All right, in Galatians chapter
4, we're going to start with verse 21. And here the apostle
Paul had expressed his sincere desire, his fervent desire, that
Christ be formed in them. You remember that Christ? He
said in verse 19, my little children of whom I travail in birth again
until Christ be formed in you. And that is that your heart be
so entrenched in the truth of the gospel of God's grace in
Christ that you cannot be moved away from it. I mentioned last
week about going past the point of no return. In other words,
God the Holy Spirit in bringing you to true conviction and bringing
you to faith in Christ, he's brought you past the point of
no return. You can't go back. We were talking
about that this past week, how if we look at the scriptures,
and before the Lord brought me to faith in Christ, I realized
this, that what I'm preaching to you in the gospel, this is
what the Bible teaches. Whether I believe it or not,
that's what it teaches. And so if I were to turn back,
I would just simply have to admit to myself, well, I'm just going
against the scriptures. But God, the Holy Spirit, when
he forms Christ in us by the spirit and by the word, he brings
us to that point where we say, well, this is it. There's no
other way. And Christ is not, he's not formed
in a person, until that person is brought by God the Holy Spirit
to trust Christ for all righteousness. To see that Christ is our only
righteousness before God, he's our only way of forgiveness of
sins, it's by his blood. He's the only way of salvation,
and we have to stop trusting in ourselves in any way, to any
degree, at any stage. And so it was so inconsistent
with the gospel of grace for these who heard the gospel and
claimed to believe it to be brought back under the law or brought
under the law in any way. The Jews being brought back under
it or the Gentiles being brought under it. And so he says in verse
20, I desire to be present with you now to change my voice for
I stand in doubt of you. Paul's saying I want to be with
you and I want to talk to you in a different tone Rather than
reproof and admonishment, I'd rather be meeting with you and
praising and commending you, not for your works, but for your
faith in Christ." But he said, the problem is, is because you've
been moved away from looking to Christ as the author and finisher
of your faith, as the Lord your righteousness, I stand in doubt
of you. So he says, now let me tell you, about what these false
preachers, these Judaizers are doing. And so he uses a story,
an allegory, beginning at verse 21. He says this, listen to this.
He says, tell me you that desire to be under the law, do you not
hear the law? Don't you hear what it says?
Now here's what he had already established back in Galatians
chapter three and verse 10. If you turn the page back there.
Listen to verse 10, he says, for as many as are of the works
of the law are under the curse. Because it's written, cursed
is everyone that continueth not in all things which are written
in the book of the law to do them. In other words, to be under
the law is to be under a curse. Now, do you desire to be under
a curse? He went on to say, Christ has redeemed us from the curse
of the law, being made a curse for it. You wanna leave Christ
and go back to the law? Don't you hear the law? The law
requires perfect obedience. The law requires perfection in
every way. The law never commands a person
to do the best they can do. The law simply says, do the best
that the law requires. Paul in Galatians chapter five,
you remember, he said, to be under the law is to be a debtor
to do the whole law. Why would you wanna leave the
freedom and the liberty that we have in Christ by his grace,
having all things completely taken care of by him, all, like
I said, all forgiveness, all righteousness, and go back under
debt? Why would you wanna do that?
A debt you can't pay. A debt you can't even contribute
to the payment of. You see, don't you hear what
the law says? To be under the law is to be
obligated to keep it perfectly. And so don't you understand what
the law requires? I was thinking about John chapter
five there where Christ was telling the Pharisees about their condemnation
under judgment. He said, you have one who condemns
you, judges you, Moses, he said, in whom you trust. Now that didn't
mean they trusted in Moses the person. What that meant was they
trusted in the law, their works of the law. And he said, that
will condemn you. That's to be under condemnation,
to be under the law. To trust in the law, in your
works of the law, to save you or to keep you saved or to recommend
you unto God is to be under condemnation. Don't you hear that he's saying?
To be under the law is to be a debtor to do the whole law.
To be under the law is to deny the Lord Jesus Christ and his
work of redemption. To be under the law is to deny
his righteousness imputed as the only ground of salvation.
