Some false teachers had arisen in the churches of Galatia. They were teaching that a man must focus his life upon the rituals and teachings of religion, and the works of the law, instead of focusing upon Christ. They were in essence saying that a man had to be ritualized or circumcised, or in modern terms, become a church member or get baptized. Men were charged to give their lives keeping the law in order to be acceptable to God. They placed ritual and law, and that which they had to do, above Christ. Their center of attention was themselves, and what they could do to save themselves and to make themselves acceptable to God, and not upon Christ and His saving power. They stressed the flesh, the physical and the natural, the strength of man, instead of the power of the Holy Spirit. Lastly, faith was noticeably missing from their lives. Paul gave a persuasive and powerful answer from Scripture. He used Abraham to illustrate the truth that Scripture, in particular the Torah itself, proved that a man is justified by faith and not by works or law (v. 6-7). He wrote that the Torah preached the gospel of faith to Abraham (v. 8-9). He argued from Torah that the law puts a man under the curse (v. 10-12). And even drew from Torah his case that Christ has redeemed us from the curse (v. 13-14).
