1. Family of Faith Galatians 3:1 - 14 ...
The church in Galatia that Paul wrote to was dealing with questions about family too
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2. Family of Faith Who is part of the family of faith?
Who is in? Who is out?
God’s Chosen People
How can you tell?
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So again, we come back to our questions: “Who is part of the covenant family?” and “How can you tell?”
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3. Family of Faith Galatian’s Experience Abraham’s Example
of the Spirit
Abraham’s Example
of faith
The Great Exchange
from curse to blessing
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First, Paul appeals to the Galatians’ experience of the Spirit.
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4. Experience of the Spirit
You Foolish Galatians!
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Maybe Paul witnessed miracles like these among the Galatians. At any rate, the Galatians had received the Holy Spirit—and Paul appeals to them on the basis of that experience:
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5. Experience of the Spirit
Did you receive the Spirit by observing the law, or by believing what you heard? Does God give you his Spirit and work miracles among you by your observing the law, or by your believing what you heard?
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The point he’s making here is obvious. Clearly, the Spirit came when they believed.
Just to clarify for a moment. What does Paul mean when he talks about “observing the law”?
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6. Observing the Law {Timed slide} ...
and all of these references can be taken as a kind of shorthand to mean the entire Jewish religious system.
This he contrasts with faith—that is, believing the gospel.
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7. Believing the Gospel
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Abraham is a very important person in Judaism.
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8. Abraham Ancestral Father of the Family “You have given me no children”
He was the father of the Jewish faith.
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But Abraham, who God has promised to bless and make into a great nation—and who doesn’t have any children yet at 80-something—replies by complaining honestly and understandably:
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“Then the word of the LORD came to him: ‘This man will not be your heir, but a son who is your own flesh and blood will be your heir.’ He took him outside and said, “Look up at the sky and count the stars—if indeed you can count them.” Then he said to him, “So shall your offspring be.”
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9. Abraham Ancestral Father of the Family “You have given me no children”
“Count the stars”
“Abram believed the LORD...”
“... and He credited it to him as righteousness.”
The Lord repeats his promise. He didn’t change anything in Abraham’s physical circumstances. All he did was repeat his promise to Abraham. “I will give you children, Abram.”
And then…faith. verse 6
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“Abram believed the LORD…”
I love this part in the text because Abraham’s faith gets recorded like action. Like it’s part of the dialogue. It gets its own line in the script. Abram believing the Lord is recorded in chronological order, like any other part of the story.
It is internal, invisible. It produces no outward change whatsoever. But it was decisive. And it shifted reality in the heavenlies.
The verse finishes
and He credited it to him as righteousness.
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Now comes the family part.
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10. Children of Abraham Lineage, circumcision, Torah
Faith = Children of Abraham
“All nations will be blessed”
Those who have faith are children of Abraham
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“all nations will be blessed through you”
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In the third movement
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11. Law and Faith Way of the Law Under a Curse Impossible to keep
Action and attitude
Way of Faith
Blessing
Righteous will live
Change of heart
In the third movement of this passage, Paul contrasts the way of the Law with the way of faith. He explains that all who “rely on” observing the law are under a curse
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—because no one is able to keep the law perfectly and do everything it says (whether it’s the moral code, ceremonial law, whatever!). In contrast, those who have faith are blessed, and he quotes Habbakuk, which says that the “righteous will live by faith.”
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“The law is not based on faith,” Paul reminds us. And that’s true. Faith is a matter of the heart which in turn affects behavior.
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It’s like a seed that gets planted and grows and then produces fruit. But the law doesn’t primarily address the heart. It addresses action and attitudes. It serves to restrict bad behavior and encourage good behavior.
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12. The Great Exchange Jesus took on a curse We receive a blessing
“He redeemed us in order that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that by faith we might receive the promise of the Spirit.”
Paul finishes this section by describing the “great exchange” that takes place in the gospel:
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Jesus identified with us by taking on a curse, and in turn, we identify with him and receive blessing.
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Through his death, Christ made this possible. And all of this is so that we can receive full status in the family of God—and receive God’s Spirit—by faith alone. As v. 14 explains,
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“He redeemed us in order that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that by faith we might receive the promise of the Spirit.”
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What does the text teach us about our spiritual family?
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13. Family of Faith Inclusive Gender Socio-Economic Class
Language and Culture
University Chapel!
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that the family of faith is inclusive
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The idea gets fleshed out in Galatians on a few levels,
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including gender and socio-economic class—but for today, we’ll start with the cultural level.
Here at UC,
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we speak English as our common language and Canada is our common home, but we are a really diverse group!
So the first thing we learn about our family is that it’s inclusive of people of all backgrounds. Second, we learn
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14. Family of Faith Faith in Jesus Don’t just do something, stand there!
Door to righteousness
Homegroup
Second, we learn that in our family, faith in Jesus is the heart of the matter...
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His response to this was this exhortation:
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But to God, faith in Christ is everything. It is the door to righteousness.
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I’ve appreciated my homegroup a lot over the years
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So our family is inclusive, our focus is on faith, and one last thing we learn
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about Abraham’s family is that our inheritance is the Holy Spirit

15. Family of Faith Inheritance is the Holy Spirit
Makes it possible to live differently
Comforter and Teacher
Life, Truth, Freedom
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makes it possible for us to live differently
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He knows our hearts and loves us. He is our Comforter and Teacher and Guide.
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The presence of the Spirit brings life, truth and freedom.
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As we draw to a close today,
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16. Family of Faith Where is the Spirit working in your life today?
What do you sense He is calling you to do – or to believe?
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