Part 4 of 5 in series on Galatians given on May 26, 2011.

<p>Part 4 of 5 in series on Galatians given on May 26, 2011.</p>

<p>Free sharing permitted under the Creative Commons <a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/">BY-NC-ND 3.0 (US)</a> license.</p>

AudioVerse

Norman McNulty

Galatians and the Gospel

Galatians 1—Another Gospel

Galatians 2—Justified and Crucified

Galatians 3—The Law in Galatians

Galatians 4—Two Covenants

Galatians 5&6—Flesh Versus the Spirit

All right. Good morning. Good morning. Let's have a word of prayer and we'll get started. Father in heaven, we thank you for another day. We thank you that we can have another moment of time to open up the word of scripture and we pray for a special blessing as we look at Galatians chapter four this morning. I pray this in the name of Jesus. Amen. Amen. So we've looked at the first three chapters in Galatians, Galatians chapter one. We saw that Paul reminded the church of Galatia, that he was an apostle called by God to preach the gospel. And he marveled that they were so soon turned to another gospel different than the one that he had taught them. And then he tells his personal testimony last half of chapter one, first half of chapter two of how he was a Jew, exceedingly zealous, persecuting the Christians. And if anyone knew the law of the Jews, Paul did. And then after his conversion, he talks about how the apostle Peter, despite what he knew, got carried away or influenced by judaizing and Christians. And in other words, he had the fear of man. And Paul stood up to him and he then clearly shows what salvation is, what justification by faith is, and that in order to have salvation, we must be crucified with Christ, that the gospel is a gospel of surrender. And then in chapter three, he tells the Galatians that you have been bewitched. Christ was set before you, crucified among you, and yet you have churned to a different gospel. And one of the things I thought about even since yesterday was that when we see Jesus crucified on the cross, that really motivates us to surrender our lives to him. And so then he goes through in chapter three talking about Abraham, how he received righteousness and the ch the the covenant that God made with Abraham. And then he talks about the law and how it was the school master to bring us to Christ. But once Christ came, we saw him as the demonstration of the gospel. And therefore those who have put on Christ are Abraham seeded, not just the literal Jesus. So that's what we've seen so far. Now we're gonna look at chapter four today. And if you look at the end of chapter three, he says, if you be Christ, this is verse 29, then are you Abraham seed and heirs according to the promise. So when you accept Christ, you become an heir of salvation. Amen. And the, so he continues on with that in chapter four, verse one. He says, now I say that the heir, as long as he is a child, give herth nothing from a servant, though he be Lord of all, but is under tutors and governors until the time appointed of the Father. So the obviously example would be for, for example, Trinidad used to be a colony, if you will, of of the United Kingdom. And you have Queen Elizabeth right now, when she was much younger, she had her first son, prince Charles, and he's been aired to the throne for quite some time now. But if, for example, queen Elizabeth had died when Prince Charles was two years old, would Prince Prince Charles would be king of England? He would have been, but he would not have had the knowledge or ability to carry out the, the function as king, but he would have been the king. But he would've had tutors and governors overseeing him until he grew up so that he could function in that role properly. And what Paul is saying here is, is that look, when you are a child of God and because of what Christ did, as the lamb slain from the foundation of the world making a means for salvation, we became heirs of the kingdom of God from the very time that, or we had the potential to be heirs. And if we accepted Christ even before he came, we had the potential to grow up to be a full mature Christian with the knowledge of God. But before Jesus came and gave a full demonstration, we were in the dispensation of this world like children who needed tutors and governors to train us. And what he's teaching us is, is that, or what Paul is saying here is, is that the law was our cheater and governor until the time appointed. So the law was our cheater, our governor that we were under until the time appointed of the Father. And then continuing on Ann three, it says, even so when we were children, we were in bondage under the elements of the world. Now I looked this up in this in the Bible commentary and where it says we are in bondage of the, under the elements of the world. What what you see here is Paul is clearly connecting, being under tutors and governors with being under bondage to the elements of the world. He says even so. So it's a clear continuation. He says, justice children are under tutors and governors if they were an heir to the throne. Even so we were in bondage to the elements of the world. And if you look at what the commentary says, if it shows that the elements of the world, the word for elements here actually describes the laws that guide the world that we live in. And so what Paul is actually talking about is we were under bondage to the law when we were children before we had a full demonstration of who Christ is. We were in bondage under this law. But, and then the contrast becomes very clear, verse four. But when the fullness of the time was come, God sent forth his son, made of a woman made under the law to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons. So notice this, because Jesus came, we received the adoption of sons, we became heirs. Now, this is the amazing thing about being an heir. If you look at Romans eight specifically, it talks about how yes, Jesus is the son of God, but when we accept Jesus as our savior, we also become heirs of God. So just as Jesus is the son of God, we can become heirs of the same