In Galatians 4, the Apostle Paul
is doing exactly what Peter wrote about that we just read. The
Judaizers had spoken against Paul to these brethren and they
couldn't hear Paul and Paul just keeps answering with Christ. He just keeps declaring Christ
to them. And he says here in verse 21,
Tell me, ye that desire to be under the law, do you not hear
the law? This is the problem. When we desire to be under the
law, we don't hear the law. There are many ways to be under
the law. If any part of salvation is dependent
upon our works, we're under law. It doesn't necessarily have to
be that you're under, you know, you could say you're not under
the Ten Commandments, but if you turn gospel precepts into
law and make those a requirement for salvation, it's the heart
is what it is. It's the heart that makes it
be law or grace. but they were insisting believers
must do something to contribute to their salvation. And by doing
that, these Judaizers were rejecting Christ entirely. They weren't
saying they were rejecting Christ. They were saying it's okay to
believe on Christ, but by making the believers' works to be necessary
to add to Christ, they were rejecting Christ entirely. and they were
under law, and they were producing children of law, children in
bondage. Salvation is by God's everlasting
covenant promise. Salvation is entirely by God's
covenant promise, fulfilled entirely by Christ the Lord, apart from
our works. Our works don't contribute to
it. It's all of Christ. Now verse 21, he says, or verse
22, he says, for it's written that Abraham had two sons. Now these Judaizers were boasting
they were Abraham's sons. They were children of Abraham
because they were under the law. And Paul says, remember, Abraham
had two sons. He had two sons. One was by a
bondmaid, Hagar, was a slave. And one was She gave birth to
Ishmael, the other by a free woman. Sarah was free. She gave
birth to Isaac. But he who was of the bond woman
was born after the flesh, born after Abraham's works. But he
of the free woman was by promise. Isaac was born according to God's
promise. God birthed him. Now, you know
the story. Let me just rehearse it a little
bit. But Abraham was married to Sarah. She's the free woman. But Sarah was barren, and God
promised Abraham she'd have a child, promised she'd have a son that
would be his heir. It was a covenant promise. He pictured the covenant promise
of grace, the everlasting covenant of salvation, and the new covenant
of grace. And God promised to produce this
son. This would all be of God. He
would create this son. But 10 years went by. Now Abraham
and Sarah ought to be commended because they waited 10 years.
That's a long time to wait. And that's faith. And they waited
10 years. But then after 10 years, God
had not produced a son. And so Sarah gave Abraham her
handmaid, Hagar. And Abraham married her and produced
a son. named Ishmael. Now Hagar was
the bondmaid, she was the slave, and that was a picture of a man
trying to work the works of God by his own hand. And that's what
Abraham was doing. That was sin, it was unbelief.
If you think about it, that one sin resulted in most of the division
we see in the world today. But God overruled that, just
like He overrules the sin of His people, to glorify Himself
and to show us Christ and teach us Christ. You know, you go and
read Hosea, we usually stop at chapter 3, you read the rest
of Hosea and you'll find out why God did what He did with
Hosea. And it's to show us something of what we are and how come we
can't come to God by our works and how we have to be saved by
Christ. And you see the primary example
in Christ on the cross. There was wicked men doing what
they would, but God was overruling it all. And through it, he saved
his people and glorified his name. And that's what God's always
doing in these things. That's what he was doing with
Abraham. But after 10 years, so they produced this son Ishmael
through Hagar. Well, God waited longer. He waited
even longer, like about 13 years longer, until Sarah was 90 years
old, way past the age of childbearing. She was barren, and then he waited
until she was past the age of childbearing. Abraham was 100
years old. God was gonna make certain everyone
understood he did this. Man didn't do this. And then
he gave that promised son, Isaac, through Sarah, just as he promised. Verse 24, he says, which things
are an allegory, that's a figure, that's picturing some spiritual
things, and he said, for these are the two covenants. Sarah's
the free woman, she represents the covenant of grace, God's
free promise, but the covenant from Mount Sinai, which genders
to bondage, is represented by Hagar. She was the bondwoman,
she represents the covenant given at Sinai. For this Hagar is Mount
Sinai in Arabia, and answereth to Jerusalem, which now is, is
in bondage with her children. She also represents earthly will
works religion. Everybody, the majority in Jerusalem,
were doing what the Judaizers were doing. They were teaching
that it's okay to believe Christ, but you gotta come under the
law. Verse 26, but Sarah represents
Jerusalem, which is above, who's free, and the mother of us all. She represents true religion,
the true church of God, in heavenly Zion from where Christ sends
the gospel. So I wanna show you here two
covenants, two religions, and two kinds of religionists. We'll
pick up the remainder of the passage as we get to it. But
first, Abraham's two wives here represent two covenants. Now,
a covenant's an agreement between two parties, two or more parties,
and there's promises made based on some conditions being met.
