The tension that prevails between law and grace as revealed by Paul is apparent in Galatians 3-4. Here, Paul offers a doctrinal groundwork to explain the connection between law and grace. He offers six major viewpoints with the goal of demonstrating that grace fosters salvation via faith rather than efforts of the law. The three major recurring words, which include “faith,” “law,” as well as “promise.” Here, by grasping the teachings of Paul as well as incorporate them into practice, it would be possible to follow the right path by avoiding numerous false teachings, which focus on blurring the unique biblical teachings concerning law as well as grace (Blue Letter Bible, 2016).
On the ground, grace and law appear as opposed to each other. For example, the law requires individuals to exercise obedience to serve as a Salvation condition whereas grace avails salvation freely. The law rejects any sinner while grace seems to justify sinful activities. As a result, those who end up accepting the grace as an offer from God discard the law. In the Bible, God does not offer grace to oppose the law, since the two come from God, and God does not contradict Himself (Blue Letter Bible, 2016).
Delegate your assignment to our experts and they will do the rest.
In the perspective of many Christians in the present world, they usually embark on resolving the tension that prevails between law and grace by directing their attention to the dispensationalist doctrine. Dispensationalism refers to a system that dwells on the Bible’s historical progression comprising of a set of stages that depict self-revelation of God as well as the salvation plan. Christians believe that from the age of Moses until Christ, salvation featured the obedience that man directed to the law in the old covenant perspective. In the present viewpoint of Christians, however, Christ provided humankind with eternal redemption by offering salvation via grace, which serves as the new covenant. They consider the law as no longer applicable (Blue Letter Bible, 2016).
The teaching appears to deny the Scripture’s unity as well as contradicts the New Testament’s clear teaching. The only way that God has saved sinners is by grace via the redemptive activity he exercises through Christ. Apostle Paul stipulates that Abraham, the Jews’ father, did not receive redemption through circumcision or by following the law, but through the faith, he had in God’s salvation promise through Jesus Christ, His Son (Blue Letter Bible, 2016).
God did not give the law to facilitate salvation, leading the ideal to emerge as a perversion. As for Paul, he embarks on correcting the error in his Galatians’ letter. He stipulates that the reason as to why God provided the law was to eradicate sin from humanity to make sure that the salvation gift would have a meaning. Therefore, the law served as our guide until Jesus came to justify us through faith (Blue Letter Bible, 2016).
In the present ministering culture, therefore, the competition between law and grace manifests itself because of the self-centered nature of humankind. As such, we end up being trapped in legalism, which serves as an attempt to witness saving by obeying the law. For many non-churchgoers, religion serves as the notion that each person should save himself be the good works he does. According to the Bible, however, it is not possible to realize this, since our only salvation hope lies in the redeeming grace of God (Blue Letter Bible, 2016). As such, Christians believe that true redemption comes from God’s grace as opposed to abiding by the law.
Reference
Blue Letter Bible. (2016). Galatians 3-4. Retrieved from https://www.blueletterbible.org/tools/MultiVerse.cfm?t=KJV&Retrieve=&mvText=Galatians+3-4&refDelim=1&refFormat=2&numDelim=1&abbrev=1
