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Daily Devotional for Saturday, June 6, 2026

Today's PC(USA) Daily Lectionary Readings:

  • Morning Psalms: 122; 149
  • Evening Psalms: 100; 63
  • First Reading: Ecclesiastes 5:8–20
  • Second Reading: Galatians 3:23–4:11
  • Gospel Reading: Matthew 15:1–20

Scripture: Galatians 3:23–29

Now before faith came, we were imprisoned and guarded under the law until faith would be revealed. Therefore the law was our disciplinarian until Christ came, so that we might be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer subject to a disciplinarian, for in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith. As many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus. And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to the promise.

Reflection:
Think about the spaces in our world that are defined by rules, levels, and consequence-systems. We see it in the justice system, in treatment facilities, in classrooms, and even in the rigid boundaries we set up to manage our own lives when things feel out of control.

The Apostle Paul understood the necessity of these structures. In his letter to the Galatians, he calls the law our "disciplinarian." In the ancient world, the paidagogos was a guardian, often a strict one, whose job was to keep a child safe and supervise their conduct until they reached maturity. We need the law. We need boundaries to show us where the edges are, to keep us from harming ourselves and others.

But Paul’s beautiful, radical point is that the disciplinarian is not our permanent home.

The ultimate goal of the strict guardian is to get the child to adulthood. The goal of rules is to create enough safety for a relationship to form. In Christ, the rigid lines of the "behavior chart" are transcended. We are no longer defined by our infractions or by how well we perform under the law. We are adopted as children.

Think of a teacher, a social worker, or a mentor who stops being merely an enforcer of rules and looks at a struggling kid, saying, "As long as you are within my sphere of influence, I am not leaving you alone. We're in this together." That is the exact shift from law to grace. It’s the shift from external compliance to internal transformation rooted in love.

In a cultural moment that feels increasingly fractured by divisions, where the news and social media constantly demands we measure people by their political labels, their demographics, or their worst mistakes, Paul reminds us of something greater. "There is no longer Jew or Greek... slave or free... male and female." When we are clothed in Christ, those old divisions lose their power to separate us. We belong to God, and therefore, we deeply belong to one another.

Art for Today:
To match today’s reading, spend a moment looking up the artwork Baptism of Jesus (1973) by the Japanese mingei (folk) artist Sadao Watanabe. Paul writes, "As many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ." Watanabe’s art depicts biblical figures wearing everyday, earthy Japanese garments rather than distant historical robes. He clothed the Gospel in the everyday fabric of ordinary people, a visual reminder that Christ clothed himself in our humanity so that everyday people like us could be clothed in him. We aren't marked by our past records; we are marked by the grace we wear.

Prayer:
Gracious God, we thank you for the boundaries that keep us safe, but we thank you even more for the grace that sets us free. Help us to live not as prisoners of our past mistakes or our societal labels, but as your beloved children. Give us the eyes to see others not through the lens of their infractions, but through the clothing of Christ's love. Amen.