Let's read from Genesis 21. I hope you had time or took the
time to Read this this afternoon, Genesis 21. And the Lord visited Sarah as
he had said, and the Lord did unto Sarah as
he had spoken. For Sarah conceived and bare
Abraham a son in his old age. at the set time of which God
had spoken to him. And God called the name of his
son that was born unto him, whom Sarah bared to him, Isaac. And Abraham circumcised his son
Isaac, being eight days old, as God had commanded him. And
Abraham was a hundred years old when his son Isaac was born unto
him. And Sarah said, God hath made
me to laugh, so that all that hear will laugh with me. And
she said, who would have said unto Abraham that Sarah should
have given children such God said it, that's who. Well,
I have borne him son in his old age, and the child grew and was
weaned, and Abraham made a great feast the same day that Isaac
was weaned. And Sarah saw the son of Hagar,
the Egyptian, which she had borne unto Abraham. She saw Ishmael
mocking, or mocking Therefore Sarah said unto Abraham,
Cast out this bondwoman and her son, for the son of this bondwoman
shall not be heir with my son, even with Isaac. And the thing
was very grievous in Abraham's sight because of his son, because
of Ishmael. And God said unto Abraham, Let
it not be grievous in thy sight because of the lad and because
of thy bondwoman. And all that Sarah hath said
unto thee, hearken unto her voice. For in Isaac shall thy seed be
called. And also of the son of the bondwoman
will I make a nation, because he is thy seed. And Abraham rose
up early in the morning, and took bread, and a bottle of water,
and gave it unto Hagar, and put it on her shoulder. and sent her away. And she wandered in the wilderness. Let's ask the Lord to open this
to our understanding. Our Heavenly Father, we bow before you in our hearts. We hope to worship this evening
Hearts emptied, minds emptied with all the clutter and clamor
of this life. We pray, O Lord, that you by
your Holy Spirit might set our affection this night on things
above. Set it, our affection, on Christ. Set our minds, our attention,
our hearts upon the things of God. make it a must that we be about
our Father's business this evening. It's one thing equal. Open our understanding, Lord.
These things are a mystery. They're too hard, difficult,
things hard to be understood. without your Holy Spirit, without
him illuminating us, opening our understanding. These things
are impossible to understand because God's ways are not our
ways, his thoughts are not our thoughts. As the heavens are
higher above the earth, so are your thoughts higher than our
thoughts and your ways than our ways. And those things that just
don't seem right and reasonable and rational to us, God does you do as you please,
with whom you will, how you will, and the way you will. It's the
Lord. You do all things well and right,
as our brothers already said. You do things right. You're the
judge of all the earth. Shall not the judge of all the
earth do right? He will. Is there unrighteousness
with God? God forbid. But shall we say
these things? It's the Lord. Let him do what
seemeth good in his sight. Open our understanding, Lord,
that we might understand the truth as it is in Christ, the
gospel, salvation. It's in Christ and him alone.
In his name we pray, met together tonight in hopes of worship. In his name, amen. This will be as clear and as
important a message as you could hear. Turn over to Galatians 4. Galatians
4 is the chapter in the New Testament where the Apostle Paul explains
or declares the gospel from the story we just read of Hagar and
Sarah, Ishmael and Isaac. This is a very, very, very important
message. Galatians 4, let's read verses
21 through 31. Tell me, and oh, how I wish the world
could hear this message. Tell me, you that desire to be
under the law, do you not hear the law? For it is written that
Abraham had two sons, one by a bondmaid, the other by a free
woman. But he who was of the bondwoman
was born after the flesh. He of the free woman was by promise. Which things are an allegory?
For these are the two covenants, one from Mount Sinai, which gendereth
to bondage, which is Hagar. This Hagar is Mount Sinai in
and answereth, or is the same as Jerusalem which is now, now
is, and is in bondage with her children. Jerusalem which is
above, spiritual Israel, is free, which is the mother of us all,
the new Jerusalem. Rejoice thou barren that bearest
not, break forth and cry thou that travailest not. For the
desolate hath many more children than she which hath a husband.
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 are not
children of the bondwoman, but of the free. What saith the scripture? Cast her out. I'm reading Charles Spurgeon
here because he cannot be improved upon. I've got many points from
him. This is one of his earlier messages,
New Park Street, when he was just about twenty years old.
