Remind me afterwards, I have
some announcements about the conference and some other things,
so just remind me. I think you're all staying for
the second service, but if anyone's leaving, let me know. I want
to make sure that you are aware of some things. All right, but
let's go to Galatians, Galatians chapter 4. Paul has been laboring with the
Galatian Church. He's declaring to them the hope
of the brethren, turning their hearts, their eyes back upon
the Lord Jesus Christ and warning them not to be deceived by the
fleshly appeal of the law for righteousness. That's an appeal
to our flesh. And he's telling them to understand
that all of God's children are justified by the promise of God
in Christ. In Christ, that's our salvation. Salvation by grace through the
imputed righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ. And every
child of God is going to experience this grace of God in their Savior,
Jesus Christ. They experience it because it's
manifested in them by God-given faith. Faith to believe in Christ. And what does faith believe in
concerning Christ? We believe the faith of Jesus
Christ. We believe the faith of Jesus
Christ. What is that? What is the faith
of Christ? Because the Bible describes it
in that way. Our faith in him, in the faith
of Jesus Christ. What is that faith? It's to trust
in the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ who came
in the flesh to do for His people what we could not do for ourselves. And He does it not because we've
earned it, not because we deserve this mercy and grace, but because
God will be gracious to His people. God will be merciful and gracious
to whom He will in His Son Jesus Christ, provided for the salvation
of His people. You know, we're chosen by God
before the foundation of the world. The scriptures say it
that way, just over in Ephesians 1 verse 4. He says, according
as He hath chosen us, in Him before the foundation of the
world. So we've been chosen by God the
Father in eternity past, given to the Son, that is committed
to the care of His Son to accomplish our salvation, to deliver us
from the just wrath of God coming against the inhabitants of this
world for our sin and rebellion against Him. And so Christ came
at the appointed time to redeem, to purchase his people, to deliver
us from that wrath, to pay our debts, and to reconcile us to
holy God. And so Paul, he concludes in
Galatians 3.29, he says, if ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's
seed, and heirs according to the promise. And so this faith
that is manifest in us by the Spirit of God, whereby we believe
on Christ, we believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, it's revealed
in us by the grace of God. It's not a once and done kind
of a thing, but it's a lifelong following, a lifelong walk of
faith looking to Christ. We endure to the end in faith.
And so now in our passage in Galatians 4, Paul gives us another
allegory, and this allegory he gives to say to us that all the
heirs of promise, every one of God's children by faith, every
one of his children by promise, had a tutor. God put us under
a tutor, a governor, whereby we were taught and brought to
to specific troubles and difficulties that we might be shut up, that
is, hemmed in to find salvation in the Lord Jesus Christ alone. And so we were prepared according
to the purpose of God. According to the purpose of God.
I've titled this, When the Heirs Were Children. So to begin, let's
look at verse 1 in Galatians 4 verse 1. Now I say, that the
heir, as long as he is a child, differeth nothing from the servant,
though he be lord of all. Paul is continuing here to speak
of the heirs, meaning heirs according to the promise of God. We are
heirs of eternal life in Christ. God has promised that to us in
his word. And the heirs are Abraham's seed. Abraham's seed and heirs according
to the promise. These are the people of faith
in Jesus Christ. Whether Jew or Gentile, all are
saved one way, by faith, the faith of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Look at Galatians 3 verse 26. for ye are all the children of
God by faith in Christ Jesus. He says right there, Galatians
3.26, you're all, whether Jew or Gentile, you're all children
of faith in Jesus Christ. And so once faith is revealed
in a person, it's manifested. It's revealed in that person
that they are a child of God by the Spirit of God who manifests
that faith in his people, whereby they believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ. It's apparent now that they are
heirs according to that promise which God spoke to Abraham. when he promised him life, when
he promised him inheritance. That same promise is made to
all the children of God in Christ. That's where it's given to us.
That's where God meets with his people in Christ. Outside of
Christ, there's no fellowship, no relation to God. In Christ
is all our salvation, all our comfort, all the peace and rest
for the children of God. Look briefly over at Romans 8.
