for another day that we have
together, together, and we've asked for that you just might
be with us today. We enjoy the fellowship of the
brethren. We love to see brothers and sisters
gathered together to catch up on things and to be able to minister
the Word of God with each other and to rejoice in our salvation,
rejoice in our Savior together, to worship our God. But Father,
more than anything, we need to hear from you and we desire to
worship you in spirit and in truth. And Father, we desire
to be grown in the grace and the knowledge of Jesus Christ.
The preaching of the word may edify our soul. And Father, we
know that that can't happen without the Holy Spirit coming and helping
to accomplish that. Lord, we know that nothing in
our flesh can do that. Nothing in us can do that. And
so we need your help this morning, and so we pray that you would
send the Spirit to teach us today, to guide us, to direct us, to
give us ears to hear and eyes to see, and to give us receptive
hearts to renew our minds, Father, to grow us in that understanding
of the things of the Spirit. Lord, we just pray that our worship
today will be pleasing to you. We pray that Christ will be exalted
and magnified today. We ask, Lord, that you just might
be with me as I preach. Lord, I pray that I might not
speak any error, but I might speak only those things that
are true. I pray that the Holy Spirit would give me those things
to say that would help me to utter the things of the Word
of God, not of my own opinions. Father, Lord, I just Pray for
those that are here today. I pray that if any of your child
is here that has yet to be converted of the gospel, to be given repentance
and faith, that Lord, that you would give them that this morning,
that you would draw them to yourself by the gospel, and that you would
give them understanding of your salvation that is in Christ Jesus. And Father, as we look now at
this, and at this word that you have preserved for us in this
Bible, Lord, we pray that you just might speak to us now, and
that you might reveal Christ to us. It's in Jesus' name that
we pray. Amen. Well, turn now, brethren,
in your hymn books, in your Gatsby hymn books, to hymn number 418.
418. Praise to the Redeemer. We'll
sing this to all hail the power of Jesus' name. To our Redeemer's glorious name
Awake the sacred song O may His love immortal flame Tune every
heart and tongue O may His love immortal fling To every heart
and tongue. His love, what mortal thought
can reach? What mortal tongue display? Imagination's utmost trench In
wonder dies away Imagination's utmost stress In wonder dies
away He left his radiant throne on high, led the bright realms
of bliss, and came to earth to bleed and die. Was there ever
love like this? and came to earth to bleed, and
that was ever loved like this. Dear Lord, while we adoring pay
our humble thanks to Thee, May every heart with rapture say,
the Savior died for me. May every heart and rapture say,
the Savior died for me. Amen, that's what we just prayed
for, that the Lord might open up the heart, open up the understanding. We might understand our salvation
in Christ. Remember in the scriptures, the
Bible spoke of Lydia, who was a cellar of fine purple. And whenever the gospel came,
the Bible says that the Lord opened up her heart that she
might attend to the things that had been spoken. And unless the
Lord opens up the heart, we can't understand or know what is being
spoken of. We can know physical things,
but we don't know spiritual things without the Holy Spirit. So we
pray that the Spirit comes and leads us in these things. All
right, turn back if you would to hymn number 225. Hymn number
225. Sing this to the tune of, I love thy kingdom, Lord. Faith is a precious grace where
it is bestowed. It boasts of a celestial birth
and is the gift of God. Jesus, it owns a king. and all atoning priest. It claims no merits of its own,
but looks for all in Christ. To him it leads the soul when
filled with deep distress. Fly to the fountain of His blood
and trust His righteousness. Since tis Thy work alone, am
I divinely free. Come, Holy Spirit, and make known
the power of faith in me. Amen. You know, that's what God-given
faith looks to. It doesn't look to what you can
do. It looks to what Christ has already done. God given faith was never designed,
if you can call it a design, surely it was designed, God designed
it all, but the purpose or the whole reason for faith is that
it might cause the child of grace to look to Christ alone and that's
all that it will look to. And so a lot of times we talk
about faith is something that we can do in and of our flesh
and trust it in all kinds of different things. Well, there's
a natural faith that we have that just like, you know, any
other kind of faith, you know, that whenever I pick up this
cup, I trust that it's going to stay together and not fall
apart on me. You know, if I sit down in the
chair, I have faith that that chair is going to hold me up
or whatever. But that's not the faith that we're talking about
when it comes to scripture. Scripture is, talking about faith
that is foreign to us. It's not inherent in the child
of Adam. It's not inherent in the flesh.
