Galatians 3:1-9 – Start well but also end well

In verse 1 Paul chided the Galatians for their folly because they had started by faith, but now lived as if their journey with Christ could be completed by their effort in obeying the Law. In using the word “bewitched,” Paul implied that their straying away from Christ was somewhat diabolical. It was as if someone had cast a spell over them, to cover their spiritual sight from the message of the crucified Christ. 

From verses 2-5, Paul asked a series of questions. The purpose for asking these questions was not to seek for answers but to emphasize a point. They were rhetorical questions, asked to realign the thoughts of the Galatians. Paul wanted to stir them to consider their actions and make correction to their wrong conduct.

 

Through the questions, the Galatians were brought back to their initial experience with Christ. They had begun by receiving the Spirit through the hearing by faith, and not by observing the Law. Paul emphasized that it was foolhardy for them to expect what had begun in faith to be completed by their self-effort in observing the Law. He reminded them of the hardship that was involved in order for them to attain their spiritual experience, and that they should hence not allow it to end in futility. In asking them if indeed it was in vain, Paul believed that the Galatians could be salvaged.

In verse 5, Paul basically said the same thing as verses 2-3 except that he put it in another way. He was indirectly talking about how God, through him, imparted to them the Spirit and works of miracles by the hearing of faith, and not through their observation of the Law. The “works of miracles” mentioned here was Paul’s indirect way of substantiating his apostleship, because one of the signs of an apostle is the working of miracles.

In arguing from Abraham’s life, Paul showed the genius that he was. His opponents used Moses to argue their case but he went back centuries before Moses, to the life and mission of Abraham. Here he quoted from Genesis 15:6 to prove that Abraham was made righteous by faith. God made Abraham a promise – the promise of a seed and posterity. But Abraham knew how humanly impossible it was for that to come to pass. So God took him out into the open and told him to count the number of stars in the sky, and promised him descendents as numerous as the stars. Abraham believed God and righteousness was reckoned to him. Abraham received his righteousness by faith and not works, because the Law and circumcision weren’t even given then. 

                                           

Wisely, Paul also linked this to another promise God had made to Abraham earlier in Genesis 12:3. The blessing to the nations through Abraham is justification. The means to receive that justification is faith. This is the only way for the Gentiles to receive it because they are not Abraham’s physical descendents. Paul proved here that the true children of Abraham are those who have received the promise made to his seed and not his posterity by physical descent. We have all began well so let us also end well, holding fast the profession of our faith without wavering.