Galatians 3: The Promise—God's True Heart That Came Before the Law
Galatians 3: The Promise—God's True Heart That Came Before the Law
Galatians 3
17 What I mean is this: The law, introduced 430 years later, does not set aside the covenant previously established by God and thus do away with the promise. 23 Before the coming of this faith, we were held in custody under the law, locked up until the faith that was to come would be revealed. 27 For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. 28 There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. 29 If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise.
1. The Law: Humanity's Response to the Promise
In Galatians 3, Paul unfolds God's salvation history like a grand courtroom drama. His central argument, much like Romans 4, establishes a chronological priority: God's promise to Abraham preceded the law given at Mount Sinai by 430 years. Therefore, a law that came later cannot invalidate an inheritance covenant established earlier—this is a perfectly logical argument. But we must go a step further. The law did not come to compete with or replace the promise. Rather, the law was Israel's joyful, confessional response to God's prevenient grace—the saving event of the Exodus. If we embrace critical biblical scholarship, when Israel returned from Babylonian exile and sought to reconstruct their history, the spirit of the law was essentially their holy commitment: ""Before the God who saved us, this is how we will live."" God's giving of the stone tablets with the Ten Commandments at Sinai was His loving affirmation of their confession, and the law represents their wholehearted pledge offered with body, mind, and soul. Just as a response cannot nullify an invitation, the law can never abolish the promise. While the law is a precious tool in God's hands, by its very nature it can neither precede nor supersede the promise.
2. The Tutor's Role: An Honorable Limitation
So what is the role of the law? Paul defines the law as a tutor (guardian) that led us to Christ (v. 24). A tutor is charged with protecting and disciplining the master's son until he reaches adulthood. This is by no means a worthless function. The law performed an honorable role: it revealed what sin is, made us realize that we cannot become righteous before God by our own strength, and caused us to earnestly await a Savior. However, the problem arises when the heir reaches adulthood yet continues to remain under the tutor's rules. This was precisely the situation with the Galatian believers who were trying to make works of the law a condition for salvation even after faith had come. Paul proclaims, ""Now that faith has come, the time of being imprisoned under the law's supervision has ended!"" (v. 23). Let us not allow what once protected us to become a prison that shackles our freedom. Paul's passionate appeal is to honor the tutor's dignified exit and now boldly enjoy the inheritance as sons and daughters.
3. Clothed with Christ: New Creation Beyond All Boundaries
The outward sign of this new life through faith is baptism. Paul declares that we ""were baptized into Christ and have clothed [ourselves] with Christ"" (v. 27). This expression of being clothed with Christ is not about our ethical practice or decision, but God's sovereign invitation and declaration that precedes our actions. In the waters of baptism, the old self dies, and God dresses us in the new garment of Christ. This is a new identity given entirely by grace.
This new garment renders all the world's boundary lines meaningless. ""There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female"" (v. 28). If circumcision was the sign of the law that created boundaries between Jew and Gentile, baptism is the sign of the gospel that tears down all such boundaries. This is the moment when God's promise to call Abraham the father of many nations is finally fulfilled. The cross not only demolished the vertical barrier between God and humanity, but also destroyed every horizontal barrier between human beings. When we belong to Christ, we become Abraham's true descendants and heirs of heaven—not through bloodline or law-keeping, but according to the promise. This is God's unchanging heart and promise that calls us through faith, beyond the law. Paul powerfully proclaims this truth."