Galatians 3:23-25 tells us: “Before the coming of this faith, we were held in custody under the law, locked up until the faith that was to come would be revealed. So the law was our guardian until Christ came that we might be justified by faith. Now that this faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian.” (NIV)
At one point, our only hope of becoming justified before God was the law of Moses. And what a dim hope it was.
None of us are perfect enough to ever become justified before God through keeping the law lined out in the Old Testament. Knowing this, our loving Heavenly Father sent His only begotten Son – Jesus Christ – to die on the cross, carry our sin that separated us from God, and give us His righteousness (2 Corinthians 5:21).
And if we accept what Jesus did on the cross for us, we are justified by faith. As explained in these verses in Galatians, the law was merely a guardian until Christ came. It was not God’s eternal plan for our justification. Jesus was God’s perfect plan all along.
In fact, the Bible says that the law was given “so that all people could see how sinful they were.” (Romans 5:20; NLT) The law was given to bring us to the end of ourselves, so we could fully understand that we are in need of a Savior.
