Why the Law, Pt. 1

Okay, Galatians chapter 3. Now we're doing a three-part series here, 19 through 24, and I'll start by just reading 19. That's what we're going to get through today, 19 and 20. That's as far as I got for this first part. So Paul says, why the law then in verse 19?

It was added because of transgressions having been ordained through angels by the agency of a mediator until the seed would come to whom the promise has been made. Now a mediator, in verse 20, is not for one party only, whereas God is only one. Verse 21, is the law then contrary to the promises of God?

May it never be. For if a law had been given which was able to impart life, then righteousness would indeed have been given based on law. But scripture has shut everyone under sin so that the promise by faith in Christ Jesus might be given to those who believe. But before faith came, we were kept in custody under the law, being shut up to the faith which was later to be revealed. Therefore, the law has become our tutor to lead us to Christ so that we may be justified by faith. And that we'll get to that tutor issue later on in part two or part three of this series of 19 through 24.

Oh, where did... Oh, I just wanna show you a picture of Mount Sinai. here, Mount Horeb, where the Israels, they think it's maybe this one. It could be another one. It's a choice between two. And you see this little guy down, can you see my cursor? So it's a pretty big mountain, but we're looking at this giving of the law right to start this lesson. So that's where it was given. If you camp the Israelites right here, I guess, and then God appeared up here. Interesting how this is all blackened, isn't it? Maybe by fire, who knows? So that's where we're starting here. And this is Exodus 19.

So in the third months after the sons of Israel had come out of the land of Egypt, they came into the wilderness of Sinai. And I'll kind of paraphrase a little. Moses went up to God, and the Lord called him from the mountains, saying, Thus you shall say to the house of Jacob, and tell the sons of Israel, You yourselves have seen what I have done to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles' wings, and brought you to myself. Now then, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, then you shall be my own possession among all the peoples, for all the earth is mine, and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. These are the words that you shall speak to the sons of Israel." So this is them getting their mission. They're getting chosen right here. This is it. Israel is getting chosen right here at Mount Sinai. They call it both.

So Moses came and called the elders of the people and set before them all the words which the Lord had commanded him. And the people answered and said, all that the Lord has spoken we will do. Very optimistically, huh? And then Moses brought back the words to the people to the Lord. So I have this highlight in green. I want you to remember that.

And the Lord said to Moses, so here's the Lord again speaking to Moses, behold, I will come to you in a thick cloud so that all the people may hear when I speak with you and may also believe in you when I speak with you and may also believe in you forever." Then Moses told the words of the people to the Lord. So there's a back and forth between God and Moses here, and then to the people of Israel. The Lord, here's verse 10 of Exodus 19, the Lord also said to Moses, go to the people and consecrate them today and tomorrow, and let them wash their garments, and let them be ready for the third day, for on the third day, the Lord will come down on Mount Sinai in the sight of all the people. That's why I had that picture of Mount Sinai. So you get that in your mind, that picture in your mind.

You shall set the bounds for the people saying, beware, you do not go up on the mountain or touch the border of it. Whoever touches the mountain shall surely be put to death. No hand shall touch him, but he shall surely be stoned or shot through. Whether beast or man, he shall not live. When the ram's horn sounds a long blast, then come up to the mountain."

So Moses went down from the mountain to the people and consecrated the people and washed their garments. And he said to the people, be ready for the third day. Do not go near a woman. 16 so came about on the third day it was morning and there is thunder and lightning Flashes and a thick cloud upon the mountain and a very loud trumpet sound so that the people who were in the camp trembled and Moses brought out the people of the camp to meet the Lord and they stood at the foot of the mountain Mount Sinai Mount Horeb.

So there it is. There's um There's the giving of, well, the consecrating of Israel. In chapter 20, the next chapter, he gives them the law, right, the Ten Commandments. So here we go back to the Galatians and verse 19. So Paul asks the question, why the law then? He said, it was added because of transgressions, having been ordained through angels by the agency of a mediator until the seed would come to whom the promise had been made. So this is our question for this morning. Why the law, then?

