Okay, well we come to Galatians chapter 4 this week and the first few verses of this chapter. But I want to ask you in starting a question. Is life good for you? Is it satisfying? Is it purposeful? Think about tomorrow and this coming week. Do you relish it? Or do you dread it? Do you dread aspects of it? It's a serious question, it really is. And most people in this world dodge that question. They respond like the mythical ostrich, that when it is aware of trouble, it buries its head in the sand. I don't think they literally do that, but it's a myth. gone down in folklore, but they bury their head in the sand because they don't want to admit that there are problems around. Oh, let's pretend they're not there. Let's pretend it isn't going to happen.

But however good some might find this life, the fact is it all ends. We were thinking of that in Ian's prayer then, we were thinking of that. If you want to know, you know, I remember for years as I was working and in some very, some of my work was really enjoyable. Others of it was incredibly stressful. It was really, it was, did I dread the week ahead? Yes, I dreaded it because it was going to be really hard work. Oh, if only I could retire, if only I could retire. And now I've been retired. 10 years, good 10 years now. And you think, well, that's wonderful. And in many ways, it's wonderful. Everything the Lord gives is good. But read Ecclesiastes 12 if you want to know what to expect, because it just gets worse and worse. The physical things of this body get worse and worse. The teeth stop working properly. They drop out when you don't expect them. Not to your eyes. You can't see as clearly as you used to see etc. Etc Read Ecclesiastes 12. It's an honest view of what to expect as our bodies age

You say well, I'm young Doesn't matter to me, that age is off yet. I'm going to get the most out of this life now. While there's cool things to do, I'm going to get the most out of this life now. I'm going to join the Broadway along with everybody else that's on the Broadway of this life. Look at the world outside, look at them all enjoying themselves.

You know, there were many people who, in the ministry of our Lord Jesus Christ, they followed him enthusiastically. And he fed them, he fed them as part of the 5,000. He fed them and they thought this was great. Oh, here's a man that's going to supply all of our needs. This is excellent. And they kept searching for him. Where have you gone? Where have you gone? And the more that, read John chapter six, the more that goes on, When he starts to preach his gospel of sovereign grace, of particular redemption, of eating his flesh and drinking his blood to be united with him, it says that many of them said, that's a hard saying. Who can take that? And many of them went back and followed no more with him.

And Jesus turned to the 12, to his disciples, and he said, what about you? Will you also go away? And of course it was Peter that responded, where shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. There's one thing that's important in this life of getting fed with the 5,000 and going off and having your fun and doing everything else, but it's eternal life. It's eternal life. You have the words of eternal life. Have you heard the words of eternal life? Do you see it? the glorious inheritance of eternal life. that awaits at the end of this life.

Moses did. Turn to, if you can, turn to Hebrews chapter 11 and verse 24. It says there, by faith, Moses, when he was come of years, when he was mature, when he'd grown up, he refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter because he was brought up, this Hebrew boy was brought up in the palace of Pharaoh as the son of Pharaoh's daughter. He was in a high position, but he chose rather to suffer affliction with the people of God than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season.

He esteemed, he valued the reproach of Christ, the the negative things that you get for being associated with Christ. He esteemed the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt, for he had respect unto the recompense of reward. Do you know what he's talking about there? The recompense of reward? He's talking about eternity. He's talking about the eternal life in the kingdom of God.

And like all of God's chosen multitude, in God's time, at God's pleasure, they see that, what else it says in Hebrews, it says, here they have no continuing city, but they seek one to come. Here in this world, It doesn't go on forever. Here they have no continuing city, but they seek one to come.

There's only one way to it. Thomas said, what is the way? How can we know the way? Show us the way. Jesus said, I am the way, the truth, and the life. If you would come to the Father for eternal life, you must come by him. He is the way, and the salvation from sin that he accomplished by the faith of Jesus Christ.

We keep using this phrase, but it's a scriptural phrase. The salvation from sin that he has accomplished by what he did for his elect, that is the means by which we come along that way to that possession. Is it your possession? If it's your possession, it's your possession by faith. By faith.

A simple way of regarding faith, it's the sight of the soul. It's not the sight of the physical eyes which sees the things around. Faith is the sight of the soul, to see that which the natural man cannot see, cannot receive. It's foolishness to him, neither can he know them. Why? Because it's spiritually discerned.

