We sang that song one time and
a preacher came up to me after the service, not here, we were
in another meeting somewhere, I can't even remember where,
but where it says they're prone to wander, Lord, I feel it, prone
to leave the God I love. And he came up to me, he said,
you know that line there? He said, I don't believe that.
And I said, well, I understand what he meant because we're kept
by the power of God. We're saved, we're preserved,
and we'll be glorified by the goodness and the power of God,
but we're still fighting the flesh. And I know this about myself,
and I believe every one of you believers will say the same thing,
that if God removed his hand of power and grace and goodness
from me, what would I do? I'd be on the lamb, I guess you
could say. And that's what I look at that
when I read those lines. It's not that I have to struggle
to know Christ, because I do know him, and you know him too
if you're a believer. But we have so many rivals within
our own fleshly minds, and it's easy to give in sometimes. And
that's what I think he means by that when he says prone Leave
the God I love. Lord, don't let me go. And what we pray, don't let me
go. Keep me in thy way. All right, Galatians 4. Last week I preached out of Galatians
3. And the subject there in Galatians
2 and 3 has to do with the ground of justification. Now justification
is the legal aspect of salvation. Because in order for God to save
sinners like us, he must be just, righteous, and true in order
to do it. We can talk about God's love,
which I love to talk about. His love is unconditional towards
sinners like us. His love is not unconditional,
period, because it was conditioned on Christ here in His love. Not that we loved Him, but that
He loved us. And did what? He sent His Son to be the propitiation. That's the sin-bearing sacrifice
that brought satisfaction to His law and justice. Propitiation
for our sins. So there were conditions to save
us, but not on us. And that's because if it were
conditioned on us, it'd fail. Now you got, that's what we know.
That's what the Bible says about me and about you by nature. So, but justification is the
legal aspect of salvation. And in other words, in order
to satisfy the law of God and the justice of God against our
sins, what Paul says here in Galatians chapters two and three
is that It cannot be done by sinners trying to keep the law. Justification. I think it's in
Romans 3 where he talks about how the law is the knowledge
of sin. shows us the necessity of grace,
and by deeds of law shall no flesh be justified. And to be
justified, it means, I see two aspects of it. Number one is
the forgiveness of all my sins, but I wanna add this, because
most people don't. Now, not to say that some of
them who don't say it like I do, I'm not saying you've gotta say
it like I do in order to preach the gospel, but you gotta have
that truth in mind. And so to be justified legally
is to be forgiven of all my sins on a just ground. Now, it's true
that the forgiveness of my sins is a product of God's love, God's
mercy, God's grace. The old publican prayed, God
be merciful, be propitious is what that literally means, to
me the sinner. And so, yes, it's love and mercy
and grace, but it's got to be on a just ground, a right ground. And what is the only right ground
for God to forgive me of all my sins? The blood of Jesus Christ. See, his blood is his death.
And his death satisfied the law and justice of God. That's why
he cried on the cross in John 19, it is finished. The wrath of God has been completely
Drain dry upon our surety. Our substitute, our redeemer.
But then there's another aspect of justification, which goes
right along with it, and really could stand for the whole thing.
And that is God declaring his people righteous, legally, in
his sight, on a just ground. And the just ground, why does
it have to be on a just ground? Because God must be honored.
He must be glorified. He must be exalted. And so we're
declared righteous based upon the obedience unto death of Christ,
okay, as our surety, having our sins imputed, charged to him,
and his righteousness imputed, charged to us. And that's what
it is to be justified. Well, as you know, in the Galatia,
false preachers came in challenging that, challenging that truth,
that gospel truth. And that's why Paul begins Galatians
in Galatians 1, if any come unto you and preach not this gospel,
let him be anathema. In other words, if they don't
preach this gospel, this good news, they're false preachers. They're lost, they're cursed.