Paul wrote in Galatians 2 and verse 21, he said, if righteousness
come by the law, then what? Christ is dead in vain. In other
words, if you go back, if you're under the law in any form, whether
it's the Mosaic law or the law of conscience, the law of the
land, thinking that your works, your efforts make you righteous,
then your whole life is a living testimony that you deny the Lord
Jesus Christ. If you think salvation is conditioned
on you, that's a denial of Christ. That's to be under the law. One
cannot rightly claim to believe in Jesus Christ and still be
under the law. Romans 10, four, for Christ is
the end, the fulfillment, the finishing, the completion, the
perfection of the law to everyone that believe it. In Romans, well, let me say this
first. To be under the law is to deny
grace. Remember Paul over in chapter
five, when he was talking about leaving the liberty of Christ,
he says in verse four, Christ is become of no effect unto you,
whosoever you are, whosoever of you are justified by the law,
you're fallen from grace. Now that term fallen from grace,
incidentally, if you see me tearing up, it's not because I'm crying,
it's allergies. All right. But anyway, that term fallen
from grace doesn't mean that you were saved and then lost.
He's simply saying you who claim to believe salvation by grace,
well if you trust the law to be justified, to be made righteous,
you're denying grace. How many people do you know who
claim to be Christian, who claim to believe salvation by works?
I don't know of anybody. They all say, oh, it's all of
grace. But if salvation's conditioned on the sinner, they're denying
grace. That's how subtle this thing
is. That's what the book of Galatians is all about. That's why it's
in here, to show that people who claim to believe grace need
to examine themselves to see whether they be in the faith.
I was on an interview, an internet interview, phone interview, about
the book, What Is Salvation? And I told the fellow, I said,
really, the two main thrust of that book, number one, the purpose
of the book, number one is evangelistic. We want to get the gospel out.
We want people to hear the gospel. As many as the Lord is pleased
to deliver that book to or messages to, we want them to hear the
gospel of God's grace, the true gospel. But I said, secondly,
And this is one of the main things is I want it to be a challenge
to people to examine their faith. That's what the book is. It's
a challenge to test your faith. Take the book and mainly take
the Bible and read the scriptures and test your faith. Do I really
believe salvation as it's taught in the Bible? And I told the
fellow, I said, now, If it confirms the truth that you do believe
it, then that's great. But what if it doesn't? That's
what Paul's doing here when he says, I stand in doubt of you. Do you really believe the grace
of God in Christ? Or are you just a false professor?
Well, he tells them that there's no way that the law can save
you or make you righteous in any degree. And to think it does
in any degree is to deny Christ. Law and grace, works and grace
do not mix. You remember in the book of Romans
chapter 11, Paul wrote that. In the matter of salvation, a
right relationship with God, grace and works will not mix
or mingle. If it's of grace, it's no more
of works. If it's of works, it's no more
of grace. You can't have an intermingling. When I look at verse 22, He says,
here's the allegory. He says, for it is written, now
it's the word of God. He says, I'm gonna tell you what
God's word says on this. I'm gonna support what I say
with God's word. It's written, he said. And he
says, Abraham had two sons. You know who Abraham was. And you remember that the Jews,
they boasted of basically three things. that they thought would
recommend them to God, that would prove them to be children of
God. And the first thing was their physical connection with
Abraham. We be Abraham's seed. The second
was circumcision, and the third was keeping the law. So he's
covering it all. And he says, for it's written
that Abraham had two sons, the one by a bondmaid and the other
by a free woman. Now you know the story. Abraham,
with whom God made a covenant, and whom God made a promise of
a seed, children. And he says, and that God would
give him, that seed that God would give him, and that seed
who would come from Abraham, and Sarah, his wife. Now the
bondman, and she's the free woman, the bondmaid is Hagar. The translators here said Agar,
same one, it's Hagar. She was the bond maid. And she was an Egyptian servant.
And she was Abraham and Sarah's servant. She was not a free woman. She had no freedom. She was obligated
to them. We don't know the details of
all that. We don't need to know. That's
not what it's about. But that's Hagar. And then the free woman
is Sarah. That's Abraham's wife. So what
you have there is between Abraham and Hagar, you've got a law relationship,
an obligation, a debt to be paid. In the relationship of Abraham
and Sarah, you have a love relationship. You see the difference? Husband
and wife. The obligation to each other is not of law, but of love.