Where can I go to get spiritual discernment? You can't buy it, you can't work it up yourself, but you can ask God. For it's God who by his grace gives that. It's the gift of God. Faith, not of yourselves, it is the gift of God. And by that faith, you see the faith of Jesus Christ, your substitute, standing in your place and making you qualified for that kingdom of God.

For as it is, as a sinner, as that wretch of which we've been thinking, you cannot come. God will not allow anything that defiles into that eternal kingdom. He will not allow anything like that. He must qualify the people he loved, who are sinners like everybody else, for that kingdom. And that is the gospel. That is the guarantee of life eternal.

But most Christian religion calls itself Christian. It says, that's not enough. By this letter that Paul was inspired to write to the Galatians, that group of churches in middle modern day Turkey, He tells us today, he wrote it nearly 2,000 years ago, but it's the word of God to his people down the ages and therefore it's to us today, that the only way we attain eternal bliss at peace with God is by what Christ has done, by what he has accomplished and nothing else.

It was by this letter to the Galatians that Martin Luther was brought out of Catholic error into gospel truth. And he does it layer upon layer, as it says elsewhere in the scriptures, in Isaiah, he says, layer upon layer, precept upon precept, line upon line, bit by bit, have you got it yet? Have you got it? Well, listen, let's see if you can get it.

Layer upon layer, he reinforces the truth of salvation accomplished by Christ alone. So now we come to these first seven verses of chapter four. And I want us to see as my first point, children in bondage.

Children in bondage. I say that the heir, the heir, the one who's going to inherit, as long as he is a child, he differs nothing from a servant. Though he be Lord of all. I could say to one of you younger people here living in houses with parents and you say sometimes it's so unfair the way they treat me and the things they get me to do and the things that they stop me from doing and I'm no different from a servant. I'm no different from a servant but I'm a child. He says, you're an heir, you're going to become Lord of all, but for a while, you're under tutors and governors until the time appointed by the Father.

Even so, we, when we were children, were in bondage under the elements of the world. In chapter three, the law it's shown is the schoolmaster that is impossible for us to please and to satisfy. The law of God, the purpose it was given was to show us what sin is, and to show us that we are sinners, and to show us that as sinners we cannot possibly please God, to show us that God's standard is inestimably high and we can never attain to it. The law is our schoolmaster, but a schoolmaster that's impossible to please or to satisfy.

But, here's the gospel, Christ has pleased that schoolmaster to the full for his elect. How has he done it? Well, that schoolmaster demanded that the soul that sins, it shall die. The soul that sins, it shall die. And so he shed his blood, his lifeblood. He shed his lifeblood as the substitute of his people. He satisfied that schoolmaster, the law, for his people to the full. in his death on the cross of Calvary.

By his death, by what he did, Yes, some people say the works that he did made his people right. No, no, read back in Galatians chapter two. If righteousness come by the law or the works of the law, Christ died in vain. No, what his righteous life did was prove that he was the Passover. He was the acceptable Passover. He was the fitting substitute for his people. He was the one who was qualified, but it was in his death that he pleased that schoolmaster on the behalf of his elect.

By the faith of Jesus Christ, The law and divine justice can make no more demands on Christ's people. Do you get that? By the faith of Jesus Christ, by the things that he did, dying as the perfect substitute for his people, the law of God, divine justice, can make no more demands on Christ's people. It can't demand punishment for sin, because he's born the sins of his people and paid that penalty.

So that when comes to the day of judgment and the sins of Judah and of Israel, the transgressions of them, are looked for, it says in Jeremiah 50, they shall not be found. Why not? Because they're not there. Why are they not there? Because he has taken them. out of the way. It cannot demand, the law cannot demand improving fleshly righteousness. Do you know why? I'll tell you. Scripture, Scripture tells us, Hebrews 10, 14, by one offering, Christ's offering, by one offering, the priests offered repeated sacrifices and they weren't able to continue because of death. It was a picture, on and on and on. But when the fullness came, by Christ's one offering, it says he has perfected forever them that are sanctified. No, you can't use the law to beat us into progressive sanctification, no.