And God only deals with sinners on the basis of covenant. And
what we're seeing here is the old covenant law in Hagar, it
said do and live. He gave no grace, gave no mercy,
gave no help, no spirit, no life, nothing. He just said do and
live. Impossible for a sinner. But the covenant of grace, the
promise here says Christ has done it all. He's doing it all. He's gonna bring his people to
glory. Believe on him. You have eternal life. That's
a far better promise, isn't it? Far better promise. So Hagar
typifies that old covenant law given at Sinai. He says there,
the one from Mount Sinai which genders to bondage is Hagar.
Now she was a bondwoman, so she pictures the old covenant law
given at Mount Sinai because it genders bondage. It produces
bondage. That's what it was meant to do.
God gave it to declare us guilty, to show us our sin, and to make
us see that we cannot earn a righteousness acceptable to God. The law entered
that the offense might abound. So she pictures that old covenant
law and her children were in bondage. Her child was in bondage. To make salvation dependent on
anything a sinner does is to come under law, is to be a legalist
at heart, and it's going to result in bondage. Now Sarah represents
the covenant of promise. She represents God's covenant
of grace. Sarah was Abraham's wife before
Hagar was and she never ceased being his wife even when Hagar
entered the picture. Before the world was made, God
established this covenant of grace. Before as yet the old
covenant entered in, just like before Hagar entered in, Sarah
was the wife. This covenant of promise was
from eternity. God chose his people and gave
them to Christ and Christ entered covenant with the Father to glorify
the Father in saving them, to come and do everything for His
people, absolutely everything. He would come forth as a man
and redeem His people from the curse of the law. He would ascend back to glory
and He would send us the gospel and He would send the Spirit.
He would cause His people to be born again. He would produce
fruit in His children. He would preserve His children. He would bring them all home
to glory to God. And in the process, God gets
all the glory because God did it all. God was in Christ reconciling
His people to Himself. He gets all the glory. And so
that's what this covenant pictures. God made a promise to Abraham. The entire work was of God. And
God made certain it was clear that God did it. It was all of
God. The work of magnifying the law
and making it honorable for God and for his people is Christ's
work. The work of being the head of the church and birthing his
children, that's Christ's work. The work of robing us and fitting
us for glory by his robe of righteousness, that's his work. He does it through
the Holy Spirit of God. He does it through the Gospel.
But this is all His work and He's going to get all the glory.
He produces fruit in His people. They're called fruits of righteousness
which are by Jesus Christ. He's going to get all the glory
for this. He's going to not lose one. He'll bring each one to
God. That's the covenant of promise. Everything was of God. He's the
Alpha and Omega of salvation. Eternity for His people was settled
from eternity. He finished the works from the
beginning because there's no possibility he shall fail. And
he came forth and accomplished everything and he's the salvation
of his people. And you know, when you read Hebrews
11, the majority of the brethren that are mentioned in Hebrews
11 were before the law was ever given at Sinai. You have Abel
and Adam and Enoch and Noah and Abraham and Isaac and Jacob.
They didn't have the law at Sinai, but yet the Lord worked this
work in them. He made them to be born again.
He made them to believe on Christ. He made them walk by faith, constrained
by the love of Christ. He overruled their sin to show
them Christ more and make themselves decrease in their estimation
of themselves. And all through it all, he brought
each one to glory. And he did it by the gospel. He did it by the spirit in their
heart leading them. and that's how he does this work.
It's the covenant of his grace. Now secondly, so we got these
two covenants. There's a covenant of works and
there's a covenant of grace, a covenant of promise. Now secondly,
these two women represent two kinds of religion. All religion
falls into one of these two categories. Either it's under a covenant
of works or covenant of grace. And he says here, Hagar represents
works religion. He said, verse 25, for this Hagar
is Mount Sinai in Arabia and answers to Jerusalem which now
is and is in bondage with her children. Now, you think about
this. He says Hagar here is Mount Sinai
in Arabia. That's out there in the desert
in the wilderness. That's outside the land of promise. If a believer
in Jerusalem is told they gotta go back to the law, that'd be
like telling them, you gotta go back out in the wilderness.
