Now this morning, we're gonna
begin in Galatians chapter four, and the title of the message
this morning is The Time of Jesus Christ. The Time of Jesus Christ. And I took that title from verse
four, where it talks about the fullness of the time. When time
was filled up, God appointed a time, that time came. Now let me say this before we
get into the verses. The Lord Jesus Christ, the second
person of the Trinity, the Godhead, triune Godhead, the eternal Son
of God, that's who He is, with no beginning and no end, the
Alpha and the Omega. That's how He's described in
several passages. Revelation, you can think of. He has always been and will always
be the Savior of His people, the substitute of God's elect,
the surety of his people. God purposed, before the world
was created, to save a people of his choice. And he purposed
to save those people in a way that would honor and glorify
him in every attribute of his character, his nature, that's
his glory. The Bible, many times when the
Bible speaks of salvation, and we can think of several passages,
but one that comes to mind is 2 Timothy 1, 9, where the Apostle
Paul spoke of a salvation that was given to us in Christ Jesus
before the world began. And he's talking about the sovereign,
eternal purpose of God before this world was ever created,
before Adam ever fell. Christ was set up to be the surety
of his people. And what that means is, his being
our surety, it means that our sins were imputed to him and
his righteousness to us. His people, that is. And people
argue over these issues of time and eternity. And one of the
things we have to understand is, we have to understand that
we really cannot understand eternity. It's beyond our grasp. All we
know about eternity is what God's word says about it. God's eternal
purpose. And a lot of people have a hard
time understanding how the Bible portrays salvation in matters
of eternity and time. And they'll use human logic,
which is the first, that's where we first go wrong, you know,
in trying to figure these things out. For example, some people
will conclude, well, if God chose a people before the foundation
of the world and gave them to Christ and our sins were imputed
to him and his righteousness to us, well, there's no need
for him to come then. Well, that's a wrong conclusion.
That's human logic. That's rationalizations, sinful
rationalizations. And I can't explain eternity
to you, but here's what I would tell you. I learned this a long
time ago. And this is the way the Bible
sets it forth. That what God purposed before
time must be accomplished and applied in time. And the reason
that's so is because his purpose in salvation was not just to
populate heaven, His purpose in salvation is to glorify himself
in salvation. So God purposed to save who? To save sinners. That means in
time, after the world was created, Adam fell, and we fell in Adam.
We fell into sin and death in Adam. And we're born in trespasses
and sins, born dead in trespasses and sins. Christ, who was set
up before the foundation of the world to be the surety of his
people, he had to come in time and fulfill the duties of his
suretyship. What does that mean? It means
he had to pay the sin debt. He had to redeem us from our
sins with the price of his own precious blood. I've heard men say things like,
well, God's elect have always been saved, we're just sent to
tell you about it. That's really not true, that's
not a good way to say it. Now we can talk about the mind
and purpose of God, and God's mind never changes. And that's
something we can't understand. You think about a changeless
being, immutability. I think that's one of the hardest
concepts for any of us to grasp, and we can't understand it, because
all we know is change. Everything about me has changed,
everything about you, our world is changing. But God never changes,
the scripture says. That means this, that means God's
judgments never change. What God has always judged is
the way it is and always will be. But to say, well, God's elect
have always been saved, we're just sitting here today, that's
really not a biblical way to put it. And that may be a confusion
of terms, but it could be someone trying to deny the gospel. trying
to deny the need for faith in Christ and repentance of dead
works as presented in the scripture. And that's ungodly. There are
also some who deny the truth of eternal justification in Christ
by claiming that that means Christ didn't have to come and die on
the cross. And that's not so. The scripture doesn't teach that.
The Bible teaches, again, what God purposed before time has
its establishment and fulfillment in time. And that's what this
passage is about. Look at verse one of Galatians
4. He says, now I say that the heir,
as long as he is a child, differeth nothing from a servant, though
he is Lord of all. Now what he's talking about here,
if you'll keep the context, he's talking about the nation Israel
under the old covenant. That was 1,500 years from Sinai
to the cross, and now he's pointing out that they're no longer under
that covenant. The nation's no longer under
that covenant. Now, granted, men try to put people under that
covenant, try to keep people under that covenant, but Paul's
saying that covenant's over. That covenant was given by God
for a particular period of time to that particular nation. It
has its beginning and now it's come to an end. And the air here
that he's talking about, he's using an illustration to illustrate
his point that Israel was under the old covenant only until the
coming of Jesus Christ into the world in time. You see, an heir
is one who stands in legal right to inherit his father's estate.
