proclaim. Whosoever teaches a gospel contrary to ours, or different from
ours, let us be bold to say that he is sent of the devil.


VERSE 10. Or do I seek to please men?

"Do I serve men or God?" Paul keeps an eye on the false apostles, those
flatterers of men. They taught circumcision to avoid the hatred and
persecution of men.

To this day you will find many who seek to please men in order that they
may live in peace and security. They teach whatever is agreeable to men,
no matter whether it is contrary to God's Word or their own conscience.
But we who endeavor to please God and not men, stir up hell itself. We
must suffer reproach, slanders, death.

For those who go about to please men we have a word from Christ
recorded in the fifth chapter of St. John: "How can ye believe, which
receive honor one of another, and seek not the honor that cometh from God
alone?"


VERSE 10. For if I yet pleased men, I should not be the servant of
Christ.

Observe the consummate cleverness with which the false apostles went
about to bring Paul into disrepute. They combed Paul's writings for
contradictions (our opponents do the same) to accuse him of teaching
contradictory things. They found that Paul had circumcised Timothy
according to the Law, that Paul had purified himself with four other men