”So until the revelation of faith for salvation was released, the law was a jailer, holding us as prisoners under lock and key until the “faith,” which was destined to be revealed, would set us free. The law was our guardian until Christ came so that we would be saved by faith. But now that faith has come we are no longer under the guardian of the law.“
Faith sets us free from the condemnation of the law. When Paul was writing this to the Galatians the law he spoke of was far more than the Ten Commandments. There were hundreds upon hundreds of manmade, unjust, impossible to follow religious laws that the Jews were expected to keep. Someone told me not long ago when we were discussing the reality of Marxism in American society today that because of the way our government system has been operating, we as innocent hard working citizens could be found guilty of committing any number of federal crimes if the government set us in its crosshairs. He said we were living in the reality of that idea spoken by Soviet police chief Lavrentiy Beria who said, ‘show me the man and I’ll give you the case against him.” And we know that to be the case with Jeremy Harrell, the J6ers, Tina Peters and many other wrongfully imprisoned innocent ones. The same was true in the spiritual sense of Jewish law at this time. So what Paul is saying is that the religious rules that had been so burdensome that people were completely trapped into condemnation no matter what they did.
But Jesus changed all of that. Paul explains that putting our faith in Jesus’s perfect sacrifice to save us -- through His death and resurrection -- releases us into true freedom. Our faith in Jesus is the only way to be unchained from condemnation of our sins because we all are guilty of sin. And this passage struck me so powerfully this morning, because I know Jeremy is sitting wrongfully prosecuted now sitting in prison, having committed no crime. Because the condemnation-seeking “law” determined his guilt. But this scripture shows us that something more powerful than unjust “law” is true in his life -- his freedom is derived from a higher Source, Jesus. So while he may be jailed physically, His liberty of soul is one thing that no prosecutor or judge on Earth can take away. And thank God for that. I know that’s where he’s deriving his strength.
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