Irrespective of human differences, as we read, there's neither bond nor free, Jew nor Greek, male nor female, You're all one in Christ Jesus. All those that Christ represented in his earthly mission of grace are what it says in verse 26 of chapter 3. Ye are all the children of God by faith in Jesus Christ. You say, I keep going on about the faith of Jesus Christ. Yes, but there it says faith in Jesus. Yes, that's right. It's my faith in Jesus Christ that is God-given that enables me to see the faith of Jesus Christ and what he has done.

And all the children will inherit the kingdom promised to Abraham. Verse 29 of chapter 3. If ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise. You're going to inherit what exactly God promised to Abraham. back in Genesis 15, those chapters back there. You're going to inherit the city that he looked for, that has foundations, whose builder and maker is God.

And so then Paul goes on, in chapter 4, to reinforce the point. The promise concerned a people, the seed of Abraham. Now then, we've already read, I say that the heir, as long as he is a child, differeth nothing from a servant, though he be lord of all. This people that the promise was made to was the seed of Abraham. That promise was not made even to angels. It wasn't made to angels. It wasn't made to all men without exception. which would have been the seed of Adam. It wasn't made to all men without exception, but it was made to the seed of Abraham.

What is the seed of Abraham? The seed of Abraham is Christ. It says, not of seeds as of many, but of one, which is Christ, the seed of Abraham. But it's all those who are in Christ who are the seeds of Abraham. Not angels, not all men, but his people, the multi-ethnic innumerable multitude, united with God in Christ. When were they united with God in Christ? Before time began.

For as Paul again writes to Timothy in 2 Timothy 1 verse 9, Has saved us and called us with a holy calling not according to our own works of righteousness that we have done But according to his purpose and grace which he gave us in Christ when before the world was Before time he did that look at Ephesians you don't need to turn over one page in your Bibles to Ephesians chapter 1 and verse 5 and You see, it's already told us that he's chosen us in Christ before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love. And verse 5, he's predestinated his people unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ, to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will.

predestinated children in the kingdom of God, predestinated children for adoption by God. I say, the heir, as long as he's a child, he differed nothing from a servant, though he be Lord of all. But there is a people, which is the seed of Abraham, who are predestinated to be the children of God by adoption in the gospel.

But as they're born into this world, These people, this seed of Abraham, is born like everyone else, without exception. Children of Adam, progeny of Adam, of the race of Adam, sinners by nature, sinners in thought, in word, in deed, violators of divine justice, unrighteous, Unbelieving, that's the key to it all. Unbelieving, that's the key one. Unbelieving, because that's the root of absolutely everything else. Rebels against God. Yet this people, in the eternal purposes of God in Christ, are heirs according to the promise of the eternal covenant of grace.

In the eternal covenant of grace, the persons of the triunity, the trinity of God, the Father, the Son, and Holy Spirit, They covenanted together in that covenant of grace, the Father to choose a people of his own choice for no other reason than his love for them, the Son to come and represent them and redeem them, the Holy Spirit to come and regenerate them and give them life and cause them to see and to possess these things. They're children of that promise of that eternal covenant of grace, though for a long time while in your life you don't know it.

So Galatians 4 verse 1 says, the heir, as long as he's a child, differs nothing from a servant. These people whom God has, as it says in Acts chapter 13, 48, those that are ordained to eternal life, Paul preached the gospel, and those that were ordained to eternal life believed the gospel. Why? Because they were ordained to eternal life. Why did they hear the shepherd's voice and follow him? Because they were the sheep of the shepherd. As Jesus said to the unbelieving Pharisees, you don't believe, Because you're not of my sheep, but his sheep do.

These heirs live for a while of their lives, from birth, like the children of Adam. That's what it says in chapter two of Ephesians and verse three. Children of wrath, were by nature children of wrath, even as others. No different from everybody else. Children of wrath, not free, but verse two of chapter four, under tutors and governors until the time appointed of the father. They're not free. to do what they want. They're under tutors and governors. They're under a schoolmaster. They're under the law.

What's he talking about there? What is this law? Well, if you're a Jew, I think it clearly means that's the Mosaic law, because they were the ones that were given the Mosaic law. But what about all the rest that were never given that Mosaic law? It's the law written in the heart. It says that in Romans chapter 2. There's a law written in the heart. And we are habitual breakers of that law. Habitually, we break that law. We're children, verse 3, in bondage under the elements of the law. In bondage to it because we can't do anything other than break it. It rules us, it governs us, it's like a harsh schoolmaster. It never lets us go. It says, do this and live. Fail to do this and you shall die. But we're incapable of doing. We're incapable in the flesh by nature.

