13 Christ has made us free from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us: because it is said in the Writings, A curse on everyone who is put to death by hanging on a tree:
Do not let his body be on the tree all night, but put it to rest in the earth the same day; for the man who undergoes hanging is cursed by God; so do not make unclean the land which the Lord your God is giving you for your heritage.
He took our sins on himself, giving his body to be nailed on the tree, so that we, being dead to sin, might have a new life in righteousness, and by his wounds we have been made well.
And this is love, not that we had love for God, but that he had love for us, and sent his Son to be an offering for our sins.
Being conscious that you have been made free from that foolish way of life which was your heritage from your fathers, not through a payment of things like silver or gold which come to destruction, But through holy blood, like that of a clean and unmarked lamb, even the blood of Christ: Who was marked out by God before the making of the world, but was caused to be seen in these last times for you, Who through him have faith in God who took him up again from the dead into glory; so that your faith and hope might be in God.
It was right for us to have such a high priest, one who is holy and without evil, doing no wrong, having no part with sinners, and made higher than the heavens: Who has no need to make offerings for sins every day, like those high priests, first for himself, and then for the people; because he did this once and for ever when he made an offering of himself.
For as the rain comes down, and the snow from heaven, and does not go back again, but gives water to the earth, and makes it fertile, giving seed to the planter, and bread for food; So will my word be which goes out of my mouth: it will not come back to me with nothing done, but it will give effect to my purpose, and do that for which I have sent it. For you will go out with joy, and be guided in peace: the mountains and the hills will make melody before you, and all the trees of the fields will make sounds of joy.
The God of our fathers gave Jesus back to life, whom you had put to death, hanging him on a tree.
Who gave himself for us, so that he might make us free from all wrongdoing, and make for himself a people clean in heart and on fire with good works.
And has gone once and for ever into the holy place, having got eternal salvation, not through the blood of goats and young oxen, but through his blood.
So Christ, having at his first coming taken on himself the sins of men, will be seen a second time, without sin, by those who are waiting for him, for their salvation.
Because it is not possible for the blood of oxen and goats to take away sins. So that when he comes into the world, he says, You had no desire for offerings, but you made a body ready for me; You had no joy in burned offerings or in offerings for sin. Then I said, See, I have come to do your pleasure, O God (as it is said of me in the roll of the book). After saying, You had no desire for offerings, for burned offerings or offerings for sin (which are made by the law) and you had no pleasure in them, Then he said, See, I have come to do your pleasure. He took away the old order, so that he might put the new order in its place. By that pleasure we have been made holy, by the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once and for ever.
My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may be without sin. And if any man is a sinner, we have a friend and helper with the Father, Jesus Christ, the upright one: He is the offering for our sins; and not for ours only, but for all the world.
And their voices are sounding in a new song, saying, It is right for you to take the book and to make it open: for you were put to death and have made an offering to God of your blood for men of every tribe, and language, and people, and nation,
And from Jesus Christ, the true witness, the first to come back from the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth. To him who had love for us and has made us clean from our sins by his blood;
For then he would have undergone a number of deaths from the time of the making of the world: but now he has come to us at the end of the old order, to put away sin by the offering of himself.
For I have a desire to take on myself the curse for my brothers, my family in the flesh:
And the Lord was no longer able to put up with the evil of your doings and the disgusting things you did; and because of this your land has become a waste and a cause of wonder and a curse, with no one living in it, as at this day.
Then Joshua had them put to death, hanging them on five trees, where they were till evening. And when the sun went down, they were taken down from the trees, by Joshua's orders, and put into the hole where they had gone to be safe; and great stones were placed at the mouth of the hole, where they are to this day.
Now when Ahithophel saw that his suggestion was not acted on, he got his ass ready, and went back to his house, to the town where he came from, and having put his house in order, he put himself to death by hanging; so he came to his end and was put in the resting-place of his father.
And a certain man saw it and said to Joab, I saw Absalom hanging in a tree.
Then Joab said, I would have made it safe for you. And he took three spears in his hand, and put them through Absalom's heart, while he was still living, in the branches of the tree. And ten young men, servants of Joab, came round Absalom and put an end to him.
So David said to the Gibeonites, What may I do for you? how am I to make up to you for your wrongs, so that you may give a blessing to the heritage of the Lord?
And he gave them up to the Gibeonites, and they put them to death, hanging them on the mountain before the Lord; all seven came to their end together in the first days of the grain-cutting, at the start of the cutting of the barley.
Because your heart was soft, and you made yourself low before me, when you had word of what I said against this place and its people, that they would become a waste and a curse, and you gave signs of grief, weeping before me: truly, I have given ear to you, says the Lord.
So Haman was put to death by hanging him on the pillar he had made for Mordecai. Then the king's wrath became less.
And the king said that this was to be done, and the order was given out in Shushan, and the hanging of Haman's ten sons was effected.
See, you will send for a nation of which you had no knowledge, and those who had no knowledge of you will come running to you, because of the Lord your God, and because of the Holy One of Israel, for he has given you glory. Make search for the Lord while he is there, make prayer to him while he is near: Let the sinner give up his way, and the evil-doer his purpose: and let him come back to the Lord, and he will have mercy on him; and to our God, for there is full forgiveness with him.
For all who are of the works of the law are under a curse: because it is said in the Writings, A curse is on everyone who does not keep on doing all the things which are ordered in the book of the law.