You gotta go back out to Arabia, to the desert, and leave the
land of promise. You gotta leave it. Hagar represents
Jerusalem, which now is in bondage with her children. Now at the
time, there was majority in Jerusalem were preaching, they were mixing
law with grace, which is just all law when you do that. They
were saying there's something that's necessary that the believer
has to do or he can't be saved. Rather than saying Christ is
working at all in his people and he gets the glory for everything
that's done. His people are gonna, they're
gonna believe on him, they're gonna follow him, they're gonna
do as he leads them to do because he will not fail. It's all of
Him. But these were in bondage. They were bringing forth children
of the flesh. Anybody born of their will, their
works, anything they contributed to their salvation, they're born
of flesh. And that's all that works religion
is producing are children of flesh. Just like Abraham, when
he went to Hagar by his work, he produced a child of flesh.
He produced a child of his own works. It wasn't of God. And
unless God is the one who births his child, it doesn't matter
how good they appear outwardly. It's just flesh. It's just sinful
flesh. And it's all bondage, brethren. If a person's law-keeping, turning
gospel precepts into law, people can make a degree of knowledge
necessary They can make a degree of knowledge necessary. They
can make church ordinances and traditions of denominations necessary. These are all things whereby
you come back under the law. And that's a terrible place to
be. It's bondage. But Sarah here
represents the true church of God. He says in verse 26, but
Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all.
Heavenly Jerusalem. This is the mountain we've come
to. We saw this Thursday night. The mountain that can't be touched.
This is a spiritual mountain. It's where Christ abides. It's
where Christ is risen to. It's from where Christ sends
his gospel into the, remember the mountains and the hills in
the earth? His churches. This is where he
sends the gospel forth. And so Christ is the one who
births his children. He's the husband of this bride.
And he's the one who sends the spirit and sends the gospel and
makes his child be born of incorruptible seed. Just like Isaac was born
of God, he makes his child be born of him. And he is the redeemer
who brought us out from the law and under grace, under Christ's
rule, led of the spirit, constrained by his love, we're born free.
When you're born again by God, you're born free. The first time
we were sinners in bondage under the law, under the broken law,
under the curse. When He makes you be born again,
you're born into His church, into His kingdom, and you're
free. He set you free. Now you can
actually live under God. A man can't live under God until
he's died to the law. You can't. You can't live under
God until you've died and know you've died and know your sins
are put away and are filled with the Spirit. Then you can live
to God. Now you've got a right motive
in your heart because you know it's finished. It's finished.
God's not going to reject me. He's not going to turn me away.
He's never going to, brethren. He won't reject you. He receives His people because
before God, you're righteous and you're holy and you're perfect
in His Son, and He'll receive you. He'll receive you, and that's
liberty. He's our husband who redeemed
us and who makes us to be born again. He says there in verse
27, for it's written, Rejoice thou barren that bearest not.
We can't bring forth children. This church, the bride can't
bring forth the children. We couldn't bring forth life
in ourselves. We can't bring it forth in anybody
else. We're barren by nature. But look what he says. But break
forth and cry thou that travailest not, for the desolate hath many
more children than she which hath a husband. Go over to Isaiah
54. Let's look at this. This is right
after he spoke of Christ's travailing. and seeing the travail of his
soul and being satisfied after he redeemed and justified his
people. Then he says in Isaiah 54, 1, here's the result of Christ's
redeeming work. He says, Sing, O barren, thou
that didst not bear. Break forth into singing. Cry
aloud, thou that didst not travail with child. For more are the
children of the desolate than the children of the married wife,
saith the Lord. Enlarge the place of your tent. Let you stretch
forth the curtains of your habitation. Spare not, lengthen your cords,
strengthen your stakes. Why? For thou shalt break forth
on the right hand and on the left. Thy seed shall inherit
the Gentile and make the desolate cities to be inhabited. Fear
not, thou shalt not be ashamed. Neither be thou confounded, for
thou shalt not be put to shame, for thou shalt forget the shame
of thy youth, and shalt not remember the reproach of thy widowhood
any more. Here's why all this is so. For thy maker is thine
husband. He's the one who makes this church.
He's the one who makes these children. He's the Lord of hosts,
that's his name, so he can get the gospel to where his people
are. He says, and he's thy redeemer. It means he's your righteousness.
