Day 15 – God Wants Us Under Love, Not Law ~ Julie Earl
Galatians 3:15-20
15 Brothers and sisters, let me take an example from everyday life. Just as no one can set aside or add to a human covenant that has been duly established, so it is in this case. 16 The promises were spoken to Abraham and to his seed. Scripture does not say “and to seeds,” meaning many people, but “and to your seed,” meaning one person, who is Christ. 17 What I mean is this: The law, introduced 430 years later, does not set aside the covenant previously established by God and thus do away with the promise. 18 For if the inheritance depends on the law, then it no longer depends on the promise; but God in his grace gave it to Abraham through a promise.
19 Why, then, was the law given at all? It was added because of transgressions until the Seed to whom the promise referred had come. The law was given through angels and entrusted to a mediator. 20 A mediator, however, implies more than one party; but God is one.
Julie’s Nugget
If God had wanted us to live under Law, He would have established the Law in the Garden of Eden. But He didn’t want us to live under Law, He wanted us to live under love. That’s why the priority in the Garden was relationship – not rules and regulations. God walked with Adam and Eve in the cool of the day, so that they would come to trust Him and obey His leading.
But, alas, their pride won out over their love for God…and they listened to the lies of the devil rather than the truth of the Father.
It would seem logical that God would incorporate laws as soon as Adam and Eve had to leave the Garden, but God still didn’t want them to live under Law. He wanted them to live under love. God continued to reach out in love again and again to Adam and Eve and their children, but the further they got from intimacy with God, the more their sin increased.
Their descendants got to the point where it says in Genesis 6:5 that “The Lord saw how great the wickedness of the human race had become on the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil all the time.” Can you imagine being raised by parents whose every inclination was only evil all the time? How painful to be raised by, and then become, so evil that there were no good, kind or loving thoughts coming from your heart. Talk about abusive parenting! For the sake of the current generation and future generations, God stepped in and stopped this wickedness with a flood.
It wasn’t until Moses’ time that God finally set up the Law to help the people do what was right. Since they kept refusing to love the Lord with all their hearts (which would have resulted in obedience prompted by love), He had to set up guidelines and laws to help direct them away from sin and its painful consequences.
Praise God that when Jesus came, He made a way for us to be cleansed of all our sins and to walk once again in intimacy and love with the Father. What a privilege!
My Prayer
My prayer is that none of us will take for granted the tremendous gift we have been given in Christ, and that we will make falling in love with Jesus our highest priority – because the result of intimacy is love and obedience!
Have a great day enjoying sweet intimacy with Jesus!
Julie Earl
[All scripture taken from the New International Version. Bold lettering mine.]