Continued from Part 4.

To get the context for this discussion you should probably go back and read the previous posts on this topic.

But why was the law given then? In other words, if the law does not apply to me in my relationship to God, why give it? If I am completely forgiven and declared righteous completely apart from my obedience to God’s commandments, why does He give commandments? He answers that question in verses 22-24 of Galatians 3. First he says that it confines all under sin. In other words, the law lays down the standard, and no one lives up to it. Therefore all have sinned and fall short of God’s glory. Don’t just skip over this. That is an interesting reason to give the law: “to confine all under sin.” Paul writes essentially the same thing to the Romans in Romans 5:20, “Moreover the law entered that the offense might abound.” Abound means to increase. The law was given to increase the sin. There are more attitudes and deeds that are sinful than you can imagine. When we confess to a few sins each day, we are way underestimating our sinfulness!

Second, before faith came we were kept under guard by the law and kept for the faith that should be revealed later on (Galatians 3:23). Before faith came the law had a guardianship role to keep people under control. A question you should ask yourself is what is the timeline involved? In other words, the law guarded before the faith came. When did the faith come? When did that guardianship end?

Third, the law was a tutor to bring us to Christ. Again, he says that when faith came, the tutor relationship ended. When did that faith come? We’ll look at the timing of this more later. What I want us to see now is that the purpose of the law had nothing to do with giving salvation because it can’t do that. It doesn’t even have anything to do with spiritual growth. As you will recall, Paul asked that question in verse 3. His conclusion was that the law neither perfects nor matures us. The law’s responsibility was to confine all under sin, make us all guilty, and to guard and serve as tutor until the time that faith comes, at which time, it would point to Jesus Christ as our only hope.

In the Old Testament God said that those who keep the law will be blessed and those who don’t keep it in its entirety will be cursed. (If you didn’t read the beginning of this series, you need to go back and start with Part 1.) There are many Christians who are still trying to live under those terms, trying desperately to keep the law so that God’s blessing will be on their lives. They do this because they read this in Deuteronomy and Joshua. They believe this applies to them. But it does not! What we’ve learned in this study is that as Christians, we are children of Abraham and therefore recipients of the unconditional promise made to him and to his seed. Christ took God’s curse on himself so that the blessing of Abraham could be ours (Galatians 3:14). There is no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus (Romans 8:1). Those who are in Christ Jesus are completely forgiven and declared righteous apart from the works of the law (Gal 2:16; Rom 3:28).

What I’m trying to encourage you with is to realize and believe that God will not add conditions to the blessing He is giving you through His promise to Abraham. The law that came 430 years after the promise cannot annul the promise. If you’re a Christian, the discussion of God’s curse does not apply to you. Christ became the curse so that you won’t be the recipient of it. The way to avoid the curse is to trust in God’s promise of salvation through Jesus Christ. Having done so, you are justified and declared righteous by faith. Any righteousness you bring to God is flawed and tainted and is replaced by the perfect righteousness of Christ.