But before the faith
came from we were kept
under guard by the
law, kept for faith
which would afterward
be revealed.
Therefore law was our
tutor
to bring us to
Christ, that we
might be justified by
faith.
But after faith has
come,
we are no longer under a
tutor.
For you are all sons
of God
through faith in
Christ Jesus.
Galatians 3: 23 -- 26
Paul
reiterates over, and over, that righteousness comes by faith and not by works
that men might do or accomplish. The
law given to teach men what is sin, and furthermore, the wall would lead men to
Jesus Christ and by becoming a son, of God, this was through faith in Jesus
Christ. The ceremonial law served a
purpose for the Hebrew people in West to continue until the promised Messiah
came, and that Messiah was Jesus Christ.
Then the ceremonial law abolished to promote the spirituality of the
divine worship. The ceremonial law was
gross, carnal, and calculated for an infant, and was a sensitive work,
especially for a sensitive church.
Think about this whole ceremonial law consisted in the rudiments, the
circumcision of the flesh, the blood and smoke of sacrifices, the smell of
incense, observation of days, even a distinction of meats, and corporal
purification. The law was clogged with
some sort of rite to be particularly observed by the Jewish people. This is what Judaizers were attempting to do
with this infant and sensitive Christian church. They were attempting to return them to the ceremonial law and
especially the law of the circumcision of the flesh. Often when you are performing various rituals or rights, even
reciting the Lord's prayer, or one of the creeds of the Church, something done
each Sabbath, there is a possibility and does happen that the ceremonial ritual
becomes rote. Those ceremonial laws were to teach them about the glory of God
but had become veiled under some sort of cloud, and the people no longer
worshiped God or beheld God and His glory.
If the church had returned to the ceremonial law then they too will fall
in under this veil. When you fall under
the legalistic practices of works to define your spirituality then in some
sense you to have fallen under this cloud and you can no longer look at that
which would fail by the death, resurrection, and ascension to heaven, by our
Savior Jesus Christ. Works should come
out of a person's faith, and not for the works themselves, but to allow the
Holy Spirit to lead whatever way He desires to lead. Legalism in actuality this as defined in
Scripture is in opposition to the Gospel, which is called Spirit. Yes, the ceremonial law was ordained by God
as it was part of his divine economy and dispensation, instituted by Him,
albeit instituted by God the apostle Paul declares this no better than simple
carnal ordinances: "But now we have
been delivered from the law, having died to what we were held by, so that we
should serve in the newness of the Spirit and not in the oldness of the
letter" (Romans 7:6). The
Gospel is the ministration of the Spirit, and has special in its virtual
efficacy on the minds of men. Now when
the Galatians who were degenerate, after having tasted of the pure strain of
the Gospel, returning back to drink of law, the
apostle chided them for doing so, for that which had begun in the spirit would
now be made perfect in the flesh. The
moral law, is in of itself its own nature spiritual, in regards to any abuse of
its, that is, to be an expectation of justification by outward works, then it
is called flesh. The law had been
written on paper, and by the incarnation of God, Jesus Christ the only begotten
son of God, the law was now written upon the heart and that law no
longer required the old ceremonial laws of works. It is not that we must not do certain things or do certain
things, that is, the moral law as recorded in the 10 Commandments that we are
to follow and Paul and other writers explain how that law would be carried out
in a person's life and there is no sense that any works a person because the
only justification is by faith. These legal
ceremonies were never fit to bring the heart into its spiritual frame. Yes, but by its spiritual intent, and this can be
seen in the rock and the manna which prefigured to salvation and spiritual
narration by Jesus Christ. The
sacrifices were to point them to the justice of God and the punishment of sin,
furthermore, they were to point to the mercy of God in substituting them, for
them, and the types of the Redeemer in the ransom by His blood. This brings us to the circumcision which was
being attempted that all people who became Christians must adhere to circumcision of the flesh. This veil over the people did not instruct them in the
circumcision of the heart. The law was
a schoolmaster fitted for weak people, and simply an administration. Year after year high priest gave a sacrifice
for the sins of the people and now the high priest, Jesus Christ paid once and
for all the final sacrifice for the payment of sins for all time. This He did by sacrificing His human life on the
cross. Our faith is in that fact, and
that fact is, a man Jesus Christ, Jesus Christ who is God in the flesh would
come as a man, the Second Person of the Trinity, paying His a debt owed to Him,
by Himself and by His mercy applies a sacrifice to the children of God. Now, it is by faith in the actual work of
Jesus Christ, the promises of God fulfilled, that we have a foundation for that
faith, and by this we are justified.
Paul writes: "For as many of
you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free,
there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ's, then you are
Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise" (Galatians 3: 27 --
29).
For God is the King of all the earth;
sing
praises with understanding.
Psalm 47:7
Arise, your Redeemer lives
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