Now, there is a legal binding in marriage, but what it is is
an ideal marriage is a husband loving a wife and a wife loving
a husband, and that's the basis of the relationship. The basis
of the relationship between the master and the servant is a legal
relationship. And of course, you all know the
story about the law of the bond slave in the Old Testament. I
think it's in what, Exodus 25, I think it talks about that.
If a person fulfills their debt to a master and then they have
the option, their debt's paid, they have the option to leave,
but they want to stay because they love their master. And so
there's the difference. So you got a legal relationship,
a law relationship, and then you've got a love relationship.
And so they had, Abraham had two sons. And you know the story
of the two sons, the story of Ishmael. You can read about that
in Genesis chapter 16. So Ishmael, he was the offspring
of Abraham, he was the offspring of the legal relationship between
Abraham and Hagar. And then Isaac. Isaac was the
offspring of the love relationship between Abraham and Sarah, but
Isaac was the child of promise. And we'll get to that. Now look
at verse 23. He says, but he who was of the bond woman was
born after the flesh, but he of the free woman was by promise.
Ishmael, the son of the bond woman was born after the flesh.
Now that refers to the regular physical nature of conception
and birth, but it refers to more. And we'll see that. Isaac, the
son of the free woman, was by promise. And of course, you know,
that refers to the miracle birth, the miracle conception and birth
by promise and power of God, outside the realm of human effort
and human works. Now look at verse 24. He says,
which things are an allegory? Now, what's an allegory? That's
a literary device. It's a literary device where
it uses symbols, typical figures, actions, imagery, and events
to convey or teach spiritual truth. You all know about the
types in the pictures of the Old Testament. We could go back
and look at all them. Their types and their pictures
and their symbols. Well, an allegory, you know,
like for example, the lamb slain. is a type of Christ, the Lamb
of God. And that's just one symbol, the
Lamb slain for the sins of the people, the Passover Lamb. Well,
an allegory is the same, except they call it maybe an extended
metaphor. It's like a whole story, a whole
event. And so what he says here, look at it, he says, which things,
verse 24, which are an allegory, for these are the two covenants. Now you see that? These are the
two covenants. He says the one from Mount Sinai,
now what covenant's that? Well, that's the Sinaitic covenant.
That's the law of Moses. That's after God brought the
Hebrew children out of Egypt, brought them to Mount Sinai,
took Moses up and gave him the covenant that he established
with the nation. And he says that's what Hagar
represents. Now, Hagar, She herself was not
a Jew, she was an Egyptian. But see, he's not talking about
Hagar personally here, he's talking about Hagar as a symbol. And
here's the symbol, see, he's using this historical event of
Hagar and Abraham having this child of their own will, this
is what they wanted, of the flesh, Because they didn't, and really
Ishmael was the result of unbelief. God promised Sarah and Abraham
a child, and time went on, and they went past the age of childbearing,
and they didn't believe God, so Sarah said, you go into Hagar. We're gonna have some offspring
here. We're gonna have a seed here. And that's what happened. So Hagar represents Mount Sinai. That's the legal covenant, the
law covenant that God made with the nation. And he says, the
one, look at verse 24 again, the one from the Mount Sinai
which gendereth to bondage, which is Hagar, which gendereth to
bondage. Now I want you to think about
something. I was listening to a message on this passage last
week. And the man said this, he said,
the old covenant was not a covenant of works, but a covenant of grace.
