The Law as a School Master

Galatians 3:24 (ESV)
So then, the law was our guardian until Christ came, in order that we might be justified by faith.

The following is commentary from John Gill's Exposition of the Bible:: "The sense of the passage is, that the law performed this office of a schoolmaster(translated in the ESV as guardian) until the coming of Christ; which shows that till that time the church was in its minority, that the Jews were but children in knowledge and understanding, and therefore stood in need, and were under the care of a schoolmaster, the law."

The law's purpose was to educate the Jews on their need for a saviour and to eventually show them the beauty and freedom that is found in grace and the Son of God, who came and fulfilled the law and offered us His own righteousness by faith.

This is a wonderfully poetic truth and brings my sin soaked heart to adoration of Jesus.