Expositor's Bible Commentary Commentary Galatians 5:21

"envyings, drunkenness, revellings, and such like; of which I forewarn you, even as I did forewarn you, that they who practise such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God." — Galatians 5:21 (ASV)

“Envy” (GK 5784) is so closely related to “jealousy” that it is hard to tell the difference between them, except for the fact that this attitude is always bad. This third set of words shows the sinful nature to be responsible for the breakdown in interpersonal relationships seen in all strata of society.

(4) The final grouping is concerned with sins of alcohol: “drunkenness” (GK 3494) and “orgies” (GK 3269). They denote pleasures that have degenerated into debauchery. There are more items that could be mentioned, for when Paul adds “and the like,” he indicates that the list is not exhaustive.

Paul adds a solemn warning, saying that those who habitually practice such things will never inherit God’s kingdom. This does not mean that if Christians fall into an isolated lapse into sin through getting drunk or some such thing, they thereby lose their salvation. Rather, Paul is referring to a habitual continuation in sins of the sinful nature, and his point is that those who continually practice such sins give evidence of having never received God’s Spirit. When he says that he warned the Galatians of this previously (presumably when he was among them), he reveals that his preaching was never what one might call mere evangelism but that it always contained a strong dose of the standard of morality expected from Christians.

The reference to the “kingdom [GK 993] of God” introduces an entirely new and large subject, one that is an important and complex idea in the New Testament (see comment on Mk 1:15). Here, however, Paul is doubtless thinking of God’s kingdom only in an eschatological sense. The phrase “will not inherit” carries the thought back to Paul’s words about Abraham in ch. 3. His point is that those who keep on living in the sinful nature give evidence that they are not Abraham’s seed and therefore will not inherit salvation.

Paul continues his contrast between the natural productions of the sinful nature and Spirit that he had begun in v.19. Here, however, he speaks of the “fruit” (GK 2843) of the Spirit (using both a new term and the singular form) in contrast to the “acts” (v.19; GK 2240) or works of which the sinful nature is capable. The term “acts” already has definite overtones in this letter. It refers to what a human being can do, which, in the case of the works of the law (2:16; 3:2, 5, 10), has already been shown to be inadequate. The fruit of the Spirit, on the other hand, suggests that which is a natural product of the Spirit, made possible by the living relationship between the Christian and God through Christ (cf. 2:20; Jn 15:1—17). The singular form stresses that these qualities are a unity, like a bunch of grapes instead of separate pieces of fruit, and also that they should all be found in all Christians. In this they differ from the “gifts” of the Spirit, which are given one by one to different people as the church has need (1 Corinthians 12).

The nine virtues that are the Spirit’s fruit hardly need classification, though they seem to fall into three categories of three each. The first three comprise general Christian habits of mind; their primary direction is Godward. The second set primarily concerns Christians in their relationship to others and are social virtues. The last three concern Christians as they are to be in themselves.