By Aaron Swartzentruber
Greenleafton, MN
“Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith. But after that faith is come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster.” (Galatians 3:24-25)
I am told that the Greek word for schoolmaster is “paidagogos” and it doesn’t really mean schoolmaster as we think of it in the English. It means more of like a 24/7 tutor or overseer.
I am also told that it was very common in the Apostle Paul’s day for a child to be put under a paidagogos. So the people at that time would’ve easily understood what Paul was talking about. Children that were put under a paidagogos were under their constant supervision to teach and instruct them. But once a child was of age, grown up if you will, the child was adopted into the family, as it were, by the child’s father, and was released from the paidagogos. Because a father could disown his biological child, as far as inheritance goes, but he could never disown an adopted child.
We are all children of God in the sense that we are human beings created by our Creator. But God, the Father, can and will disown and condemn each one because we’re all sinners, unless we come to faith in the blood of Christ alone for salvation, then the Father adopts us into His family, and will never, no never, no never, forsake us!
But a lot of people prefer to remain in bondage under the paidagogos and never graduate to “the adoption of sons” to have assurance that they have an inheritance and that it is secure. “Instead of being an exclamation mark they’re a question mark with their heads all bent over,” – Adrian Rogers.
I believe that Paul was also talking about the nation of Israel in this illustration. Because in Galatians 4:3-5, after having talked about the paidagogos relationship, he says, “Even so we, when we (the Jews) were children, were in bondage under the elements of the world: But when the fullness of time was come (notice the past tense), God sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons.” Who was under the law? The Jews.
The kingdom was promised to the Jews. In Matthew 10 when Jesus sent the 12 disciples out, He said, “Go not into the way of the gentiles, but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. And as ye go, preach, saying, the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” But the Jews, as a nation, refused to graduate from their paidagogos. They didn’t understand, and still don’t, that Jesus’ Kingdom is not of this world. They were looking for the Stone of Daniel chapter 2, and since Jesus wasn’t setting up His kingdom now they thought He can’t be the Messiah, not realizing that He had to deal with the sin problem first; thus the death, burial, and resurrection, then at His second coming He’ll establish His kingdom and reign over the whole earth for a thousand years, then the final showdown, then eternity. (Rev. 19 and 20, Zechariah 14:9)
And because they reject Him salvation is come unto the gentiles. “Then Paul and Barnabas waxed bold, and said, it was necessary that the word of God should first have been spoken to you (the Jews); but seeing ye put it from you, and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, lo, we turn to the gentiles. For so hath the Lord commanded us, saying, I have set thee to be a light to the gentiles, that thou shouldest be for salvation unto the ends of the earth.” (Acts 13:46-47)
However, God has not replaced Israel with the Church. I believe Romans 9,10 and 11 make that very clear. “Blindness ‘in part’ has happened to Israel, ‘until’ the fullness of the gentiles be come in.” 11:25. My point is, anti-semitism, of any kind, should have no place in the church. Until next time…
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