That's not true. The covenant of grace does not
gender to bondage. And what he said here, he says
that what Paul's talking about here is the perversion of that
covenant by the Jews. Now listen to me. It's true,
the Jews perverted that covenant. just like any of us would do
in our natural way of thinking, our natural, self-righteous,
ignorant way of thinking. But the Old Covenant was not
a covenant of grace. It was a covenant of law. It
was given to that nation to show them what? The impossibility
of salvation, of righteousness, of being justified before God
by their works. That's why it was given. The
covenant of grace itself is not just simply given to show us
our sin. It does show us our sin, but
it doesn't stop there. This covenant did. The blood
of bulls and goats could never take away sin. The earthly priesthood
could not make the worshiper perfect. It was given as a temporary
thing to show them their sin until what the book of Hebrews
calls the time of reformation, the time of change, which time
was fulfilled in the coming of Christ. So the old covenant was
not a covenant of grace. Now, there were types and symbols
and pictures there that showed Christ and salvation by him,
but the nation as a whole didn't see that. They missed it. Paul wrote about that in Romans
chapter 9, you remember? Israel, he said, they sought
after righteousness, but they didn't find it, they didn't make
it, they didn't achieve it. Why? Because they sought it by
works and not by faith in Christ. So it's, yeah, it's true the
unbelieving Jews perverted the law by trying to make it a way
of righteousness, but it was never given. to be a way of righteousness. It was given to show them the
impossibility of righteousness by their works. And I thought
about this verse here, John 1, 17. It says this, it says, the
law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.
So Hagar or Agar symbolizes all who are born and who walk after
the flesh. Ishmael, the child of the flesh,
seeking salvation by their works, bringing forth fruit unto death.
That's what that law covenant gendered. It was a bondage. It
was an imposition. Putting upon them that which
they could not perform. That's the bondage. And Hagar
also symbolizes those who believe salvation by free will. I believe
that. Ishmael, think about it this
way. Ishmael was born of what Abraham and Sarah willed. This
is what we want. Not what God in his revealed
will had promised. Isaac was born of God's will.
And it's kind of like, you know, you think about the new birth.
We're not born by the will of man, we're born by the will of
God. It's all of God's will. It's not of him that willeth,
nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy. So
Ishmael represents man lost in the flesh. Again, bringing forth
fruit unto death. Now notice verse 25. He says,
this covenant, Agar represents that covenant on Sinai that genders
unto bondage, which is Agar, verse 25. For this Hagar is Mount
Sinai in Arabia and answereth to, which literally means is
the same rank or same plane with, Jerusalem, which now is, and
is in bondage with her children. In other words, he's talking
about Jerusalem in his day. And he's also talking about Jerusalem
in our day. The physical city of Jerusalem.
And here's what he's saying. Now think about this. He's saying
Jerusalem today, in its religion, in its efforts, in its way of
thinking is just like Ishmael of the flesh. You know, over
in the book of 2 Corinthians chapter three, the apostle Paul
was describing there the greater glory of the new covenant over
the old covenant. And he was talking about how
that old covenant was was a letter that killeth. He says the ministration
of death, the ministration of condemnation, that's what it
was, that's that bondage. And he says down in verse 12
of 2 Corinthians 3, in talking about the hope that we have in
Christ, he says, seeing then that we have such hope, we use
great plainness of speech. Now listen to this. He said,
and not as Moses, which put a veil over his face that the children
of Israel could not steadfastly look to the end of that which
is abolished. Remember when Moses came down
out of the mount, he had an effulgence, a glow about him. It was a physical
thing they could see, and it was so bright he had to put a
veil over his face. And what that's symbolizing is
the holiness of God that exposes us as sinners. Holy, holy, holy,
Lord God Almighty. But he says in verse 14 of 2
Corinthians 3, he said, but their minds were blinded, for until
this day remaineth the same veil untaken away in the reading of
the Old Testament, which veil is done away in Christ. That
veil is man's natural ignorance, self-righteousness, self-love,
religious pride, and all of that. Well, he says it's the same of
Jerusalem in his day. They've missed it. There's a
veil over their face. There's a veil over their heart,
rather. And he says in verse 25, he says, they're now in bondage
with their children, just like Hagar and Ishmael, in bondage.
