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Scripture Reading: Gal. 1:15-16; 2:20; 4:19; 3:14
I. Galatians reveals that God’s plan according His good pleasure is to work Christ Himself into us; the most evil thing, according to Galatians, is to distract people from Christ — Eph. 1:5; Gal. 1:4-16; 2:20; 4:19 Hymns, #538.
II. Galatians presents the Christ who is the threefold seed in humanity for God’s dispensing of Himself into the believers of Christ for the fulfillment of His economy — 3:16; Gen. 3:15; Gal. 4:4; Luke 8:5a, 11; John 12:24:
А. Christ as the seed of the woman refers to the incarnated Christ, the complete God becoming a perfect man through the dispensing of Himself into humanity in order to destroy Satan and to save the believers in Christ from sin and death — Gen. 3:15; Isa. 7:14; Matt. 1:16, 20-21, 23; Gal. 4:4; John 1:1, 14; Heb. 2:14; 1 Cor. 15:53-57.
B. Christ as the seed of Abraham is for the blessing to all the families of the earth; the unique seed of Abraham as the last Adam became the life-giving Spirit, who is the blessing of Abraham (the reality of the good land), for the dispensing of Himself into the believers of Christ to make them the corporate seed of Abraham — Gen. 12:2-3, 7; 17:7-8; Gal. 3:14, 16, 29; John 14:17-20; 1 Cor. 15:45b; John 12:24; Isa. 53:10.
C. Christ as the seed of David refers to the resurrected Christ, who carries out God’s New Testament economy for the dispensing of the processed Triune God into the members of His Body, so that they may share His kingship in His resurrection in the eternal kingdom — 2 Sam. 7:12-14a; Matt. 22:42-45; Rom. 1:3; Rev. 22:16; Acts 2:30-31; Matt. 16:16-18; Rev. 20:4, 6:
1. The great mountain, the kingdom of God that fills the whole earth in Daniel 2:34-35, is the corporate threefold seed in humanity, which includes all the believers in Christ — cf. Mark 4:26.
2. Through Christ as the threefold seed in humanity, the enemies are gone, the blessing is here, and we are in the kingdom; this is the revelation of the entire Bible.
III. Galatians reveals the way to receive, experience, and enjoy the all-inclusive Christ as the all-inclusive life-giving Spirit — the aggregate of the all-embracing blessing of the full gospel of God — 3:14:
А. The way to receive, experience, and enjoy the all-inclusive Christ as the all-inclusive life-giving Spirit is by God’s revealing of Christ in us; we live the Christian life according to the Christ whom we have seen — 1:16a; Eph. 1:17; Gen. 13:14-18; Eph. 3:8, 19.
B. The way to receive, experience, and enjoy the all-inclusive Christ as the all-inclusive life-giving Spirit is by our receiving of Christ out of the hearing of faith — Gal. 3:2:
1. The faith of the believers is Christ entering into them to be their faith, making their spirit a spirit of faith — Heb. 12:2a; Gal. 2:16; Rom. 3:22; 2 Cor. 4:13.
2. Faith comes out of the hearing of the word — Rom. 10:17.
3. Faith is to believe that God is and we are not; faith always annuls us and reveals Christ to us — Heb. 11:6; Gen. 5:24; John 8:58; Gal. 2:20.
4. The believers are the members of the family, the household, of faith; this faith-house is a house that believes in God through His word — 6:10.
C. The way to receive, experience, and enjoy the all-inclusive Christ as the all-inclusive life-giving Spirit is by being born according to the Spirit and by being given the Spirit of God’s Son into our hearts — 4:29b, 6.
D. The way to receive, experience, and enjoy the all-inclusive Christ as the all-inclusive life-giving Spirit is by putting on Christ through the baptism that puts us into Christ — 3:27.
E. The way to receive, experience, and enjoy the all-inclusive Christ as the all-inclusive life-giving Spirit is by being identified with Him in His death so that it may be no longer we who live but He who lives in us; and the life which we now live in the flesh we live by the faith of Christ — 2:20:
1. To be identified with Christ means to be one spirit with Him and even to be one entity with Him — 1 Cor. 15:45b; 6:17; Phil. 1:20-21a.
2. We are identified with Christ in His death in order that it may be no longer we who live but Christ who lives in us — Rom. 6:3-4; Gal. 2:20a.
3. We live such a life in Christ as our faith; genuine faith is Christ Himself infused into us to become our appreciation of Him as a reaction to His attraction — v. 20b; 2 Cor. 5:14-15; Heb. 12:2a.
F. The way to receive, experience, and enjoy the all-inclusive Christ as the all-inclusive life-giving Spirit is by living and walking by the Spirit — Gal. 5:16, 25.
G. The way to receive, experience, and enjoy the all-inclusive Christ as the all-inclusive life-giving Spirit is by having Christ formed in us through travail — 4:19:
1. Christ’s being formed in us depends on our being transformed; our being transformed and His being formed in us cause us to be conformed to His image — 2 Cor. 3:18; Rom. 8:29.
2. To have Christ formed in us is to have the three parts of our soul (our mind, emotion, and will) renewed — 12:2; 2 Cor. 4:16.
H. The way to receive, experience, and enjoy the all-inclusive Christ as the all-inclusive life-giving Spirit is by sowing unto the Spirit with the desire and aim of the Spirit in view, to accomplish what the Spirit desires — Gal. 6:7-8.
I. The way to receive, experience, and enjoy the all-inclusive Christ as the all-inclusive life-giving Spirit is by boasting in the cross of Christ and living a new creation — vv. 14-15.
J. The way to receive, experience, and enjoy the all-inclusive Christ as the all-inclusive life-giving Spirit is by the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ with our spirit — vv. 17-18.
