Galatians 2: “I am crucified with Christ”

An angry letter to Galatia

Galatians is Paul's most heated letter. He had founded churches in the Roman province of Galatia, in central Turkey, among people who were not Jewish. After he left, other teachers arrived and told these new believers they must be circumcised and keep the law of Moses to belong fully to God's people. Paul skips his usual words of thanks and goes straight to the point.

Chapter 2 is autobiography. Paul describes a meeting in Jerusalem where James, Peter and John accepted his mission to the Gentiles. Then he recounts a confrontation in Antioch: Peter had been eating freely with Gentile Christians, but when visitors came from James he withdrew, and others followed. Paul opposed him to his face, he says, because the gospel itself was at stake.

What does Galatians 2:20 mean?

Paul's argument is that people are made right with God through faith in Christ, not by the works of the law. Verse 19 says he died to the law so that he might live to God. Verse 20 explains how: I am crucified with Christ, the words printed on our poster.

The Greek verb is in the perfect tense, which describes a past event with lasting effect, so it could be rendered “I have been crucified with Christ and remain so”. Paul means that when Jesus died, the old self defined by status, performance and law died with him. The next words turn it into life: nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ lives in me.

Then comes the tenderest phrase in the letter. The life Paul now lives, he lives by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. The great theological argument lands on a single person being loved.

A verse for baptism and new life

Many churches see baptism as a picture of this verse, going under the water as a kind of death and rising again (Romans 6 makes the link explicit). That is why Galatians 2:20 is a common choice for adult baptisms, testimonies and confirmations. A plain wooden cross with these words also suits a quiet corner for prayer.

Dying and living with Christ

Paul returns to the idea later in the same letter (Galatians 6:14) and in Colossians 3, which says your life is hid with Christ in God. Jesus himself asked his followers to take up their cross daily (Luke 9:23), and Paul presents that call as something that happens inwardly, once and then every day.