Paul questions the Judaizers because they are actively putting the law and the promise against each other. He is accusing them of making the law contract the gospel and the promises of God. He is calling them out of the false hypothetical that they have created that if they keep the law they could gain life. He’s saying no such word has ever been uttered. The truth is that humans break the law and sin every single day. Paul is making it obviously clear to them and to us today that if our faith is in the law and not the promise then we will not find the justification we are seeking in the eyes of God. The Old Testament makes it clear that the law has put all of them under the category of sinners. 

So how do we harmonize the law and the promise? Only when we see that we inherit the promise because we cannot keep the law. Because we cannot keep the law it makes the promise all that more desirable and indispensable in our lives. 

We end our reflection with a quote from Martin Luther. A quote that expresses this truth in his usual forcefulness.

‘The principal point … of the law … is to make men not better but worse; that is to say, it showeth unto them their sin, that by the knowledge thereof they may be humbled, terrified, bruised and broken, and by this means may be driven to seek grace, and so to come to that blessed Seed (sc. Christ).