The flesh doesn't have faith that looks to Christ alone. It
has natural faith. So faith has to be given. It's
a gift of God. Ephesians tells us that it's
a gift of God. And so we need to be given faith,
and the faith that once it is given, faith doesn't reach out
to other things and trust in other things, the faith of Christ
looks to Christ alone for righteousness and for salvation. That's the
only thing that it looks to. As a matter of fact, it cannot
look to other things. That doesn't mean that our flesh
doesn't look to other things. Our flesh definitely looks to
other things. But the faith of Christ, it looks to Christ alone. So it's completely different
than our natural faith. I've heard growing up all my
life, you know, that we have, everybody has faith and that
all you need to do is change the object of your faith. Instead
of putting faith in yourself, put faith in Christ. And they
assume that we have a natural faith, but the scripture actually
does say that not all men have faith. So there are some men
that does not have faith. Well, what are they talking about?
We're talking about godly faith. Not all men have a spiritual
faith. God has to give that, and He
gives it out in measure. The Bible says that He gives
the measure of faith. To some, you know, He may give
a small portion of faith. To some, He may give a large
portion of faith. Today, I may have a lot. Tomorrow,
I may have very little. You know, you look at the life
of the apostles. There were some days that they
were mighty in faith towards Christ, and then there were some
days that they were just literally beautiful, you know, and so we
pray that the Holy Spirit would increase and give us the faith.
Alright, turn now to hymn number 136, one of my favorite hymns, or
one of my favorite hymn writers. 136, we'll sing this to the tune
of Amazing Grace. Dear refuge of my weary soul,
On thee when sorrows rise, On thee when waves of trouble roll,
My fainting hope relies. I tell each rising grief, for
Thou alone canst heal. Thy Word can bring a sweet relief
for every pain I feel. But oh, when gloomy doubts prevail,
I fear to call thee mine. The springs of comfort seem to
fail, and all my hopes decline. Yet gracious God, where shall
I flee? Thou art my only trust, and still
my soul would flee to Thee. Though prostrate in the dust,
Hast Thou not bid me see Thy face? And shall I see in vain
And can the ear of sovereign grace be dead when I complain? The sovereign grace attends the
mourner's prayer. Oh, may I ever find access to
breathe my sorrows there. Thy mercy sea is open still. Here let my soul retreat. With humble hope, attend thy
will, and wait beneath thy feet. All right, does anybody have
a song that you'd like to sing? 64 and the Gatsby. God's Decree. This is to take
my life and let it be. Sovereign ruler of the skies. ? Ever gracious, ever wise ?
All my times are in thy hand ? All events at thy command ?
All events at thy command ? His decree who formed the earth Fixed
my first and second birth, Parents, Native place and time, All appointed
were by Him, All appointed were by Him. He that formed me in the womb,
He shall guide me to the tomb All my time shall ever be Ordered
by His wise decree Ordered by His wise decree ? Times of sickness,
times of health ? ? Times of pinnery and wealth ? ? Times
of trial and of grief ? ? Times of triumph and relief ? ? Times
of triumph and relief ? Times the tempter's power to prove,
Times to taste the sovereign's love, All must come and last
standing, As shall please my heavenly friend. I shall plead my heavenly friend. Plagues and deaths around me
fly. Till he bids I cannot die. Not a single shaft can hit. Till the God of love sees fit. Till the God of love sees fit. Do we have a scripture you'd
like to read or a course or anything you'd like to see? Got any comments of any kind? Alright, Galatians chapter 4
please. We're going to be looking today at
verses 20 and moving forward. In fact, there will probably be
20 down to verse 31. We'll read all of that and see
how far we get this morning. We'll also be going back and
looking at some stuff in Genesis. It has to do with what Paul was
talking about and get a groundwork on why he's using this allegory. Genesis, or excuse me, Galatians
chapter four, starting in verse 20, the word of God says, I desire
to be present with you now. I'm sorry, verse 19, my little
children. of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be formed
in you. I desire to be present with you
now and to change my voice for I stand in doubt of you. Tell
me, ye that desire to be under the law, do ye not hear the law? And we kind of ended with some
of this last week and everything. Those who want to be under the
law obviously have not listened to what the law says. And that's
what Paul is getting at here. before he goes into even this
allegory that he's about to go into, he's reminding them, you
guys who want to listen to these Judaizers that are telling you
