Galatians 3:10-12 Podcast To invest in BYM, click here
10 For all who rely on the works of the law are under a curse, as it is written: “Cursed is everyone who does not continue to do everything written in the Book of the Law.” 11 Clearly no one who relies on the law is justified before God, because “the righteous will live by faith.” 12 The law is not based on faith; on the contrary, it says, “The person who does these things will live by them.” (Galatians 3:10-12)
The book of Galatians is God's reminder that we are in constant danger of false assurances. The enemy is constantly at work trying to get us to think if we are good enough, we are where we need to be.
By the grace of God through Christ Jesus and our abiding faith in His work on the cross, we are right before God. Nothing has to be added to His finished work on the cross for our justification. The book of Galatians consistently brings us back to the one thing that keeps us close to the heart of God: the GRACE of GOD.
Galatians 3:10–14 makes three statements which we will consider today and tomorrow. The first statement is v.10: "For all who rely on the works of the law are under a curse." The second is v.13: "Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law." The third, in v.14, gives the purpose of the second: "that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith."
First, "For all who rely on the works of the law are under a curse." The opposite of a curse is a blessing. Since the blessing is the Holy Spirit (v.14), the curse must be the absence of the Holy Spirit. In v.10 Paul writes "For all who rely on the works of the law are under a curse," which means that they are without the Holy Spirit. And, if they are without the Holy Spirit, they are depending upon their good performance which will never be good enough to merit God's favor.
When Paul referred to legalism, he used the terms "law" or "works of law," and then he trusted that the context would clarify the meaning.
Paul says this is not consistent with the gospel (2:14). In 2:18 he wrote, "If I rebuild what I destroyed, then I really would be a lawbreaker." That is, if we start again to depend on "works of law" to show our value to God, then we show ourselves to be lawbreakers. The law itself condemns the use of its own commands as a way of trying to earn God's blessing. Paul uses the term "works of law" to refer to this legalistic misuse of law.
So the "works of law" in 3:10 refers to our efforts at obedience to earn God's favor. This is why "works of law" are contrasted with faith in v.5: "So again I ask, does God give you his Spirit and work miracles among you by the works of the law, or by your believing what you heard?"
"Works of law" are not the "good works" that a Christian does in reliance on the power of the Holy Spirit. They are our efforts at obedience to earn God's favor. Therefore, the phrase "works of law" is synonymous with legalism, and the law itself condemns legalism.
In Galatians 3:1–5 the legalistic teachers told the Galatians that it is OK to start the Christian life by faith, but then you have to do "good works" to maintain God's favor. But, God supplies the Spirit to the believer does so only by faith, not by works of law.
Galatians 3:10 confirms this: "For all who rely on the works of the law are under a curse, as it is written: 'Cursed is everyone who does not continue to do everything written in the Book of the Law.”'
The curse in v.10 is not because you fail to do the works of the law. It is because you do them with the wrong motive. The advice of the legalists to supplement faith with "works of law" has exactly the opposite effect from the one intended, it brings a curse, not a blessing.
The problem with the Legalists is not their failure to follow the detailed teachings of the law; the problem was that they missed the larger teaching: without a new heart, without the enablement of God, and without faith, all efforts to obey the law are just works of the flesh.
In v.12, Paul contrasts faith with legalism, and that the Mosaic law itself pronounces a curse precisely on that legalism. The word "law" in v.11-12 refers not to the teaching of Moses but to the distortion of the law into legalism by the Legalists.
Our conclusion: good, moral, religious people, who have not been "born again" and do not have God's Spirit living within them are under a curse from the law itself. I believe this explains that passage in Matthew 7:21-23 where the Lord Jesus said to those who were known for their "good works", "depart from me for I never knew you."
