A recent study by Harvard Law School reported that we are experiencing a cultural “epidemic of conflict avoidance.” They cite now-common behaviors like “ghosting” and “quiet quitting” as evidence of our unwillingness or even inability to have hard conversations.

In Galatians 3, Paul does not have that problem. He addresses his Galatian readers directly for the first time, and confronts them with an uncharacteristically harsh rebuke. “You foolish Galatians!” (v. 1). The modern-day equivalent would be to call them “idiots.”

Paul follows that direct address with a similarly accusatory rhetorical question: “Who has bewitched you?” (v. 1). The act of “bewitching” was a serious matter at the time. The word was used when someone was cursed by the “evil eye,” an act typically motivated by jealousy or malice. Paul is rebuking the Galatians for their gullibility and the false teachers for their malicious seduction. As the antidote, Paul points his readers back to the cross of Christ. Jesus crucified is central to the gospel and his theology. He reminds the Galatians that the gospel had been clearly communicated to them. They are without excuse. Paul infers that they have gone astray precisely because they have lost sight of this core truth.

Then, Paul asks a series of questions, all about the issue of the Law versus belief, works versus faith, Spirit versus flesh (v. 3). Paul’s rivals had been tempting the Galatians to find their identity and security in their own adherence to the Jewish rituals. To contradict this belief, Paul repeatedly reminds them that they had already experienced the miraculous work of the Spirit, whom God sent to them, not because of their own good deeds, but because they believed in Jesus Christ.