And most of them, if not all of them, in Galatia were Jews
who claim to believe the gospel, claim to believe Christ, but
they were trying to bring people back under the law of Moses in
the way of circumcision, keeping of certain days. In other words,
what they would say is something like this. They say, well, we're
saved by grace through the blood of Christ, but, and be careful
when you hear that, but what? but you've got to be circumcised,
the men have to be circumcised, you have to keep this or keep
that, keep that day, or you have to keep the law. And when they
said that, they denied the gospel. That's why Paul wrote over here
in Galatians five, he said, verse two, behold, I, Paul, say unto
you that if you be circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing.
Now what does he mean by that? He means if you be circumcised
for that reason, in order to be justified, in order to be
saved, in order to be holy, thinking that your works will save you. Christ will profit you nothing.
You go around here claiming you believe in Christ, well if you
do that in order to be saved, he'll profit you nothing. He
goes on, he says, He says, for I testify again to every man
that is circumcised for that reason now, that he's a debtor
to do the whole law. Christ is become of no effect
unto you, whosoever of you are justified by the law. You're
fallen from grace. Now that term fallen from grace
does not mean you've lost your salvation. It means you have
denied what you claim. You claim to believe grace, well
you're fallen from grace. You're denying grace. You never
were saved to begin with. That's what the Bible teaches,
anyway. Well, back over here in Galatians 3, he talks about
the law of Moses and why it was given to the nation Israel. And
we could talk about that all day long, but basically, one
of the main things that he said the law was given for was because
of transgressions, because of sin. In other words, that law
was given. Now, one of the reasons it was
given was to keep the nation together virtually. And of course, they had a lot
of problems, like a 1,500 year period. And you know, when the
Lord Jesus Christ arrived on the scene, that nation was in
shambles under the Roman government. But he had not completely done
away with them yet. Didn't do that until AD 70. But
that law was given to them to keep them together as a nation
in a very brutal period of time until the Messiah came. And that's
what he says here. If you look back up in Galatians
3 and verse 24, he says, wherefore the law was our schoolmaster,
our tutor, to bring us unto Christ that we may be justified by faith.
And to be justified by faith is to be justified by what Christ
accomplished. So they were under that tutor.
And that law had both the moral law, had the ceremonial law,
the moral law, which exposed their sin. They couldn't keep
it perfectly, neither could we. The ceremonial law, which were
full of types and pictures of Christ, how God could save sinners,
the high priest, the blood of animals, lamb of God, see that
kind of thing. And so he says, we were under
that schoolmaster. In verse 25 he says, but after
that faith has come. Now see, faith here is Christ.
But after that faith has come. Now faith, the gift of faith
that God gives to his people that connects them spiritually
to Christ, that's always been there. Read Hebrews 11. Didn't he mention Abel? Didn't
Abel have faith? Enoch had faith. They had the gift of faith. That's
not what he's talking about here. Faith here is the body of doctrine,
the promise that God made to send Christ. And when that came,
he said, we're no longer under a schoolmaster. We're no longer
under that mosaic law, the Jews. It's abolished by way of fulfillment. And you want a commentary on
that? Read Hebrews. That's what it's all about. He
taketh away the first that he may establish the second. And
that first is the old covenant in time, which began in Mount
Sinai and lasted all the way to the cross. But when Christ
came, he said we're no longer, and did his work. And one of
the great physical signs of that is when he said it was finished
and he gave up the ghost, the veil in the temple was torn in
two from top to bottom. That's over. The unbelievers tried to sew
it back together, and they did, and they tried to keep that law
in force, but that's a denial of Christ. So look at verse one
of chapter four. He says, now I say that the heir,
now an heir is somebody who gets an inheritance that an ancestor,
a father, a grandfather, or whoever, earned for him. If you're an
heir, you didn't earn it. And if you're an heir, you may
not even deserve it. And that's the case with God's people. The
inheritance that we have, we didn't earn it and don't deserve
it. That's salvation and all of its blessings, all of its
benefits. Now the heir, as long as he's
a child, differeth nothing from a servant, though he be Lord
of all. But he is under tutors and governors until the time
appointed by the father. Even so we, when we were children,
were in bondage under the elements. That's the physical things of
the world. The blood of bulls and goats.
