Part LVI on The Study of Galatians

Galatians 3:7b
"...they which are of faith, the same (way) are the children (the true sons or promised seed) of Abraham."  We have entered in the faith way + nothing the same way that Abraham did, and so consequently we are spiritually now connected to this man Abraham. In and through Christ Jesus. Now to follow that up we've again got to go all the way back to Genesis. Let's turn to chapter 13, and there are some interesting words in this passage. Now of course this is the chapter after the Abrahamic Covenant was given so he's already on Covenant ground, he already has all these promises. Now look what God says to Abraham.


Genesis 13:16a
"And I will make thy seed..."  Or your off spring. Also here is another little quirk of Hebrew. We have to discern from the context whether the word seed is singular and speaking of Christ or whether it's plural and speaking of the whole Nation of Israel. Now that takes some doing we know, and we know when we were in Genesis we gave the example even in our English language. We can have 12 sheep over there, and 1 over here, but what do we call them? Sheep. It's the same way with the Hebrew word that pertains to the word seed. It can be plural, but the same identical word can be singular, so we must use our where with all to determine from the context of the text as to how its speaking, singular, and the Messiah, or it is speaking plural the children of Israel. Well this one is plural.


Genesis 13:16
"And I will make thy seed (the off spring) as the dust of the earth:..." (earthy, tied to the external realm or material)  Now what's dust? Is it earthly or heavenly? Well it's earthly. So his earthly protegee would be as the numbers of the sand of the sea. In other words the Nation of Israel would be in terminology of course that is comparative. Compared to the rest of the nations of the ancient world were by far more in number. Now turn the page to Genesis chapter 15, and verse 5. And now look what God promises.


Genesis 15:5
"And he brought him forth abroad, and said, Look now toward heaven, and tell (or count) the stars, if thou be able to number them: and he said unto him, So shall thy seed be."  Now what was God doing? Playing games? No. God in His infinite Sovereign Grace was promising Abraham two different groups of people that would be connected to him. Now naturally the dust of the earth was his earthly offspring who came by the sons of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Now when God brings him out and tells him to look toward the heavens, God is talking about a heavenly connection (spiritual). Most of us have been hearing us teach long enough now to know that we have two concepts in Scripture, "The earthly people Israel and The heavenly people who are the Church." All right Abraham is being promised a connection to both of them. He will have an earthly progeny which are the children of Israel the Hebrews, but he's also going to have a heavenly progeny (another Israel if you will) which are those who have entered in like he did by simple trust and obedience in faith, and faith alone, through Christ Jesus (the promised seed of woman, Genesis 3:15).


So now we have this two fold promise the Nation of Israel which would be earthly, but also a group out there some place who would be connected to him only in the realm of the spiritual, who develop the same kind of trusting faith. Now we already made our point as we come back to the Book of Galatians. Let us say something that maybe will help a little bit. In a time line we find Abraham back about 2000 years before Christ. Also on this time line we have the finished work of the Cross at Calvary, and then here we stand in this interval from the time of the early Acts, an especially with Paul's ministry, and the Body of Christ is being called out.


All right we've already made our point. How do we become members of the Body of Christ that is being called out? By faith + nothing! Abraham became the Friend of God and his righteousness because of his faith + nothing also! This was done just by believing what God said. Now if we were in an algebra class what would we be able to say? There's an equality. Right? This is equal to this. Why? Because Abraham received eternal life the same way the Church Age believer does, we all came in the same way. Now to make our point, how did people back here from Adam, Abel, Seth, Noah, and all the way up to Abraham, how did they come into a right relationship with God, faith + nothing? No way, but rather it was faith + sacrifice. They couldn't approach God without the sacrifice. Coming up to the Cross even in Christ's earthly ministry, did Jesus ever teach the concept of a salvation by faith and faith alone. No. What were they to do? They were still to be in adherence to the Law of Moses, they also had the added responsibility of repentance and water baptism, + their faith. But faith alone wouldn't cut it. Even in the early chapters of Acts until chapter 11, it wasn't just trusting and faith alone. They had to repent and be baptized, and that was the requirement. It wasn't just empty words, but their requirement.


Then along comes the Apostle Paul with faith + nothing, and this is why he had so much opposition. That's why we imagine out there at least silently we've also got that opposition. We don't hear it personally, but we know it's out there. "We hear, you make it too simple! You've got to repent and be baptized." And we've even had people say, "Well we've always been told that you have to repent, be baptized, and speak in tongues before we're saved." Well that's not faith + nothing, that's faith + something. OK now what's our point?


That just as surely as Abraham was saved by faith + nothing when he believed God when He told him to go to a land that He would show him. We, in the Body of Christ, are saved by faith + nothing when we believe God when He tells us to believe the Gospel for Salvation in I Corinthians 15:1-4. So on the basis of faith + nothing Abraham had imputed righteousness, we as members of the Body of Christ have also imputed righteousness, and that makes us just like Abraham. Does that make sense? No one else in all of God's economy had that privilege. Let us show this in the Epistle of Hebrews. Maybe that will make our point. Chapter 11 - the great faith chapter. It goes clear back to Genesis chapter 4.