Tuesday, May 22, 2012

Part LXXII on The Study of Galatians

Matthew 24:37
"But as the days of Noe were, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be."
Well we're getting closer to this description of the earth today. Now come on down to verse 12 of Genesis chapter 6. We're always saying that when the Scripture repeats something 3 or 4 times in a matter of a few verses, it's there for emphasis, it's getting our attention. And here it come again:


Genesis 6:12-13
"And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth. 13. And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me: for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth."  Was there anything to deter violence, and corruption? No. There were no laws, there were no systems of worship, there was a ritual that men could follow, but only a few of them knew and practiced it and this was the end result. Even after the destruction of the flood everything starts cranking up again (but remember God has always had His few exceptions, in this case it was Noah, Shem, Eber, and Abram) and it's heading right down that same old road, until they get to Babel, and then they're ready to embrace every evil, pagan concept of worship that you can imagine. All the Tower of Babel was was a place of worship, it was pagan, and it was ungodly. Out of it came all the immorality of the mythologies, and mythological gods and goddess, you name it, and once again God just saw it all, and said, "Now this time I'm not going to destroy them, but I am going to do something different.” 


God turned to Abram, was he the only man that God could use. No, but God spoke to him and called him out out from among his people or fathers house and place of living. Then He gave him these promises. Then after Abram received all the promises, and the “I wills” of chapters 12, 15, and 17 and so forth. It is just here we need to see a place of change that is coming:

Genesis 17:19 
"God said, Sarah thy wife shall bear thee a son indeed; and thou shalt call his name Isaac: and I will establish my covenant with him for an everlasting covenant, and with his seed after him." from here look at chapter 21 verse 12


Genesis 21:12 
" God said unto Abraham, Let it not be grievous in thy sight because of the lad, and because of thy bondwoman; in all that Sarah hath said unto thee, hearken unto her voice; for in Isaac shall thy seed be called."  This indicates and break or split in the road because Isaac is the son of promise through whom the promised seed of woman is to come not though Jacobs seed but Isaac's. Isaac was a son of righteousness or faith in God and Jacob is a practical man, though not as earthy as his brother Esau, one without faith there is the difference.


Now it comes to the place where God says, "Man has to understand what's right and what's wrong, because he doesn't seem to get it." So He gave the Law and its codicils or statutes and ordinances, and He laid it down with authority. "Thou shalt have no other God's before me." Well right off the bat what did that fly in the face of? Everything that had taken place at Babel, because Babel was the beginning of all the false worships and every man doing his own thing. Then God comes on through with the rest of the Ten Commandments. Now remember, and very few people understand this. Percentage wise it would be way down but what does Romans 3:19-20 say? These are verses that very few people even know are in their Bible, and yet they say so much. Remember what we just saw in Galatians. That the Law was added because of sin, it was the corral or tutor for the Hebrews until Christ came. It did not take sin away from people, but rather it merely showed them the utter sinfulness sin and it could only condemn them.


Romans 3:19
"Now we know (full knowledge) that what things soever the law saith, (the Ten Commandments in particular) it saith to them who are under the law; (who was that? Israel. Only Israel was put under the Law, but the power of it, the convicting part of it didn't stop with Israel, but rather went out to the whole human race.) that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God."  Now you see that's exactly the opposite of what most people think is the function of the Law. Most people think that the Law was given to help people do right, do the best they could, and God would somehow wink and say, "Yeah you didn't do too bad, I'll let you in." But you see that wasn't the purpose of the Law. The Law was given for only one purpose and that was to show mankind how far they fallen from God's required standard. No man that has ever lived could keep the Ten Commandments, because it's impossible for the carnal or earthy man (only the Spiritual Man the giver of the Law lived in it is required demands, Jesus). So it was given for that purpose alone. Now verse 20 makes it so clear. Now since all the world has become guilty by the giving of the Law:


Romans 2:20
"Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin."  Oh, if our friends don't learn anything else, we would hope that they'd learn this. That the Law can do nothing but convict a person of their utter sinfulness. So that's why it was added. Up until this time of the flood God couldn't impute all that wackiness. He couldn't put it to those people's account because they weren't breaking any written code s or laws. For all early man had was his conscience and the Holy Spirit. Now that's hard for us to comprehend and we know it is. We say, "Now wait a minute when they come up before the Great White Throne the books aren't going to be open for them like they will be for every one since the Law?" No, not in the same way.


Now they're going to come before the Great White Throne, and they're going to be consigned to their place of judgment but God is not going to be able to say, "Look at all the Law-breaking that you did." Because they had no law, all they had was they're conscience and you can't break a law if there isn't one. But as soon as the Law was given then the whole world became responsible. Now there is no question, adultery is sin. Yes, thievery is sin, yes coveting is sin, and all the way down through the Ten Commandments. So now all the world has been made guilty because now there is no excuse, " Well I didn't know there was a law against that.” Now we know and that's what it means. Now back to the Book of Galatians. Verse 19 again-

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