Galatians Study Part Ten: 3:26-29
NLT: “For you are all children of God through faith in Christ Jesus. 27 And all who have been united with Christ in baptism have put on Christ, like putting on new clothes. 28 There is no longer Jew or Gentile, slave or free, male and female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus. 29 And now that you belong to Christ, you are the true children of Abraham. You are his heirs, and God’s promise to Abraham belongs to you.”
NASB: “For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. 27 For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. 28 There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. 29 And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s descendants, heirs according to promise.”
I don’t believe Paul could say it any plainer than he did when he wrote, “For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus.” Those of us from unhealthy churches need to grasp this reality. No matter what we were told was necessary according to our former churches, this is NOT up to us. We don’t become sons of God any other way than through believing the gospel and having faith. It is so simple and yet so often people distort it by adding in their own conditions. People fight against the simplicity in this message.
When believers are baptized into Christ, they are clothed with him. We become one in the Lord. This truth goes along with what Paul shares in 1 Corinthians 12. God has combined us all together in one body, the body of Christ. It no longer matters our nationality, sex, or status in life – or any of the things that make us different from one another. We are one in Christ.
Some believe that baptism here means water baptism and I don’t totally dismiss the thought. I lean much more toward it meaning being baptized with God’s Spirit (and I am not referring to speaking in tongues). Let me explain why.
A person can be water baptized and yet go no further in their walk with God. They could get baptized in the heat of a moment or could be pressured to do so by family or friends. Some of us have heard stories of how, in an effort to win over someone they wanted to be with, a person would fake things such as being baptized. A person could be water baptized and yet, like Simon the sorcerer, not have their heart right with God (Acts 8). In any of those cases, could we say that the people had clothed themselves with Christ and become one with all believers? I cannot grasp that being the case.
Is it not the Spirit of God who baptizes us into the body of Christ? Consider 1 Corinthians 12:13, “For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free, and we were all made to drink of one Spirit.” Note in this passage that Paul also makes mention of Jew and Greek as well as slave or free, just as he did in Galatians 3:28.
Ephesians 2:22 says, “in whom you also are being built together into a dwelling of God in the Spirit.” Without the Spirit of God, we cannot be one in Jesus.
In the last verse of chapter three, Paul brings us back to the thought of our relationship with Abraham, that believers are the descendants of Abraham and are heirs, according to the promise. It is all because we believed and had faith, just as Abraham did.
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