Galatians 3 -- Contract Law 101

Paul pretty wells sounds like an attorney specializing in contract law here, and God caught my eye this morning by it, reminding me of the hammering out of contract agreements that I often see at work.

What Paul talks about in verse 20 is important, for in most contracts, there are two or more contracting parties, and each agrees to do or not do certain things as their consideration given (what’s required of them by the contract) to get their desired benefit.  Our court system becomes the mediator whenever one party fails to perform as promised.

Verse 20 tells us that there was only one contracting party in what Paul was talking about and He was God.  Paul therefore reasoned that a mediator was not needed.  In other words, man did not have to perform before he could get what God promised, so no court system was needed to let God off the hook for His promise if we failed to perform.

Paul said that Moses and the angels served as mediators in bringing the Law to the people, and that implies that some requirement was placed on man that made having a mediator necessary.  And here, Paul said, is the glaring weakness of the Law – it required man to do what we are incapable of doing.  “It called for obedience from those who did not have the power to give it,” my commentary said.

But God had made a promise to Abraham, while he was technically still a Gentile, to bless all nations through Abraham’s seed, not seeds.  With that promise, nothing was required of man.  “God was the sole contracting party.  Everything depended on God and nothing on man.”

Father, I continually prove to myself just how weak I am.  I couldn’t successfully keep all of the provisions of the Law for a day, much less for my entire life.  I’m a sinner in a body infected with sin.  As a contracting party, I would therefore lack the capacity to make a contract with You requiring obedience.  How thankful I am that You promised what You did, for I have been incalculably blessed by Your grace and love, unable to give anything in return other than my belief in Your Son’s death for me on the cross.  Such an awesome and loving God I have!

Your Brother In Christ,

Gary Ford