What does Galatians 4:5 mean?

Christ has come, and with Him the opportunity to be freed from the curse of the law. In the previous verse, Paul said that God sent His Son at the exact right moment in human history to be born to a human woman.

As fully God and fully human, what was Christ's mission on earth? Paul reports that He came to redeem those under that law. The word translated as "redeem" is from the Greek root word exagorazo. This is the same word used to buy a slave out of bondage. That's why Jesus came: to buy those who believe in Him out of our bondage to the requirements of the law, and the out of the curse that comes with the law, because we could not keep the law perfectly. We were literally slaves to our own sinfulness with no hope of escape.

Christ didn't redeem us just to set us free to wander on our own, however. He came to redeem us so that we can be adopted into God's family. Through faith in Christ, we not only escape the need to follow the works of the law endlessly with no hope of ever escaping our sin. We also find a home and family as children of God the Father. We find forgiveness from sin and belonging with God.

Paul will soon ask why the liberated children of God would ever want to go back to living in slavery under the law.