Hey my friends, it's Matt. This is the Ten Minute Bible Hour Podcast, and we continue to be in the home stretch of Galatians. We're in Paul's closing arguments. It's not even really closing arguments, it's like a resumarization, a highlighting of all of the important stuff from this book that we have now spent 272 going on, 273 episodes working on without apology, I might add. And in these closing remarks, Paul is alluding back to a bunch of stuff that you and I took a whole bunch of time, if you've done this whole season with me, to think about as it came up. And this next little bit that we're getting here, this on my list, this would be like the fourth point of emphasis or reminder that he's making at the end here. This next one on this list does the same thing. It's going to take us back to a passage from 150 or so episodes ago. And well, let me just tell you what I'm talking about right here. Paul, in his closing summary, says here in Galatians 6, 11, see what large letters I use as I write to you with my own hand. So there we get point number one of Paul's summary. That is, I'm Paul and I wrote it. And point number two is implicit, which is it matters that Paul wrote it. I'm speaking with authority. He goes on to write in verse 12 Those who want to make a good impression outwardly are trying to compel you to be circumcised. The only reason they do this is to avoid being persecuted for the cross of Christ. Not even those who are circumcised obey the law, yet they want you to be circumcised, that they may boast about your flesh. Yesterday we talked about a third summary point that Paul is making here, which is speaking with the authority of the church, I condemn the teachings of the Judaizers. They are wrong. I am giving you the teachings of Jesus. Jesus' disciples agree with me on this. Here is truth. They are teaching falsehood. Don't integrate what they're saying at all. But also in this little passage, we get some nods to what exactly they were getting wrong. What exactly are we speaking to? If you just go pick up a study Bible or something and you thumb to the first page of a given study Bible, and you're like, well, what's the point of this book of the Bible? And you go to Galatians, you're generally going to see something that's like, this is about faith versus works. That's the point of Galatians. And I think you and I have spent enough time on this book to say, is that the point of Galatians? I think rather it'd be better to say it's a point of the book of Galatians. Clearly, there was a tension here between people who thought that the way to right standing with God was by going way harder on the law of Moses from the Old Testament. If Moses said to get circumcised once, why don't we get circumcised twice? I don't know that they ever actually said that one, but it was that kind of thinking. If there's this many rules, let's make bonus rules. Let's strictly adhere to that stuff. And then there's other people like Jesus and the disciples and Paul who are saying and the Bible who are saying, no, there's only one way to right standing with God, and it's Christ, because you can't uphold the law, you cannot circumcise hard enough, you cannot Ten Commandments hard enough, you cannot Old Testament rules hard enough, you cannot Jewish social preferences of the first century hard enough to become perfect and to impress God. The law makes us aware of our imperfection, but ultimately it is Christ who offers forgiveness. It is Christ who gives us his righteousness. Abraham believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness. Well, if you believe God, if you believe Christ, goes the reasoning in Galatians, then you are joined with Abraham, the man of faith, and you are made right before God, not with your own righteousness by doing lots of great things or obeying the law or even bonus laws, but simply by the work of Christ, the grace of God. So in that regard, well, yeah, the tension between works as a means to right standing before God, or adherence to the law as a means of right standing before God, the tension between that and faith in Christ alone as the only way to right standing with God, yeah, that is addressed in the book of Galatians. It's there, it's important, it's a central theme, but think about how much more now that we've looked closely at this is going on throughout this passage. I mean, we're also dealing with the question of ethnic insiders and ethnic outsiders. Who is the family of faith? Who is in God? Circumcision, remember, wasn't just a random work. It was the work that was the boundary marker of households that were in the Jewish ethnic religious family or out of the Jewish ethnic religious family. Well, now circumcision isn't that marker anymore. So who's in? Who's in the family? And Paul is making it very, very clear. And he's going to make it clear here again in just a couple more verses at the end of Galatians 6. It's anybody who's joined with Abraham, the man of faith, who has faith in God and who trusts Christ. If you are in Christ, you are a part of God's family. You're no longer a slave, you're a son, a daughter, an agent, an heir of the kingdom. You have a role in the household of the king. Well, that is a massive point. And one could forgive the Judaizers if that huge shift was a little bit difficult for them to internalize. But it would seem to me that a fourth point that Paul is making here at the end of Galatians would be that there just isn't hope in the law. It isn't like you have two options for how to have right standing with God, and some people are going to do better with this one, and some will do better with obeying a lot of rules because they're really good at obeying rules and they can generate their own righteousness. But some other people aren't going to be as good at that and they're going to have to depend on Jesus more. No, no, no, no, no. There is one way, and the only way is through Christ. Well, that sort of sends us down the rabbit trail of the question of, okay, well, then why is there a law at all? Well, because according to Paul, in the middle of the book of Galatians, the law was a teacher. It was a pretty tough one. Like you could even liken it to a slave master, training servants, bondservants, even slaves. And it was a tough tutor with really tough standards, and it played its role for a period of