And we get the answer from the verse, because of transgressions. Now, transgression is to step over or beyond the limit to violate a prescription, and it's a willful disobedience, which is in view, is what a transgression is. And note that it was added because of sin. Sin is defined as falling short or missing the mark. And note that sin was already there, wasn't it, from Adam. But sin needs to be addressed and to be revealed for what it is. And that's the reason for the law. So the law provides a relief or backdrop to make sin visibly clear.

And Merriman says, the promise of Abraham, which we looked at before earlier in the chapter chapter three, the promise to Abraham does not address or highlight sin or righteousness. It doesn't deal with that yet. So God has to bring in the law to deal with righteousness and well, to deal with sin, I'm sorry, not righteousness, but sin. So analogies, see if you can give me the thumbs down on these analogies or thumbs up.

But the law is like a fingerprint powder, right, that the cops use. It reveals that a person has been at the scene of the crime. So you have their fingerprint and you dust it and oh, there they are. And it reveals the fingerprint as the law reveals sin.

Or using a UV light or black light. Have you ever seen a CSI show or crime show? They go into a room and You can't tell there's a murder, but then when they light up the black light, there's all these bloodstains on the wall, if you've ever seen a crime show like that. So that says that a crime happened here, right? That's the same thing of the law being added to highlight sin.

And then third, and my favorite, is your bathroom scale. It reveals that you have a big problem, But it doesn't help you do anything about it, right? But it reveals your problem and my problem. So I forgot who gave that. It might have been William Kelly. No, I don't know. But I stole it from someone.

So we're still dealing with these transgressions. for the purpose of the law, and it says the law was added, and that word in Greek means to place beside, or place toward, or come in by the way, that the offense may abound, I think I should have said there, in Romans 5.20.

In Romans 5.20, it says the law entered, so In Romans 5.20, it says the law entered, and it's the same thing as kind of being added or coming by the way. And it's a second thing, the second reason for the law to answer Paul's question, quite literally here, is to make sin manifest. And I'll repeat here that the promise of the blessing to Abraham did not address sin and righteousness. That was just a promise of blessing. That was all blessing, right? But no sin, no righteousness addressed there. So God needed to address this issue of sin and righteousness. So Think about this, too. Sin was not added because it was there all along. It started with Adam.

But there is a transgressing of God's written standard so that all the consciousness, consciousnesses, someone don't want to help me. consciences of mankind, you can read it for yourself there, that word, I can't say, might be reached, to reach your conscience, and the sentence of death and condemnation might be felt by their light and careless hearts, is what Darby says.

So yeah, needs, sin needs, you need to have You need to be conscientious of sin, and that's what the law is for. And it, Lehman Strauss says that it, this bringing of the law gives that relief to, it gives that background to sin so that you can see how ugly and despicable it is, how heinous and serious it is. And before the law, they really didn't know Those things about sin, you know, it wasn't named and and shamed, I guess you could say. A third thing, a third reason of why God brought in the law is to make sin known. Kind of the same thing as to be made manifest.

But Romans 3.20 says, by the law is the knowledge of sin.

And that word knowledge is epinosis, so it's a full knowledge. And I get it, knowledge. A knowledge that you acquire through personal and intense involvement. You really get acquainted with what it means and what it is. Again, stirring the conscience. A word I can read, but I can't say. C-O-N-S-I-N-E-N-Z. Say conscience. How about that? Conscience. Conscience.

Okay, I'll work on that and I'll get back to you in two weeks. A second thing, making sin known, and about Romans 520, the law came in so that transgression would increase, is what Romans 520 says. But I always thought that I always, in my mind, misread that to mean so that sin would increase. But it doesn't say that. It's so that the transgression would increase. So the sin is there. But the law makes the transgression, the knowledge of that sin, increase. So it highlights how sin oversteps God's righteous prescriptions. So sin is not increasing necessarily, but the infractions of sin are increasing.

A fourth reason for why the law, to conclude all members of the Adamic race are under sin, and that's Galatians 3.22, to put up everyone under sin.

To stop every mouth is the fifth reason, Romans 3.19.

