What does Galatians 1:4 mean?

Paul understood his life to a have a singular purpose. He had been commissioned by Christ to take the message of salvation through Christ to the world. It is not surprising, then, that he includes the simple facts of what he will call "the gospel" at the very beginning of his letter.

Paul has already described Jesus Christ as the person who God the Father raised from the dead. Now he adds to that, building on the greeting from the previous verse. He has wished his readers "grace and peace" from God the Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.

Now Paul describes exactly who Jesus Christ is by describing what the Lord did and why He did it.

First, Jesus gave Himself. Paul uses this language about Christ's death on the cross repeatedly in his letters (1 Timothy 2:6; Ephesians 5:25; Titus 2:14). Nobody took Jesus' life from Him against His will. He gave it freely (John 10:17–18). It's true that the Jewish religious leaders called for His death and that the Romans executed Him, but they could not have done so without Jesus' willingness to be sacrificed.

Why was He sacrificed? "For our sins." Jesus gave Himself to the death penalty we earn with our sin (Romans 6:23). He became our substitute on the cross, paying what we owed.

Why did He pay it? In part, He did it "to deliver us from the present evil age." Humanity was trapped in a world built from our own sinful choices. Jesus paid the only exit fee, the ransom, to make it possible for us to escape into a deathless life.

He also gave Himself "according to the will of our God and Father." Jesus' death on the cross was an act of submission to the plan and purpose of God.