Earthly priesthood. Physical tabernacle and temple.
See, that's all the elements. But they have been fulfilled.
We don't need them anymore. We don't need them anymore. If
we did, we ought to be sacrificing lambs. But why don't we? Because Christ fulfilled that
and abolished it by way of fulfillment. We look to the Lamb of God. And
we don't need animals. Those things were pictures and
types. There was other reasons, but I don't have time to go into
that. But look at verse four. Now here's where we go. when
the fullness of the time was come." God is the God of eternity
and God is the God of time. There are things in the mind
of God that are eternal because God is eternal. And there are
things that are subject to time because God created time and
He works in time. He's the Lord of time. Read Ecclesiastes
3, to everything there is a season and a time. You know what that
says. You know, why is that all of those things that are mentioned
there, who's under, who controls it? Not fate, not kismet, not
the clock, not you, and not me. God does. And so what he has purposed in
eternity, has its accomplishment in time. I wrote that book called What
is Salvation? Where I recognize in the Bible
that salvation is seen from four different realms or vantage points. The eternal realm, God before
the foundation of the world, covenanted with his son in the
spirit to save a people of his choice, and he gave them to Christ. He put all of their salvation
conditioned on Christ. That's why Christ says, all that
the Father giveth me shall come to me. That's why 2 Timothy 1,
nine I think it is, says that he gave us a salvation in Jesus
Christ before the world began. That's the eternal realm, the
eternal aspect. Here's a time, but when the fullness
of the time was come, this time, was set down in the mind and
purpose of God before he created this world. You know that? The time of your birth and your
death, set down by God, is appointed unto man once to die. Who appoints
it? The devil? No, God. And we could go through so many
things like that. And then there's the legal aspect,
that's justification, which I believe was in the eternal mind of God
all along. God made Christ to be our surety,
and it was upon the basis of something that he appointed to
happen in time, and that's the death of Christ. I'll show you
that in just a moment. And then there is that legal,
it is accomplished in time by the redemption that's in Christ,
And then there's the spiritual aspect of salvation, that's when
we're born again, we're brought under the gospel, and we're given
the gift of faith to believe and to repent. And then the glorified
aspect, that's when we're taken away from this world and go to
be with Christ. Well, look at verse four. But
when the fullness of the time, what is that fullness? When the
time that was appointed arrives. When the fullness of the time
was come, now what happened? God sent forth His Son. Now you know what that tells
us? It tells us that Christ, Jesus, is God. The fullness of the time, God
sent forth His Son. What God purposed before time
is being accomplished in time. Purpose to send his son into
the world at a particular time. And listen, he came into the
world not one second before or one second after this appointed
time. Amazing. But that's his deity. God sent forth his son. Now I
went to a seminary where I didn't hear the gospel. And my professors
would tell me, say, well, we're all sons of God. Yes, if we're
saved, we're sons or daughters of God, children of God, but
not like this. Not even close to this. We're
not God, we're not deity. This is Christ, the second person
of the Trinity, who covenanted with the Father and the Son.
This is specific. This is the Messiah, and God
sent him into the world. Now look at the next line, made
of a woman. That's his humanity. Now notice
it doesn't say made of man, does it? That's significant. Do you know where you find the
first revelation and prophecy of the coming of Jesus Christ
into the world? Anybody know? Genesis 3, 15. Where he is prophesied
as the seed of woman, the woman's seed. Which tells us what? He's not born of man, like you
and I. He wasn't born in sin. His humanity
had no sin nature. See, we're born with a sin nature.
We're born spiritually dead in trespasses and sin. But not Christ.
He was conceived in the womb of Mary by the Holy Spirit. And He had an immaculate birth.
