One Way

Series on Galatians

II The Apostolic Assertions

B The Patriarch

Text: 3:6-9

Introduction

Have you ever been on a one way street in a strange town and discovered that you were going the wrong way. You were probably shocked and scared. There is only one way to God and the Galatians were going the wrong way. Paul would have liked them to be shocked and scared. In the first part of this chapter, verses 1-5, Paul has called their efforts vain and their behavior foolish and senseless. Now he begins to expand their understanding of what the Scriptures were always teaching Israel, namely that salvation is by grace through faith. Noun and verb forms of the word faith occur seven times in verses 1–9. In verses 6-9 we see that none are excluded from the blessing because they are not Jewish. Faith alone brings the blessing of Abraham and it brings it on all who believe like Abraham. As is readily apparent and is spelled out in the rest of this letter being a child of Abraham really never had anything to do with being his physical descendant. It has always meant being his spiritual descendant. Such are the true heirs. In redirecting the church to the Bible, the Protestant Reformation set forth various principles, now enshrined as maxims and bywords. They are Grace alone, faith alone and Christ alone, and they are what the Apostle is focusing on here. He suggests that the Galatians Jew and Gentile alike have missed three truths. We must understand these or it’s three strikes, you’re out. Paul says they are chosen with Abraham, consecrated with Abraham, and confirmed with Abraham.

I Chosen with Abraham

Thus we read in verses 6 and 7, Consider Abraham: “He believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.” Understand, then, that those who believe are children of Abraham. The Jews of Jesus day were exceeding,y proud that they were descendants of Abraham. Yet in the days of Ezekiel when God pronounced judgment upon Jerusalem for their unfaithfulness, God said to them in 16: 2-14, Son of man, cause Jerusalem to know her abominations, and say, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah unto Jerusalem: Your birth and you nativity is of the land of the Canaanite: your father was an Amorite, and your mother a Hittite. And as for your nativity, in the day you were born your navel was not cut, neither were you washed in water for cleansing; you were not rubbed with salt at all, nor swaddled at all. No eye pitied you, to do any of these unto you, to have compassion upon you; but you were cast out in the open field, from abhorrence of your person, in the day that you were born. And I passed by you, and saw you weltering in your blood, and I said unto you, Live! yea, I said unto you, in your blood, Live! I caused you to multiply, as the bud of the field; and you did increase and grow great, and you came to fulness of beauty; your breasts were fashioned, and your hair grew: but you were naked and bare. And I passed by you, and looked upon you, and behold, your time was the time of love; and I spread my skirt over you, and covered your nakedness; and I swore unto you, and entered into a covenant with you, says the Lord Jehovah, and you became mine. And I washed you with water, and thoroughly washed away your blood from you, and I anointed you with oil; and I clothed you with embroidered work, and shod you with badgers’ skin, and I bound you about with fine linen, and covered you with silk. And I decked thee with ornaments, and I put bracelets upon your hands, and a chain on your neck; and I put a ring on your nose, and earrings in your ears, and a beautiful crown upon your head. Thus were you decked with gold and silver, and your raiment was linen, and silk, and embroidered work. You ate fine flour, and honey, and oil; and you became exceedingly beautiful, and you prospered into a kingdom. And your fame went forth among the nations for your beauty. This Word of the Lord clearly tells us that there was nothing in Abraham to cause his leaving Ur in Babylonia and following the Lord into the great unknown. It was sovereign divine election. The Bible does not say that Abraham made a covenant with God, but rather God made a covenant with Abraham. Throughout their history God is repeatedly reminding Israel that he chose them, the physical seed of Abraham. They were not choice, but they were chosen. Paul says “consider Abraham,” and they were to learn from that consideration that it was grace that brought Abraham out of Ur just as grace brought Israel out of Egypt under Moses. Secondly they were to learn that grace, the gift, must be received and that act of receiving is called faith not works. Their history was a witness to the fact that it was not who your biological father was that mattered, but what mattered was who was your spiritual father.