Isn't that right? That's what an heir is. But during
his childhood, he has no more right or an authority than a
servant, though he be Lord of all. Look at verse two. This
heir is under tutors. That's guides, teachers. Let's
see, another word for it would be steward. That heir. And he's under tutors, he's under
governors who must guide him and rule him until, look here,
verse two, until the time appointed of the father. You see, in other words, here's
this heir, here's this child, he has every legal right to inherit
what his father has bequeathed to him. But as long as he's a
child, he's under tutors and guides, teachers and guides,
until a time is appointed by the father that he's to receive
all of those things that the father was going to give him,
until the time appointed of the father. Those tutors and guides
make decisions for him. You don't let children who are
not of age make decisions for themselves, basically, do you?
What they eat, what they drink. You know what would happen if
you did? And that's his point here. Until the time appointed
of the father. Now he's illustrating here this
issue of the nation Israel under the old covenant, but think about
it. Who is the father? Well, God is our father. Who
appointed all times? God did. The time of everything. I don't know how to explain that
to you, but I know it's true. Read Ecclesiastes chapter three,
to everything there is a season and a time. Now why is it to
everything there is a season and a time? I'll tell you why,
because God appointed it, all of it. And that's what he said. There's a time, there's a time
for judgment. The judgment of the whole world.
In Acts chapter 17, you remember when Paul preaching to the Athenian
philosophers from Mars Hill, and he talked about the God of
creation, the God who does all things for his own glory, and
he brings it down to a specific point in time, in verse 31, by
which God commanded all men everywhere to repent, because he hath appointed
a what? A day, that's a time. in the
which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man
whom he hath appointed and that he had given assurance unto all
men and that he raised him from the dead. That's the time, a
time fixed by the father in which the heir will receive the inheritance.
Now look at verse three. He says, and even so we, when
we were children, now that's referring to the nation Israel
in their infancy under the Old Covenant, we were in bondage
under the elements or the rudiments of the world. Paul, again, he's
describing the Jews under the Old Covenant as children in bondage
under the elements or the rudiments of the world. And one thing that
that proves is this. It proves that there was no salvation
for Israel according to the terms of that Old Covenant law. These
elements that he mentions here in verse three, they were the
rudiments of that law which were worldly in the sense that they
were physical. They were temporal. They were
ceremonial. They could not give of themselves. They could not wash away sin.
Remember he says, remember in Hebrews 10, the blood of bulls
and goats can never take away sin. That's the rudiments of
the world. That was physical things. They're
ceremonial things. There was a physical tabernacle. There was a physical altar there.
And they brought actual lambs and bullocks and rams and they
killed them and that was blood. That was real blood that was
poured out all over that altar. And the priest caught that blood,
you know, in the basin and they brought it in. The high priest,
he physically walked into the Holy of Holies and sprinkled
the mercy seat with the blood. All that was ceremonial and physical.
And in and of itself, it was a bondage, an imposition upon
them that they had to partake of and had to deal with and had
to fulfill. But there was no spiritual life
there. There was no forgiveness of sin.
There was no righteousness for sinners under that law. It could
not make, in Hebrews 10 again, it could not make the comers
thereunto perfect. You remember that? That old covenant
priesthood, those old covenant sacrifices. And the only spiritual
benefit that they had under that covenant was as they were pointed
forward to the time of the coming of the Messiah, the Lord Jesus
Christ, who would, the Lamb of God, who would take away their
sins, take away the sins of God's people, his elect. But in themselves, there was
no salvation. And under that covenant, Israel had to be led,
they had to be guided, they had to be punished, just like children
with no heart to obey it, just like rebellious children. That's
how they had to be treated. You remember in Jeremiah 31,
he talked about the covenant, which my covenant they break.
That's what it is. But look here in verse four.
Now, he says, but when the fullness of the time was come, that's
when time filled up. That's what it literally means. God appointed a time. Now, when
did God appoint this time? Well, before the world began,
the scripture says. Now, was there some kind of a
room up there in heaven that God entered into one day and
sat down and said, now I'm going to appoint it? No. This has always
been God's appointed time. How do you explain that? I can't.