that you need to be under the law, that you need to keep the
law for righteousness or for acceptance or for continuance
in the faith, you need to listen to what the law says, you're
not listening to the law. Because obviously if you hear
what the law says, you're not going to want to be under the
law. The law says that you have to keep everything in the law,
not just part of it, but the whole thing. You've got to keep
the whole thing, and you have to keep it perfectly and never
break it. Because the transgression of
the law is sin, and the wages of sin is death. If you transgress
the law, then you have sinned, and if you have sinned, the wages
of sin is death. There is no middle ground there. And so if you disregard or if
you don't have any care towards what Christ has done on your
behalf and you seek righteousness in this way, then you're going
to have to live by those terms. Those terms are do this or die. Do all of it, not just part of
it. You know, some people like to
break the law up into the the decal or the the the Ten Commandments,
the moral law, the civil law, the ceremonial law, the civil
law. They like to break the law up
into all these things, but we don't see anywhere in Scripture
where Scripture breaks the law up into any portion and says,
well, this part's gone, but this part's still here. It uses it,
when it speaks of the law, it speaks of it as a whole. Whenever
we see in the New Testament and it talks about the Old Covenant
has now been done away with and the New Covenant is what we are
looking towards or looking at, then that's what it means. It
means all of it. Not just part of it, but all
of it. Okay? The law was weak because in the
flesh and it couldn't keep anything. So the New Covenant is something
that doesn't have anything to do with the flesh. See, that's
the difference between the two covenants. Now, there's a lot
of differences between the covenants, but one area of difference is
this. Is the covenant, the old covenant,
was a covenant of the flesh, do this or die. And then God
had given them sacrifices for atonement of those sins. As not for a removal of sins
and not for a lasting thing for them, it was only a type and
a shadow for what Christ would do. So those animal sacrifices
actually didn't do anything with their sins other than cover their
sins as God was going to take care of those sins in Christ
Jesus, right? But that whole system of law
was do this or die. And those people had to follow
that law, and if they didn't follow that law, then they sinned,
and if they sinned, then they had to make and follow the exact
way God told them to make sacrifices, to bring offerings and sacrifices.
Okay? So it was a fleshly thing, but
the New Covenant is a total spiritual thing. The Old Covenant was something
that they had to try to accomplish, but never could. The New Covenant
is all about something that you don't even have any participation
in except for the receiving of it, except for the being in it. I've got to turn my words correctly
lest I be misunderstood or misquoted. The New Covenant is something
that we don't have to do any type of works to get. It all
comes because of what Christ Jesus did in his death, burial,
and resurrection, his life, death, burial, and resurrection. That's
the new covenant. That's the terms of the new covenant.
The new covenant is ratified in blood. Okay? It's guarantee
or it's stamp is in blood. It's not in what you do. Okay? That you keeping something. Matter of fact, if you look at
the everlasting covenant, you'll see that that covenant wasn't
even between God and man. The new covenant was between
God and the Son of God. You know, God elected a people
and gave them to Christ, and Christ is the one who is doing
all of the work of atonement on their behalf. And then the
Holy Spirit is the one who quickens. The Holy Spirit is the one who
grants repentance and faith. The Holy Spirit is the one who
convicts of sin. The Holy Spirit is the one who grows in the grace
and knowledge of Jesus Christ. The Holy Spirit is the one who
binds our heart and keeps us from going away, who is the one
who preserves us until the end. The Holy Spirit is the one who
does that. So we see that God in totality here is part of our
salvation and that that salvation was a covenant amongst God. It was a covenant in the Godhead. It wasn't a covenant that had
to do with anything that we do. We do not have to keep anything
in this covenant, but we are recipients of everything in that
covenant, and it's because of Christ our substitute. So, Paul
says, you who want to be under the law, do you not hear what
the law is saying? If you guys have been given spiritual eyes
to see that there is no works of the flesh that can profit
anything, and that the gospel that was given to you was that
Christ did everything for you, why do you want to go back to
this place that says death, death is all you're going to hear?
