Galatians 4:12-14

Paul had become as his readers were in the sense that he had lived among them as a Gentile, not under the Mosaic Law. He now called on them out of a sense of fair play to live independent of the Law as he did. This is the first imperative (in the Greek text) in Galatians.

"In seeking to win other people for Christ, our end is to make them like us, but the means to that end is to make ourselves like them. If they are to become one with us in Christian conviction and experience, we must first become one with them in Christian compassion." [Note: John R. W. Stott, Only One Way: The Message of Galatians, p. 113.]

Evidently Paul suffered with some physical ailment or handicap when he preached in Galatia (Galatians 4:13). The Galatians had put up with some bodily affliction Paul had without despising him when he had evangelized them because they so valued the good news that he brought them.

The commentators have suggested many different ailments that might have been Paul’s including severe headaches, malaria, epilepsy, ophthalmia, and others. Obviously it was something repulsive (Galatians 4:14). However there is not sufficient information in the text to be dogmatic. Whatever it was, the Galatians knew to what Paul referred. It may or may not have been Paul’s "thorn in the flesh" (2 Corinthians 12:7-10).