And from Romans 3.19 as well, it establishes, it says that the law makes people accountable before God. So it establishes accountability. And the seventh thing, and I'll leave it here, but is to put Israel under its custody, the custody of the law, as a tutor until the seed of Abraham's promise comes to deliver them from its curse and its condemnation.

And that's with Galatians 3.19 and 24, and we'll look at that later on. I won't get that too much today, that Tudor issue, right? But I think Bob will cover that next week, and I'll kind of follow up with that on the third part in two weeks. Hey, Andrew? Yeah.

While you were naming all those, one through six, I'm thinking to myself, so why was it only given to Israel and not the whole world? Yeah, that's... Once you got to point number seven, then we see why it was given to Israel. Oh, yeah, right, right, to put them... So that the pure seed would come through. And yeah, that's a question, Bob, that I had, too, is it's the Lodz very unique to Israel, right? And it was their thing. You see them at the foot of Mount Sinai. And I wasn't there. You weren't there. Gentiles weren't there. But Israel was there.

Yet it You know, it says, where does it say in Romans that all are under the law? So that's a good question. That's a good... Anyone want to tackle that? If it was only given to Israel, the law, how are we then under its curse? One of the places Paul deals with that, 2.14, for when Gentiles who do not have the law do instinctively the things of the law, these not having the law are a law to themselves. And that they show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience bearing witness, and their thoughts alternately accusing or defending them. And this is really interesting, Paul, in that, chapter there, he goes through a lot to explain that everybody, even if you don't have the written law of God, you have a certain awareness in your own conscience of these things that condemns you. Yeah, that's what I was thinking too, even before that Mount Sinai, Sin was still, men were conscious of their sin.

There was still the transgressing, but it wasn't codified, right? So it was still there and because God had always had the standards So but it's yeah, it's an interesting. It's an interesting thing. But yeah, that's a good point miles Would you say that the moral part of the law? We're not talking about the sacrifices or The food or things like that, but the moral part of the law was actually there long before The mosaic well came in Yeah, I think it was it. Can we say it was like understood? Without like most of the Ten Commandments It's understood what's right and wrong.

Yeah. Mm-hmm Yeah That's true, yeah. And we'll leave that for Echo for next week. Good idea. Yeah, I think it's a very big topic, isn't it? Very big subject. But let's move on to this. The law came by the agency of a mediator. And this is pretty simple. Who is the mediator? I would say again, who is it? I don't know. Go ahead. I was it. Oh, okay. It's babbling.

So either Christ, because he's in this or Moses. So what is meant by the angels? Well, good question. Are we talking about real angels or are we just talking about messengers? Wait for a couple slides down, Bob. We'll get there. So the mediator, I think, is Moses. He fits the bill. Because that's why I brought up the back and forth. Remember that from Exodus 19? God told Moses something to say to the Israelites. He walked down. gave it to the Israelites. So there is this back and forth. So being a mediator is mesete, mesetes, one who is in the middle or in the midst of two parties representing each party's claim to one another. And the goal is to unite them in a peaceful manner. That's zodiades.

These two examples here from Exodus 19 and Exodus 17, the part that I highlighted in green here, you can see Moses brought back the words of the people to the Lord. And then later on, then Moses told the words of the people to the Lord. And then in Exodus 17, 4, Moses cried out to the Lord, saying, what shall I do with these people? A little more, a little more, and they will stone me. Then the Lord said to Moses, and he told him what to do.

So you see this. Back and forth, Moses is acting as a mediator. That's the work of a mediator. And the examples are just all over the Old Testament and the Pentateuch there, as Moses going as a go-between, running back and forth between God and the people. He probably got in not 10,000 steps, but probably 30,000 steps. So that's the mediator. So that's pretty simple. Here's the part that I wanted to punt this verse to Bob for next week.

But the law was ordained through angels. And that's why, too, I read the whole kind of Exodus 19 account of Mount Sinai. Where were the angels? Did you guys hear anything about angels in that account? I sure didn't. So they weren't there and I'm like, how is that so? So that's the question I'm asking here in point one. We get the account and there's no angels to be found. So how is this?

