Galatians 1:3-4 “3Grace be to you and peace from God the Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ, 4Who gave himself for our sins, that he might deliver us from this present evil world, according to the will of God and our Father:”

“Deliver us from this present evil world” is not talking of the created nature, or the earth and its productions, nor even wicked men. The Earth is our place while alive; you cannot do without it as a human being. Even if you go to the moon, that’s completely an artificial life. It’s not fully the habitat for man neither is God foolish or has made a mistake to place man on the Earth. Wicked men itself we cannot avoid if we must be real to ourselves, for the Church of God is formed out of converted wicked ones. So you need them for the Church to grow. And, by the successive conversion of sinners is the Church of Christ maintained; and the followers of God must live and labour among them for their conversion. So the world here is not dealing with the created universal and the habitable earth.

So then the first application of the word EVIL WORLD (AGE) here must mean the Jews, and their system of carnal ordinances; statutes (which were not good), and judgments by which they could not live. Look at it;

Ezekiel 20:24-25 “24Because they had not executed my judgments, but had despised my statutes, and had polluted my sabbaths, and their eyes were after their fathers’ idols. 25Wherefore I gave them also statutes that were not good, and judgments whereby they should not live.”

What that really meant is; “But my people would not hearken to my voice; and Israel would none of me, So I gave them up unto their own hearts’ lust: and they walked in their own counsels.” (Psalms 81:11-12)

And again, 2 Thessalonian 2: “10And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. 11And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: 12That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.”

So we see that the whole of the Jewish Religious Economy was a burden that neither they nor their fathers were able to bear as the Council spoke concerning the Gentiles;

Acts 15: “8And God, which knoweth the hearts, bare them witness, giving them the Holy Ghost, even as he did unto us; 9And put no difference between us and them, purifying their hearts by faith. 10Now therefore why tempt ye God, to put a yoke upon the neck of the disciples, which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear? 11But we believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved, even as they.”

Therefore, in Galatians 1:4, we are dealing with an age. And to “deliver us from this” in the Greek, means “out of the,”. The Father and Son are each said to “deliver us,” (Colossians 1:13): but the Son, not the Father, gave Himself for us in order to do so, and made us citizens of a better world, His kingdom (Colossians 1:12-13; Philippians 3:20).

The Galatians, in desiring to return to legal bondage, are here implied renouncing the deliverance which Christ wrought for (them) us.

“Deliver” is the very word used by the Lord as to His deliverance of Paul himself from the Jewish religion that he was into; (Acts 26: 17);

“Delivering thee from the people, and from the Gentiles, unto whom now I send thee.”

Again, like I said the word “world”–Greek, as used here is “age, system or course of the world, regarded from a religious point of view.

The present age opposes the “glory” of God. (Galatians 1:5 “To whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen”) When you read of EVER AND EVER, it means “ages of Ages” in this passage.

Meaning as compared to the whole spectrum of this present age that is under the prince of the power of the Air.

“Wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience” (Ephesians 2:2)

It is completely opposed to the ever unfolding glory of the Lord in His people.

Even as we are told; “17Now the Lord is that Spirit: and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. 18But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.” (2 Corinthians 3:17-18)

This age is opposed to the Glory of God. “And Christ is that express image and Glory of God.” (Hebrews 1:3).

In other words, the spirit of this age that we are living in is completely opposed to the character and image of the Spirit of Christ that is resident within His people.

To be continued…