But for the eternal heirs of life, according to that promise in verse 29 of chapter three, heirs according to the promise, their time of bondage under the law, whether it be the Mosaic law of the Jews, or whether it be under the law written in the hearts of all men by nature, was subject to legal tutors. Their time of bondage, their time of subjection to legal tutors is limited. When does it end? Look in verse 2. We are under tutors and governors until the time appointed of the Father. It doesn't go on indefinitely. There's a time appointed of the Father when those who are his people from eternity, born in this world just like everybody else, living in this world just like everybody else, but there's a time in the purposes of God appointed by the Father when that Being under those tutors and governors comes to an end. And so, at that time, we receive the liberty of redemption. Verses four and five. I love these verses. I've loved these verses for many, many years.

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. I know I don't need to argue with any of you here, but this is why we use the King James Version of the Bible. because all the other modern versions go and make a mess of those verses. This is the nearest to the original. He was made of a woman by God, made under the law to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons.

Why might we receive it? Because we're predestinated to the adoption of sons, it tells us in Ephesians. There's a but there. Don't you love the buts in the Gospel of Grace? Bad situation, but God did such and such a thing.

There's a hopeless situation of these children under bondage, under the schoolmasters, the tutors and the governors, and they're in bondage, sensing no prospect. of freedom, no prospect of liberty, no prospect of that eternal bliss which is the reality of the inheritance for the people of God. But God then reveals his eternal covenant in action. God then reveals what he purposed in Christ before the foundation of the world in action.

This seemingly hopeless case of being unable to do anything about our situation This seemingly hopeless case becomes a case of being, as it says in Hebrews 7 verse 25, saved to the uttermost. Saved not by the skin of your teeth, saved to the uttermost, absolutely to the end.

All world events happen in the purposes of God, verse 2, at the time appointed by the Father. All things happen according to the purpose of God. This world, this world's history, is all ordained of God. Creation and time, where we are now, and right from Adam down through the ages, creation and time form the stage on which God performs salvation. And he, if I can put it this way, is the great director who orders every scene in detail, right the way down.

Though Christ is the lamb slain from the foundation of the world, this is what we read in Revelation 13 verse 8, he's the lamb slain from the foundation of the world, he had to come onto this stage at the appropriate time. Why? To pay the penalty for his people's sins, that his people might be made the righteousness of God in him. And being made that righteousness, they're qualified for his eternal kingdom.

He came and paid that price that was required. The soul that sins, it shall die. The life is in the blood. He must shed his precious blood. And so he came. He came at the right time to die, not the death of stoning of the Jews, but to die the death of bleeding to death on a wooden cross, a cruel wooden Roman cross, because that was the right time in space, time, creation.

When would God accomplish the qualification of his elect for his kingdom? Verse 4, when the fullness of the time was come, God sent forth his son, made of a woman, made under the law, at the exact time You know, right the way down, it was specified in the scriptures that he would come, the son would come, given different names, but in Jacob's speech about his sons and what would happen to them, there's a particularly interesting section in Genesis 49 from verse 8 about Judah, the son Judah, because it was from him that the Christ would come. And he says in verse 10 of Genesis 49, the scepter, what's the scepter? It's the symbol of royal power. It's the symbol of royal line. The scepter shall not depart from Judah. It did depart from the other tribes. They got interspersed with the Assyrians. And we can lump Benjamin in with Judah because they stayed in that area.

A scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh come. Who's Shiloh? Shiloh is the peacemaker. Who's the peacemaker? The Lord Jesus Christ. And unto him shall the gathering of the people be.

In Daniel chapter 9, And again, we could spend ages studying this, but we won't. But Daniel is given this vision, and Gabriel comes, is sent by God to him to explain it to him. And if you read there in Daniel chapter 9, in verse 24, It's confusing language, but nevertheless, if you take time to untangle it and think about it, 70 weeks or heptads are determined unto thy people and upon thy holy city to finish the transgression and to make an end of sins. and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up the vision and the prophecy, and to anoint the most holy.