Romans 8, verses 16 and 17. Romans 8, 16 and 17. The Spirit itself beareth witness
with our spirit that we are the children of God. And if children,
then heirs, heirs of God and joined heirs with Christ, if
so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified
together. And so God gives the Spirit to
testify to us, to make known to us through the hearing of
faith Christ is, that He is our salvation and gives us hope and
faith in Him. Paul tells us in another place,
all men have not faith, all men don't have faith, but faith is
the gift of God for His people, and whom He reveals that faith
in, that's a good hope. Thank your God, bless His name,
because that's revealed in you, and not in all people, but in
you It's revealed. And he speaks of suffering with
Christ. That suffering is what God uses
to mature his people, to grow them in Christ. As Peter said,
but grow in the grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and
Savior Jesus Christ. And so we see through trials
and sufferings that we are matured and grown in Christ. James put
it this way, James 1, 3, knowing this, that the trying of your
faith worketh patience, worketh patience. And there again, in
Romans 5, I'll read it to you. Romans 5, verse 3, and not only
so, but we also glory in tribulations also, knowing that tribulation
worketh patience. and patience experience, and
experience hope, and hope maketh not ashamed, because the love
of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which
is given unto us. And so your God, in mercy, in
wisdom, brings afflictions, and trials, and tribulations, and
sufferings to His people with which He reveals Christ to us,
makes us to call upon Him, and secondly to grow us and mature
us in Christ so that Christ becomes our all. So we're thankful for
His grace and mercy to teach us. He says here in verse one,
let's read it again, this is an allegory, and it's to help
us, it's to help our understanding, and it also shows us the unity
of all believers. There's a unity once again, whether
Jew or Gentile. Now I say that the heir, as long
as he is a child, differeth nothing from a servant, though he be
lord of all. Now this word child in verse
one, and it's children in verse three of this same chapter, It's
a different word than was used in Galatians 3.26 when he says
that we're all the children of God by faith. This word child
here is a different word and it means someone who's a minor,
someone who's not yet of age. And the sense is when we were
yet in darkness, when we were yet unknowing of our God, we
didn't know the true and living God. We didn't know the depth
of our sin. We didn't know or believe on
the Lord Jesus Christ unto salvation. We didn't hear his call in the
gospel. We didn't believe. the truth
of God revealed in the face of Christ. Though he was a child
according to promise, he yet was in darkness, yet in sin,
yet unknowing of God. He wasn't yet born again. We read an example of this over
in Romans 9, verse 11 through 13. Here's an example. For the
children, being not yet born, neither having done any good
or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might
stand, not of works, but of him that calleth. It was said unto
her, this is Rebecca, the elder shall serve the younger. As it
is written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated. So in that, God is revealing
to us that he chose to be gracious to Jacob. In that same womb,
twin boys, God chose to be gracious to Jacob, and he chose to leave
Esau to his own devices. He showed him no grace, no mercy.
He didn't help him in any way. But after they were born, and
they were growing up, Jacob didn't know God. He didn't know the
truth of God. He wasn't under the saving graces
of God. And he knew nothing of it. He
didn't hear God's voice. He didn't believe. He grew up
in Isaac's household. He knew his grandfather Abraham.
And those two men worshipped God. And they brought those boys
to the services. And they saw the sacrifices,
the shadows. They saw the pictures of Christ
revealed in that. But they didn't believe. They
didn't believe. Jacob didn't come to know the
true and living God until he was fleeing for his life from
Esau. And God revealed himself to him
in the wilderness. And yet all that time, while
he was a child in darkness, he was an heir of promise, but not
in experience. He didn't experience that grace
yet. Now back in Galatians, Looking at chapter 3, verse 23 and 24,
we saw a similar allegory. We saw a similar argument by
Paul. He says in verse 23, We Jews, he's speaking of the
Jews, we were kept under the law, shut up unto the faith which
should afterwards be revealed. Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster
to bring us unto Christ that we might be justified by faith. And so this law was specific
to the Jews. They were kept, they were preserved
under that law given to Moses until Christ should come. Until Christ should come under
that law and be sacrificed under that law for the remission of
sins, where God put away the sins of his people to justify
his chosen people. Now, one of the reasons that
God gave that law, as it says, was to preserve the Jews under
that law in order that when Christ came, he would be born under
that law, that he would be born while those people were still
practicing that law. They had the temple, they were
sacrificing the sacrifices, and Christ was born under that. And
you and me and those Jews back then could not keep that law
perfectly. They could not keep that law
perfectly, but Christ came in the flesh, and He kept that law
perfectly. He is sinless, without sin, and
He fulfilled all the righteousness which God requires of His people,
so that He, as a fit sacrifice, as the Lamb of God, went to the
cross for His people as their surety and substitute, bearing
our sin, to put that sin away on the cursed tree, to put away
