Galatians 3:13 Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written… The apostle here unveils a reason why men are not saved by their personal righteousness, but by their faith. He says the reason is, that men are not saved now by any personal merit, but their salvation lies in another, viz., in Christ Jesus, the Representative Man, who alone can deliver from the curse of the law; and since works do not connect us with Christ, but faith is the uniting bond, faith becomes the way of salvation. Since faith is the hand that lays hold upon the finished work of Christ, which works could not and would not do, for works lead us to boast and to forget Christ, faith becomes the true and only way of obtaining justification and everlasting life. Let us try to understand more clearly the nature of His substitution, and of the suffering which it entailed upon Him. I. WHAT IS THE CURSE OF THE LAW HERE INTENDED? 1. It is the curse of God. God who made the law has appended certain penal consequences to the breaking of it; and the man who violates the law becomes at once the subject of the wrath of the Lawgiver. Hence it must be (1) supremely just; (2) morally unavoidable; (3) most weighty. 2. It is a sign of displeasure. God is angry with the wicked every day: His wrath towards sin is great. 3. God's curse of something more than a threatening; He comes at length to blows. He uses warning words at first, but sooner or later He bares his sword for execution. Cain. Flood. Sodom. II. WHO ARE UNDER THE CURSE? 1. The Jewish nation. To them the law of God was very peculiarly given beyond all others. 2. All nations. The law, although not given to all from Sinai, has been written by the finger of God more or less legibly upon the conscience of all mankind. 3. Those who, when offered the gospel, prefer to remain under the law (Galatians 3:10). All that the law of works can do for men is to leave them still accursed. III. How was CHRIST MADE A CURSE FOR US? 1. By substitution. Christ was no curse in Himself. Of His own free will He became a curse for us. 2. All the sins of His people were actually laid upon Him. He endured both (1) the penalty of loss; and (2) the penalty of actual suffering, both (a) in body and (b) in soul.It was an anguish never to be measured, an agony never to be comprehended. To God only were His griefs fully known. Well does the Greek liturgy put in, "Thine unknown sufferings," for they must for ever remain beyond guess of human imagination. Behold Christ bearing the curse instead of His people. Here He is coming under the load of their sin, and God does not spare Him, but smites Him as He must have smitten us, lays His full vengeance on Him, launches all His thunderbolts against Him, bids the curse wreak itself upon Him, and Christ suffers all, sustains all. IV. THE BLESSED CONSEQUENCES OF CHRIST'S HAVING THUS BEEN MADE A CURSE FOR US. 1. We are redeemed from the curse. The law is silenced; it can demand no more. The quiver of wrath is exhausted. 2. The blessing of God, hitherto arrested by the curse, is now made most freely to flow. A great rock has been lifted out from the river-bed of God's mercy, and the living stream comes rippling, rolling, swelling on in crystal tides, sweeping before it all human sin and sorrow, and making the thirsty who stoop down to drink at it. (C. H. Spurgeon.) Parallel Verses KJV: Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree: |
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