It's The Law

"Therefore the law was our tutor to bring us to Christ, that we might be justified by faith. But after faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor."
Galatians 3:24-25

There are speed limit signs everywhere. Traffic lights abound. Police cars screaming down the streets of our cities at night. There is no shortage on the evidence that we are governed in our society by the law. That is what we call the law of the land. It is what keeps societies in order, and with some framework within which to operate.

God gave the Ten Commandments to Moses on the top of Mt. Sinai, written by His own finger. How awesome that must have been. God told Moses to tell the people not to come near the mountain. They were so fearful, that they didn't want to get that close. Here, Paul is telling the Galatians the reason for the giving of the law. They had allowed men to come in and tell them that not only they needed Jesus for salvation, but that they needed the law as well. "The law" refers to the Law of Moses, which are the Ten Commandments, but also all of those instructions given in Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. The religious leaders had taken the Law, and divided it out into some 600+ individual laws to keep. But the Law was given, Paul says, to be a "tutor," translated "schoolmaster." The law was given to us, to show us that no one can keep it. It is impossible for us to keep the law. Try as we might, we can't do it.

That is what Paul is saying. The Law was our schoolmaster, to point out our need for a Savior. We need Jesus Christ in our lives. That is the long and short of it. We try and we try in the church to keep our rules and regulations, but no one is ever good enough. There is only One who can fulfill all the law. He came as a sacrifice for our sins, a substitutionary atonement for our sins.

As we go through this day, let us observe the law of the land, and also let us know that the fulfillment of the law that the law of the land is based upon, was accomplished already, and the fulfillment of the law is found in Jesus Christ, the lover of our souls.