There never was a time that God didn't have this in mind. I don't
know, and I can't explain that to you, and you can't explain
it to me, and I'm certainly not gonna devise some alternate system
of theology around it that would enable me to separate from other
people who, you know, like I've got a handle on this thing. God,
listen, God revealed himself to Moses as I am. I am. That's the eternal self-existent
one who has no beginning and no end. But I know the scripture
comes down on our level in a lot of ways, especially when it talks
about things of eternity and time. And here's one of them.
In the fullness of the time, God appointed a time, the time's
here. That's what this verse says.
When that time came, what happened? Look at it. Look at these elements.
God sent forth his son. Now that speaks of the deity
of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ, the Son of God,
is God. Very God of very God. The second
person of the Trinity, without beginning, without end. He was
not created. In beginning was the Word, and
the Word was with God, and the Word was God. But He always has
been God, always will be God, never will change. As to his
deity, there is absolutely no change to be attributed to him
in his deity. God sent forth his son. And he was sent into a fallen
sinful world, and look at the next line, made of a woman. Now
some translations render it born of a woman. Either way, what
it means is someone came into existence here. that did not
exist before. Well, that certainly is not talking
about the deity of Jesus Christ. He always has been, always will
be. But what's it talking about?
And it means he became what he was not before. This is a new
thing. Jeremiah said that in Jeremiah
31, 22. There's a new thing coming. Something
that has never existed on this earth before. And what's it talking
about? It's talking about his humanity.
His human body and soul without sin. He was made of a woman.
He was conceived in the womb of the Virgin without the aid
of man. He was not born in sin, as you and I were. Born dead
in trespasses and sins. He was born the perfect, the
perfect man. That holy thing, the angel said. And that's not derogatory towards
him. The angel is attesting there
to a marvelous miracle, that holy thing. He's God and man
in one person, without sin. Listen, every element of what
it takes to be a human being, we find in Jesus Christ without
sin. Even every limitation of humans
is there. Now there's no limitation on
his deity. He's infinite. But he united
his deity with perfect, sinless humanity, and that's what it's
talking about. He was made of a woman. That's
his incarnation. The Word was in the beginning,
the Word was with God, the Word was God. John 1 14, the Word
was made flesh and dwelt among us. And Hebrews 2, there's several
verses we could go to, but Hebrews 2 tells you exactly why this
had to be. Why did Jesus Christ, why did
the Son of God, the second person of the Trinity, have to come
to this world? Why did he have to unite with
sinless human nature? Well, Hebrews 2.14 says it this
way. For as much then as the children,
now who are the children there? That's God's children. That's
God's elect, given to Christ before the foundation of the
world, for whom he became surety. whose sins were imputed to him
and his righteousness imputed to them. Well, it says, for as
much then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood,
that's us, he also, Christ also himself likewise took part of
the same. What same? Flesh and blood. Now
we know the exception with him is he's without sin. That through
death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that
is the devil. Christ had to unite with humanity, human nature,
to destroy death. And I always have to say when
I read that verse, the power of the devil of death is not
the power of the devil to kill you. The devil doesn't have that
power. Only God has that power. The
Lord giveth and the Lord maketh alive. Blessed be the name of
the Lord. It is appointed once for men
to die. Who appointed that, the devil?
No, God did. After that, the judgment. There's
the times again. The power of the devil in the
realm of death is his power to accuse. He's called the accuser
of the brethren. And I always use this illustration.
