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Paul's letter to the Galatians is at the center of recent debates and controversies in Pauline Theology. These controversies have questioned the legitimacy of traditional reformed views on Justification and have confused many on this long-held core doctrine of the faith. David McWilliams sat down recently with Jeff Shamess of WTSBooks to share some of his thoughts on these issues and his hope for his recently released commentary on the letter.

David McWilliams is the Senior Minister of Covenant Presbyterian Church, Lakeland, Florida where he has served for 20 years. In 2009, McWiliams was appointed as Adjunct Professor of Systematic Theology at Redeemer Seminary, Texas. He has earned degrees from Mercer University, Westminster Theological Seminary, and University of Wales.

WTSBooks: What attracted you to Galatians?

DM: I am immensely attracted to Paul’s epistles and Pauline studies. Galatians is the first book that I taught as a young man moving toward gospel ministry and it has always cast its spell over me. The Christian life is learning what it means to live by grace through faith in Christ alone. As I have said to my people for years, “you never mature beyond the cross.” And, Galatians helps us to understand grace. I never turn to the book without sensing that the life’s sap of all the Bible flows out of this book and from the gospel of free grace found there. Like the Galatians, we are in danger of forgetting the gospel and are in desperate need of seeing Jesus Christ placarded before us as crucified! (Galatians 3:1).

WTSBooks: Why do you think a new commentary on Galatians is necessary at this time?

DM: In part, it was necessary for me. That is, I need to stay in it and, I think, others do as well, just as we all need to steep in Romans. So, there is something that transcends present debates, a perennial need for the church to remember the gospel of grace set forth so forcefully by Paul in this letter. The reason for this is that we are tempted to go back to old, dark ways of works righteousness. Rather than a “theology” of despair and hopelessness that breeds fear in the soul, Christians need a theology of grace that understands the significance of the cross, the sufficiency of his merit, no matter how deep our sin has been!

And, then, the mischaracterizations of Paul in the “new perspective” call upon us to reassert forensic, gratuitous justification taught by Paul in the letter to the Galatians.

Another important factor is that I think we need to see that in Galatians there is a sustained emphasis on the theme that salvation is “not according to man” (Galatians 1:11), on the two-age construct, and on gratuitous, forensic justification. These themes are constant and pervasive and I hope that as one reads through the exposition that this will be evident. I don’t think that I have seen these themes pressed thoroughly in commentaries as the sustained concerns of Paul.

WTSBooks: What role do you hope this commentary might serve in the Church?

DM: Let me add that I don’t like what is happening to commenting today where everything that a scholar might know about a book is poured into one volume. Those commentaries might have a place but I think that scholars would serve the church well by returning to Calvin’s approach - “lucid brevity.” And so, I have attempted to say a lot in a little space, to write a commentary in which I have not said all I know about Galatians, but have attempted a true, scholarly and sound exposition that presents what I think a minister or student of the book might need to think through to preach or teach Galatians.

Preaching is my main concern. This is not a volume of sermons but an exposition that I pray will help ministers in particular to think through the text and to preach Galatians. To that end, I have written the book to be read through and suggest that someone who is thinking of preaching or teaching Galatians read the exposition through over a short period of time and then consult it as he preaches the book. In short, I hope that the book helps ministers to preach and others to learn to value the gospel of free grace and to preach justification by grace alone, through faith alone on the basis of the work of Christ alone. And, I hope that reading through the exposition will help to make plain the dominant themes in Paul’s mind.

WTSBooks: One of the key hermeneutical questions in recent Pauline theology regards the role and influence of 2nd Temple Judaism. How do you think the context of 2nd Temple Judaism should affect our interpretation of Galatians?

DM: This is nothing new; we have always been interested in the intertestamental period (not often called that any more, but I still prefer that designation) and in anything that can help us understand the world into which the gospel came and was first proclaimed. But, when we are told that fundamentally we have misunderstood Judaism that the Judaism of the first century preached grace, I not only demur, I protest. When I read in the New Testament that the Jews of Paul’s day “did not know the righteousness that comes from God and sought to establish their own” (Romans 10:3), that they did not pursue righteousness by faith “but as if it were by works” (Romans 9:32) and that the Pharisees were “confident of their own righteousness” (Luke 18:9) the Scriptures tell me how to read the situation into which Paul preached regardless of some evidence that might possibly be found to suggest the contrary. The Scriptures are to determine the right use of the cultural data that is acquired by historical research. There are no brute facts.