Okay? So, he is reiterating once again this fact that this is
not a good thing. And we've seen it all the way
through so far. I mean, we started out up here. Again, why do you desire to be
in bondage again? Why do you desire to be underneath
the law? Do you not hear what the law
says? So moving on, verse 22, for it is written that Abraham
had two sons, the one by the bondmaid, the other by a free
woman. And when we see for that, for
it is written, we know that he's talking about, or he's going
back to quote, and remember at this time when Paul is writing
this letter, that there is no New Testament yet. Right? It's
being written. Matter of fact, this letter,
when Paul wrote it, was the New Testament being formed, right?
But they didn't have it. What did they preach out of?
They preached out of the Old Testament. That's what they were
preaching at. They were preaching the Gospel
to these people from the Old Testament. And they were taking
the New Testament knowledge that they had been given by Christ,
but they were applying that Old Testament Scripture with a spiritual
understanding of it. And see, that's how we ought
to take that too, brother. We don't throw away the Old Testament.
Now, I'll be honest with you. Now, I've said this before, and
it's to my shame, but I'll be honest with you. I study more
in the New Testament than I do in the Old Testament. There's
a lot of times I don't go in the Old Testament and do a lot
of studying, right? And I know I probably should
spend a lot more time in the Old Testament. But we don't disregard
the Old Testament. Whenever we say that the Old
Covenant has gone away and the New Covenant is here, or the
Old Testament and the New Testament, we're now under the New Testament,
we're not talking about what's written in the Bible. This Bible,
Old Testament and New Testament, is the Word of God preserved
for us today. And we can trust that this is
what God's Word, that this is God's Word. It doesn't just contain
God's Word, it is God's Word, right? And so the Old Testament
is just as much God's Word as the New Testament is, and it's
profitable. The Bible says all Scripture
is given by inspiration of God, and it's profitable, even the
Old Testament. Sometimes I wonder, how are all those back in numbers,
whenever you start reading all those lineages and everything?
Sometimes you kind of wonder, why is there two chapters of
just names, okay? It's there for a purpose. It's
for our teaching. It's for our understanding. It
is profitable for us. So we should study in the Old
Testament and it's just as relevant to us today. However, when we
look at the Old Testament, we've got to interpret the Old Testament
with New Testament revelation. What's been revealed in the New
Testament as the veil has been pulled away, as we have begun
to see now what the Old Testament types and foreshadows were pointing
to, We can now understand the Old Testament, and that's what
the apostles were doing. They were preaching Christ from
the Old Testament. You see, Jesus did it just right
after he resurrected from the grave. He was on the road to
Emmaus. There was two disciples that
were walking along. They were discussing everything that happened.
The Bible says that Jesus came up alongside of them, and he
took them, and from Genesis to the end, he revealed everything
that was about him to them. And he did that with all the
disciples and the apostles and all those people. And so we see
here it is written that Abraham had two sons. So we need to find
out what is he talking about. For it is written, he's appealing
back to something that happened in the Old Testament. Something
about Abraham and his two sons. It says, for it is written that
Abraham had two sons, the one by a bondmaid, the other by a
free woman. So let's just take a moment there,
leave your hand there in Genesis 4 if you want to, but let's go
back to Genesis because I want to point out a couple of things
in the original story of this. And let's go to, I believe it's
Genesis chapter 17. That's where we want to begin. I'm sorry, Genesis chapter 16.
I'm going to try to read through this quickly because there's
a few points that I'd like to make in this as we move forward. It says, now Sarai, Abram's wife,
bare him, chapter 16, verse one. Sarai, Abram's wife, bare him
no children. And she had a handmaiden, an
Egyptian, whose name was Hagar. And Sarai said to Abram, Behold
now, the Lord hath restrained me from bearing. I pray thee,
go unto my maid. It may be that I may obtain children
by her. And Abram hearkened to the voice
of Sarai, and Sarai, Abram's wife, took Hagar, her maid, the
Egyptian, after Abram had dwelt ten years in the land of Canaan,
and gave her to her husband, Abram, to be his wife. And he
went in unto Hagar, and she conceived. And when she saw that she had
conceived, her mistress was despised in her eyes." Now, what's that
saying there? Well, he sent Hagar in to take
the place of Sarah, okay? So Sarah said, listen, the promise
that God made about us having a child, it's not coming along. I'm not able to perform that.
Obviously, I'm too old to do that. Maybe God wants you to
have a child, and you can do that through my handmaiden, through
my bondmaiden, okay? So the bondmaiden, Hagar, went
in, laid with Abram, had a child by Abram, and it says here, whenever,
and this kind of gets a little tricky because it sounds like
that Sarah was mad at the other woman, but that's not the case.
