Let's be honest. The process of sanctification ain't pretty. From the time God justifies us until He glorifies us, it is a long, slow, painful procedure. And when you consider the raw materials the Lord has to work with, namely despicable me, it is easy to understand why.
As unpleasant as sanctification is for the one on the Potter's wheel, it may be more agonizing for those who desire to see Christ formed in us, especially when we disobey God.
That's what Paul is saying in these verses. He poured his life into the Galatians during separate two visits on his first missionary journey (Acts 13:14-14:23).
And now these new believers have apparently ditched the Gospel of grace for a counterfeit message peddled by a group of smooth talking spiritual hucksters (Gal 1:6; 2:4; 4:17).
The apostle aches over what is happening in the churches of Pisidian Antioch, Iconium, Lystra and Derbe. He loves these people and it kills him to see what they've been sucked into.
Paul begins by calling them "my little children" (v19). He clearly wants to reassure them that despite everything that's happened, he still cares deeply for them. They might be fools (Gal 3:1, 3), but they're his fools.
While “children" is one of the Apostle John's favorite terms (Gr. τεκνιον/teknion), this is the one and only time Paul uses it. He wants them to have no doubt about his love for them.
That's the good news. The bad news is watching their sanctification is is driving him crazy. "For whom I am again in the anguish of childbirth until Christ is formed in you!" (v19). First we see that this isn't the first time. It's happening AGAIN!
This is a reminder that we must be patient and encouraging to those we're discipling. As the old saying goes, "Be patient, God isn't finished with me yet." In his famous love chapter, Paul tells us that "love is patient" (1Cor 13:4).
I love Ruth Bell Graham's humble attitude about her own sanctification. Driving through a road construction zone, she saw a sign that summed it up.
She loved it so much that she asked that it be her epitaph. Her grave marker reads, "End of construction--thank you for your patience.”
While we need to continue to encourage, we must all remember that each one of us is an active construction zone on this side of eternity. Let's be patient.
Paul describes what it is like to be a spiritual father to these Galatian kids. It's "the anguish of childbirth” (v19). This English phrase is expressed by a single Greek term: ωδινω/odino. It means to feel those dreadful labor pains of childbirth.
I realize that the apostle is on a slippery slope as a man talking about the pain of childbirth. Carol Burnett says that the best way for a man to understand the severity of the pain is for him to take his upper lip and then stretch over the top of his head.
The bottom line is that Paul says waiting and watching the Galatians to be in God's process is like giving birth to a snow tire. It's just as painful for the apostle (if not more!) as it is for these new believers.
Paul longs for the day when "Christ is formed in you" (v19). This is the goal of God's work in each of our lives. He has predestined every believer "to be conformed to the image of HIs Son" (Rom 8:29).
One day we we be mature, "to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ" (Eph 4:13). God promises to finish the project that He's started in each of us (Phil 1:6). The apostle longs for that divine graduation day when he "may present everyone mature in Christ" (Col 1:28).
We need to remember that while we are IN the process, this is GOD'S process. He's the one sanctifying. He's the one forming. He's the one at work.
What role do we play? Tullian Tchividjian says that our part in our sanctification is to simply remember our justification daily.
When we understand each and everyday of what Jesus did for us that we could never do, that's when God can do His greatest work in our lives.
We're reminded of that through the grammar of this phrase "until Christ is formed in you" (v19). The Greek verb here is μορφοω/morpho'o. It's the idea of morphing into something we're not. Completely transforming from the inside out.
But the verb here is passive. We don't do the morphing. We are the "morphee." We're the ones being morphed. Again, this is God's process.
Paul reminds us here that watching and waiting for that to happen in ones we love is like giving birth to a snow tire.
©2012
Jay Jennings
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