Galatians 2:17-18

Galatians 2:17-18

[17] But  if,  while we seek  to be justified  by  Christ,  ourselves  also  are found  sinners,  Christ  the minister  of sin?  God forbid.  [18] For  if  I build  again  which  I destroyed,  I make  myself  a transgressor. 

What does Galatians 2:17-18 Mean?

Contextual Meaning

Paul refuted the charge of the Judaizers that justification by faith led to lawless behavior. He said this made Christ, in effect, a promoter of sin. This could never be. If a Christian puts himself or herself back under the Law, the Law will show him or her to be a sinner since no one can keep the Law perfectly. These verses are a strong testimony that Christians are free from the requirements of the Mosaic Law.
What did Paul mean when he said "while seeking to be justified in Christ, we ourselves have also been found sinners" ( Galatians 2:17)?
"Here he [1] may simply mean that when law-abiding Jews like Peter and himself cease to look to the law as the basis of their justification before God and find that justification in Christ instead, they put themselves effectively on a level with "sinners of the gentiles": they have, in that sense, "been found sinners"-they themselves (kai autoi) as much as lesser breeds without the law. But this applies to all Jewish Christians, even to those who have not appreciated the law-free character of the gospel: by yielding faith to Christ they have in logic, if not in consciousness, abandoned faith in the law, and have had to take their place as sinners, utterly in need of God"s justifying grace." [2]
". . . Paul is arguing that although it is true that in order to be justified in Christ it is necessary to abandon faith in the law as a means of salvation (premise1) and hence to become sinners in the sense of being reduced to the level of the "Gentiles and sinners" of Galatians 2:15 (premise2), the conclusion does not follow that Christ thereby becomes an agent of sin (in the sense of a promoter of actual wrongdoing), support for this statement being given in Galatians 2:18-20." [3]
The "For" at the beginning of Galatians 2:18 is probably coordinate with the "For" at the beginning of Galatians 2:19. Both verses give reasons "it must never be" ( Galatians 2:17). Galatians 2:18 gives the hypothetical negative proof: actual transgression inevitably follows when the law becomes the authority in the believer"s life. Galatians 2:19 gives the actual positive proof.