He's the holy one of Israel. He's your holiness. The God of
the whole earth shall he be called. Because he got people all over
this world and he's bringing them to himself. This is the
true church. This is how we're born into this
liberty. It's all of God's promise. It's
all of Christ. And from A to Z, from God purposing
it in eternity until the day that we're all gathered with
God at Christ's feet and worshiping God, every bit of it is Christ's
work. Every bit of it. Every single
bit. We're not gonna be able to glory
in anything. Not anything, it's all of Christ.
It's all of Christ. Lastly, these two sons represent
the two kinds of people in religion. to kinds of people in religion.
And this is where Paul's bringing this home to these Judaizers
because they were persecuting him and they were persecuting
those that didn't bow to him and come under the law as they
were commanded. And he says here now, verse 22,
for it's written, Abraham had two sons, the one by the, let
me see here. I'm sorry, verse 29. I'm sorry,
verse 28. 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. Nevertheless, what saith the
scripture, cast out the bondwoman and her son, for the son of the
bondwoman shall not be heir with the son of the free woman. So
then, brethren, we're not children of the bondwoman, but of the
free. This child that was born of works
was a child of flesh. That was Ishmael, born of works. And so are all those that are
born of their will and of, if it's their faith that made the
difference, their works that make the difference. You know,
it's a, law sets up a standard. and then judges everybody else
that don't meet the standard. That's what the legal heart does.
It says, here's a standard you're gonna have to meet, and you don't
meet it, I'm better than you, what have you. That's law. That's
just law. That's not seeing ourselves as
being the sinner we are. And that's what he has to bring
us. But everybody that's after the flesh or in the bondage,
but Isaac was of the free woman. He was of the free woman. He's
a child of God's grace. He pictures the elect who were
chosen by God in Christ, who Christ redeemed, who he births
again. This is a picture of a believer. And he says there, now we brethren,
everybody who believes Christ, is Christ your all? Is Christ
your only hope? Is he, do you trust him right
now today to provide everything you need right now, just like
you trust him for everything for eternity? If he's your all
and your only hope, then you're one of these brethren. And he
says, now brethren, as Isaac was, we are children of promise.
Children of promise. Back in Galatians 4 verse 6,
he said, because you're sons, God has sent forth the spirit
of his Son in our hearts, crying, Abba, Father, wherefore you're
no more a servant, but a son. And if a son and an heir of God
through Christ. And now these two kinds of religion
won't ever get along. These two kinds of religionists,
they're not going to get along. He says in verse 29, as then
he that was born after the flesh persecuted him that was born
after the spirit, even so it is now. It's just going to happen. Ishmael mocked and persecuted
Isaac. Legalists are going to persecute
the children of God. They're going to burden them
with do's and don'ts. They're just going to. It's always
going to. But look at verse 12, I'm sorry,
Galatians 6, 12. Paul says, as many as desire
to make a fair show in the flesh. See, the motive is everything,
brethren. And this is what he's saying.
If this is the motive, a man desiring to make a fair show
in the flesh, they constrain you. And you can fill in the
blank. If it's constraining you, trying to make you do something,
that's law. That's law. make some fleshly
requirement for salvation, doubt in another due to something done
in the flesh, anything other than faith in Christ alone. That's
legalism. And it's the same as these Judaeites.
They were constraining them to be circumcised only lest they
should suffer persecution for the cross of Christ. For the
cross of Christ. When somebody is wanting to bring
somebody under the law, It takes some boldness and some faith
to say, I'm looking to Christ. And that's where he'll bring
you. I'm looking to Christ. I'm gonna trust Christ on them.
But the legalist, he don't wanna suffer that persecution for the
cross of Christ. For neither they themselves who
are circumcised keep the law, but they desire to have you circumcised
that they may glory in your flesh. This is what we have to remember.
None of us have lived as we ought to live. Not any of us have. None of us have to be able to
put any confidence in it. And this is where the Lord reminds
us. He keeps us knowing this. Ishmael,
we got an Ishmael in us. We all do. It's what our sin
nature is. And Ishmael was about 13 years
older than Isaac. He was a lot stronger than Isaac.
And brethren, that Ishmael in you and me is a lot stronger
than the new man in you and me. The new man's not as old as the
old man. And there ain't but one way that
old man's gonna be subdued, and that's by the Spirit of our Lord.
Paul said there in Galatians 5.16, this I say then, walk in
the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh.
