Narrative Lectionary Program Year – One in Christ
Galatians 3.1-9, 23-29
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Furthering the Power of God’s Story – Narrative Lectionary Commentary
by Rev. Dr. Clint Schnekloth
Deceit is kind of a big deal in the Bible. It’s not just that biblical ethics against it. It’s literally that deceit breaks all the things.
Paul, like Jesus, is never more enraged than when those who are entrusted with the gospel themselves deceive those who are receiving it.
Jesus said to his disciples, “Occasions for stumbling are bound to come, but woe to anyone by whom they come! It would be better for you if a millstone were hung around your neck and you were thrown into the sea than for you to cause one of these little ones to stumble.”
Jesus’ harshest words are not for those who stumble, but for those who deceive and therefore cause others to stumble.
So also in Galatians, some of the harshest discourse found anywhere in Scripture, and in Paul, is reserved by Paul for those who have deceived the Galatians into accepting “some other gospel,” which is in fact not the gospel at all, according to Paul, but such a deep corruption of it that it eviscerates the gospel altogether.
In a way it’s rather simple. Paul is arguing they should not turn back to previous ways of salvation or achieving righteousness, and by faith look to Christ alone and his righteousness.
Then, because faith is so incredibly freeing, it frees those who have believed in such freedom space not simply to move beyond the law as a source of justification, but even beyond some of the traditional ways the law enforces identity outside of identity in Christ.
Here in Galatians we get one of those dramatic eschatological declarations of what it means to be “in Christ.” Life in Christ is beyond gender, race, ethnicity, religion, and ownership.
Instead, those made righteous by faith in Christ are literally ONE in him.
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Exegetical Links
Who Are Abraham’s Heirs, Steve Godfrey
The End of the Cosmos, Andrew Prior
Galatians 3:19—25 As An Argument for God’s Faithfulness, L. Ann Jervis
Great Quotes
“Abraham believed the promises of God, and God declared Abraham “righteous.””
A Good Read
Pauls Negotiation of Abraham in Galatians 3 in the Jewish Context: The Galatian Converts Lineal Descendants of Abraham and Heirs of the Promise
by Per Jarle Bekken
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Free Dramatic Reading For This Text (NRSV)
Reader: Paul 1, Paul 2
Paul 1: You foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? It was before your eyes that Jesus Christ was publicly exhibited as crucified! The only thing I want to learn from you is this: Did you receive the Spirit by doing the works of the law or by believing what you heard? Are you so foolish? Having started with the Spirit, are you now ending with the flesh? Did you experience so much for nothing?—if it really was for nothing.
Paul 2: Well then, does God supply you with the Spirit and work miracles among you by your doing the works of the law, or by your believing what you heard? Just as Abraham “believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness,” so, you see, those who believe are the descendants of Abraham. And the scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, declared the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying, “All the Gentiles shall be blessed in you.”
Paul 1: For this reason, those who believe are blessed with Abraham who believed. Now before faith came, we were imprisoned and guarded under the law until faith would be revealed. Therefore the law was our disciplinarian until Christ came, so that we might be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer subject to a disciplinarian, for in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith.
Paul 2: As many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus. And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to the promise.