For I have taken an oath by myself, says the Lord, that Bozrah will become a cause of wonder, a name of shame, a waste and a curse; and all its towns will be waste places for ever.
Seventy weeks have been fixed for your people and your holy town, to let wrongdoing be complete and sin come to its full limit, and for the clearing away of evil-doing and the coming in of eternal righteousness: so that the vision and the word of the prophet may be stamped as true, and to put the holy oil on a most holy place.
And at the end of the times, even after the sixty-two weeks, one on whom the holy oil has been put will be cut off and have no ...; and the town and the holy place will be made waste together with a prince; and the end will come with an overflowing of waters, and even to the end there will be war; the making waste which has been fixed.
Awake! O sword, against the keeper of my flock, and against him who is with me, says the Lord of armies: put to death the keeper of the sheep, and the sheep will go in flight: and my hand will be turned against the little ones.
And he put down the silver in the Temple and went out, and put himself to death by hanging.
And they may have righteousness put to their credit, freely, by his grace, through the salvation which is in Christ Jesus: Whom God has put forward as the sign of his mercy, through faith, by his blood, to make clear his righteousness when, in his pity, God let the sins of earlier times go without punishment; And to make clear his righteousness now, so that he might himself be upright, and give righteousness to him who has faith in Jesus.
For what the law was not able to do because it was feeble through the flesh, God, sending his Son in the image of the evil flesh, and as an offering for sin, gave his decision against sin in the flesh: So that what was ordered by the law might be done in us, who are living, not in the way of the flesh, but in the way of the Spirit.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Galatians 3
Commentary on Galatians 3 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 3
The apostle in this chapter,
Gal 3:1-5
The apostle is here dealing with those who, having embraced the faith of Christ, still continued to seek for justification by the works of the law; that is, who depended upon their own obedience to the moral precepts as their righteousness before God, and, wherein that was defective, had recourse to the legal sacrifices and purifications to make it up. These he first sharply reproves, and then endeavours, by the evidence of truth, to convince them. This is the right method, when we reprove any for a fault or an error, to convince them that it is an error, that it is a fault.
He reproves them, and the reproof is very close and warm: he calls them foolish Galatians, v. 1. Though as Christians they were Wisdom's children, yet as corrupt Christians they were foolish children. Yea, he asks, Who hath bewitched you? whereby he represents them as enchanted by the arts and snares of their seducing teachers, and so far deluded as to act very unlike themselves. That wherein their folly and infatuation appeared was that they did not obey the truth; that is, they did not adhere to the gospel way of justification, wherein they had been taught, and which they had professed to embrace. Note, It is not enough to know the truth, and to say we believe it, but we must obey it too; we must heartily submit to it, and stedfastly abide by it. Note, also, Those are spiritually bewitched who, when the truth as it is in Jesus is plainly set before them, will not thus obey it. Several things proved and aggravated the folly of these Christians.
Gal 3:6-18
The apostle having reproved the Galatians for not obeying the truth, and endeavoured to impress them with a sense of their folly herein, in these verses he largely proves the doctrine which he had reproved them for rejecting, namely, that of justification by faith without the works of the law. This he does several ways.
Gal 3:19-29
The apostle having just before been speaking of the promise made to Abraham, and representing that as the rule of our justification, and not the law, lest they should think he did too much derogate from the law, and render it altogether useless, he thence takes occasion to discourse of the design and tendency of it, and to acquaint us for what purposes it was given. It might be asked, "If that promise be sufficient for salvation, wherefore then serveth the law? Or, Why did God give the law by Moses?' To this he answers,
The apostle adds that the law was given for this purpose till the seed should come to whom the promise was made; that is, either till Christ should come (the principle seed referred to in the promise, as he had before shown), or till the gospel dispensation should take place, when Jews and Gentiles, without distinction, should, upon believing, become the seed of Abraham. The law was added because of transgressions, till this fulness of time, or this complete dispensation, should come. But when the seed came, and a fuller discovery of divine grace in the promise was made, then the law, as given by Moses, was to cease; that covenant, being found faulty, was to give place to another, and a better, Heb. 8:7, 8. And though the law, considered as the law of nature, is always in force, and still continues to be of use to convince men of sin and to restrain them from it, yet we are now no longer under the bondage and terror of that legal covenant. The law then was not intended to discover another way of justification, different from that revealed by the promise, but only to lead men to see their need of the promise, by showing them the sinfulness of sin, and to point them to Christ, through whom alone they could be pardoned and justified.
As a further proof that the law was not designed to vacate the promise, the apostle adds, It was ordained by angels in the hand of a mediator. It was given to different persons, and in a different manner from the promise, and therefore for different purposes. The promise was made to Abraham, and all his spiritual seed, including believers of all nations, even of the Gentiles as well as the Jews; but the law was given to the Israelites as a peculiar people, and separated from the rest of the world. And, whereas the promise was given immediately by God himself, the law was given by the ministry of angels, and the hand of a mediator. Hence it appeared that the law could not be designed to set aside the promise; for (v. 20), A mediator is not a mediator of one, of one party only; but God is one, but one party in the promise or covenant made with Abraham: and therefore it is not to be supposed that by a transaction which passed only between him and the nation of the Jews he should make void a promise which he had long before made to Abraham and all his spiritual seed, whether Jews or Gentiles. This would not have been consistent with his wisdom, nor with his truth and faithfulness. Moses was only a mediator between God and the spiritual seed of Abraham; and therefore the law that was given by him could not affect the promise made to them, much less be subversive of it.