NOTES for Gal 2:20

To appreciate all the splendor of this formulation, one must look closely at the meaning of the word "to live." Does all our passing of time deserve this name? Paul appears to single out especially those stretches of time or events that are spiritually filled, and not with sin but with its opposite - righteousness. This is precisely what life is for him, and he believes that the very possibility of such life has been brought by Christ. It is His righteousness being realized in Paul's life; therefore it is Christ's life in Paul.

But there are also other moments in our existence when everything is not so good. Paul calls this life in the flesh, and in principle, as Paul himself wrote, it is not so much life as dying. Yet here too there is a possibility of transformation: faith in the Son of God becomes a path of overcoming death.