Those were his best sermons. He said, There cannot be a greater
difference in all the world between two things than there is between
law and grace. These things are diametrically
opposed, yet the human mind is so depraved, so depraved, and
one of the most difficult things in the world is to discriminate
properly between law and grace. He who knows the difference and
always is mindful of the difference And I'm paraphrasing so we'll
understand. He who knows the difference and is always mindful
of the essential difference between law and grace, he's grasped the
marrow of divinity, the very substance of how God does things. He's not far from understanding
the gospel in all its ramifications. Now, the first difficulty, the
first problem In trying to learn the gospel is this. Between law
and grace there's a difference. It's plain, a plain difference. But there's always a tendency
in us to confound these two things. Law and grace are as opposite
as light and darkness. They can no more agree than fire
and water. They can no more be mixed than
oil and water. And those who continually strive
to make a mixture of them, what God has put asunder, let
no man join." That's good, isn't it? Now, four points to this message. There's two women here. Point
number one, two women. Number two, we'll look at the
two sons. We're going to look at one son's treatment of the
other, and number four, how they ended up, how the two sons ended
up. Number one, two covenants. Look
at verses 24 through 26 again. Paul writes and says, these things,
this story of Hagar and Sarah, Ishmael and Isaac, these things
are an allegory, an allegory, parable, type, picture. allegory,
something that depicts something else, a story. These are the
two covenants. Two covenants. Do you notice that? These are
the two covenants. There's a lot of people out there
who try to make five or six or seven covenants. A different
one with Abraham, a different one with Noah, a different one
with David, a different one. On and on it goes. Moses, Ephraim,
two. These are the two covenants.
All right? Read on. One is from Mount Sinai. That's where the law was given,
right? The law. Covenant of works. Hagar. This is Hagar. This is who Hagar
represents. Hagar. Hagar, remember, was the
bondwoman or the woman who was a servant of Abraham and Sarah,
whom they brought with them. She's from Egypt. She was a slave.
All right? She was a slave. She represents
the covenant of works, the law, which says, this do and live. Sarah is a free woman. She never was under bondage.
She was always a free woman. She was a wife by choice. A free
woman. Sarah represents the covenant
of grace. Two covenants. An allegory. Am I right? Now the Sarah covenant,
the covenant of grace, is not made with God and man. The covenant of grace is not
made with God and man. God didn't consult any man when
He made the covenant of grace. He doesn't come to us. When salvation
comes to us, He doesn't come to us and consult us about that
either. He doesn't ask any man for his cooperation or his help
or his input. But this is a covenant made with
God and with Jesus Christ, between those two. And this is the covenant. This is it. Christ Jesus agreed
to bear the penalty of all his people's sin, to die, to pay
their debts, to take their sins upon his shoulder and pay for
their sin. And the Father promises on his
part that all for whom the Son would die would most assuredly
be saved. That's the covenant of grace.
Christ agreed to save them by living a life that God demands,
by dying a death, to pay for their guilt and their sin. And
God said, everybody you do that for, I will save them by grace. The covenant of works says this,
do this and live, man. That's what God gave to Adam,
wasn't it, in the garden. Covenant of grace, that's where
that covenant started. The covenant of works, of law.
To Adam in the garden, he said, do this and live, don't do it,
you'll die. Adam didn't do it, he died, and
everybody fell in Adam. They're all already guilty. It's
not like God offered us again the covenant of works and said,
here, you try it. Then later on he said, okay,
you try it, Terry. Did he do that? No, he was already
guilty. Right? In Adam. All died. All died. This do and live. That's the covenant of work.
