Post-feast of the Exaltation of the Cross; Holy Great-Martyr Nicetas (374)
Galatians 3:23-4:5; Mark 6:30-45
Read Galatians 3:23-4:5
Glory to Jesus Christ! Glory forever!
Historians like to pinpoint major figures that changed the course of history, without whom world history could not possibly have developed the way it did. In the course of salvation history, one person stands alone as the most important and most significant, without whom salvation is not possible: the Son of God incarnate, Jesus Christ.
Before Christ came to earth, only a small portion of all humanity knew God: the Jews, the children of Abraham. God had set them apart from all others as his own. He Law that God gave to the Jews served both as a guide on how to live rightly and as an identity marker for those who followed it. Jews could be identified as a separate people and as God’s people by the law they followed.
This Law, however, could not possibly give life. Because of our sin, we always were in the wrong. The Law could tell you when you had committed evil and were in a state of death, but it could not give life.
When Christ came to dwell among us, He brought Life. And we become justified and right before God not by perfectly following the Law, but by faith in Christ. Since Christ is revealed to all, Jew and Gentile alike can come to know Him and partake in His Life.
By our faith in Christ, we become adopted sons of Abraham and heirs to God’s promise of blessedness.