WTSBooks: Though a diverse group within itself, the major party questioning a traditionally reformed or more pointedly, a Lutheran view of Justification has been called the "New Perspective." How would you define the various perspectives of NT Wright and James Dunn?

DM: Let me first say that I have not written an exposition that dwells on the new perspective. Yes, concern over this viewpoint is always in the backdrop, and I do address it head on when I think it is called for, but I am more concerned with Paul and what he is actually saying. So, I hope that if Christ tarries, and someone picks up my exposition in a hundred years or so, it will not be dated by an overemphasis on polemics but that Paul’s voice will still be heard in the book.

But, to your question, Wright has said that justification in Paul is not about ‘how I get saved’ but about ‘how I am declared to be a member of God’s people.’ This is simply wrong. And, I point out in the exposition of 2:11-21 that Wright is confused about what Paul is doing in his rebuke of Peter. Wright sees Paul’s concern for “righteousness” as a concern for membership among God’s people. But he has failed to understand that Paul’s entire concern up to this point has been that the gospel is not according to man. Paul is passionate about “the truth of the gospel” (Galatians 2:5). Wright substitutes ecclesiology for soteriology by failing to see that the gospel is the issue. Wright makes a fruit of the gospel the gospel itself and this perverts Paul’s gospel.

Wright is just confused on the fundamentals of the gospel. He has, it seems, no place for the imputation of Christ’s righteousness and seems to substitute Spirit produced works of the believer for the finished work of Christ as the basis of our acceptance with God. This cuts the heart right out of the gospel.

WTSBooks: Are there any places of overlap with traditionally reformed views or of value generally that reformed Christians can take away from their studies?

DM: Of course, from whom can we not learn? But, this is not the issue. The things that we can learn from these men can be learned just as well from sound writers. I fail to understand why so many are enamored of the New Perspective and their representatives.

WTSBooks: What should Christians be on guard against as they read Wright and Dunn?

DM: They are very learned and, especially in the case of Wright, persuasive writers who say many good things. Wright in particular says what he says well and, I think, this accounts for much of his popularity. It might be difficult for some church members to sift the good from the bad. But, it is inexcusable in ministers to fail to distinguish the gospel from error. Exegesis, exegesis, exegesis! Get into the text and read what others say in light of what the Scriptures clearly teach.

WTSBooks: As a veteran pastor, how would you advise the Church to interact with proponents of the New Perspective? Put another way, how can someone responsibly dialogue with the new perspective?

DM: I have been an ordained Presbyterian minister for 25 years. I have seen many fads come and go, many errors proliferate and I think that the best way to handle this is to teach the truth. If justification by grace alone, through faith alone on the basis of the finished work of Christ alone had been so part of the warp and woof of the church’s preaching and teaching and had been understood by Christians to be indispensable for daily Christian living, the new perspective would have been a tempest in a tea cup. I am not saying that we do not have to point out error; but, getting the gospel way down deep in the heart is the best defense against false gospels. This has been my aim with my congregation and with my seminary students.

Dialogue with those who are confused is part of the minister’s work. Paul makes this plain in his writing to Timothy. So, we must be gentle, patient, pastoral. On the other hand, the teaching of this in our churches is intolerable and calls for us to take seriously the anathema proclaimed by Paul in Galatians 1. We who have a biblical view of Paul’s doctrine of justification, as summarized in the Reformed confessions and the leaders of the new perspective understand one another. We do not agree. And the disagreement is vital and serious; it relates to the very nature of the gospel itself. Paul defines the gospel in terms of justification, the work of Christ, and makes plain that new covenant ministry is ministry of righteousness as over against condemnation (Rom. 5:16; 2 Cor. 3:9). About this, in the teaching ministry of the church, there can be no dialogue; only faithful proclamation of justification by grace through faith. We do nothing to be accepted by God; Christ has done it all.