Paul is preaching even more freedom in
Jesus Christ today as we take a look at Galatians 3:15-22 today.
Let's take a look at a few verses:
"Dear brothers and sisters, here’s
an example from everyday life. Just as no one can set aside or amend
an irrevocable agreement, so it is in this case. God gave the
promises to Abraham and his child. And notice that the Scripture
doesn’t say 'to his children,' as if it meant many descendants.
Rather, it says 'to his child'—and that, of course, means Christ.
This is what I am trying to say: The agreement God made with Abraham
could not be canceled 430 years later when God gave the law to Moses.
God would be breaking his promise. For if the inheritance could be
received by keeping the law, then it would not be the result of
accepting God’s promise. But God graciously gave it to Abraham as a
promise." (Galatians 3:15-18)
In these verses, Paul is analyzing
words. I love words. They are one of my favorite things, so the fact
that Paul is taking the time to do this is pretty cool to me.
Basically in these verses, he is talking about some misunderstood
wording in the old testament. Apparently, much of the Jewish world
believed that God made his promise of blessing to Abraham and all of
his children (some texts read "seed" here) when in reality
it only says "Abraham and his child." Paul is pointing to
that child and saying it is actually God's one and only son, Jesus.
That means it is not the people of Israel. He is saying, "hey,
you don't have to be a member of the Jewish community for God to love
you. He loves you anyway, just where you are."
This is good news for all of us. No
matter who we are- white, black, brown, red, yellow, (aw, it's Jesus
Loves Me!) gay, straight, happy, sad, fun, boring, perfectionist,
tattoo-covered, pizza loving, pizza hating (because, for real, the
important things here ;) ), mom, dad, single, married, kid, adult,
bike rider, motorcycle lover or hater, Christian, Muslim, or Jew- God
loves us. Not only that, he wants a relationship with us so much that
he sent his SON to DIE for US.
I don't know anyone on Earth who would
do that. In fact, Paul wrote these words in Romans 5:7- "Now,
most people would not be willing to die for an upright person, though
someone might perhaps be willing to die for a person who is
especially good." So even hundreds of years ago, when everything
was very different than it is now, it wasn't a common thing to be
willing to die for someone else.
Let's get back into Galatians 3 with
verse 19-20:
"Why, then, was the law given? It
was given alongside the promise to show people their sins. But the
law was designed to last only until the coming of the child who was
promised. God gave his law through angels to Moses, who was the
mediator between God and the people. Now a mediator is helpful if
more than one party must reach an agreement. But God, who is one, did
not use a mediator when he gave his promise to Abraham."
Remember that when Paul is speaking of
"the law" that he is referring only to Mosaic Law. He is
not talking about laws of the country like following the rules and
regulations laid out by our government. This is not permission to
disobey and break laws in your country of residence. So get that out
of your head now. ;)
In reading about the Israelite people
throughout the Old Testament, we get to see a ton of great, inspiring
stories but we also see so many screw ups. David, the man after God's
own heart, was an adulterer and had a man killed to cover up the fact
that he got the guy's wife pregnant. Tamar seduced her father-in-law
disguised as a prostitute in order to get pregnant by him after his
first two sons died without giving her any children (there is SO MUCH
MORE to that story but I don't want to make this post about that so
look at Genesis 38 if you want the full story). Abraham lied- more
than once. His wife, Sarah? She laughed at God's promise to give her
a child in her old age (I might have too, honestly. Yikes).
They say that "hindsight is
twenty-twenty." It's easy for us to look back at all that
happened over the course of hundreds of years with the Israelite
people and see that keeping the law, following the rules wasn't
enough to bridge the gap between sinful people and a perfect God.
That's why Paul says this at the end of this section of his letter to
the Galatians:
"Is there a conflict, then,
between God’s law and God’s promises? Absolutely not! If the law
could give us new life, we could be made right with God by obeying
it. But the Scriptures declare that we are all prisoners of sin, so
we receive God’s promise of freedom only by believing in Jesus
Christ." (Galatians 3:21-22)
So many people are under the impression
that being a Christian means a boring, rule following life. It's not
true. We are free because of our choice to love God, to accept the
promise he's made through his son Jesus Christ! And I wouldn't want
it any other way. Today, I am so thankful to God for all he has done
for me. I know, thanks to the Israelite people's stories in the Old
Testament, that I can't do anything on my own to be made right with
God. I need Jesus and I can't imagine life without him.
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