Left image is from a comic book. Source.

Do not be deceived. God will not be made a fool. For a person will reap what he sows, because the person who sows to his own flesh will reap corruption from the flesh, but the one who sows to the Spirit will reap eternal life from the Spirit. So we must not grow weary in doing good, for in due time we will reap, if we do not give up. (Galatians 6:7-9)

by Brian Shilhavy

Background

These verses occur at the end of Paul’s letter to the believers in Galatia back in the First Century. Galatia today is in Central Turkey.

Controversy

The controversy that caused Paul to write this letter, was that the believers who accepted that Jesus Christ was the promised Messiah, were comprised of ethnic and religious Jews, as well as “Gentiles” or “Greeks,” who were not ethnic Jews, and had no physical genealogy back to Abraham.

Some of the Jews were insisting that the Gentile believers had to convert to the Jewish religion, including becoming circumcised.

Paul explained that the New Covenant, started by Jesus and his death and resurrection, abolished the ethnic and religious divisions that separated people, and that those who had the same faith as Abraham, were his spiritual descendants, regardless of race, religion, nationality, gender, or any other way of classifying human beings.

This was referred to as “the Good News“, or “the Gospel.”

See my previous article:

Who are the Children of Abraham?

The Truths in Galatians Chapter 6

1. Do not be deceived.

This assumes that one can be “deceived.” Deception is based on lies, or things that are not true.

This truth first occurs in the earliest pages of the Bible, in Genesis chapter 3.

Now the serpent was more shrewd than any of the wild animals that the LORD God had made.

He said to the woman, “Is it really true that God said, ‘You must not eat from any tree of the orchard’?”

The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit from the trees of the orchard; but concerning the fruit of the tree that is in the middle of the orchard God said, ‘You must not eat from it, and you must not touch it, or else you will die.’”

The serpent said to the woman, “Surely you will not die, for God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will open and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

When the woman saw that the tree produced fruit that was good for food, was attractive to the eye, and was desirable for making one wise, she took some of its fruit and ate it. She also gave some of it to her husband who was with her, and he ate it.

Then the LORD God said to the woman, “What is this you have done?”

The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.”  (Genesis 3:1-6, 13)

The serpent, which throughout the Bible refers to Satan, or the Devil, lied and deceived Eve. It was her choice to believe what the serpent said, instead of believing what God said.

In John chapter 8, Jesus referred to Satan as “the father of lies.” Those who lie and deceive people, are referred to as Satan’s children, even if they are ethnic Jews and physical descendants of Abraham.

“Abraham is our father,” they answered.

“If you were Abraham’s children,” said Jesus, “then you would do the things Abraham did. As it is, you are determined to kill me, a man who has told you the truth that I heard from God. Abraham did not do such things. You are doing the things your own father does.”

“We are not illegitimate children,” they protested. “The only Father we have is God himself.”

Jesus said to them, “If God were your Father, you would love me, for I came from God and now am here. I have not come on my own; but he sent me.

Why is my language not clear to you? Because you are unable to hear what I say.

You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desire.

He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him.

When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies.

Yet because I tell the truth, you do not believe me! Can any of you prove me guilty of sin?

If I am telling the truth, why don’t you believe me?

He who belongs to God hears what God says. The reason you do not hear is that you do not belong to God.” (John 8:39-47)

2. God will not be made a fool.

In the original Greek that the New Testament portion of the Bible was written in, the word translated here in Galatians 6 as “be made a fool” is also often translated into English as “mocked.”

God cannot be mocked.

In other places where this word is used, it is sometimes translated as “ridicule” or “scoff,” or “sneer.” (See Luke 23:35 for example.)

When we look at the world around us, it would appear that the “God is Dead” view, which is the predominate view in our world, is the view that is winning.

Those who believe in God and in the “Good News” of Jesus, are the minority. It has always been this way.

Jesus himself stated:

“Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.” (Matthew 7:13-14)

This truth then clearly shows that corporate Christianity, and the “church” today in the United States, is “ridiculing/mocking God,” because it is the dominant religion in the U.S., and most of the people belonging to it do the same things as those who are not “Christians,” by ridiculing God as a fool, as they participate in lies instead of the truth.

