bidding you to walk in the Spirit I indicate to you that our
love is not sufficient to justify us. Neither do I demand that you
should get rid of the flesh, but that you should control and subdue
it."

VERSE 17. For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit and the Spirit
against the flesh.

When Paul declares that "the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the
Spirit against the flesh," he means to say that we are not to think,
speak or do the things to which the flesh incites us. "I know," he
says, "that the flesh courts sin. The thing for you to do is to resist
the flesh by the Spirit. But if you abandon the leadership of the
Spirit for that of the flesh, you are going to fulfill the lust of the
flesh and die in your sins."

VERSE 17. And these are contrary the one to the other; so that ye
cannot do the things that ye would.

These two leaders, the flesh and the Spirit, are bitter opponents. Of
this opposition the Apostle writes in the seventh chapter of the
Epistle to the Romans: "I see another law in my members, warring
against the law of my mind, and bringing me into the captivity to the
law of sin which is in my members. O wretched man that I am! who shall
deliver me from the body of this death?"

The scholastics are at a loss to understand this confession of Paul and
feel obliged to save his honor. That the chosen vessel of Christ should
have had the law of sin in his members seems to them incredible and
absurd. They circumvent the plain-spoken statement of the Apostle by
saying that he was speaking for the wicked. But the wicked never
complain of inner conflicts, or of the captivity of sin. Sin has its
unrestricted way with them. This is Paul's very own complaint and the
identical complaint of all believers.

Paul never denied that he felt the lust of the flesh. It is likely that
at times he felt even the stirrings of carnal lust, but there is no
doubt that he quickly suppressed them. And if at any time he felt angry
or impatient, he resisted these feelings by the Spirit. We are not
going to stand by idly and see such a comforting statement as this
explained away. The scholastics, monks, and others of their ilk fought
only against carnal lust and were proud of a victory which they never
obtained. In the meanwhile they harbored within their breasts pride,
hatred, disdain, self-trust, contempt of the Word of God, disloyalty,
blasphemy, and other lusts of the flesh. Against these sins they never
fought because they never took them for sins.

Christ alone can supply us with perfect righteousness. Therefore we
must always believe and always hope in Christ. "Whosoever believeth
shall not be ashamed." (Rom. 9:33.)

Do not despair if you feel the flesh battling against the Spirit or if
you cannot make it behave. For you to follow the guidance of the Spirit
in all things without interference on the part of the flesh is
impossible. You are doing all you can if you resist the flesh and do
not fulfill its demands.

When I was a monk I thought I was lost forever whenever I felt an evil
emotion, carnal lust, wrath, hatred, or envy. I tried to quiet my
conscience in many ways, but it did not work, because lust would always
come back and give me no rest. I told myself: "You have permitted this
and that sin, envy, impatience, and the like. Your joining this holy
order has been in vain, and all your good works are good for nothing."
If at that time I had understood this passage, "The flesh lusteth
against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh," I could have
spared myself many a day of self-torment. I would have said to myself:
"Martin, you will never be without sin, for you have flesh. Despair
not, but resist the flesh."

I remember how Doctor Staupitz used to say to me: "I have promised God
a thousand times that I would become a better man, but I never kept my
promise. From now on I am not going to make any more vows. Experience
has taught me that I cannot keep them. Unless God is merciful to me for
Christ's sake and grants unto me a blessed departure, I shall not be
able to stand before Him." His was a God-pleasing despair. No true
believer trusts in his own righteousness, but says with David, "Enter
not into judgment with thy servant; for in thy sight shall no man
living be justified." (Ps. 143:2) Again, "If thou, Lord, shouldest mark
iniquities, O Lord, who shall stand?" (Ps. 130:3.)

No man is to despair of salvation just because he is aware of the lust
of the flesh. Let him be aware of it so long as he does not yield to
it. The passion of lust, wrath, and other vices may shake him, but they
are not to get him down. Sin may assail him, but he is not to welcome
it. Yes, the better Christian a man is, the more he will experience the
heat of the conflict. This explains the many expressions of regret in
the Psalms and in the entire Bible. Everybody is to determine his
peculiar weakness and guard against it. Watch and wrestle in spirit
against your weakness. Even if you cannot completely overcome it, at
least you ought to fight against it.

According to this description a saint is not one who is made of wood
and never feels any lusts or desires of the flesh. A true saint
confesses his righteousness and prays that his sins may be forgiven.
The whole Church prays for the forgiveness of sins and confesses that
it believes in the forgiveness of sins. If our antagonists would read
the Scriptures they would soon discover that they cannot judge rightly
of anything, either of sin or of holiness.

VERSE 18. But if ye be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law.

Here someone may object: "How come we are not under the law? You
yourself say, Paul, that we have the flesh which wars against the
Spirit, and brings us into subjection."

But Paul says not to let it trouble us. As long as we are led by the
Spirit, and are willing to obey the Spirit who resists the flesh, we
are not under the Law. True believers are not under the Law. The Law
cannot condemn them although they feel sin and confess it.

Great then is the power of the Spirit. Led by the Spirit, the Law
cannot condemn the believer though he commits real sin. For Christ in
whom we believe is our righteousness. He is without sin, and the Law
cannot accuse Him. As long as we cling to Him we are led by the Spirit
and are free from the Law. Even as he teaches good works, the Apostle
does not lose sight of the doctrine of justification, but shows at
every turn that it is impossible for us to be justified by works.

The words, "If ye be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law," are
replete with comfort. It happens at times that anger, hatred,
impatience, carnal desire, fear, sorrow, or some other lust of the
flesh so overwhelms a man that he cannot shake them off, though he try
ever so hard. What should he do? Should he despair? God forbid. Let him
say to himself: "My flesh seems to be on a warpath against the Spirit
again. Go to it, flesh, and rage all you want to. But you are not going
to have your way. I follow the leading of the Spirit."

When the flesh begins to cut up the only remedy is to take the sword of
the Spirit, the word of salvation, and fight against the flesh. If you
set the Word out of sight, you are helpless against the flesh. I know
this to be a fact. I have been assailed by many violent passions, but
as soon as I took hold of some Scripture passage, my temptations left
me. Without the Word I could not have helped myself against the flesh.

VERSE 19. Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these.

Paul is saying: "That none of you may hide behind the plea of ignorance
I will enumerate first the works of the flesh, and then also the works
of the Spirit."

There were many hypocrites among the Galatians, as there are also among
us, who pretend to be Christians and talk much about the Spirit, but
they walk not according to the Spirit; rather according to the flesh.
Paul is out to show them that they are not as holy as they like to have
others think they are.

Every period of life has its own peculiar temptations. Not one true
believer whom the flesh does not again and again incite to impatience,
anger, pride. But it is one thing to be tempted by the flesh, and
another thing to yield to the flesh, to do its bidding without fear or
remorse, and to continue in sin.

Christians also fall and perform the lusts of the flesh. David fell
horribly into adultery. Peter also fell grievously when he denied
Christ. However great these sins were, they were not committed to spite
God, but from weakness. When their sins were brought to their attention
these men did not obstinatel