Family of God

 Hello everybody. 

We will pick up where we left off in Galatains 3.  This time, we examine verses 26-29: 

26 You are all children of God through faith in Christ Jesus. 27 For all of us who have been baptized into Christ have been clothed with Christ. 28 We are no longer Jew or Greek, slave or free, male or female, since we all are now one in Christ Jesus. 29 So if you are in Christ, you are a descendant of Abraham, and, according to the promise, heirs. 

You may remember from the previous post that the Law was to serve as a παιδαγωγόν (paidagōgon), or guardian.  He tells in verse 25 by coming to faith in Jesus, we no longer need this guardian. Now, in verse 26 and following, we can see that since we are no longer under that guardian of the Law, we live by our faith and now are children of Abraham, whether Jew or Gentile. 

So, in Christ, we reach adulthood, and can receive the inheritance of God that His children receive.  Paul has been making the claim that we are children of God based on our faith rather than our heritage or our obedience to the Law.  In verse 27 he further explains this relationship.  He says, “For all of us who have been baptized into Christ have been clothed with Christ.” So then, all baptized believers have put on Jesus.  We are wrapped or enveloped in Christ. This is not the only time that Paul makes this comparison to clothing.  In Romans 13:14 he tells them to “put on Christ.”  In Colossians 3:9, he tells the church at Colassae to put off the old self, then in verses 12-14, he tells them, “as God’s chosen people” to put on a number of Christ-like attributes like compassion, kindness, humility and others.  

So what does this all mean?  As His children, we are to be Christ-like in our appearance, completely absorbed in Him. 

Douglas Moo makes reference to Isa. 61:10 here.  It says, “I delight greatly in the Lord; my soul rejoices in my God. For he has clothed me with garments of salvation and arrayed me in a robe of his righteousness.” (Moo, 252,)  It is an appropriate reference here, as in Galatians we are putting Christ when we are baptized, but really it is God that is doing all of the work here, clothing us and making us righteous.  

In verse 28 we see that because of the Promise and our faith in Jesus, we are now one in Christ. The barriers that separated us: ethnicity, socio-economic status, even gender, are gone.  We all share in the blessings and the inheritance of Abraham. 

Note:  Since women share in the promise in God’s kingdom, in that kingdom, they are no longer to be second class citizens, getting a full inheritance, just like their brothers.  

Paul says similar things in 1 Corinthians 12:13 and Colossians 3:11.  Galatians is the only one that includes male and female. All three passages contain opposite pairs and all start with the main opposite pair for how the Jews see the world:  Jew and Gentile. Paul’s point is similar in all three.  We are all part of one body, have one Spirit and all belong to the one Christ. 

In verse 29, Paul makes a concluding statement pulling the two big ideas together here, that, in Christ, we are: 1)  Children of Abraham, and 2) Heirs of the Promise. The point that Paul continues to make remains.  We belong to the family of God, not because of our obedience, but because of our faith.