It was not through the law
that the promise was made to Abraham and his descendants
that he would inherit the world,
but through the righteousness that comes from faith.
The Mosaic covenant with all the laws and ceremonial works it involved was not given until later in salvation history, hundreds of years after the promise to Abraham. That law of Moses was promulgated with promised blessings for conformity and obedience and curses for disobedience. However, without the gift of faith, "the law produces wrath" (see Romans 4:15). It served more to bring awareness to the problem of sin than as an antidote.
Consequently, the law was our disciplinarian for Christ, that we might be justified by faith (see Galatians 3:24).
Paul insisted that the later Mosaic covenant could not make it so that "faith is null and the promise is void" (see Romans 4:14). A later covenant demanding obedience of which its adherents were incapable could not supercede that which was offered as a gift.
For this reason, it depends on faith,
so that it may be a gift,
and the promise may be guaranteed to all his descendants,
not to those who only adhere to the law
but to those who follow the faith of Abraham
The Mosaic covenant had many rituals designed to separate the people of Israel from the surrounding Gentile nations. Although it contained the most definitive statements of the moral law that existed it did not contain within itself the power to change hearts. Therefore the it was a covenant of wrath, for the very signs by which the members of Israel showed their adherence to that covenant served to remind them that the deeper moral problems of sin remained untreated.
But in these sacrifices there is a reminder of sins every year (see Hebrews 10:3).
The Mosaic covenant gave a heightened awareness of the vocation of Israel as set apart to be holy and dedicated to God. It set definitive external boundaries designed to remove external excuses for disobedience. But for all that was only a "disciplinarian" which brought, along with the awareness of the vocation of Israel, also a heightened awareness of sin and knowledge of how that vocation was not being fulfilled.
The promise made to Abraham was always meant to be a gift. So why did God detour through this difficult place of unmeetable obligation? Part of the reason was because of the way the people showed that they were not yet ready to receive what God wanted to give freely by their obstinate self will. They needed this experience of their own inadequacy in order to be willing to finally surrender. Unfortunately, they had to learn the hard way. But they were not unique in this regard.
We too would prefer to remain in control, or at least apparent control, of our destinies. We give lip service to gifts when we receive them, but to rely on a gift in the way that we are called to rely on faith requires a fundamental reorientation within us that trusts in the giver more than in we who receive. Therefore God chose to wait until the fullness of time, until hearts were finally ready, to send the one who would finally fulfill the promise, who was himself "Yes" to all the promises of God (see Second Corinthians 1:20).
Relying on faith even our failures are no longer insurmountable obstacles. We can find forgiveness even when speak words against the Son of Man, as we implicitly do whenever we speak as if his promises were impossible or as if his Kingdom centered understanding of reality were wrong or naive.
Everyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven
Relying on faith is the opposite of blasphemy against the Holy Spirit by which we refuse to receive the gift being offered, by which we finally and definitively refuse to receive the grace God never ceases to offer.
For the Holy Spirit will teach you at that moment what you should say.
When we rely on faith we are able to receive the words of the Holy Spirit that we need at the moment when we need them. What we see in this is a hint of how faith makes the self-gift of the martyrs possible. Before faith we would have needed some human way to overcome situations like being taken "before synagogues and before rulers and authorities". We would have needed to have our own careful legal defense worked out, because the obligation began and ended fundamentally with us. Faith set us free to trust, even in the most challenging of situations.
And he led forth his people with joy;
with shouts of joy, his chosen ones.
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