Yet, and this is very interesting, because when Stephen is stoned, he says that angels were involved. Stephen says, as he's dying, and you received the law as it ordained by angels, yet you did not keep it, he says in Acts 7.53.

Paul says in Hebrews 2.2, For if the word spoken through angels proved unalterable, and every transgression and disobedience received is just penalty, dot, dot, dot, dot, he goes on. So Paul says it was ordained through angels. And then Deuteronomy as well.

In Deuteronomy 33.2, he said, the Lord came from Sinai and dawned on them from Seir. He shone forth from Mount Paran, and he came from the mist of ten thousand holy ones. At his right hand there was flashing lightning for them.

Now that is that little Deuteronomy 33.2, that the miss of 10,000 holy ones. So when you have this word myriads or 10,000, tens of thousands, and especially the word holy one, you're you're talking about angels there. And we're at Sinai there. And we read in Exodus 19 that there was flashing of lightning from that account. So yet, we didn't see any angels. So here's, I think, the answer. And I rely on Stoney as well for this.

But in Psalm 68, 17, It says, the chariots of God are myriads, thousands upon thousands. The Lord is among them as at Sinai in holiness. So we're right there at Sinai with chariots of God and myriads of angels. So here's what Stoney says, for it was angels who shone in the glory of Sinai, invested by the will of God, the proclamation of the law, with the splendor of their dignity. But the God of the angels and of Israel stood apart, hidden in a sanctuary of clouds and of fire and thick darkness." And we got that picture at Mount Sinai there in Exodus 19. Same thing was happening. He was encompassed with glory. He made himself terrible in his magnificence, but he did not display himself.

So I think that we can pin it down to that these angels were present with God at the top of Mount Sinai, the cherubim. They're living creatures. And if you remember from Exodus, not Exodus, but Ezekiel, A cherub has four faces. They're really strange-looking angels. They have a face of a man, a face of a lion, a bull, and an eagle. They have four wings.

And their ministry is to defend God's holiness from the pollution of sinful beings. And you could say they seal God hermetically from sin, especially when they appear to people, like at Mount Sinai. And that's Schaeffer who defines the cherubim that way. And in Ezekiel 1 and 10, really describe these cherubim who do that. And I remember Mike saying that a couple of years ago, that cherubim, they defend the holiness of God. And I thought, how is that? But this is what they do. That's their job.

So if you look at, too, you think of the physical Ark of the Covenant, you have those cherubim covering that their depiction and their wings come together. And then in the Holy of Holies, God had Solomon construct out of olive wood these huge cherubim, 15 feet tall, made of olive wood and then they were covered in gold and they're massive and they go up and their wings touch and they cover the ark. So these cherubim are are always with God when he appears. And there's a depiction of kind of what they would look like. There's the Ark of the Covenant there covered in purple, but something like that.

And that's not a great depiction, I think, because they have human, they're in human form, but there's all sorts of depiction of these cherubim. So they're there in the clouds, it's just that no one sees them, and God is in their midst and the cherubim defend his holiness.

How does that sit with you guys? Good. That's good. Andrew, it's interesting. I'm going to be talking about the anointed cherub. the unfallen Satan, which he's called, his name given in Ezekiel, we'll talk about this morning here in a little bit, he's the anointed, singular, there was a singular anointed cherub, which will become Satan. And it talks about how he is with God in the holy place, he is just so beautiful, with all these jewels covering him, this anointed cherub. But he then, sin is found in him, and he falls.

So it's pretty amazing. It's really great you're doing this, because people that came to our class have an advantage for main service. Yeah, you're in the right class. verse 19 there, it was just like, how? I don't know what, yeah, what's it with these angels? Well, it's not God is surrounded by, you know, I get, and what's incredible is that this anointed chair, we're going to learn that he was the closest of the closest.

He was the guy But, you know, it's just, you know, it's incredible. Yeah, he was the archangel cherub, right? I'm not sure he was an archangel. This is Satan, of course. This is Satan before he fell. The anointed cherub that covers is called Ezekiel.

