Galatians 1:2 - Homiletics

The apostle's companions in the gospel.

"And all the brethren which are with me." It was after his manner to associate brethren with him in the inscriptions of his Epistles.

I. WHO WERE THESE BRETHREN ?

1 . They were not the Christian people among whom he resided ; for it was his habit to distinguish between "the brethren which are with me" and "the saints" ( Philippians 4:21 , Philippians 4:22 ). Besides, in that case he would rather have spoken of the brethren as the persons with whom he was.

2 . They were his colleagues in gospel work and gospel travel , including probably Timothy and Titus, who had accompanied him in his first visit to Galatia, and who had rejoined him there ( Acts 18:5 ), and perhaps Erastus, Trophimus, and others.

3 . They were very numerous. If the Epistle was written during the apostle's three months' visit to Corinth, toward the close of a.d. 57, he was now accompanied by a larger number of brethren than at almost any other time.

II. WHY DOES HE IDENTIFY THESE BRETHREN WITH HIMSELF IN THE EPISTLE ?

1 . The concurrence of such brethren as Timothy and Silas , with whom the Galatians were personally acquainted, might have the effect of conciliating their affection and abating the bitterness of their opposition.

2 . His emphatic reference to "all the brethren " seems to show that there was no singularity in his views ; that he was supported by the best and the wisest of the Church's leaders, and that the Galatians, by repudiating Pauline teaching, were really severing themselves from the recognized guides of visible Christianity.