Compelled

Galatians 6:11-15    
11 See with what large letters I have written to you with my own hand! 12 As many as desire to make a good showing in the flesh, these would compel you to be circumcised, only that they may not suffer persecution for the cross of Christ. 13 For not even those who are circumcised keep the law, but they desire to have you circumcised that they may boast in your flesh. 14 But God forbid that I should boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. 15 For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything, but a new creation.

Paul personally addressed the Galatians, not to show how good he was as those who tried to mix Judaism with gospel truth and freedom, but that they would imitate Christ and follow Him as Paul spoke and walked it out for them.  He made it clear that persecution and suffering were part of Identification with Christ, and keeping the Law in the ritualistic sense to avoid trouble was trouble with God.  Boasting should only be in Christ and what He has done for us, not in what we do as an attempt to gain God’s grace.  Paul clarified by identifying with the cross of crucifixion as death to the world and Identification with Christ’s suffering - and new life.  We are made new, forgiven and free with the Law now written by God’s finger on our hearts (not on stone tablets) to move our hands, not by us moving hands to make our own righteousness.  Christ compels us now, not the words and commands of men.