CLOTHED WITH CHRIST
Galatians 3:26-29 CSB
26 for through faith you are all sons of God in Christ Jesus.
27 For those of you who were baptized into Christ have been clothed with Christ. 28 There is no Jew or Greek, slave or free, male and female; since you are all one in Christ Jesus. 29 And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed, heirs according to the promise.
Paul was constantly challenged in his ministry to the Gentiles by Jewish believers. These Jewish believers may have loved the Lord Jesus but they were sadly lacking in revelation of what receiving Christ meant. They would follow Paul and bring in different teachings. Their teachings focused on keeping the law of Moses. And Paul was correcting the Galatians in this chapter for believing that after coming to Christ by faith, they could now be made right with God by keeping the Jewish laws. The majority of the letter to the Galatian church corrected the erroneous teaching that they were adhering to.
We can understand Paul’s frustration. He invests time proclaiming the gospel of Christ, only to have false teachers come in and proclaim a different gospel. So Paul lays out the problem of following the law. No one can do it. The promise of being in right standing with God was given to Abraham by faith. And only those who are of faith are blessed with believing Abraham. Paul did not say the law of Moses was bad, just that it was insufficient in terms of making people right with God. The law pointed the way to Christ, but now that Christ has come, righteousness is by faith in Christ alone. Not Christ and being circumcised, or Christ and eating certain foods.
That leads us to our verses for today. Through faith, we are all sons of God through Christ. Don’t get hung up on being daughters if you are female. In ancient cultures sons were the ones who were given an inheritance. In Christ, there are male and female sons in terms of where we stand with God. For all of us who have been baptized into Christ have been clothed with Christ. I don’t know exactly how we were baptized and clothed; it’s obviously a spiritual thing, but I believe it and am grateful for it. So when we go stand before the Lord, we stand clothed in Christ, and we look a whole lot better clothed in Him.
Paul then shares a revelation that had to rock the ancient world. In Christ, race, gender, and social status go away. No Jew or Greek. No slave or free. No male or female. That sounds amazing today, and it had to have been earth-shattering in Paul’s day. We are all one in Christ. This is a truth that is important that we grasp from the standpoint of helping our spiritual growth. We are so accustomed to looking at others and ourselves through the lens that the world uses. What race do we belong to? What is our gender? And what is our status in life? Are we part of the haves or have nots, and that can vary worldwide. But the one unifying factor is that regardless of our background and demographic features, in Christ we are one. That means in Christ, there are no first-class or second-class citizens. In Christ there are no haves and have nots. In Christ, there are no privileged and common. You get the picture. Clothed with Christ, our focus is on who we are because of Him. And because of Him, we look good to God.
This truth is worth giving time and thought to. This is why Paul prayed for the churches that God would give them the spirit of wisdom and revelation. The more we see spiritually, the stronger we become in Christ.
PRAYER
Thank You, Father, for what You have done for me in Christ. I can approach the throne of grace with confidence because I am wearing the right clothes. I am clothed in Christ.