Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins to set us free from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father, to whom be the glory for ever and ever. Amen. (Galatians 1: 3-5)

Each espistle begins with a similar summary of Paul's fundamental message. Grace and peace from the present turmoil is available from God through the example of Jesus whose sacrifice fulfilled the will of God.

Grace is the Greek charis. In typical Greek vocabulary - before centuries of theological overlay - this means joyfulness, gladness, wellness.

Peace - eirene - is harmony, safety, and wholeness. It is derived from a verb meaning to join.

I like the "set us free" in the translation above. But the original - exaireo - seems closer to rescue or draw out or select. Being set free is not wrong, but stronger still is the sense of being removed from danger.

Sins - the Greek is hamartia - is worth more attention. But there will be plenty of opportunity for this later in the epistle.

Evil is not an inaccurate translation of poneros, but the primary meaning was closer to tough, hard, difficult, or troubled. After a long and difficult time at work we might describe the day as poneros.

In my summary of the summary above, I left out "to whom be the glory for ever and ever." In the English I heard an honorific. The Greek suggests something more substantive.

What is translated as glory is doxa. This is a common Greek term for opinion, judgment, or outcome of deliberation. A legal decision was a doxa. A very literal translation of Paul could render this as "in whom exists infinite judgment."

So we might crystallize the core message of Paul as something like the following:

Joy to you and fulfillment from our God and Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ who gave himself for our sins to draw us away from the difficulty of this time and place according to the will of our God and Father who discerns all.