It's like if somebody accused you of committing a crime, and
the sheriff came to arrest you, what does he have to have to
arrest you? He's gotta have evidence, doesn't he? If there's evidence
that you committed the crime, then the accusations stick and
you've got to do the punishment. But if someone accuses you of
a crime and the accusation doesn't stick, then the courts can't
do anything to you. Well, the devil accuses the brethren,
but the accusations don't stick. Now why is that? Well, who shall
lay anything to the charge of God's elect? It's God that justified. God justified his people. He's
already declared his people not guilty. He's declared his people
righteous. Who can condemn us? It's Christ
that died, yea rather is risen again, seated at the right hand
of the Father ever living to make intercession for us. Christ
is our defense against the accusations of the devil. And it's based
upon the fact that he as God man gave himself for our sins. He paid the penalty. He paid
the price. So he was made of a woman. His
incarnation did not change the nature of his deity. For deity
cannot change. Deity cannot be created. Deity
cannot die. But his holy, sinless humanity,
that's what he's talking about. And then look back at Galatians
4, the next line says, he was made under the law. Now what
that means is this, all of the salvation of his people given
to him before the foundation of the world was conditioned
on him, upon his shoulders. to keep the law, to satisfy its
justice, to establish righteousness according to the justice of the
law. He was made under the law. He who took our sins as our surety
before the foundation of the world had to actually be made
under the law. As man, God-man, he had to come
and work unto death, obey unto death under the law for the salvation
of our people. As our surety, he had always
been under obligation to satisfy justice for his people, but here,
as God-man, is the time of the fulfillment. As our surety, he had always
been under that, but he was made under a broken law, and that's written in different ways in
the scripture. He was made sin, for example, 2 Corinthians 5.21.
He was made a curse for us to redeem us from the curse of the
law. So there, look at that. God sent forth his son. How did
he do it? Made of a woman, that's his incarnation.
Why did he do it? He was made under the law, all
of the salvation of the people that he was given before the
foundation of the world was conditioned upon him to fulfill all righteousness,
he said, for them. And look at the results, verse
five, to redeem them that were under the law. He had to come
and actually in time pay the redemption price. Now the redemption
price was not paid until the time of the cross. When Christ was on that cross
and he kept telling the disciples, he said, this is what I have
to do. I'm obligated to do that. In fact, you know, in that passage
over in Hebrews chapter two, over in verse 17, when it's talking
about how the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he likewise
took part of the same that he might destroy death. It says
in Hebrews 2.17, wherefore in all things it behooved him to
be made like unto his brethren. Now, that word behooved there
in Hebrews 2.17 is the Greek word for debt. In fact, it's
often used in the context of the sin debt, and that's what
it's used here. Now what it's saying there is that Christ was
obligated to be made like his brethren. He had to come and
become incarnate because he had to pay their debt. In other words,
what that shows you, that even before he was made like unto
his brethren, even before he became incarnate, he was already
indebted to pay the debt. Right there, it tells you that.
Why did he have to become incarnate? Somebody said, well, He had to
go to the cross to pay the debt, that's right. But in order to
accomplish that, he first had to be made like unto his brethren. He had to be made of a woman,
made under the law. And why did he do it? Because
he was already indebted. And he kept telling his disciples,
I have to do this. It's necessary. Well, I'm gonna
be preaching from John 16, seven, where he tells the disciples,
it's necessary that I go away. If I don't go away, the comforter
won't come. In other words, there's not gonna be any work of the
Holy Spirit. There's not gonna be any new birth unless Christ
goes away. Why? Because sin had to be put
away. Sin was already charged to him. That's why he had to become incarnate.
That's why he had to keep the law. That's why he had to be
made of woman, made under the law. And he had to come and pay
the redemption price. And again, that redemption price
was not paid until the time of the cross. It was based upon sin imputed
to him before the foundation of the world, but he had to come
and pay the price. It was given to the Old Testament saints by
promise, like a promissory note. It was always sure and certain
to happen because God is immutable, God is infinite, God is sovereign. So he said, verse five, to redeem
them that were under the law. to pay that price. We're redeemed
with the precious blood of Christ. What can wash away my sins? Nothing
but the blood of Jesus. Don't look for anything else
to do that. To look for and think that anything else could wash
away our sins is unbelief. To look for righteousness anywhere
else is unbelief. And he says in verse five that
we might receive the adoption of sons. We're adopted into God's
family. We receive the adoption of sons.
The way adoption works is there's a legal act of adoption of a
child, and then the parent takes possession, the adopting parent
takes possession of the child. That's the way it works, and
that's what he's saying. There has to be a price paid,
and then they take possession. So he actually took possession
of his adopted sons, that's children. All of his people whom he redeemed.