promise, please. And that's the wonderful message of salvation. Now, here's what Paul is saying, and this is interesting. Says, when the fullness of time was come, God sent forth his son made of a woman. That means that means Jesus was made a human being. Not only that, it says he was made under the law, which means that he came in human nature with a kind of human nature that we have. He was made under the law specifically to redeem them that we're under the law. And you know, sometimes people will say, well, Christ couldn't have taken our nature because that would then mean that he needed a savior. Well, Paul says Christ was made of a woman made under the law to redeem them that we're under the law. So Christ obviously didn't need a savior, but he, he came in the humanity that we have to redeem us, that we might receive adoption of sons. And Paul continues because you are sons. God has sent forth the spirit of his son under your heart's crying, Abba Father. So when we become sons of God, we enter into our relationship with God where we see God the Father, as a loving God who sent his son to give us salvation in verse seven, where for thou no more a servant but a son. And if a son than an air of God through Christ Howbeit, then when you knew not God, you did service unto them, which by nature are no gods. And then notice verse nine, he says, but now after that you have known God or rather are known of God, how turn you again to the weak and biggly elements where until you desire again to be in bondage. So Paul is saying this, look, yeah, come these laws brought you in. You were in bondage under these laws. They were the laws that were like tutors and governors until the time was appointed that Jesus would come. They helped you to gain a knowledge of who God was, but you were a servant to those laws, so to speak, until you had a better demonstration of who Christ is. And now that Christ has come, he has made it possible for you to be an heir of God through Christ. So why then would you go back to the things that you were in bondage to the weak and beggarly elements of the world? And a practical illustration is this, many of us had a time in our lives where we were in the world. We lived by the laws of the world and according to the principles of this world, and then a time came in our lives where we saw Jesus as our savior, we accepted him, we received salvation, and we felt that freedom that came in Christ. And as so often happens with many Christians, they backslide to the things they once were in bondage to you. And the question is why would you go back? Why would you desire to go back to the things that you were in bondage to that you were delivered from? So just as the Galatians, so it is today. And then Paul specifically talks about the things that they were in bondage to. So this is very clear that the Jewish Christians were affecting in verse 10, you observed days and months and times and years. I am afraid of you list I have LA have bestowed upon you labor in vain. What are these days, months, times, and years. He's talking about these were the Jewish ceremonial feasts, they that were on specific days of the year and these Jewish Christians were teaching them, Hey, when Jesus died on the cross, yeah, he brings salvation. But you still need to keep the Jewish ceremonial system, continue to keep all the feasts and the ceremonies and all of those things, which the feasts, by the way, were based on the monthly cycle of the moon. So when he says days and months, the feast days were based on the new moon. And you can see that in Colossians chapter two. And Paul says, I am afraid of you lust. I have bestowed upon you labor and vain. And there's still people today there. There's actually a strain within even our church who are teaching In order to receive the seal of God, you must keep the feast days of the Jewish system. But Paul's saying, you observe these days, I'm afraid of you unless I bestowed labor upon you in vain. And then he goes on and and verses 12 through 15, he speaks about how when he came he he came. And even though he had an infirmity in the flesh, which was the fact that he was had poor eyesight, he preached the gospel and he talks about how they were so blessed by his preaching that if they could have, they would've given their eyes to him. They were so blessed by his message. He's like, remember that time? Because now they're trending away from what he tell you. He's like, remember when I preached to you, you were so blessed by my preaching, even though you knew that I was had an infirmity in my flesh and that I couldn't see very well, you were so blessed and you knew that God was speaking through me. You were willing almost to give your own eyes to me, but you couldn't. Of course that's not humanly possible, at least at that time. So then he says, and and he says, I was received as an angel of God, even as Christ Jesus. That's verse 14, verse 16. Then he says, am I therefore become your enemy? Because I tell you the truth And you know we need more pastors and teachers to just tell the truth, amen. To not be afraid of men and to just preach people pleasing sermons who perhaps they have helped lead someone into the truth and now they see the person turning away from the clear teachings of truth, but they don't want to offend them. And so they just preach watered down, pleasing, smooth messages and people just come to church feeling good about themselves and walking away feeling like they're just fine. But you know Jesus at times he would speak right to the heart. It wasn't like everything Jesus ever said just pleased everyone. There came a time when Jesus gave a message of separation. So Paul says, am I there for become your enemy? Because I tell you the truth. And now he's speaking of the Jewish Christian. He says they zealously affect you but not well. Yay. They would exclude you that you might affect them. But it is good to be zealously affected always in a good thing. And not only when I'm present with you. And now notice verse 19, he says, my little children of whom I trivial and birth again