And he says, look at verse 26 of Galatians 4 now. He says,
but Jerusalem, which is above, is free, which is the mother
of us all. Jerusalem, which is above, Now
you can read about that in several passages. The heavenly Jerusalem. What does that represent? What
is that a symbol of? It's a symbol of the church of
the Lord Jesus Christ. Sinners chosen of God, redeemed
by the blood of Christ, regenerated by the Holy Spirit. They've been
made free as they are justified before God in Christ based on
his blood and righteousness alone. And they've been liberated from
the darkness and deceit of sin by the power of the Holy Spirit
who's given them life, imparted life. And so they're now citizens,
not of the world, but they're citizens of the heavenly. This world is not our home. We've
been brought to see Christ. And that's a free citizen. We're
not legally bound. to the law. We're citizens of
the heavenly Jerusalem and we serve God. And he said, which
is the mother of us all, meaning spiritual Jerusalem in the sense
that we who are saved by grace in Christ, born again by the
Holy Spirit, we're citizens of that country. Jerusalem, which
is above. And then verse 27, look, he says,
for it's written, 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. He quotes from
Isaiah 54 one as the fulfillment of a prophecy in and by the Lord
Jesus Christ by whose death on the cross comes righteousness
that demands life from the dead. Just like Sarah's womb was dead.
God made it alive. Just like we're born dead in
trespasses and sins, God brings us to life through Christ by
the power of the Spirit. Sinners are saved by grace. You
know, and that's the issue. That's the picture of the dead,
spiritually dead. You call on a dead person to
do anything, they can't do anything because they're dead. Well, spiritually
speaking, that applies to us by nature. Until God, the Holy
Spirit, gives life in the new birth. And then we're brought
from the dead. Well, look at verse 28. Now we
brethren, as Isaac was, are the children of promise. There's
the true Jerusalem. There's spiritual Jerusalem.
Remember Paul in Romans 9, he said, they are not all Israel
which are of Israel. The children of the promise are
counted for the seed. Over in Galatians 3 that we studied
a few weeks back, you remember he says in verse 29, if you belong
to Christ, then are you Abraham's seed and heirs according to the
promise. Those who believe in the Lord
Jesus Christ, they're Abraham's offspring spiritually by the
power of God through Isaac, through whom the Messiah came. And that's the issue of the promise.
It's not just, yeah, Abraham and Sarah, you know the story
how when she was way past childbearing, God blessed her with a child. the child of promise. And it
was clear that it was not by the power of Abraham and Sarah. And it really wasn't even by
the will of Abraham and Sarah. They wanted a child, but they
did it their way, according to the flesh, and that's how Ishmael
comes. We could talk a lot about Ishmael
today, couldn't we? That one who cannot be tamed?
We're not gonna go into that this morning, I don't have time.
But the thing about it is, Isaac was a child born in God's time,
according to God's will, by God's power. And he was the child of
promise. And it's through him, it was
through him, that the Messiah came according to the flesh.
And the Messiah, Christ, is our salvation. And so that's why
we can say with the Apostle Paul, we are the circumcision. We worship
God in spirit. We rejoice in Christ Jesus and
have no confidence in the flesh. Children of the promise, we believe
the promise of the gospel of God's grace. And then look at
verse 29. But as then he that was born
after the flesh, that's Ishmael, persecuted him that was born
after the spirit, that's Isaac, even so it is now, verse 30,
nevertheless, what saith the scripture? What does God say?
Well, this is going back to Genesis 21. 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. Well, there's always
been conflict between the flesh and the spirit, the children
of promise and the children of the law. Goes all the way back
to Cain and Abel, doesn't it? Cain was born of the flesh, lived
after the flesh. Abel was born of the spirit,
lived after the spirit. Cain brought the works of his
hands. Abel brought the Lamb of God, pleading as a sinner
the righteousness of the Christ who was promised. There was conflict. They cannot exist together. I'm
not going to go into all the speculation of how cruel God
was to do this. God took care of Hagar and Ishmael
providentially, but they couldn't exist together. The child of
promise, he says, And the child of liberty, Isaac, could not
exist with the children of the bondwoman, the children of the
flesh. We who are saved by grace have
no spiritual connection to and fellowship with those who seek
salvation by works. Now, we have family, we have
friends that we know do that, and we deal with them on the
level that we can here on this earth. But as far as a spiritual
relationship, a fellowship, we don't have it. They cannot exist
together because law and grace will not mix.