Saturday, March 14, 2026
“They zealously affect you, but not well; yea, they would exclude you, that ye might affect them. But it is good to be zealously affected always in a good thing, and not only when I am present with you” (Galatians 4:17,18 KJV).
Let us see if we can identify and comprehend the dangers of relying on emotions….
Recall the conundrum of the Galatian Christians. In today’s Scripture, they were “zealously affected, but not well.” To wit, their Law-based false teachers affected them so they became fervently supportive of man’s religious performance (discarding God’s all-sufficient work/Grace). Emotionally manipulated, they were no longer “zealously affected in a good thing;” that is, they had been brainwashed to reject God’s grace which they had originally received from Paul heartily! In short, they were “flip-floppers,” suddenly changing their opinion to match their situation which had also changed. By “warming up” to their false teachers, the Galatians then “cooled down” in their affection for Paul, thereby being excluded from the Lord’s spokesman to them. Once their Apostle wrote to call this to their attention, he foresaw how they would react to him most bitterly, regarding their friend and brother in Christ as their enemy (cf. Galatians 4:16). What an ABSOLUTE mess!
“God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth” (John 4:24). Worshipping God goes beyond mere experiencing “good feelings” and involves more than simply “getting in touch with the spirit world.” Our praise of Him must align with “truth,” and truth is not found by searching our hearts or admiring ourselves. Truth is pinpointed in the words of God “rightly divided” (2 Timothy 2:15), what the Holy Spirit says to and about us in Paul’s epistles of Romans to Philemon. We study the Bible from cover to cover, as it is all God-breathed or spoken by the Holy Ghost. Still, we make sure we understand that the Pauline Books define what the God of creation is doing at the moment. Regardless of how we “feel” about this or that, no matter what we “feel” about “him” or “her” (fellow people), here is the objective standard by which we (should!) determine the veracity or falsity of our experience.
This is the only way to survive our spiritually “perilous” world….
333 Words of Grace 