until Christ be formed in you, and this is the essence of the gospel, Paul is saying, it is as if I am going through the pains of labor as I see you being deceived by these false teachers. And I will go through if necessary, what in a spiritual sense how women go through the pains of labor. I will go through that experience until you have the true experience of the gospel of Christ being formed within you. And we need to labor for our brothers and sisters in the same way. Verse 20, I desire to be present with you now and to change my voice for I standing out of you. Tell me you that desire to be under the law, do you not hear the law? So he is like those of you who you heard the true gospel, but now you want to go back to being under the bondage of the law of having that as the means of salvation as opposed to Christ being the means of salvation. He says, let me give you an illustration and here's the illustration. And for the interest of time, I'm going to summarize what Paul says here in verses 22 through 26. He gives an illustration of how Abraham had two sons, Isaac and Ishma. One was through Hagar, one was through Sarah Hagar was the servant or bond woman through whom Ishma was born. Sarah was the free woman through whom Isaac was born by promise and pulses. This is an allegory of the two covenants. One is the covenant where people worked according to the flesh and said all that God has said, we will do the other. Covenant is the promise of God where God says, through my power, I will do something that is not possible. And in Abraham's case, he says, I will give you new life. Amen. Just as I will write my law to your hearts and minds and give you a new heart which will give you a new life. And so what Paul says, then he says in verse 25, for this Hagar is Mount Sinai in Arabia. That's the old covenant where the law was written in tables of stone. And notice it says, and Anth, and in the margin of the King James, it says, and is in the same rank with. So Hagar is a symbol of the covenant at Mount Sinai, which is in the same rank to Jerusalem, which now is. So here's what Paul is saying. Those Jews in the literal Jerusalem right now are just like Hagar, which was like the old covenant given at Sinai where God's people said, we will try to do what you have said. And Abraham, when God said, you will have a child, Abraham said, okay, I can go according to the works of the flesh and I'll get this woman pregnant. Well, there was nothing shocking about that because Hagar was a childbearing age and that was the law of biology. But Sarah was past the time of childbearing age and God said, I will do a miracle. I will give new life in that which is impossible, humanly speaking and humanly speaking, humanity cannot make a new heart. But God says, through my power, I will write my law or character into your hearts and minds so that you will have a new life. And so Paul is saying verse 26, but Jerusalem which is above, which is the mother of us all is free. And then he concludes verses 27 through 31, for it is written, rejoice, thal, barren that bears not break forth and cry that thou trave us not for the duate half many more children than she, which half and husband. In other words, people who live according to the flesh are much more numerous than people who walk according to the spirit. Now we brethren as Isaac was are the children of promise. But as then he that was born after the flesh persecuted him that was born after the spirit. Even so it is now Ishma who was born after the flesh, persecuted Isaac. And so it is now those who walk according to the flesh, persecute the Christians who walk according to the spirit. And then verse 30, nevertheless, what sayeth the scripture cast out the bond woman and her son for the son of the bond woman shall not be heir with the son of the free women, free woman. So then brethren, we are not children of the bond woman but of the free. And so here in chapter four, Paul makes it explicitly clear, if you are following the Jewish system, which the Galatians were following into you, you are not following Christ. We as children of Abraham in a spiritual sense, we do not follow the Jewish ceremonial system anymore. We allow God to write his law into our hearts and minds, which is the symbol of how Abraham and Sarah were able to have Isaac when it was not humanly possible to do so. But through faith, they believed the promise that God would give new life. And we who are children of Abraham through faith believe that God will give us new life. And that is the new covenant. And what Paul is saying is, Hey Galatians, if you do what you you're continuing to do, you will be under the old covenant. And if you stay under the old covenant, you will lose your salvation. And so Paul Love them so much. He says, my little children of whom I trivial in birth again until Christ be formed in you, or in other words, until his law is written in your hearts and minds. So here we've seen in the first four chapters, and we're gonna finish our study on Galatians tomorrow. We've seen in the first four chapters, Paul has been contending against the false gospel and teaching what the true gospel is. And so may we experience that true gospel as we continue to move forward. So do we have time for a closing Him? Yeah, we'll help prayer and then a closing him. Let's pray. Father in heaven, thank you for how you have made things clear to us through scripture. May we be like Isaac, the child of the free woman. May we have new life through faith, not through works of the flesh, but through faith and the promises of the power of God. So we thank you for your blessings to us and go with us this day. I pray this in Jesus' naming, amen. 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Galatians and the Gospel

Galatians 4—Two Covenants

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Other Teachings in Series

Galatians 1—Another Gospel

Galatians 2—Justified and Crucified

Galatians 3—The Law in Galatians

Galatians 4—Two Covenants

Galatians 5&6—Flesh Versus the Spirit

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