Now what that tells you is that he didn't redeem everybody without
exception. He redeemed the sons, he redeemed
the children, he redeemed the adopted sons. And then verse
6, look here, and that's the redemption. And now again, now
he's using this to illustrate how the Jews, the nation Israel,
was not under the old covenant. But what he's talking about here
applies to spiritual Israel, God's people out of every tribe,
kindred, tongue, and nation. He redeemed God's elect out of
the Jewish nation, but is that all whom he redeemed? No. We've
already seen that over in chapter three when he talked about that
the Gentiles might receive the blessing of Abraham. God has
a people out of every tribe, kindred, tongue, and nation.
Christ redeemed them. And so Paul uses this great truth
of redemption by the blood of Jesus Christ, of justification
based on his righteousness imputed alone, which applies to all the
redeemed of the Lord, Jew and Gentile, to show both believing
Jews and believing Gentiles that the law of Moses has been totally
abolished by way of fulfillment and cannot now be imposed on
Christians. It's over. And any preacher who
tries to impose that on you is denying Christ. We're not under that. I don't
care what they call themselves. I don't care how much scripture
they quote. If they come in and try to impose
the law of Moses upon Christians then and now, they're denying
Christ. And then look at verse six. He
said, and because you are sons, not in order to become sons now. You notice that, how the language
is? Because you're already sons. Let me tell you something, children
of God, you who know Christ, you see, you were a son of God
and you didn't even know it. But because you are sons, look
at it, God has sent forth the spirit of his son into your hearts,
crying, Abba, Father. God lets you in on it. That's
what he's talking about. God informed you of something
you didn't know because of spiritual deadness. God informed you through
the preaching of the gospel and the power of the Holy Spirit,
something that you didn't know you had. And the Bible says that's
salvation. Now, as you all know, we've got
the book out called The Four Realms of Salvation, or What
Is Salvation? and it divides salvation as presented
in the Bible into four realms. The eternal realm, that's the
mind and purpose of God. Let me tell you something about
us. We can't think like God in his
eternal mind and purpose. Does that surprise you? We shouldn't,
that should be one of the most obvious things. We know something
about God's eternal mind and purpose because he tells us.
And that's all we can know. But that's the eternal realm.
And then the legal realm, that's the work of Christ on the cross
to redeem us and establish the righteousness that was imputed
to us before the foundation of the world. And then there's the spiritual
realm. Now that's what Paul's talking about here in verse six,
the spiritual realm, that's the new birth. You must be born again. And until you're born again,
you're not going to know anything about Christ in salvation. The Bible, you can read the Bible,
but you won't really understand the spiritual glory of the Bible
until you're born again by the Spirit to see your sinfulness
and to be drawn to Christ for all salvation. That's the work
of the Holy Spirit. Because you are sons, not in
order to become sons, but because you are sons, God has sent forth
the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, into your very inner
being, your mind, your affection, your will, and crying what? Abba,
Father. Now that word Abba, is an interesting
word, but it indicates a close personal relationship with God
as your father through Jesus Christ. Tim James used to say
it's like saying Papa, Papa. I hear these people calling the
Pope Papa. No, the Pope's not Papa. God
is our father, and I'm his son. Now let me tell you something.
He says, he tells me that I'm a son not because of anything
I've done or will do, try to do, promise to do. I don't deserve
to be his son. And I certainly haven't earned
the right to be his son. But he made it so because of
his grace and his mercy. And he sent his only begotten
son into the world. to establish the only ground
upon which he can save me as his son, make me righteous before
him. I'm not guilty. Why? Because
I have a righteousness that answers the demands of God's law and
justice. And one day, and I don't know when, and I'm not really
concerned about it, under the preaching of the gospel, he sent
his spirit into my heart and brought me to a saving knowledge
of him as my father, a just God and a savior. And I entered into
a relationship with him in my heart and mind that I never knew
I had before. And look at verse seven, wherefore,
you're no more a servant, but a son. Now we are servants of
God, but the point that he's making here is we're not any,
we're no longer unwilling, rebellious slaves like Israel was under
the law. Rebellious children. No, he says now we're a son. We're a child of God. We're permanent
members in the household and family of God. And if a son,
if that's what we are, we're an heir of God through Christ.
We have an inheritance, Peter said. We, listen, we know something
about our inheritance of eternal life and glory. But we haven't
seen hardly any of it yet, realized it. John said it this way, now
are we the children of God, the sons of God. But it does not
yet appear what we shall be. We'll see him as he is. And then
we'll experience the glory that only he can give in that day.
All right.