time. It demonstrated our inability to live up to its standards. It also taught us things about the character of the great king who wrote this law. But ultimately, our right standing in the household of faith was never going to be because of what we got from that tutor. Ultimately, our right standing, the only way inside the house, from the status of slave to the status of son, daughter, child, heir agent, is by the master's will. By the master saying, You are this, I declare it. No one else has the authority to do that or muster it or make it happen. So then, one of Paul's closing points, I'm calling it the fourth closing point, is that there isn't hope in the law. It was our teacher. It is no longer our teacher. Effectively, when Jesus came, maybe the moment Jesus showed up, maybe the moment Jesus started teaching, maybe the moment Jesus went to the cross, maybe the moment that he was raised, maybe the moment that he was ascended, maybe the moment the Holy Spirit showed up in Acts chapter 2. I haven't really thought about when the exact flip-the-switch moment is, but somewhere in there, a switch got flipped, and the law was no longer our tutor and our master. Rather, our primary teacher was Jesus. Our primary teacher was the Spirit who indwells Christians. But one thing that's really important to note across the book of Galatians is that Paul is making it very clear that when that switch got flipped from the law is our teacher to Christ, the being indwelt by the Spirit, walking by the Spirit, that's our teacher. When that switch got flipped, that's the only switch that got flipped. It wasn't like back in the day people had right standing with God because of the law. Then Jesus came, died on the cross, was resurrected, the Holy Spirit showed up, and now there's another switch that got flipped. And now you're saved by Jesus. Now you're saved by the grace of God. But back then, you know, people were made of sterner stuff, and they could earn it by really doing a good job with the law. No. Remember, Paul points back to Abraham and says that Abraham, I mean, like the number one guy from the entire Old Testament, Abraham, everybody knows the turn of the phrase. Everybody knows his reputational statement that goes along with him. He believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness. That's it. Abraham was not the best at obeying the law. And one of the reasons he wasn't the best at that is because Abraham lived before the law was issued. He never even read the law. He never even heard of the law. He didn't know what it is. It came way after him, almost a millennium after Abraham lived, is when the law happened. But I think everybody thinks Abraham went to heaven. Jesus does. I mean, read the New Testament. There's a whole story where Abraham's right there. He went to heaven. How'd that happen? Well, he believed God and God credited to him as righteousness. So there's really two levels in Galatians that we need to note here in terms of what Paul is saying about the relationship between the law and faith in Christ. Level one is the law used to be our teacher. It was a cruel teacher. It was a difficult teacher. God used it anyway. It revealed our weakness. It revealed the character of God. But ultimately, there wasn't life in it. It wasn't meant to give life. Rather, the giver of life is God Himself, the King, the Master Himself. How do we encounter that? Through Christ. How do we impress him enough to earn it? We don't. No one can boast. It's the gift of God. It's crazy. It's just, I mean, it's not our calculus. It's wild. So that's one very important contrast in the book of Galatians between the law and faith in Christ, right there. Paul is effectively saying they're not two ways to the same thing. Rather, on one level, they're two different teachers. The law was your teacher and your master for a while, and now you're indwelt by the Spirit. But the second level of contrast here is on that question of right standing with God. And the law, Paul makes it very clear, never saved. Remember the quote from Deuteronomy that Paul throws out in the middle of Galatians 3? He quotes the Old Testament saying, Cursed is everyone who does not continue to do everything written in the book of the law. Then Paul goes on to say, clearly, no one is justified before God by the law, because the righteous will live by faith, and the law isn't based on faith. So the second big point of contrast between the law and faith in Christ is that the law was never a route to salvation. It wasn't like the law used to be a way to right standing with God in the Old Testament if you worked really hard, but then Jesus came and now I guess just nobody can do it anymore. Uh-uh-uh-uh-uh-uh-uh. It never saved. It was always faith. It was always the gracious work of God who breathed life into those metaphorical, dead, dry bones. Salvation was always the gift of God, never earned by the labor of imperfect being, never earned by people trying to obey the law. It was never an avenue to right standing with God or salvation. And therefore, in this regard, is not really in the same category as faith in Christ. God has always been the author of salvation. It's always been by his grace alone and by his power alone, going all the way back to Abraham. So what do we have going so far here at the end of Galatians that Paul seems to want to really remind us of? One, hey, I'm Paul and I wrote it. Two, that's important because there is actual authority here. There are true teachers and false teachers. Three, know the difference between the two. The people who threw you into confusion are wrong and bad. Don't integrate their thinking, disregard it. Listen to the people who are teaching the stuff of Jesus. And four, there is a contrast between the law and faith in Christ. One of those contrasts is that in the old days the law was our teacher, but it was a tough one. Now we live by the Spirit. The other contrast is some of you are apparently mistaken on the notion that the law saves. It doesn't. It never did. It's always been from God. It's always been by faith. He's always been the owner of salvation, and we've never been able to earn it. We'll unpack the rest of what Paul is saying or reminding us of here in his closing remarks next time around. I'm Matt, this is the 10 Minute Bible Hour Podcast. Let's do this again soon.