the curse which was upon us for the sins that we had committed
and the debt that we had accrued and worked up by our own works,
Christ came, being born under that law, to faithfully fulfill
all that law. And so God gave them that law
and kept that law over them in order to bring Christ forth at
that specific time to put an end to sin. But this here is
a different allegory that Paul is giving us. Let's look at verses
1 through 3, Galatians 4. Now I say that the heir, as long
as he is a child, differeth nothing from a servant, though he be
lord of all, but is under tutors and governors until the time
appointed of the father. Even so we, when we were children,
were in bondage under the elements of the world. And so this is
different from that law of Moses, that schoolmaster that the Jews
were under. But he's saying all the children
of God are under a tutor. Every one of us was brought under
a tutor, whether Jew or Gentile, even so we, when we were children,
he says, when we were ignorant, when we walked according to the
course of this world, We were children of wrath and children
of disobedience, Paul says in Ephesians 2. We walked according
to this world, according to the ways of this world, doing the
things that we thought we should be doing, the things we thought
pleased God or pleased ourselves. And Paul says we were in bondage
under the elements of the world. Except that for God's people,
his heirs. The elements of the world served
as our tutors and governors. They didn't give us life. They
didn't make it appear to us or anyone else that we were the
chosen seed of Christ. We all had our problems. We all
had our difficulties. Every one of us has done foolish
things. Every one of us has done sinful
things and wicked things for which we are now ashamed and
grieved, we got in trouble, we did awful things. Every one of
us had difficulties in this life and did foolishly. Some of us
grew up in religion. Some of us were very moral in
our practices. Some of us were very deceitful
in our religion. We all came up like that. Some
of us came up and grew up without any religion at all. and just
lived in reckless abandonment doing what we would. Some of
us without religion were more moral and better than people
in the church. We've seen it all. Every one
of us has come up different ways, but what the Lord is telling
us is that every one of us was brought through these difficulties
and trials according to the providence of God. It's exactly according
as God has purposed it for you, each and every one of you. There's
no point in you beating yourself up and looking back and wishing
that you had done things differently, that's a normal thing that we
do, but it's all according to the divine appointment of your
God to bring you to see your need of the Lord Jesus Christ. We were dead in trespasses and
sins then. Though heirs, we were dead in
trespasses and sins. We had to be born again by the
Spirit of God, but we were cared for. What he's saying, we were
cared for and prepared for the day when God would reveal his
love for his people in the Lord Jesus Christ. There were places
that you didn't go to. that he kept you from. There
were places that you did go to because God ordained it to be
so. And so every trial, every difficulty, every failure, every
success, every door that opened before you and every door that
shut, slammed shut in your face was exactly as God purposed it
for you. exactly as he purposed it for
you. He says in Hosea 11, I'll read it, verses 1 and verse 3,
he said, when Israel was a child, then I loved him and called my
son out of Egypt. I taught Ephraim also to go,
taking them by their arms, but they knew not that I healed them. God provided for you. God cared
for you. God took care of you all along
the way. and every good thing that you
remember and every horrible thing that you can think of was all
according to the divine purpose and will of God to bring you
to see your need of the Lord Jesus Christ. While you were
left to yourself, you were in bondage under the elements of
the world, being kept, being shut up to see your need of his
grace and God purposed it. to call you in love and to show
you these things, to show you your need of Christ and the sufficiency
of Christ for your need. In that day of mercy, God showed
you love and compassion for Christ's sake. And you might think, well,
that was hard. That was difficult. Why did God
do that to me? Why did he put me through that?
Why did he make things so hard and difficult for me? And yet
in that day of judgment, when he shows you all the works and
everything he did, you'll see his grace and mercy. And he'll
show you how that you are a child of his grace, a trophy of his
grace. There's probably someone in the
world just like you, has gone through every experience that
you've gone through and is just like you. And yet being left
to themselves, they don't believe. and yet God in mercy brought
you through those same things and yet you do believe by His
grace and power and glory. He does that for His people and
we'll stand in awe and praise Him and thank Him and worship
Him for it because we see that could have been me. I could have
been the Esau that was left to myself and yet God chose me,
a filthy, stinking sinner. a conniver just like Jacob. And God chose to be merciful
to me. And the Lord uses that to break the hearts of his people
and to bring us low in ourselves, to humble us, to take away that
haughty, arrogant, proud, boastful spirit that we might find our
all in the true and living God, and give him all the glory and
praise. Going back to Jacob, he was a mama's boy, and that
probably emboldened him in his works. When his brother came
in from the field and was hungry, he took his birthright. He said,
I'll give you some food if you sell me your birthright for it.
Esau should have just hit him upside the head and took it.
