Today's Devotion: Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: “Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree.”^f (^f Deut. 21:23; The Holy Bible : New International Version. electronic ed. Grand Rapids : Zondervan, 1996, c1984, S. Ga 3:13) According to the New International Greek Testament Commentary, this passage is saying that Jesus acted as our substitute, becoming the curse which we were under, because through His lifelong obedience, He remained immune from that curse. Paul is saying that the punishment for the curse under which mankind existed was the most severe and equivalent to hanging on the tree, or crucifixion.

It is clear, when one reads the Book of Genesis, that mankind deserved no redemption for his rebellion against God. Death, and only death, would suffice to appease a righteous god. And, as it also worked out, it was death, and only death that sufficed to restore our severed relationship to a loving God. In that death, God, himself, took the form of a man, Jesus Christ, and came to Earth so that mankind might be redeemed and reconciled to Him. Though sacrifice was required, it was God, himself who provided the lamb that was sacrificed; so the relationship that Adam broke with God was restored in Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.