We'll see. That's another lesson. It's really, I think, important and interesting that you bring up the fact that the cherubs defend the holiness of God, because you see all through the temple, you know, the cherubim are are all over it, right? And now, I mean, we've entered within the veil, right? We come right into God's presence. There's no more, this is not his angelic bodyguard. Good point, yeah, that's good.

Yeah, and I, you know, and learning this, it's almost like these cherub create this atmosphere around God. that an atmosphere that sin can't get to him, right? A barrier. And that's, I always wondered how that was, but it's, I guess it's the, I guess it's the angels, the cherub, cherubim around him who create that, that seal.

And, and then I was thinking as you were Myles about when we're there, In the sweet by and by let's say we're in heaven Do they need to do that anymore? Do they need to no, I don't think so because we're the righteousness of God in Christ, right? There's probably no We're right there And so it's interesting, because we're going to be right there with God himself in heaven someday.

So we'll wrap up with the last part of verse 19, until the seed, would come to whom the promise was made. And who is the seed, and this should be easy, but it's Christ is the seed from the Abrahamic promise. He's also the salvation for the sin issue.

And we see that in Genesis 3.15, where God says, he says to Eve, I will put enmity between your seed, or he says it's the Satan actually, speaking of Satan, I will put enmity between your seed and her seed, and he shall bruise you on the head. So that's the first mention of the seed in Genesis.

And then when, let's look at this law was added again, and this is review, the word added is to place toward or beside or to come alongside the promise of Abraham. But the promise of Abraham was already there. So the law was came in beside it, but didn't alter it in any way. It didn't affect the covenant to Abraham. So therefore it's, and you can't really see this on its face, but it says that the law is subordinate to the promise and inferior to the promise given to Abraham. Because that word added has this this lesser quality to it. So the law is temporal, it's from Mount Sinai to the cross, and that's its terms of service, beginning and ending. And then when Christ came, he nailed that law to the cross and died to it, right?

So let's look at verse 20 to wrap up here. Verse 20, Paul says, now a mediator is not for one party only, whereas God is only one. And this is a hard little verse, but it's really simple when you just break it down a bit. So he's talking about a mediator and the agency of angels. Well, two things. Moses is a meteor for the law, and it was given through the agency or the ordination of angels. So there's a couple parties there in the law. So he's saying that, verse 20 here is, he's simply putting an exclamation point on the fact that the declaration of the law is subordinate to and inferior to the promise made to Abraham.

Because the promise made to Abraham, well at first the law requires the intermediate agency of angels and Moses. So you've got angels and Moses, you've got God, you have angels and Moses, who am I living in? God, angels, Moses, and Israel. So there's a lot of, people in the mix there, but the promise made to Abraham was just God himself, no mediator necessary.

And you can see that in Genesis 15, 17, when you remember the sacrifice, they were cut in half and then God passed through the pieces of the sacrifice, the flaming The flaming torch and he ratified that covenant on his own with without Abraham. He was sleeping. So it was just got himself there and the promise to Abraham is just. God doing it doesn't need Moses, doesn't need angels to give it. So that's why it's subordinate to the law, subordinate to the promise of Abraham. It's what I'm saying in a lot of ways.

So I hope that's kind of clear. Is that clear? Yeah. Clear as mud. I know. Yeah, so yeah, so verse 20 is just that, yeah, the promise to Abraham only requires God himself. Yeah. Yeah, just a quick note here in John 1, John, the gospel of John 1, 17, the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. just as a background to that mediator word. Yeah, and great point, Roy, because that verse I always wondered about, too. This verse, 319, and this study of the angels and Moses, it really clarifies that verse. It's given through Moses.

Yeah, so it's all interrelated, isn't it? Confirmed scripture is really interesting. So, okay, so I'll wrap it up there, and I'll pray us out. Our Heavenly Father, we thank you for this study in your Word, and we thank you for giving the law to Israel, and we thank you for our knowledge of it. It's a glorious thing, and we just, we learn that it's a temporal thing, and that we We, being in Christ, are now beyond the righteousness of God in Christ, and we rely on that and His holiness, and we rely on His life for our righteousness in You, and we thank You for that. We pray these things in Jesus' name. Amen.