The Rhetorical Question

A rhetorical question is a question asked for effect, rather than requiring an answer. The answer is implied or obvious. We’ve likely all heard the expression, “Is the pope Catholic?” It’s not a question. It’s making a point.

Scripture asks rhetorical questions sometimes. The psalmist asks, “Who is like the Lord our God?” (Psa 113:5) Answer? No one. God asked Job, “Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth?” (Job 38:4). Clearly not present. Jesus asked, “What shall it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?” (Mark 8:36). We get it. The answers are obvious. Point made.

I noticed one such rhetorical question in Galatians that, I think, isn’t so easy.

“You foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you, before whose eyes Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified? This is the only thing I want to find out from you: did you receive the Spirit by the works of the Law, or by hearing with faith? Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh?” (Gal 3:1-3)

Okay, that’s actually a couple of rhetorical questions. Yes, they received the Spirit by faith and not by works. But that last question. Paul settled the question of how they arrived at being saved: apart from works. We’re all in agreement. Then he asks, “Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh?” It feels like most of the Christians I know would scratch their heads as if it’s a trick question and answer, tentatively, “Um … yes?”

The standard idea is that we are saved by faith and then are responsible for our sanctification. Sure, we do it with the help of the Holy Spirit. Got it. But … yes … we don’t work for our salvation, but we do work for our sanctification. And, given the nature of the question—rhetorical—that’s the wrong answer.

It’s not as if we don’t do anything. Scripture is full of commands of things we’re supposed to do, starting with “love God” and “love one another” and working out from there. But Paul is saying this isn’t from us. We don’t produce this. How, then? In Philippians, Paul tells them to “work out your salvation” followed by, “for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure” (Php 2:13). He gives us the will and power to do it. Paul tells us right after declaring we’re saved by faith apart from works that “we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them” (Eph 2:8-10). He told the Corinthians, “I labored even more than all of them, yet not I, but the grace of God with me” (1 Cor 15:10).

No, our sanctification is not ultimately our work. It’s the Spirit’s work that He accomplishes through us. It’s not that we do nothing in this process. We do the work the Spirit directs and enables. But in the end, no, we don’t accomplish our sanctification. He does. And He gets it right, every time. I’m just glad He let me take part.