The Alternatives

Series on Galatians

II The Apostolic Assertions

C The Plague

Text: 3:10-14

Introduction

The renowned American poet Robert frost gave us the memorable poem entitled, The Road Not Taken, “TWO roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both And being one traveler, long I stood And looked down one as far as I could To where it bent in the undergrowth; Then took the other, as just as fair, And having perhaps the better claim, Because it was grassy and wanted wear Though as for that the passing there Had worn them really about the same, And both that morning equally lay In leaves no step had trodden black. Oh, I kept the first for another day! Yet knowing how way leads on to way, I doubted if I should ever come back. I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference.” Life is full of choices, of alternatives. Many times it is of little consequence which alternative we take. But Jesus said in Matthew 7:13 and 14, Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it. This choice is life changing. in Galatians 3:10–14 we have an antithesis of two ways: curse and blessing. These are two alternative roads: the first leads to a curse, the second to blessing. Unlike the protagonist in Frost’s poem the Galatian Christians were taking the road more travelled. Some Jewish Christians were pointing to the well-traveled road that had been taken by the Jewish people for centuries. “Join us in the Jewish way of life, identify us and on the more travelled road will you find blessing.” But Paul says that the way to blessing is the new road, the less travelled road, because Identification with Christ and the cross is the only way to true blessing. Identifying with the Jewish heritage is the way to being cursed. The truth of this would become even more apparent in 70 AD when God visited final judgment upon the nation Israel through the Roman destruction of the city of Jerusalem and the temple, as Jesus predicted. In this passage there are road signs showing all the right way, and they are: justice, justification, and judgment.

I Justice

The first road sign is in verse 10, All who rely on observing the law are under a curse, for it is written: “Cursed is everyone who does not continue to do everything written in the Book of the Law.” The quotation is from Deuteronomy 27:26 and the book of Deuteronomy is replete with terrible curses directed at those who fail to keep the law. The force of these severe warnings of destruction is tremendous in the historical context. Deuteronomy means second law, and it has this name because it is a reiteration of all the commandments God had given Israel before they entered the promised land. The Torah, or law, consists of five books and you read through them, as Moses did orally, and then as you come to the end of the fifth book you have all these curses associated with a failure to keep the law. The Judaizers were trying to persuade all those who had acknowledged Christ, both their own fellow countrymen and the Gentiles, to keep the Old Testament law. Paul is holding a gun to their head, he is saying that if they cannot keep their own law how would the Gentiles be able to do it. Of course they can be circumcised and observe the sabbath and the Jewish dietary regulations, but that is a far cry from obeying the whole law and as James says in 2:10 For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it. The slightest offense may seem inconsequential to us, but the wrath of God is infinite and even the smallest departure from the law arouses the infinite wrath of our holy God. In the garden of Eden God gave the first commandment and when it was disobeyed he cursed the serpent, Satan, and our first parents, Adam and Eve. The universal reign of death is a constant reminder that even the slightest infraction, like eating the fruit of a forbidden tree in the midst of abundance, brings the full weight of the curse of the law down upon our heads. This is divine justice.

II Justification

The second signpost along the way is identified in verses 11 and 12, Clearly no one is justified before God by the law, because, “The righteous will live by faith.” The law is not based on faith; on the contrary, “The man who does these things will live by them.” Clearly, Paul is reminding us that If we could keep the law perfectly as we ought, then we would be justified, but since we cannot there must be a path less taken, that is the path of faith. If we could be justified by keeping the law, there would be no problem, but since we cannot, we must be justified through faith. The two roads are mutually exclusive because the law is not based on faith. The first quotation is from Habakkuk 2:4, The righteous will live by faith, and this verse was very instrumental in the Protestant Reformation. We might say the most important discovery of that time was justification through faith and not through works. Martin Luther, an Augustinian Monk was long troubled in his conscience, and could find no relief or forgiveness until in a lengthy act of penance in Rome he was freed by this verse. He wrote, “Before those words broke upon my mind I hated God and was angry with him because, not content with frightening us sinners by the law and by the miseries of life, he still further increased our torture by the gospel. But when, by the Spirit of God, I understood those words – ‘The just shall live by faith!’ ‘The just shall live by faith!’ – then I felt born again like a new man; I entered through the open doors into the very Paradise of God.” The second quotation is, The man who does these things will live by them, and this is drawn from Leviticus 18:5. It tells us that the law and faith are incompatible because we must do the law, but we receive the gift of righteousness through faith. In every area of life including our Christian experience, “doing” is very important, but there is one exception. When it comes to being saved and forgiven and justified, there is no “doing.” There is only believing in accordance with Genesis 15:6, Abram believed the Lord, and he credited it to him as righteousness. Abraham did not choose the path most travelled. He took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference. So should the Galatian Christians, and so should we.

III Judgment

Verses 13 and 14 provide us with the final road sign, pointing us to the cross of Christ, Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: “Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree.” He redeemed us in order that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that by faith we might receive the promise of the Spirit. We have already learned of the cause and extent of the curse in verse 10, and now at the climax we learn about the removal of the curse. As Walter Hansen observes,“The Jewish Christians who were pestering the Galatian believers had drawn two circles: the circle of blessing for Jews and the circle of the curse for Gentiles. The Galatian believers were moving from the circle of Gentiles to the circle of Jews so that they could be free from the curse and obtain the blessing. But Paul has demonstrated from the law itself the surprising fact that the circle of Jews is also under a curse for failure to keep all the law. Transferring from the Gentile circle to the Jewish circle is no way to escape the curse of the law.” We can escape only through Jesus. Christ bore the penalty and curse that we deserve. Jesus said it Himself in Mark 10:45 For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many. The truth was present ages before in 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. This is the curse upon the serpent and in a graphic prophecy the picture is that the deliverer, the Messiah, the seed of the woman will trample on the serpents head, but in so doing His heel will be injured. John says that the Son of God was manifested to destroy the works of the Devil and it is in that effort that he is wounded, but in the resurrection he recovers. Because Jesus is man He can bear our punishment, and because He is God He can bear the full wrath of the Father, and because he is holy and without sin, justice demands that he rise again. It is finished. Whether Jew or Gentile, Galatian or American our creed must be that Jesus paid it all. According to verse 14 the reason Christ set us free from the curse of the law was to open the way for us to participate in the promised blessings to Abraham. Paul says that the blessing given to Abraham is equivalent to the promise of the Spirit. The Galatian believers had received the Spirit by faith in Christ crucified and were already recipients of the blessing promised to Abraham. If they are already recipients of the promised blessings to Abraham why are they now trying to keep the law in order to obtain the blessings they already have? That, as Paul writes, is foolish. We are all fools who do not trust in Jesus alone and doubly foolish if we try to add some other instrument to our salvation. It is salvation by grace alone through faith alone.