Study of Galatians Part 9 - Galatians 3:15-22

Last week we heard that our attempts to be acceptable to God by keeping His law put us under a curse, because we never come close to doing everything as we should. Our hope is not in our efforts, but in Christ, who “redeemed us from the curse of the law,” by taking on Himself all sins and “becoming a curse for us,” and paying the penalty for all our sins, in our place (Galatians 3:10-14).

Paul then continued to emphasize the difference between the Gospel promises of God, given to Abraham, and the Laws given 430 years later to Moses and God’s people at Mt. Sinai. Paul used a "human example” of a "man-made covenant” or agreement - for example, a Last Will and Testament that someone makes. Various promises are made about money and property and who will be given these things. Once that will is prepared and signed, it cannot be added to or changed by anyone other than the author of the will. Everything will finally be revealed at the time of death (Galatians 3:15).

This is in a sense what God did, Paul said, when He made the covenant of promise to Abraham, when He first called Abraham in Genesis 12. God promised that He would make of Abraham “a great nation” and He promised, “In you (in your seed, in your offspring) all the families of the earth shall be blessed” (Genesis 12:2-3, Galatians 3:16).

Paul went on to point out that in the original language, the word for “seed” or “offspring” was singular, not plural. One particular offspring of Abraham would be a blessing to all families on earth; and Paul identified that offspring, that descendant, to be “Christ“ Jesus (Galatians 3:14,16). What Abraham believed in Genesis 15:6, was that God would keep His promise and give Abraham that great nation, and give from that nation a particular descendant who would bless all nations. In effect, Abraham was ultimately believing in the coming Christ Jesus, and by that faith, Abraham was counted righteous in God’s eyes.

Paul also pointed out, in Romans 4:9-10, that Abraham was “counted righteous” by faith before, not after, he was circumcised. The call to to be circumcised came later, in Genesis 17, so circumcision itself had nothing to do with Abraham’s being called righteous. In fact, Paul explained in Romans 4:11-12 that circumcision was “a seal of the righteousness that he (already) had by faith while he was still uncircumcised.” “The purpose,” Paul said, “was to make him the father of all who believe” - whether they were circumcised or not - “so that righteousness would be counted to them all by faith” in God’s promises, not by circumcision itself.

Back in Galatians 3:17, Paul also reminded the Galatians that the 10 Commandments and other laws were not given until 430 years later (see Exodus 12:40), when God led His people out of Egypt, through Moses, and brought them to Mt. Sinai. There, God blessed them and said He loved them and had already rescued them from slavery in Egypt, by His own care and mercy. (See Exodus 20:1-2 and Deuteronomy 33:1-4.) Only then did God give them His commandments and other laws.

Paul was saying that the Law was important, but it was not a way of earning God’s favor and salvation. In Galatians 3:17, Paul made it clear that the Law did not “annul” the covenant of promise that God had already “ratified” through Abraham. The “inheritance,” the blessings of God, would still come by God’s promise, given to Abraham and fulfilled finally in the descendant, Christ Jesus, and not by keeping new laws which would make the promises of God “void.” For, Paul said, “if the inheritance comes by the law, it no longer comes by promise” (Galatians 3:18).

Why then the Law? Why was it given? It was not given to save us, by our obedience to it. Rather, Paul said, “it was added because of transgressions,” until the offspring, our Lord Jesus, would come, to whom and through whom the promise of God had been made and would be fulfilled (Galatians 3:19). The Law’s primary purpose was to show us and the whole world our transgressions, our sins, and that we could never be good enough in God’s eyes by our own efforts (Romans 3:19-20, 23).

Paul even went so far as to say in Romans 5:20 that “the Law came in to increase the trespass” - not that God wants sin to increase, but that we would have increasing knowledge of how great our own sins are, as we compare our lives with God’s standard, His Law. Then we stop trying to trust our own good works and efforts and know how much we need a Savior, that Offspring from Abraham, our Lord Jesus. There are other purposes of the Law, but this is the primary one, showing us how serious and hopeless our sinful condition is, left on our own.

Paul ends this section of his letter by talking about intermediaries and mediators. There is mention in the Scriptures that when the Law was given, angels were involved in some way. (See Deuteronomy 33:1-4, Acts 7:38, Hebrews 2:2, etc.) But even with all these angels around, we humans still do not always do what the law says.

Stephen preached, “You who received the Law, as delivered by angels, did not keep it” (Acts 7:53). In fact, “God is one," Paul says (Galatians 3:20). No sinful human being can mediate with God and help himself or any other person. (See Psalm 49:7-9.) Only God Himself can help us - and He does so in the person of His Son, who became man, that perfect Offspring, and did His saving work for us.

The Law is not contrary to the Gospel, the promise of God in Christ, Paul concluded. We need both, but they serve different purposes. There is no Law that can “give us life”(Galatians 3:21). Rather, the “Scripture” that is Law shows us that we and everything else are “imprisoned under sin” and cannot rescue ourselves by our own works and efforts.

We are driven by the Law, therefore, to Christ alone and what He has earned for us and gives us: “the promise by faith in Jesus Christ to those who believe,” including us (Galatians 3:22). We, along with Abraham, are counted as righteous simply by God’s promise and His gift of faith, given to us in Christ (Galatians 3:22).

That is what Paul wanted the Galatians, and us today, to believe. Being circumcised or keeping other old laws and rules cannot save us, in spite of what false teachers say. We are saved only by God’s grace, through the gift of faith that Jesus gives to us, through His Spirit, working in His Word and Sacraments.

The Lord’s blessings to you all, in the promises of God in Christ Jesus.