What's to walk in the Spirit? It's looking to Christ, getting
all your strength from Christ, seeing His grace is sufficient. Looking to Him, staying on Him, trusting Him. Now Abraham tried
to keep Ishmael and Isaac under the same roof. He tried to. But look what happened, verse
30. Nevertheless, what saith the scripture, cast out the bondwoman
and her son, for the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with
the son of the free woman. So then, brethren, we're not
children of the bondwoman, but of the free. God's not going
to let His child that He's birthed, that He's promised to save, He's
not going to let us mix law and grace. Now, we do it, but He's
not going to let you continue in it. He's not. He's going to subdue that old
man and burn up his whip for a while until he rears his ugly
head again. But he's not going to let law
and grace, he's not going to let us put confidence in anything
we do. Because law and grace can't mix.
They can't stay under the same roof. Christ is the end of the
law for righteousness to everyone that believeth. That's the end
of our doing. When He brought you to the end
of your doing for righteousness or holiness or measuring yourself
against others by what you do, when He brought you to the end
of that, then you can start living for Him. Then you can start glorifying
Him because now your heart, the motive is right. Two people could do the same
thing outwardly, and one of them's heart be mean as a snake and
the other one be doing it for Christ. And one of them do it
worse than the other one, but the one with the true heart is
the one the Lord has worked in and received. And this is the
thing, it's the heart that says Christ is everything. He's everything. This is it right here, Galatians
6.14. Listen to Paul. God forbid that I should glory,
save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world
is crucified unto me and I unto the world. That's a dead man
right there. If the world's crucified to him
and him to the world, that's a man that's not putting any
confidence in what he does, period. Not any. He says, for in Christ
Jesus, neither circumcision avails anything nor uncircumcision,
but a new creation, a new creation. And as many as walk according
to this rule, this is the rule we're under, peace be on them
and mercy and upon the Israel of God. So go back now to Galatians
5. Here's the Holy Spirit's application
to you and I who believe on Christ. He says in verse one, stand fast
therefore, in the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free. And
be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage. For I testify
again to every man that circumcised that he's a debtor to do the
whole law." If I'm going to put confidence in anything whatsoever,
or if I'm going to make something a necessity for me or my brother, then I'm a debtor to do the whole
law. Christ has become of no effect unto you, whosoever of
you are justified by the law, and you can put sanctified there,
ruled by, it's all the same. He said you've fallen from grace.
For we through the Spirit, here it is, we through the Spirit,
we wait for the hope of righteousness by faith. What if you take a
second wife? Surely you couldn't be a child
of God if you took a second wife while you was married to the
first one and produced an illegitimate child. God's showing us this thing's
of grace. This thing is of grace. It's of Christ. It's not of us.
God overruled that and showed us a beautiful picture of the
difference between law and grace to subdue our flesh and to increase
our inward man and make us look to Christ alone. We, through
the Spirit, wait for the hope of righteousness by faith. That's
what Abraham was doing. That's what he was doing the
whole time. Through his sin, through his
falls, through his successes, through his triumphs, through
it all, he was waiting for the hope of righteousness by faith.
And here's why, because in Jesus Christ, Neither circumcision
avails anything nor uncircumcision, but faith which worketh by love. Faith says I'm complete in Christ. That's all my hope. And love
says I love him and look at how he loved me. I want to do what
I do for him just because I love him. That's grace. That's the
child of faith. All right, brethren. Father, we thank you for this
word and we pray you bless it to our hearts and keep us looking
to Christ. Help us, Lord, to see how Christ alone is everything. Help us to speak of Him and turn
one another to Him. And Lord, by Your Spirit, we
ask You to subdue our flesh and make us to walk in a way that's
honoring to You. Lord, we thank You, how we thank
You for forgiveness. We need it every hour, every
day. And Lord, you so mercifully and
graciously give it for Christ's sake. Lord, help us to remember that. Help us to be helpers of one
another's joy. Help us to see each other in
Christ, perfect, and deal with each other accordingly. Help us, Lord, to know that you're
working your will in this earth and everything you're doing is
right. Help us to truly understand these
scriptures so we don't seek out wrongs,
but we seek out love that covers and edifies and turns to Christ. Lord, we have to wait on you.
If it be long, 20 years or however long for you
to fulfill your promise to us, give us grace to wait on you.
Give us grace to trust you. Don't let us resort to our own
hands. Lord, we thank you for your covenant
of grace, for your covenant of promise. Thank you for free salvation
entirely in Christ. Lord, forgive us, we ask you
again. In Christ's name, amen.