Galatians, part 2, How it Links with Numbers and Ezekiel

Linking Hebrew Letters to the Books of the Bible

As a dalet book Galatians should link in some way with Numbers and Ezekiel. Here’s how. In Numbers 14: 33 – 35 God says:

33 Your children will be shepherds here for forty years, suffering for your unfaithfulness, until the last of your bodies lies in the desert. 34 For forty years—one year for each of the forty days you explored the land—you will suffer for your sins and know what it is like to have me against you.' 35 I, the LORD, have spoken, and I will surely do these things to this whole wicked community, which has banded together against me. They will meet their end in this desert; here they will die."

Then in Ezekiel 4: 4 – 6

Galatians, part 1, Justified by Faith

Justification

This is the third time we’ve had a dalet book. Remember the Hebrew letter dalet and what it means? Door.

Galatians was written by the apostle Paul. The Galatians had become the prey of the legalizers, the Judaizing missionaries from Palestine. They believed 2 false doctrines: one was that obedience to the law was mingled with faith as the grounds of the sinner’s justification and the other was that the justified believer was made perfect by keeping the law. Think about that. You might find that false doctrine resurfacing today. A sinner is justified by faith alone; there is no salvation by keeping the law. Don’t let someone tell you that you’re not getting into Heaven if you don’t obey the 10 commandments.

Read Galatians 2:16, 3:11,13 and 3:23-24:

16 know that a man is not justified by observing the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ. So we, too, have put our faith in Christ Jesus that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by observing the law, because by observing the law no one will be justified.

11 Clearly no one is justified before God by the law, because, "The righteous will live by faith."13 Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: "Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree."23 Before this faith came, we were held prisoners by the law, locked up until faith should be revealed. 24 So the law was put in charge to lead us to Christ that we might be justified by faith.

In chapter 4 Paul shows great concern for the Galatians:

 8 Formerly, when you did not know God, you were slaves to those who by nature are not gods. 9 But now that you know God—or rather are known by God—how is it that you are turning back to those weak and miserable principles? Do you wish to be enslaved by them all over again? 10 You are observing special days and months and seasons and years!

Paul marvels, "You are observing special days and months and seasons and years!" Yet these are not pagan festivals that he is referring to, but important dates on the Jewish calendar. We understand that there is a sense in which the observance of special days could be tolerated (Romans 14:5-6), but the Galatians are taught to observe them for justification before God and other spiritual attainments. Paul's position is that this is like returning to paganism, back to ignorance and enslavement. And this is also his assessment of the Judaizers' religion.

Next week we’ll look at how Galatians links with the other two dalet books.

The Time Bender

Sixteen-year-old Selina’s battle with APD (Avoidant Personality Disorder) seriously hampers her ability to socialize and find that oh-so-perfect boyfriend. When two interstellar teens target her for kidnapping because they’ve discovered she has the ability to manipulate time, she interprets their actions as flirting. She battles her APD to awkwardly engage in interpersonal contact, something she’s only ever been able to do easily with boy-next-door Alex. When the space teens lure her beyond Earth’s bounds and she realizes she does have a phenomenal time-bending ability, she must decide: can she leave Earth to help them and can she leave Alex?

THE TIME BENDER on Amazon

2nd Corinthians, part 2, Its Link to Leviticus

A Ministry of reconciliation. 

Read 2nd Corinthians 5: 17 – 21:

17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! 18 All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: 19 that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. 20 We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. 21 God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

Why is this important? Because it matches up to the first gimel book, Leviticus. See Leviticus 16:32 – 34: