And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the nations by faith, preached the gospel to Abraham beforehand, saying, “In you all the nations shall be blessed.” So then those who are of faith are blessed with believing Abraham.- Galatians 3:8-9
Paul spoke from the Scriptures. He had already spoken from his personal experience and from the experience of the Galatian Christians themselves. But this passage is even more important, because it shows how Paul’s teaching is correct according to the Bible itself. It would have been just fine for Paul’s opponents to say, “Experiences are just fine Paul, but show us from the Scriptures.” Paul was more than ready to take up the challenge.
Remarkably, Paul referred to the Scriptures virtually as a person who foresees, preaches, and says. This shows just how strongly Paul regarded the Bible as God’s word. Paul believed that when the Scriptures spoke, God spoke. Paul observed that even back in Abraham’s day it was clear that this blessing of righteousness by faith was intended for every nation, for Gentiles as well as Jews, because God pronounced that “in you all the nations shall be blessed” (Genesis 12:3).
The intention was to destroy the idea that a Gentile must first become a Jew before they could become a Christian. If that were necessary God would never have said this blessing would extend to every nation, because Gentiles would have had to become part of the Israelite nation to be saved. The idea is that the gospel goes out to the nations, not that the nations come and assimilate into Israel.
The blessing we receive with believing Abraham is not the blessing of fantastic wealth and power, though Abraham was extremely wealthy and powerful. The blessing is something far more precious: the blessing of a right standing with God through faith. Is your faith this important to you?
Abraham was a wealthy guy. Additionally, Abraham was a “legacy” character of the bible. This means he is definitely taught in every Sunday school class. We all are attracted to the fancy elements of Abraham, but do you know that Abraham’s most outstanding quality (his faith) is also your most outstanding quality? We do not praise our faithful Christian brothers and sisters enough. So often, a sibling in Christ has encouraged me by their unrelenting faith. I have encountered Christians in the most terrible of situations. Even still, their faith stood on.