So He sent forth His Son, made of oil. That's His sinless humanity. Body and soul. And, that's That's a mind-boggling
thing now. His name shall be called Jesus,
for he shall save his people from their sins, Matthew 121.
His name shall be called Emmanuel, which being interpreted, God
with us, God manifest in the flesh, the Word made flesh dwelling
among us, tabernacling among us, God-man. That's the kind
of person that it took to save us from our sins. You think about
that. So in God's appointed time, he
sent forth his son, God the Son, made of a woman. Some translations
say born of a woman. Doesn't matter, it's the same
thing. In other words, his deity had no beginning and no end.
He's God. But his humanity had a beginning.
Now it has no end, he'll live forever. He's right now at the
right hand of the Father as God-man making intercession for his people. So God sent forth his son made
of a woman. And his incarnation, his taking
on into union that humanity did not change the nature of his
deity. Deity can't change. God is immutable. Did you know
that? He can't change. Somebody will say, well, I can't
wrap my mind around that. Well, that's a good thing, because
you're not God. I always kid with you. Somebody
says, I can't wrap my mind around that. I say, join the club. That's,
God's higher than us, isn't he? You all agree with that. Deity
cannot be created and cannot die, but his holy, sinless humanity
had a beginning in the womb of the virgin, conceived by the
Holy Spirit. So he's made of a woman. He had to be God-man
in order to die. Deity cannot die, but this man
who is God did die. Our sins were imputed, charged
to him. He was made sin. And he walked
this earth in complete obedience to the law. That's the next line.
Look here, made under the law. Now somebody said, well, that's
the law of Moses. Well, he was under the law of Moses because
the law of Moses wasn't abrogated until he gave up the ghost. But
that would include any law that any of his elect people were
under, even before Moses. Whatever law Abel was under. And I assume it was the law of
love, love God perfectly, love your neighbors yourself. It was
just as wrong for anybody to commit murder back then as it
was under the law of Moses and as it is today. When Cain murdered
Abel, he sinned against the law and sinned against Abel and sinned
against God. So whatever law Christ's sheep were under, He
was made under that law. Now, what does that mean? That
our salvation was conditioned on His law-keeping, not ours. His law-satisfying, not ours. Christ Jesus, think about it,
Romans 10, 4. Christ is the end of the law
for righteousness to everyone that believe it. Now, what does
it mean He's the end of the law? He's the finishing, the completion,
the perfection of the law. You don't. I don't. He did. And aren't you glad? He satisfied his justice. He
took the penalty. He was made sin. He was made
a curse for us. Back over there in Galatians
3.13, Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being
made a curse for us. And that's what he did. He didn't
come, listen, he was not made to be a sinner. You all know
that. He was not made sinful in himself. He was not even corrupted or
contaminated with our sins. They were legally charged to
his account, the debt. Look at it as a debt. By nature,
we owed a debt to God's law and justice, but our debt was charged
to Christ. You have a really good illustration
of that in that little book of Philemon. where Paul stood before
Philemon in place of the runaway slave Onesimus. And Onesimus,
what happened, he ran to Paul, and of course that is by the
providence of God, and Paul preached the gospel to Onesimus, and he
was converted to be a believer. So Paul went back to Philemon,
or wrote a letter to Philemon, and he said, I'm sending Onesimus
back to you to make good, but he said, if he owes you anything,
put it on my account, I'll repay it. And that's what Christ did
for his people. He paid the debt. And that's
the next line. He was made under the law, verse
five, to redeem them that were under the law. To pay the price. And what did it take? It took
his obedience unto death. Even the death of the cross,
Philippians two says. It was his blood. And the reason
that that's so important is because God must get the glory and Christ
must be exalted. You see, salvation and all of
its benefits and blessings, we don't receive them because we
do anything for God. In other words, the forgiveness
of my sin, you know, the Bible commands me, God commands me
to repent. But it's not my repentance that
is the ground of forgiveness. Paul talked about godly sorrow
over sin. That's something that we as believers
ought to foster within ourselves, a godly sorrow. And what that
is is that sorrow without condemnation. That sorrow that comes from being
ashamed that I've sinned against God. And look at what he's given
me. I'll never forget one time with
my mother. She had a little pewter box that her grandmother had
given her. And me, the stupid guy that I
am, I took that out and put a firecracker in it and blew it up. Now, I
never had one thought that my mama was going to kick me out
of the family or disown me. But boy, I was so ashamed. And
I saw her cry. I still think about that today,
and it bothers me. But I didn't think it would blow
up. I really didn't. I was stupid. All right. OK.
