Redeemed from the Curse

Long before Moses and the Law existed, Abraham simply believed God for something impossible — a son, from a body as good as dead — and “it was accounted to him for righteousness.” No law-keeping involved; the Law wouldn’t exist for another 430 years. The Judaizers claimed Abraham as their father too, but Paul draws the line sharply: only those who share Abraham’s faith are truly his sons. And that’s where the good news, foreseen even in Abraham’s own story, gets stated as a promise centuries in advance: “In you all the nations shall be blessed.” The blessing was never going to come through law-keeping. It was always going to come by faith — to Jew and Gentile alike.

But the Law brings something else entirely to anyone who tries to use it as a path to righteousness: a curse. Anyone relying on law-keeping is under obligation to keep all of it perfectly, and no one ever has. That leaves the whole human race under judgment — until Christ does something almost too costly to comprehend. He “redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us,” taking on Himself the very curse the law pronounced, hanging on a tree in the place of everyone who deserved it. The result is a double gift: Gentiles receive the blessing promised to Abraham, and everyone who believes — Jew or Gentile — receives the promised Spirit, both entirely through faith, with nothing else added.