But Esau didn't care, and he gave him the birthright. And
that was one thing. But then he tricked his father. He deceived his father and took
his brother Esau's blessing by pretending to be Esau and that
did it for Esau when he came home and found out what his brother
had done to discover my brother All he does is lurking about
to destroy me to deceive me to take from me and that was enough
for Esau and Esau was ready to kill him and take back everything
that was Was his by by birthright but being warned Jacob fled Jacob
got in trouble and he fled and he lost a lot of time with his
family out there in the wilderness and going to Laban. But we see
how the Lord used that all and it was there in that wilderness
when he was fleeing away from his brother, that's where the
Lord revealed himself to him. No longer was he just the God
of Abraham and Isaac, now he was the God of Jacob. And so
we see how the Lord does that for you, His people. He brings
you through these circumstances to make known to you what He
has done for you in grace in His Son, Jesus Christ. And we read of many people in
the scripture who had great difficulties in life, and yet it led them
to Christ. Either they sought him because
they were pressed in spirit, or he sought them out and found
them. Always it was orchestrated, brought
about, ordained by God, so that they came to Christ born out
of a pressing need. You're probably pressed today. You're probably pressed in sorrow
and in difficulty, in trials, and things that weigh upon your
mind. but the Lord uses this to bring
you to Christ, to show you the sufficiency of the Savior. For example, there was a certain
woman whose young daughter had an unclean spirit. She heard
of Christ. She heard that He was in the
neighborhood and came and fell at His feet. As a parent, I can
think of nothing that troubles me more than when my own child
has a difficulty, a sickness, is brought into some sorrow,
and you feel it, and that never goes away for your own children. Something that you feel in particular
for your own children, and this might have been going on for
days, weeks, months, maybe a couple years, but the Lord used it to
press this Gentile woman to Christ. to Christ. Here's another example,
a woman having an issue of blood 12 years, which had spent all her
living upon physicians, neither could be healed of any. We have doctors in our day that
like to do that, get people on their pharmaceuticals for life. But worse than that are the religious
doctors who never preach the great physician who heals his
people. Instead, they preach around with
the law, going after the symptoms and never treating the disease
by preaching the Lord Jesus Christ because He is the healer of His
people. He's the one who satisfies their
need. Again, we read in John 5, verse
5 and 7, a certain man was there which had an infirmity 38 years. Christ came to him and asked
him why he was still there. And he said, I have no man when
the water is troubled to put me into the pool. But while I'm
coming, another steppeth down before me. He probably was so
upset and wrung his hands every time someone just beat him to
those troubled waters and were healed, and he had to wait another
year. 38 years this went on, and yet
that is where Christ met him. That's where Christ found him
in that great need and revealed himself to that man. And so you
and I, we may go through many hardships and difficulties for
years, even decades, but if the Lord is using that to bring you
to his son, to call out to him, to cry out to him for mercy and
grace, That's a wonderful thing. That's a gracious thing because
this life is temporary. This life is passing away fast,
but in Christ, that inheritance is eternal. Eternal. And so, rejoice in your God. Whatever we've gone through,
it prepared us for the day of grace when we heard Christ speak,
when we sought him out, when we prayed and asked God to have
mercy upon us. It was all ordained of the Lord
when he came to us and caused us to hear his gospel with the
hearing of faith and not just in the dead letter, in this flesh,
being like, well, that was nice, that was nice. But no, we were
burdened in our hearts and we rejoiced to hear it and we're
thankful and wanted to come and hear it again so some come up
one way or another whether it's through the law like Paul but
he was brought to see that he has he was left with no confidence
in the flesh when he saw the emptiness of the law to save
or you're brought up under the elements of this world all those
things when when the Lord stripped it away and showed us they have
no salvation they have no Christ there's nothing in it but an
empty vein vain thing, just vain jangling, just worthless things
in religion. But then we saw the brightness
and the glory of Christ who saves his people with an accomplished
salvation, not looking to you for anything, but giving you
everything that you need in Christ and drawing it from you and drawing
you to himself. Once Christ has come, the old
things are passed away behold all things are become new as
he makes us new creatures. I'm just going to read the next
four verses but we'll come back to these at another time and
look at them more closely. In Galatians 4 verse 4 through
7 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. And 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. I pray the Lord bless that word
for your hearts and comfort you that are troubled and going through
difficulties and trials. Call out upon your God. He is
merciful and gracious to all who call upon him and need him. He's gracious, amen. All right,
let's pray. Our gracious Lord, we thank you,
Father, for your grace. We thank you for your wise providence,
for your wisdom, your power, how that you do all things for
us, Lord, even when we're ignorant of them and unaware of what's
going on. Lord, you are perfect in your
ways, and you are able to save to the uttermost all your people.
And Lord, though the trials and difficulties trouble us, impress
us in our hearts, and we feel weighed down with them, Lord,
When we are turned to You and we see Your Son and Your salvation
and how You do all things well for our good according to purpose,
Lord, then is it all worth it. Help us, Lord. Help us to see
this. Give us a spirit that yields
to Your wisdom and Your ways and Your Word. Lord, we thank
you for our visitors. We do pray for their daughter,
Hannah. We pray that you would heal her,
help her to get well, give them wisdom and strength and the ability
to care for her. And Lord, that through it all,
you would show them Christ and comfort them in him. It's in
his name we pray and give thanks. Amen.