Deb and I are on our first cruise. Our ship is the Oasis of the Seas, the largest cruise ship in the world. It holds 5,400 guests and 2,100 crew members.
More than half these people are from countries other than the U.S. This is literally a floating U.N. And it is a beautiful parallel of God’s gracious saving act in Jesus.
Just as He promises through Abraham to bless all nations the world, this massive ship safely carries people from just about every ethnic group on our journey.
While we ride as passengers on this huge cruise ship, God’s saints set sail on His amazing Gospel ship.
Paul tells the Galatians that they are saved through their faith in God just as Abe was. No good works required. No rule keeping needed. The false teachers are wrong. Very wrong.
Once again, the apostle flips his Bible open to Genesis to explain the doctrine of justification by faith. “We’re children of faith thanks to Abraham” (Gal 3:7).
He describes how the writers of Scripture looked into the future and saw how “God would justify the Gentiles by faith” (v8). Paul uses the Greek word εθνος/ethnos to describe the Gentiles. It’s where we get our English word “ethnic.”
The Lord reveal to the prophetic authors how one day He would bless, save, and justify people from every ethnic group through the faith of Abraham. He would actually do this through Abe’s descendant Jesus.
Paul uses a very interesting phrase when he writes how “the Scripture…preached the Gospel beforehand to Abraham” (v8). “Preached the Gospel”?
In the OT? Huh? It’s another fabulous example that the Bible is really one story, not two. And Jesus is THE Hero of that story. The OT saints were saved the same way God saves believers in the NT. By faith and trust in Him alone.
The apostle says that the Gospel that Abraham heard preached was God’s personal promise to him, “In you shall all the nations be blessed” (v8). This is a quote from Genesis 16:3 that’s later repeated again in Genesis 18:18 and yet again in Genesis 22:18.
Here Paul equates the very words of Yahweh to Scripture. This reminds us how the inspired words of the Bible are equal to hearing directly from the lips of the Lord. It is indeed God’s holy Word.
God’s promise of future blessing qualifies as the Gospel because that future blessing of all the people groups of the world will happen through Abe’s eventual descendant, Jesus Christ, the radical Rabbi/Carpenter from Nazareth.
It is through Jesus that we receive that blessing. What is that blessing? Ultimately it is God Himself. He is my portion(Ps 73:26; Lam 3:24).
The beauty of God’s Gospel ship as opposed to our cruise ship is that He is still accepting passengers, just as He has been for thousands of years. He is welcoming aboard people from every country, race, language, and religious background.
They don’t need a ticket. They don’t need a passport. If they’ve placed their trust in Jesus, He lovingly welcomes them aboard.
©2012
Jay Jennings
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