Know therefore and understand, listen to this, that from the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem, that was the commandment given by Cyrus, I believe. One of those kings, anyway. But there was a command given, and you can count the times. These heptads, these weeks, are blocks of seven years. You can count them. From the going forth of the commandment to go and rebuild Jerusalem unto Messiah coming, the prince, shall be seven weeks, and three score and two weeks. The street shall be built. You say, I don't understand that. But don't worry, don't worry. Just get it. This point, it's all determined by God. If you carried on reading in Daniel, you see the word determined over and over again. God has determined, God has foreordained when all of these things shall happen. In the fullness of the time, the fullness of whose time? God's time. When God determined it, God sent forth his son made of a woman.

Judah, you know, Judah, you say, well, what about them being taken away in Babylonian captivity? Do you know, even throughout that, Judah retained its nation status, so that when the command was given to them to go back, there was a rightful heir of the throne who was Zerubbabel. The scepter hadn't disappeared from between his feet. It was forever cured. Judah was forever cured of idolatry. Idolatry had plagued the Israelites right down the ages, but it was forever cured of that.

Ezra was raised up who was very skillful in the scriptures and he compiled all the different scriptures and brought them together and taught the scriptures and synagogues were established to teach the scriptures and the way was prepared for Christ to come as Isaiah says in Isaiah 40 verse 3 Make straight in the desert a highway for our God. The way is prepared. Make straight, and this was the straight highway for our God. The synagogues where the scriptures were taught and where that scepter had been preserved, even though the Romans came, they still retained their symbolical heads of that tribe.

The Greek Empire. arose. After the Medes, there was the Babylonians, well, Egyptians, Assyrians, then the Babylonians, the Chaldeans. Then there was the Medes and the Persians in Belshazzar's feast. They came in in one night and took over. These are the great empires that you read about in the scriptures. And then Alexander the Great, this phenomenal character, Alexander the Great, raised up the most mighty military man that probably history has ever known in one single person. vast areas of what we now know as Europe and the Middle East were converted to speaking Greek, a common language in which the New Testament scriptures would be written and would go.

And then the Roman Empire arose, those legs of iron of Nebuchadnezzar's statue. And what did they do? They put roads everywhere, roads crisscrossed the empire, so that people could go. How did Paul go on his missionary journeys? Down the Roman roads, and on the boats, and all the different means that were set up. And they put in place a taxation system, the Romans did, so that people living in Nazareth, in Galilee, in the north, had to go down to Bethlehem.

in Judah, exactly as Micah chapter 5 verse 2 says. Bethlehem in Judah, though you're so lowly amongst all the other important places, yet out of you shall come he that shall be ruler of my people Israel. The fullness of the time was about 2025, if we believe our calendars today, 2025 years ago approximately. And then God became man. God became... Wow. You think of some of the things that you say and how insignificant they are. God became man. God became as one of us.

How? He was made of a woman. He was made... Why was he not made of a man? Why was he made of a woman? that he might be without the sin of Adam. He was conceived of the Holy Ghost. That holy thing, he said to Mary, that holy thing which is conceived in thee is of the Holy Ghost, and so he shall be called the Son of God. He was fully human, like his brethren, yet without sin. Fully human, flesh and blood, but yet without sin. He was the kinsman, redeemer of his people. A man like us, yet sinless, yet infinite God.

For in him, says Paul to the Colossians, in him dwelt the fullness of the Godhead bodily. And they observed him, and they looked at him, and they despised him, and they thought nothing of him. And they didn't see in him any comeliness that we should desire him. And they reviled him, and they crucified him, and they spat on him. Yet there was God in man, the Son, the Word of God, who was equal with God. He thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but he laid aside that glory of heaven of which we have virtually zero concept, but God tells us about it.

We have so little concept, but he laid that glory aside that he might come down voluntarily, voluntarily, according to his part in the covenant of grace, a little while, for a little while, made a little lower. than the angels. That's why he said, my father is greater than I. He wasn't saying that he wasn't God. He was saying that for that little while as a man, where they looked on him and saw nothing that they should desire him, where they didn't see as the artists, the middle, the Renaissance artists paint this man in glowing white robes with a halo around his head.