But the covenant of grace is this. Do this, Christ, and they
shall live. Christ did this, and so we live. And the difference between the
covenants is right here. One was made with man, the other
with Christ. One was a conditional covenant,
conditioned on Adam keeping it. The other was conditioned on
Christ keeping it. Who's the stronger? Who kept
it? The way of Christ's covenant,
covenant of grace, is unconditional with us. We're not even in the
picture. We're in the picture. But we
don't have a part in it, except that he's doing it for us. It's
unconditional. There are no conditions in the
covenant of grace. None. No conditions. No. No condition. If there are
any conditions, listen to this, the covenant gives them. If faith
is a condition, the covenant gives it. If there are any conditions,
the covenant gives it. If faith is a condition, the
covenant says, here's faith. If repentance is a condition,
the covenant says, here's repentance. I give it to you. If good work
is a condition, the covenant says, here, give good work. give
you good work. None of this depends on us in
the least degree. The covenant was made by God
with Christ signed, sealed, ratified, and all things ordered and sure. Now, let's look at the allegory. That was the covenant, covenant
of works, covenant of grace. You got that? Hagar represents
covenant of works, law. Sarah represents grace, Christ. Moses, the law came through Moses,
grace through Christ. Right? Law, grace. They're totally
opposite. Can't be mixed. Never. What God
hath put asunder, let no man join. All right? The first thing
to notice, the first thing I want you to notice is that Sarah,
who is the type of the new covenant of grace, Sarah was the original
wife of Abraham. Wasn't she? The first wife of
Abraham? Before we ever heard about Hagar,
Sarah was his wife. What does that tell you? That
the covenant of grace was the original covenant after all.
It was the first covenant. Listen to Spurgeon here. He says
there are some bad theologians who teach that God made man upright
and made a covenant with him and that man sinned, and kind
of an afterthought, God made a new covenant with Christ for
the salvation of his people. Now that is a complete mistake,
Spurgeon says. The covenant of grace was made
before the covenant of works with Christ Jesus before the
foundation of the world. He stood at its head, its representative. We are said to be the elect according
to the foreknowledge of God through obedience and sprinkling of the
blood of Christ. Long before we fell, we were
loved by God. He loved us when we became sinners. He allowed us to fall into sin
to show the riches of his grace. which existed long before our
sin. He did not love his people and
choose them from among the rest after their fall, but he loved
them before their sin, during their sin, after their sin. He
made a covenant of grace before we fell by the covenant of works. If you could go back to eternity
and see what's the oldest born, you would hear that grace was
born before the law. Before the law. Great. And long
before Adam stood in the garden, God had ordained his people to
eternal life that they might be saved through Jesus Christ
by his grace. And the next thing here. So Sarah
was the original wife of Abraham. The next thing. Sarah, listen
to this, this is a good point. Though Sarah was the older wife,
the elder wife, the original wife, yet, Hagar bore the first
son. Now listen, though Sarah was
the wife, Hagar is the one that bore the first son. Hagar was
the one that bore the first son. When we were born, how were we
born? Under the law. Right? Born under the law. But we always
had grace as our real parents. And in time, in due time, in
God's good time, we're born again, you see, by our original parent. That's a good point. All right,
now, here's another point. Hagar was never intended to be
a wife to Abraham, but always a servant. Hagar was never intended to be
a wife to Abraham, always a servant. The law, and I'm talking about
an allegory, the law is the handmaid to grace, not vice It's a handmaid. Look over at Galatians 3. Turn
back to Galatians 3, verse 19. Look. Galatians 3. And Paul, the whole book of Galatians,
Paul is dealing with this. The whole book. Galatians 3,
verse 3, he says, Are you so foolish? Having begun in the
Spirit, are you now made perfect in the flesh? Here's what I want to know, he
said, did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law or by
the hearing of faith? Huh? Are you so foolish? Begin in
the Spirit, now made perfect by the flesh? Look at verse 19.
Well, what then, wherein, wherefore, then, serveth the law? What's
the law for? It was added later on. 400 years after the
promise, added because of transgressions, till the seed should come to
whom the promise was made. It was added later on. Verse 24, what purpose is the
law? And Paul said in Romans, he said,
I had no sin except by the law. That's why. Look at verse, not salvation,
but I didn't know sin, said by the law. That's the only purpose.
The purpose of the law is to reveal the exceeding sinfulness
of sin. To reveal sin. Verse 24. Wherefore the law, here's another
purpose of the law, the law is our schoolmaster to bring us
to Christ, that we might be justified by faith. And Brother Nybert
pointed this out to me. Schoolmaster here met a hard,
unbending, inflexible tyrant who continually beat, who continually
beat the student until the student ran elsewhere for help. It's not like the law says, go
to Christ, go to Christ. No, it doesn't say that, does
it? Huh? The Spirit comes and says, come to Christ. And as the sin revealed the law,
the law is, and Paul said to young Timothy, he said, some
desire to be teachers of the law. They don't understand anything
about the law. If they, for a moment, try to
bring people under the law, They're bringing people under
bondage, severe, strict, stern bondage, inflexible justice and
bondage. Paul said to Timothy, he said,
if it's lawfully used, if it's lawfully used, it's okay. And that is just to reveal sin.