II Consecrated with Abraham

Abraham is set apart as the one through whom all of God’s blessings will come to all the world as we read in verse 8, The Scripture foresaw that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, and announced the gospel in advance to Abraham: “All nations will be blessed through you.” By alerting us to the Scripture (Scripture foresaw) the Apostle is reminding the Jewish Christian Galatians and the Judaizers that God’s intentions were a matter of record in their own account, which was of course inspired by God. The plan was not an afterthought or a desperation measure taken after God’s dealings with Adam, Noah, Abraham, and Moses fell through. Rather it is the one ancient promise made in the beginning and continued through Abraham, Genesis 3:15, And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.” The struggle is between the seed of the serpent and the seed of the woman, and the seed of the woman is the seed of Abraham, Jesus Christ. This precious truth was previously “gospeled” (literally “evangeled”) to Abraham. It had been proclaimed to him as good tidings of great joy for the entire world. This promise, though always valid, was to be realized on an international scale with the coming of Christ and of the dispensation which that coming would usher in. The content of the promise proclaimed to Abraham was this: “In you all the nations shall be blessed” The principle of righteousness by faith attested for Abraham in Genesis 15:6 is explicitly extended by Scripture itself to the Gentiles. The Mosaic law made careful distinctions between those who were Jews and those who were not; who was blessed and who was not, but the earlier promise to Abraham specifically included “all nations” in the blessing. Thus Martin Luther reminds us, “This promise of blessing is given to Abraham 430 years before the people of Israel received the law. It is said to Abraham: because you have believed God and have given glory to Him, therefore you shall be a “father of many nations” (Genesis 17:4). So the inheritance of the world for his posterity is given to him before the law was published. Why then do you brag, O Galatians, that you obtain forgiveness of sins and are become children, and receive the inheritance through the law, which followed a long time after the promise, that is to say, 430 years.” All of this the Scripture said, but Paul had also learned from his missionary experience that God would justify the Gentiles by faith. We should also consider the implicit argument against the Judaizers requiring circumcision. It is clear that Abraham was justified before before circumcision, just as he was justified before the giving of the law through Moses. When he was already accounted righteous because of his faith, the Scripture makes mention of circumcision, in Genesis 17:10, This is my covenant, which ye shall keep, between me and you. For the first century Jews, both “keeping” the law, and being circumcised were indications that they were Abraham’s children, but in Romans 4:9-12 Paul argues, Is this blessedness only for the circumcised, or also for the uncircumcised? We have been saying that Abraham’s faith was credited to him as righteousness. Under what circumstances was it credited? Was it after he was circumcised, or before? It was not after, but before! And he received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness that he had by faith while he was still uncircumcised. So then, he is the father of all who believe but have not been circumcised, in order that righteousness might be credited to them. And he is also the father of the circumcised who not only are circumcised but who also walk in the footsteps of the faith that our father Abraham had before he was circumcised.

III Confirmed with Abraham

The conclusion of our text is in verse 9 where Paul writes to the churches, So those who have faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith. This is also a conclusion of an argument. Premise one is that any and all who believe as Abraham believed are saved. Premise two is that all who believe will come from every nation because in the seed of Abraham all nations are blessed. So the conclusion is that all those who have faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith. There are many implications for this statement as observed by William Hendriksen. He says that the church of both dispensations, the old and the new, is one. All believers dwell in the same tent., because when the old dispensation ended the old tent was simply enlarged. All of God’s children are represented by the same olive tree. The old tree did not have to be uprooted; new branches were grafted in among the old. To each of the saints the same promise is given: “I will be your God.” This promise runs through both Testaments. Further, according to Hebrews 11:40, apart from us those of the old dispensation do not reach perfection. The names of all God’s people are written in the same book of life. There are not two of those books: one for the old and one for the new dispensation; there is only one. All are foreknown, foreordained, called, justified, and glorified. All partake and will partake of the glories of Jerusalem the Golden, the city on whose gates are written the names of the twelve tribes of the children of Israel, and on whose foundation stones are engraved the twelve names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb. Once this is understood the Bible becomes a living book. The unity of the covenant of grace in Old and New Testaments is essential to understanding the Bible. The form of the covenant changes from Old to New, but the substance remains the same. Thus Paul in Romans 4:22–24. reminds us that Abraham’s faith “was reckoned to him for righteousness,” and then he adds, “But not for his sake alone was it written that it was reckoned to him, but for our sake also.”