No, he didn't look like that. When he was 30 years old, talking to the Jews, they said to him, you're saying that you, that Abraham saw your day, he said, you're not yet 50 years old, he's 30 years old, he looked 50 years old. He was a man of sorrows and accrainted with grief, made a little lower than the angels for a little while, partaking of the flesh of his brethren. He calls his people his brethren, the children his brethren. He partook of the same flesh as his people, yet without sin. He was a man, fully man, made of a woman, representing man. Yet he was infinite God with infinite capacity to be made the sin of his people, and to pay its just penalty, which was, what was it? It was the ransom price. You know when somebody's taken captive, there's a price put on their head. You can go if they pay a price to let you free. This was the price. The price of freedom was the price of the life of the one who represented them, the infinite God. Bearing their sin, that was the price. He must die for that sin, and he did.

He was subject to his own divine law. He was made under the law, it says, made of a woman, made under the law, and so the law justly punished him when he bore his people's sins in his own body. He didn't ever commit a sin, but he was made the sin of his people. God made him who knew no sin to be made sin for us that we might be made, his people might be made, the righteousness of God in him. And the penalty being paid, his people are liberated from sin's curse.

For Christ, it says in verse 13 of the previous chapter, Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us. Cursed is everyone that doesn't continue to keep it perfectly. But Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us. And so, what's the result? Divine justice that we must all face, for it is appointed to man to die once and then the judgment. Divine justice has no case to bring against those for whom Christ shed his blood. Paul says in Romans 8, who shall bring any charge against God's elect? Christ has died. He's paid the price. Death for them is abolished. Where does it say that? 2 Timothy 1, verse 10, after telling us when we receive this grace, he's abolished death. Yes, we die in these bodies, but our spirits live on. He's abolished death, eternal life.

we have the adoption as children of God, as it says in Ephesians 1 verse 5. This is what his elect were predestinated to before time began, and now it's there to be received by faith. If ye be Christ's, verse 29 of chapter 3, then are ye Abraham's seed and heirs according to the promise. So finally, joint heirs with Christ, verses 6 and 7 of chapter 4. Because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father. Wherefore thou art no more a servant, but a son. And if a son, then an heir of God through Christ, chosen predestinated as sons for adoption from eternity, but kept under the legal covenant until, verse 25 of Galatians 3, after that faith is come, we're no longer under that schoolmaster, then spirit-given faith reveals to the soul the redemption that's accomplished by Christ.

read about it in verse 5 of chapter 4, and the relationship to God of children, adopted children. As he puts in his people's hearts an overwhelming sense of God being Abba Father, as it says in Romans chapter 8, he says there that in Verse 16, the spirit itself, well, verse 15, you've not received the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you've received the spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Daddy, Daddy, that's the cry, Father, Our God is the daddy of His people. We cry, Abba, Father. The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit that we are the children of God. And if children, then heirs, heirs of God. We've got something to inherit, because He's our Father. Heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if so be that we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified with Him. In verse seven, you are no more a servant, but a son. And if a son, then an heir of God through Christ.

Has faith shown you what Christ accomplished for you? Has it shown you the faith of Christ without any works from you? If that's the case, and you're resting in that, and you're trusting for eternity in that, that every day is your Sabbath day because every day is your rest in the Lord Jesus Christ, if that's the case, you're a true believer. You're one of God's elect. You're one of those ordained to eternal life that heard the preaching of the gospel and you believed it. Your name is written in a very special book. Your name is written there. There's a multitude of names in that no man can number, but your name is written there if you believe these things. It's in the Lamb's Book of Life.

Paul knew that the Thessalonians, people at the Thessalonian church, were the elect of God because of this, because of their sanctification of the Spirit and their belief of the truth. Your name is written in the Lamb's Book of Life. That's the book to have your name written in.

You're a son of God. You're no longer a child treated like a servant under legal constraint. But you are what? What does James say of Abraham? The friend of God. He's the friend of God. Abraham is the friend of God. You're a friend of God like Abraham. You're not a child under governors and tutors and legal harsh schoolmasters, but you're a mature son, a mature daughter, and thus you're an heir of God through Christ.

What will you inherit? What is it that you will inherit? It's the kingdom prepared for you from eternity. In Matthew chapter 25, 34, yes. Come ye blessed of my father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. It's life eternal. It's heavenly bliss.

What will you inherit? What did God say to Abraham? I, Abraham, I am your exceeding great reward. God himself. Amen.