Gospel of John [17:13-14]. The Lord's priestly prayer; part 17. Gal 3:1-14.

Title: Gospel of John [17:13-14]. The Lord's priestly prayer; part 17. GAL 3:1-14.

 

GAL 3:1 You foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you, before whose eyes Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified [posting of a public announcement - Paul's gospel]?

 

GAL 3:2 This is the only thing I want to find out from you: did you receive the Spirit by the works of the Law, or by hearing with faith?

 

They can only answer this - by faith.

 

GAL 3:3 Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected [completed, matured] by the flesh?

 

GAL 3:4 Did you suffer so many things in vain —  if indeed it was in vain?

 

GAL 3:5 Does He then, who provides you with the Spirit and works miracles among you, do it by the works of the Law, or by hearing with faith?

 

GAL 3:6 Even so Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness.

 

GAL 3:7 Therefore [conclusion from verse 6], be sure that it is those who are of faith who are sons of Abraham.

 

GAL 3:8 And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying [GEN 12:3], "All the nations shall be blessed in you." [not by means of circumcision or Mosaic Law]

 

GAL 3:9 So then those who are of faith are blessed with Abraham, the believer.

 

GAL 3:10 For as many as are of the works of the Law are under a curse; for it is written, "Cursed is everyone who does not abide by all things written in the book of the law, to perform them."

 

GAL 3:11 Now that no one is justified by the Law [en nomo - in the book of the law] before God is evident; for, " The righteous man shall live by faith." [HAB 2:4]

 

Obedience to laws cannot pay for sin, only blood can pay for sin, and the blood of Christ, meaning His substitutionary spiritual death, is the only qualified sacrifice. The wages of sin is death.

 

He is not here talking about the experience of faith in the life of the believer since that doesn't fit the context.

 

The righteous man shall live by faith means that God's righteousness, true life, eternal life, the life that is Christ, comes by means of faith.

 

Justification in the Bible sense is the act of God removing from the believing sinner, his guilt and the penalty incurred by that guilt, and bestowing a positive righteousness, Christ Jesus Himself in whom the believer stands, not only innocent and uncondemned, but actually righteous in point of law for time and for eternity.

 

Because I am in Christ, the Law for me is fulfilled. Because I am in Christ I cannot come into judgment for anything. I am a child of my Father in heaven and I have a guaranteed position which Christ is now preparing a place for me and that is a guarantee that I will occupy that place, and am in position, occupying it now.

 

The words justify, justification, righteous, righteousness, as used of man in his relation to God, have a legal, judicial basis. God’s holy demands are perfectly satisfied.

 

God is the judge, man the defendant. God is the standard of all righteousness.

 

 

The white linen curtains of the court of the Tabernacle, symbolized the righteousness which God is, the righteousness which God demands of any human being who desires to fellowship with Him, and the righteousness which God provides on the basis of the acceptance on the sinner's part, of the Lord Jesus who perfectly satisfied the just demands of God's holy law which we broke.

 

A just person therefore is one who has been thus declared righteous.

 

ROM 1:16-17

For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, "But the righteous  man shall live by faith."

 

The righteousness of God is revealed by faith and unto faith in those who believe and who thus live in eternal life as those who are perfectly righteous by imputation.

 

This is not a progressive righteousness or a righteousness worked out in men, but an imputed righteousness, given freely because Christ Jesus satisfied the holy demands of the Father.

 

The plan of God is also righteous. It is a way that God deems right and now that we are righteous we are qualified to walk in that way with the result that we will experience who we are in Christ and be expert witnesses of Him, yet that plan does not make any believer one ounce holier, nor does its neglect diminish how righteous he is in the eyes of God. God has asked us to learn His way and when we do, and that is academic as well as application, then we will love that way and walk in it.

 

GAL 3:12 However, the Law is not of faith; on the contrary, "He who practices them shall live by them."

 

Law and faith as a means of justification are mutually exclusive.

 

The statement, "The law is not of faith" means that the two principles of law and of faith as a means of justification are mutually exclusive of one another. They are diametrically opposed to each other.

 

His quote of LEV 18:5 which he also quoted in ROM 10:5 is a statement that could never be done but sheds light on the righteousness that comes by faith. If there was a man who could keep the whole law he would have to have been a perfect man, like Adam, and remain perfect and then he could be deemed righteous, but it would be a human or creature righteousness. His righteousness would not be from the source of God but his own. If this would be true of a perfect creature, though it has never been a reality, then how much more pitiful is the fallen creature attempting to keep a system of law to be righteous before God? This is not the righteousness of God which is imputed to the sinner who has faith because of the work of Christ. God has imputed His very own righteousness.

 

So even if we found some magical way to keep all the commands of the NT apart from our understanding of His plan and His ways and apart from the power of God the Holy Spirit it would not be a function of God's righteousness but our own.

 

Yet as I said, that magical trick does not exist for anyone. Such a righteousness does not exist no matter what definitions the world uses.

 

The law was given so Israel would be led to Christ; to their need for a Savior and then the commands of the Law would have been seen in a completely different light. A man who lived during the dispensation of Israel, if he knew he was saved, would have loved the Law, for all of it pointed to the gift that saved him. And he therefore would have fulfilled the greatest commandment of the law, to love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. And if God could deliver him from sin through a sacrifice so full of amazing grace, couldn't God also take care of his every need while he fulfilled the second greatest commandment of the law by loving his neighbor?

 

MAT 22:37-40

'You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.'  "This is the great and foremost commandment. "The second is like it, 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.'  "On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets."

 

GAL 5:14

For the whole Law is fulfilled in one word, in the statement, "You shall love your neighbor as yourself."

 

For us in the Church age, the commands are different and who we are in position is miles apart, but the fact of the love for God as the way or means of fulfilling the law, in our case, the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus, is the same.

 

JOH 14:15

"If you love Me, you will keep My commandments.

 

JOH 15:10

"If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love; just as I have kept My Father's commandments, and abide in His love.

 

I don't work to love, I am regenerated and the epitome of love, Jesus Christ, lives in me. Faith in the word and Spirit brings me to the maturity, completeness, of fullness of love. As I progress towards that fullness of maturity I see more and more the love of God's ways, God's order, God's direction, God's purpose, i.e. God's righteousness.

 

The more I mature through the teaching, leading, and empowering of God the Holy Spirit the more I will fully love God's righteousness (God's way, order, direction, will).

 

Since righteousness is God, loving it is loving Him.

 

God is righteousness, but God also loves righteousness. We say God does what is right because that's who He is, but do we realize how much He loves who He is and loves His way, order, direction, purpose, and will?

 

PSA 11:7

For the Lord is righteous;

He loves righteousness;

The upright will behold His face.

 

PSA 33:5

He loves righteousness and justice;

The earth is full of the lovingkindness of the Lord.

 

As we grow in conformity to our Lord we will not attempt to live sanctified or righteous only because we should, but because we love to. It becomes our greatest love because He is our greatest love.

 

What would have certainly been a stumbling block to Saul of Tarsus and many other learned Jews living at the time of Christ was the fact that He died on a Cross. If there was any chance that this Jesus was in fact the Messiah it was fully negated in their eyes by the fact that He became cursed. And yet we see in Paul such a transformation that he sees the truth and beauty of Christ's curse.

 

GAL 3:13 Christ redeemed [exagorazo - to purchase as one would a slave] us from the curse of the Law, having become a curse for us —  for it is written, "Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree" — 

 

The curse here is that which the legal passages of the Mosaic law pronounced upon those who did not perfectly obey its demands. The law pronounced a blessing [Mt. Gerizim] and a curse [Mt. Ebal].