It's gone. But anyway, but I was so ashamed. That's the kind of
godly sorrow that we have over our sins. But anyway, we're to
foster that. But that's not the ground of
forgiveness. The blood of Jesus Christ is the ground. The righteousness
of Christ imputed is the ground of my salvation. So all of that
to redeem them that were under the law. And aren't you glad? I think about this a lot. In
Romans 6, you know what it says about Christ's people, his people,
God's people who redeemed? We're not under law, we're under
what? Grace. And grace, Romans 5, 21,
reigns through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ
our Lord. That's it. Think about that. Now, he says in verse five, to
redeem them that were under the law, in order that we might receive
the adoption of sons. What does that tell us? Not only have we been adopted,
and I want you to turn to Ephesians chapter one, right after Galatians. Not only have we been adopted
into God's family, and I believe before the foundation of the
world, we're born into this world as enemies of God. We could even
say children of Satan because we follow his ways. Read Ephesians
2 but we're going to go to Ephesians 1. But having been adopted legally
and eternally before the foundation of the world God sent his son
into the world made of a woman, made under the law to redeem
me that I might receive the adoption of a child. And when do I receive
it? Okay, hold that thought. Here
in Ephesians chapter one, he says in verse three, blessed
be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, and listen
to this, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings
in heavenly places in Christ. according as he had chosen us
in him before the foundation of the world, that we should
be holy and without blame before him in love, having predestinated
us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according
to the good pleasure of his will, to the praise of the glory of
his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved, in
Christ. So you see that? having predestinated
us unto the adoption of children. That's the eternal, immutable
mind of God, isn't it? I mean, it's not God looking
down through a telescope of time and saying, oh, there's Robert.
Robert, he's a pretty good guy. I think I'll adopt him. No, that's
not what happened. He chose us. And he adopted us. But like I said, we fell in Adam
into a state of spiritual death, depravity, and rebellion. And kinda like when he, at his
appointed time, he brought us under the gospel, and by the
power of the Spirit, we're able to receive that adoption as we
receive Christ. Look back at Galatians 4. He
says that, verse five, that we might receive the adoption of
sons. And look at this, now this is important. And because you
are sons, now notice it doesn't say, and so that you may become
sons. You see the difference? Because
you're already sons, already having been predestinated unto
the adoption of children, God hath sent forth the spirit of
his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father. Now that Abba Father
is a word that we really can't translate, Abba. I know men have tried. But what
it is, it's indicative of the special relationship that God
has with his redeemed children, adopted children in Christ. An
unbeliever cannot rightly say Abba Father. Now, if God ever
brings him to receive that adoption that was given before the fount,
then he can. But that's a word, that's special. A child of God, by grace, not
by works. And so he says in verse seven,
wherefore thou art no more a servant. Now we are servants of Christ,
but what he's saying there is we're not forced into a slavery
like the law. See, we're not forced slaves.
We're sons, we're children of God, but a son. And if a son,
then an heir of God through Christ. Do you see that? and heir of
God, we have an inheritance. When we come into this world, with whatever we go through,
before the Holy Spirit is sent forth into our hearts that we
might be born again and have faith in Christ and repentance
and cry Abba Father, We're literally enemies of God in our minds,
he says in Colossians 1, by wicked works. But then that all changes. And it's a change brought about
by God, the Holy Spirit, as he brings us to Christ, to believe
in him and repent of our dead works, okay.