But its Virgin said this, though. Like in the story here, Hager
will always want to be the mistress, want to be served, want to take
the upper hand. I bet you Hager got the feeling
after she had the son, she got the feeling pretty good about
herself and maybe tried to start acting a little boss. She was
a slave. She never was anything but a
slave. She wasn't in charge. Brother John and I were talking
about this. When Isaac was born, it could be that Hagar, when
Isaac got up to be about a year old or something, he did something
and Hagar said, you cut that out. I bet you Sarah said, you don't
tell my son anything. Huh? Don't you know she did? Sarah said, you're a slave around
here. Don't you touch my boy. That's
my son, it's not your son. You tend to your son, you better
watch it or you're going to be out of here. Do you see the picture? God's
people, he never intended them to be under the law. The law
is inflexible, strict, hard, unbending. God's merciful, gracious,
long-suffering, compassionate, gentle, kind to his people. to those outside of Christ, God's
totally mercy and grace and love in Christ. Well, if we treat, and Spurgeon said
this, he said, if we treat those who are under the law or attempt
to bring people under the law a little too harshly and say,
I'm not going to have any of that, anything that has to do
with the law, anything that's close to it, in his subtle self-righteousness. If we treat it too harshly and
say, get out of here with that, I don't want any of that, so
be it. People think about this story
now. This really happened. This is
not just an allegory. The reason it happened, the purpose
for it happening, These things are written for our learning.
These things are written as types and pictures and to show us. These things were not revealed
to them and are now revealed unto us. These things were written
for that purpose as an allegory. God made this actually happen,
but it was a type of the gospel. But it actually happened. Deborah,
there was a woman with a son. 14 years old, not far from Andrew's
age. And Abraham put a bottle of water
in a piece of bread and said, Get out. Get out. Sarah said, Get them
out of here. I don't want to see them again.
And Abraham said, God said, Get them out. That's tough. Oh no, that's the gospel. That's what that is. This is
the gospel. Cast out the bondwoman. There's no place for her. Listen, Hagar never was a free
woman. She was always a slave. Sarah
never was a slave. She was always a free woman.
Ishmael never was a free son. He was always the son of a bondwoman.
Isaac never was a slave. He was always the son of a free
woman. If you can just pick up a little
of the spiritual type in all this, you'll rejoice. All who
trust in works of any sort are never free. That's the reason
religious people are so miserable. Oh, I know they have these fake
smiles on their face, but they're miserable. If you got right down to it and
you really, really examine their lives, they're miserable people. Why? Because they're always under
bondage, under a yoke. You've got to watch your every
move, your every step, your every word. That's bondage, buddy. Everybody who trusts and works
are never free. All who try to keep the law are
under bondage. It's never enough, people. It's
never enough. The law is is the strictest,
roughest master of all. The law keeps saying, do, do. The law never says, that's good
enough, so you can stop now. Does it? Have you ever seen,
I was looking at a, in a magazine, they had a picture of an old
ox under a yoke, going around a treadmill, or
treading. Have you ever seen one of those
that's under a yoke on a pole and it's going around a circle?
Turning that big millstone, you know. I felt sorry for that ox. It was skin and bones. And the
man over there with a whip just kept prodding it. Just kept prodding
it. The ox wanted to stop, you know,
keep going. And he never got any further.
He was walking, but he was never getting anywhere. He had his
nose, the grindstone literally, the millstone, never going. That's
what the law says, do, do, do, do, do. It never says, okay,
you can stop now. Here's something else. No, do,
do, do. Well, all these things have I
done. It's not enough. Do, do. Grace says, stop, rest. It's done. There's nothing to
grind, let me, let me, it's done. Eat. We're going to go ahead and get
started. I'm going to go ahead and do
that. I'm going to go ahead and do that. Okay. Okay. Thank you. you. I don't know. I'm not sure if I'm going to
be able to do it. I don't know. I don't know if I'm going to
be able to do it. I don't think I'm going to be
able to do it. Okay. you