“… but he is under guardians and managers until the date set by his father.” (Gal. 4:2)

We continue the thought of the previous verse and Paul returns to his guardian manager comparison. Children were managed by appointed guardians until they reached maturity. This time was controlled by the parent. Paul told us about guardians before and called the law a guardian in terms of its usefulness for God’s people. Keep in mind that the guardian was a strict manager and kept the child under heavy control. Paul compares it with being a slave as far as freedom to act independently was concerned.

Paul is comparing prison with freedom. The law was a type of prison in which the people were held captive. There was no escape and it was a type of slavery as well. Jesus then came to set the prisoners free. If freed then they should be free indeed. Foolish were the Galatians in Paul’s mind because they wanted to give up their freedom and go back to being slaves and imprisonment.

The Jews often took that approach after being freed from Egyptian captivity and slavery. At every difficult turn, they wanted to return to their old way of life and reject the calling of God from captivity. Sin is like Egypt in that regard. Sin holds us captive and enslaves us. We lose our free will and are subject to its demands. Jesus came to end the slavery of the law and the slavery of sin which it represented by putting sin to death. Strange isn’t it that Galatian Christians wanted to go back to the law of sin and Christians today often want to return to the prison of sin?

The gospel of Christ is the saving power of God. If you want to be free from sin then you have to accept the gospel as your way out. There is no other name by which we can be saved and no other way by which salvation comes than through the gospel of Christ. This is why Paul was so upset with the Galatian Christians. They were rejecting the only means of freedom.

Task for Today: What about you? Have you obeyed the good news? Hear the gospel we are told that we might believe the gospel. Once we believe it we will want to do what it calls us to do. Is that where you are in your faith? Christ has set you free from sin, why live in it any longer?