The True Gospel is Reaffirmed to the Galatians Volume 13

Paul Declares the Laws Purpose Part 4

Galatians 3:24-25 Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith. But after that faith is come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster. KJV

Paul is now coming to the close of his declaration of God’s purpose for giving man His Law. We saw in the last study that the “Law” guarded man as a garrison of military troops would guard any military installation. However, now the Apostle Paul concludes by telling these Galatians and us that God’s Law was given by Him to serve as a “schoolmaster” for the Jewish people. The English word “schoolmaster” is the closes word in the English language to describe what Paul meant here. The Greek word it is derived from is paidagogos which means a boy leader, that is, a servant, whose office it was to take the children to school; by implication or figuratively a tutor or Greek word paedagogue or an instructor. Paul here is making reference to what the readers of his letter back then would understand, but for us today this is foreign. Here is perhaps the best description I have found that clearly, coherently, and completely explains what the responsibilities entailed, “The ‘paedagogue’ was a sort of nursery governor, a confidential servant in the Greek household, commonly a slave, who had charge of the boy from his infancy, and was responsible for his oversight. In his food, his clothes, his home-lessons, his play, his walks-at every point the paedagogue was required to wait upon his young charge, and to control his movements. Amongst other offices, his tutor might have to conduct the boy to school.” Expositor’s Bible Commentary.

Therefore, Paul’s purpose in making this reference to the “paedagogue” is to parallel God’s Law to man in the exact same office, with the same responsibilities to train man up for faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. The Jews were distorting the “Laws” purpose and trying to make it the means or access by which one is justified before God. Paul disputed those claims when he wrote to Brother Timothy with these words, “For some men, straying from these things, have turned aside to fruitless discussion, wanting to be teachers of the Law, even though they do not understand either what they are saying or the matters about which they make confident assertions. But we know that the Law is good, if one uses it lawfully, realizing the fact that law is not made for a righteous person, but for those who are lawless and rebellious, for the ungodly and sinners, for the unholy and profane, for those who kill their fathers or mothers, for murderers and immoral men and homosexuals and kidnappers and liars and perjurers, and whatever else is contrary to sound teaching, according to the glorious gospel of the blessed God, with which I have been entrusted.” (1 Timothy 6-11). The “Law” was never meant to convert man, but instead to expose or uncover man’s sin in order that the sinner would be led to our Lord Jesus Christ to be washed from sin in His blood and made new by Him. Our Lord Jesus met with this hardened religious zeal void of knowledge by the Jews during His 31/2 year earthly ministry as documented by these words He spoke to them, “You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; it is these that testify about Me; and you are unwilling to come to Me so that you may have life.” (John 5:39-40).

Therefore, Paul’s conclusion is that God’s Law (Moral and Ceremonial) is not to be added to faith in our Lord Jesus, but Christ by His Perfect obedient life, then His death as sin’s sacrifice, and His Resurrection from the dead fulfilled all of the Moral Law and the Ceremonial Law. Paul said it very clearly here in this manner to the Roman believers when he wrote, “For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.” (Romans 10:4). We must remember that Paul’s whole desire here in this letter is to squash the Juadizers teaching that “faith in Christ” is not enough and that the “Law of Moses” with all of its ceremonies must still be observed in order for a sinner to be justified before God. Paul wants to show them that the “Law of Moses” never took away the sin of the Jews, but it only regulated their lives. The writer of Hebrews captures this very point perfectly when he writes, “For the Law, since it has only a shadow of the good things to come and not the very form of things, can never, by the same sacrifices which they offer continually year by year, make perfect those who draw near. Otherwise, would they not have ceased to be offered, because the worshipers, having once been cleansed, would no longer have had consciousness of sins? But in those sacrifices there is a reminder of sins year by year. For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.” (Hebrews 10:1-4).

Not only didn’t the Jews ever have the burden or the heavy load or the weight of their sins lifted from their heart and soul, but their conscious constantly and continually reminded them of their guilt before God and likewise they never knew release from sins gripping power in their heart and souls. Freedom from sins power was never satisfied by the blood of bulls or goats, but “in Christ”, that is true faith “in Christ” through His atoning blood we find what the “Law of God” was trying to covey to us all along. Our “High Priest” Jesus Christ has procured for us a far better covenant as the writer of Hebrews puts in this way, “But now He has obtained a more excellent ministry, by as much as He is also the mediator of a better covenant, which has been enacted on better promises.” (Hebrews 8:6). Under the Mosaic dispensation, the “moral law of God” was written on tablets of stone, but under the Gospel dispensation, when we turn to Christ and are born again by Him, He then writes His Moral Law upon our hearts or inner man (Jeremiah 31:33). In these two verses Paul gives his final answer or declaration of God’s purpose for given His Law to man through Moses as he so eloquently declared it with these words on his first missionary journey, “Therefore let it be known to you, brethren, that through Him forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you, and through Him (Jesus Christ) everyone who believes is freed from all things, from which you could not be freed through the Law of Moses.” (Acts 13:38-39).

My own Personal Note: God the Father knew exactly what He was doing when He introduced the “Law” into humanity, because He knew that the Jews lives needed regulation or an authoritative rule that governed their behavior not change it. He also knew that His Law would lead His “elect” sons and daughters to our Lord Jesus Christ to receive what the governing “Law” could never give us and that is new spiritual life on the inside or in our inner man and woman as the writer of Hebrews says with these words, “For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel After those days, says the Lord: I will put My laws into their minds, And I will write them on their hearts. And I will be their God,  And they shall be My people. And they shall not teach everyone his fellow citizen, And everyone his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ For all will know Me, From the least to the greatest of them. For I will be merciful to their iniquities, And I will remember their sins no more. When He said, ‘A new covenant,’ He has made the first obsolete. But whatever is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to disappear.” (Hebrews 8:10-13).

“When Christ was manifested in the flesh, and the Gospel was preached, we were no longer under the paedagogue; we came to Christ, learned of Him, became wise unto salvation, had our fruit unto holiness, and the end eternal life.” Adam Clarke

“The great fault and folly of the Jews, in mistaking the design of the law, and abusing it to a very different purpose from that which God intended in the giving of it; for they expected to be justified by the works of it, whereas it was never designed to be the rule of their justification, but only a means of convincing them of their guilt and of their need of a Savior, and of directing them to Christ, and faith in Him, as the only way of obtaining this privilege.” Matthew Henry

If you do not know the Lord Jesus Christ and His amazing healing power, pray this from your heart to the Lord Jesus Christ (you speaking directly to Him), Dear Lord Jesus, I confess to You that I am a sinner and I need Your forgiveness. I believe You shed Your Blood and died for my sins. I believe that You rose from the dead proving that You alone are God. I repent of my sins. I want to turn from my sins. I ask You Dear Lord Jesus to come into my heart and take control of my life. I want You to be my Lord, Savior, and my God. Amen...


Sincerely in Christ,


Clifford D. Tate, Sr.

Author of “Silent Assassins of the Soul - Are you Broken by Pornography and Masturbation? You can be Restored by the Lord Jesus Christ and brought into Deliverance, Freedom, and Victory! A Guide for Men and Women in the Enemy’s Crosshairs” e-book available now @ Amazon Kindle, @ Apple I Bookstore for IPod, Barnes and Noble for Nook, Reader Store for Sony Reade, Kobo, Copia, Gardners, Baker and Taylor, and eBookPie…