Image source.

One example where this can be clearly seen in modern culture, is how our society treats those who do not believe in the vaccine cult. Since the vaccine believers cannot argue based on science or reason, they simply resort to ridicule, as can be seen from this article in 2015, written years before it became “acceptable” to oppose just the COVID “vaccine.”

The Anti-Vaccine Movement Should Be Ridiculed, Because Shame Works

Christianity is a $trillion dollar industry, and they cannot afford to take views that go against the dominant views in our culture, and this has been clearly seen when it comes to the issue of vaccines over the years (among other issues), even the COVID vaccine, as Christian churches gladly participated in injecting people with an experimental product that injured and crippled millions, by allowing their churches to become vaccine clinics and collect government funding.

(Note: when I refer to “the dominant views in our culture“, I am referring to views that almost everybody believes, and NOT views where half the country, either “liberals” or “conservatives”, believes something that the other half of the country opposes, such as “abortion.” See: The Myth of Right vs. Left, Liberal vs. Conservative – Top 9 Myths Believed by BOTH Sides to Usher in a New World Order.)

In the First Century, it was not the issue of vaccines that “believers” used to ridicule others, but the issue was “circumcision,” also a medical procedure, as it was the predominant accepted cultural issue that few dared to oppose.

Those who want to make a good impression outwardly are trying to compel you to be circumcised.

The only reason they do this is to avoid being persecuted for the cross of Christ.

Not even those who are circumcised obey the law, yet they want you to be circumcised that they may boast about your flesh.

May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.

Neither circumcision nor uncircumcision means anything; what counts is a new creation.

Peace and mercy to all who follow this rule, even to the Israel of God. (Galatians 6:12-16)

But God will NOT be ridiculed, and when you ridicule one of his spiritual children, the true “Israel of God,” who are the spiritual children of Abraham based on faith, and not ethnic, religious, or national affiliations, you are trying to ridicule God and portray him as a “fool.”

For the foolishness of God is wiser than man’s wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man’s strength.

Brothers, think of what you were when you were called.

Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth.

But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong.

He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things–and the things that are not–to nullify the things that are. (1 Corinthians 1:25-28)

3. A person will reap what he sows.

“Reaping” and “sowing” are originally agricultural terms, referring to the planting of seeds (sowing) and the harvest that those seeds produce (reaping) when they are full grown and reach maturity.

When the authors of the Biblical literature use these terms, they are most often referring to “spiritual seeds.”

One can either “plant/sow” bad seeds based on deception and lies originating from the “father of lies,” or good seeds based on the truth, which is embodied in the person and character of Jesus Christ.

Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” (John 14:6)

God will not be made a fool. Truth wins in the end. Harvest time has not yet arrived.

But when it does, it will become obvious who planted lies, and who planted the truth.

4. So we must not grow weary in doing good, for in due time we will reap, if we do not give up.

It takes time to grow the truth and then reap the harvest, and so those of us continuing to sow the truth, while at the same time being ridiculed by the children of Satan who are planting lies, we must not “grow weary,” for in “due time” we will see the truth that “God will not be made a fool.”

We must not give up! Truth wins in the end.

Like probably many of you reading this, I am ridiculed and mocked on a daily basis, because of the truths I expose in my writings. Nobody in my family supports me, and I am sure they view me as “the black sheep” of the family, and on the few occasions when we speak, there isn’t all that much to talk about.

Some of them have no desire to talk to me at all, unless it is to tell me how evil I am.

But if you are planting and watering the truth that goes against the dominant lies in our culture today, this is the result, and there is no other path to follow if you want to reach harvest time.

We must not get tired and give up! In the end, it will be worth it.

I declare to you, brothers, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable.

Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed–in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet.

For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed.

For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality. When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: “Death has been swallowed up in victory.”

“Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?” The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law.

But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Therefore, my dear brothers, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain. (1 Corinthians 15:50-58)

For I consider that our present sufferings cannot even be compared to the coming glory that will be revealed to us. (Romans 8:18)