About Jesus  -  Steve Sweetman

No Curse For Christians

The Law of Moses, also known as the Mosaic Covenant, was a conditional agreement between God and the  Jews.  Like any agreement between two or more parties there were stipulations in the covenant that all participants agreed to be responsible to keep.  If the Jews failed to live up to their responsibilities they would suffer the curses documented in the covenant.  The blessings, therefore, also stated in the covenant, were conditional upon the Jews following through on their commitment to the agreement.

In contrast to the Mosaic Covenant the Abrahamic Covenant was an unconditional covenant, made not between God and Abraham but between God and Himself.  Abraham and his descendants had no obligations to keep because there were no stated obligations in the covenant.  There were only unconditional blessings.  Abraham had only one thing to do and that was to trust that God would keep His covenantal promises.        

With the above in mind I make a couple of comments on Galatians 3:13 and 14.

"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 pole.  He redeemed us in order that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that by faith we might receive the promise of the Spirit."

Paul said that Jesus redeemed us, or rescued us, from the law's curses by becoming cursed on our behalf.  In context, the word "law" refers to the Law of Moses, the Mosaic Covenant. 

Since Jesus rescued us from the curse of the Mosaic Covenant you might think that we are now recipients of the blessings of the Mosaic Covenant, but that is not what Paul said.  He said that Jesus rescued us from the curse of the Mosaic Covenant so we could benefit from the blessings, not of the conditional Mosaic Covenant, but from the blessings of Abraham, the unconditional Abrahamic Covenant.  This fantastic news is often missed when reading this text. 

Those of us who trust that Jesus was cursed on our behalf have been released from any curse associated with the Mosaic Covenant in order to receive the benefits of the Abrahamic Covenant.  Like Abraham, our only obligation is to trust that God will be true to His word.  This is what the gospel of Jesus, the New Covenant, is all about.  It is central to everything Paul taught. 

To suggest that a Christian can be cursed by God negates Jesus being cursed on our behalf.  God's blessings, which include the reception of His Spirit into our lives as seen in Galatians 3:14, are unconditional.  We simply trust that God is true to His word, and that He is.