Meditations in Galatians #15, Monday, June 15, 2009 Galatians 3:17-18
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"What I am saying is this: the Law, which came four hundred and thirty years later, does not invalidate a covenant previously ratified by God, so as to nullify the promise. For if the inheritance is based on law, it is no longer based on a promise; but God has granted it to Abraham by means of a promise. "
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You gave the promise of eternal life to Abraham through a covenant, as something to be inherited, 430 years before Israel stood at Mt. Horeb to receive Your Law through Moses. Abraham was not "saved" by a Law that did not yet exist. So how did anyone under the Law not understand this? Shouldn't they all have known that they must have a faith like Abraham's in order to participate in the blessing which was promised to him? Did they really think that they would receive the inheritance of eternal life just because they were Abraham's biological descendants? Even Jesus felt this error was important enough to condemn it directly. There seem to have been times in Israel's history when only Your prophets knew this.
Even Moses knew this. In Deuteronomy 28, Moses wrote out a terrifying list of destructions that You Yourself would bring on Israel for its disobedience. Later, Moses actually said that he knew they would not keep the covenant You made with them through Him. In Leviticus 26, He described what You would do to try to restore Israel if they rebelled againt Your Law, and how ultimately, after the covenant was finally broken beyond repair, that You would remember Your covenant with Abraham. All of this came true at the moment of Jesus' death when the Temple veil was torn in two.
You have never invalidated Your covenant with Abraham. Paul said that Jesus' death meant that the blessing of eternal life which You promised Abraham in that covenant was available to anyone who had faith like Abraham, not just his biological descendants. Someday I would like to know exactly what this means and how Jesus' cross did this.
I am so glad that You led David to mention the nature of the promise You made to Abraham in Psalm 133. Without that, this might have been much harder to understand, since Moses did not describe it that way.
Paul was trying to explain to the Galatians that the only way to receive eternal life was to inherit it from Abraham, and that You never changed that condition. Nothing was ever added to the original covenant. Moses' Law was never an alternate means to eternal life, and had no impact on the covenant You made with Abraham. Since You gave Abraham the Blessing through a promise, and not througth a law, no one can share in the promised blessing except through inheritance. So we must become "sons of Abraham" in order to inherit eternal life, and that is what happens when we enter into Jesus' New Covenant. So the Plan of Salvation has never changed. Wow!
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Thank You for giving me a few minutes of your time. Galatians is a unique letter. It will take some time to get into Paul's mind, and from there to understand what God has chosen to reveal through the disaster that the congregation at Galatia was experiencing.
The effect of these Meditations will be cumulative, and the real benefit may have nothing to do with what I have written. I believe that the discipline of having a brief daily conversation with God about the meaning of a variety of Bible passages over a period of a few weeks, even if you come to some very different conclusions, will still be a wonderful and enlightening experience for you. At DeadRight.net, under the Yellow Pages, is some background info about Galatians. If you missed an earlier Meditation, you can still read it at DeadRight.net by going to the homepage, clicking on Newsletter, and clicking on "browse previous newsletters