Does God, Who gives you His Spirit and works miracles among you, do these things because you have obeyed the Law or because you have believed the gospel?
   You can go right back to Abraham to see the principle of faith in God. "He," we are told, "believed God and it was counted unto him for righteousness." You may be certain, then, that all those who "believe God" are the real "sons of Abraham." The scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles "by faith," proclaimed the gospel in the words spoken to Abraham, "In you shall all nations be blessed." All men of faith share the blessing of Abraham who "believed God." God's purpose is therefore plain: that the blessing given to Abraham might reach the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, and the promise of the Spirit might become ours by faith.
   Let me give you an everyday illustration, my brothers. (Note in passing that the scripture says not "seeds" but uses the singular "seed," meaning Christ.) I say then that the Law, which came into existence four hundred and thirty years later, cannot render null and void the original "contract" which God had made, and thus rob the promise of its value. For if the receiving of the inheritance were to depend on the Law, then it does not depend on promise. But God gave it to Abraham by promise.
   Where then lies the point of the Law? It was an addition made to underline the existence and extent of sin but only until the arrival of the "Seed" to Whom the promise referred. The Law was appointed by means of angels, by the hand of an intermediary. The very fact that there was an intermediary is enough to show that this was not the fulfilling of the promise. For the promise of God needs neither angelic witness nor any intermediary but depends on Him alone.
   Is the Law then to be looked upon as a contradiction of the promises? Certainly not, for if there could have been a law which gave men spiritual life then that law would have produced righteousness. But, as things are, the scripture has all men "imprisoned" under the power of sin, so that to men in such condition the promise might be given to all who believe in Jesus Christ.

Taken from Galatians 3, The Phillips Translation. For free Lifescope book,
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