So then he went into Hagar, and she can see, And when she saw
that she had conceived, her mistress was despised in her eyes. See,
Hagar became the wife, and now Sarai was the mistress. Okay? And so whenever Hagar was conceived
with child, she began to despise Sarai, and basically was, you
know, making fun of her and despising her because she was barren. She
wasn't able to have any children and everything. It's kind of an amazing thing.
You don't see it in our age anymore today, but back then, women were
very, very, what should I say? I don't want
to necessarily say proud, but they were very elated. They were very concerned, they
were very happy to bear children. That was their gift to the family. That was, to bear their husband,
a child, and especially a son, to carry on their name was something
that was prized by women. Now we know, of course, the Bible
teaches all through it that children are a blessing of God, right?
The Bible even says having many children is a blessing of God.
The man whose quiver is full is a blessing from God. Those
are things that are blessed of God, okay? So we don't despise
those things. We don't look down on those things.
And during this time, and even in days of old, even in our country,
you know, women was excited to be mothers who desired to have
children and to bear children for their family. And they didn't
have a problem with that. Nowadays, women completely despise
the role of motherhood. They despise the role of being
a wife. They despise those things. And
it's completely taken God's roles for the family and they wanted
to turn it upside down now. And now the roles have been switched
to the place where now they're even, you know, they're even
trying to get men to have babies and Now they've got emojis on
our stupid phone of men that are pregnant and all this kind
of stuff. They've taken the natural order
that God has created and have turned it upside down. And so
here we see that this woman, Hagar, despised Sarah because
Sarah was barren. And for a woman to be barren,
that was an embarrassment for her. That was something that
really was an emotional problem for them. because that was what
they desired. That's what they knew. That's
what their part in the marriage was. Their part is to take care
of the home and to raise children and to be fruitful and multiply. As a matter of fact, as I was
reading some stuff on this, this morning I began to think of a
few things going back into Adam and Eve. If you remember, whenever
God gave Eve to Adam, It was after God had made all
the animals and everything, and they began to be fruitful and
began to multiply. And then it says, but Adam had
nobody to help him. Nobody to help him multiply.
And I'm going to study that out a little bit more to see if there's
any kind of connection with any of this stuff. But God gave Eve
to Adam for the purpose of replenishing the earth, be fruitful, and multiply. And see, they want to turn this
whole order over. And so the women back then knew,
this is my part. In this family that God has ordained,
my part in this is to do that very thing. And so, Sarah, because
she was barren, was obviously upset about these things. But
whenever Hagar conceived, it says, when she saw that she had
conceived, her mistress was despised in her eyes. And Sarah said unto
Abram, my wrong be upon thee. I have given my mind into thy,
my maid, into thy bosom. And when he saw that she had
conceived, I was despised in her eyes. The Lord judged between
me and thee. So Sarah, whenever she began
to see this, she now became, became upset. And she went to
Abram and said, you know, hey, I did this, I made a mistake
doing it. And now you need to judge. Do you want her or me?
So now it's laid on Abram's lap on something that Sarah did,
right? Now, Abram was complicit in all
this. He went through with it all, but Sarah's getting a little
upset now. Look at verse six. But Abram
said unto Sarai, Behold, thy maid is in thy hand. Do to her as it pleases thee.
And when Sarai dealt hardly with her, she fled from her face. And the angel of the Lord found
her by a fountain of water in the wilderness, by the fountain
in the way to Shur. And she said, Hagar, Sarah's
maid, whence camest thou? And whither wilt thou go? And
she said, I flee from the face of my mistress Sarah. And the
angel of the Lord said unto her, return to thy mistress and submit
thyself unto her hands. And the angel of the Lord said
unto her, I will multiply thy seed exceedingly, and it shall
not be numbered for a multitude. And the angel of the Lord said
unto her, Behold, thou art with child, and shalt bear a son,
and shalt call his name Ishmael, because the Lord hath heard thy
affliction. And he will be a wild man, his
hand will be against every man, and every man's hand against
him, and he shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren."
Now, the lineage of Ishmael, that's what we know today as
the modern Arab nations. all those Arab nations that's
over in the Middle East, those are the lineage of Ishmael. That's
where that line of people came from, is from Ishmael. And actually,
even as of today, it's still as God has done it. I mean, you
look and see they don't get along with anybody over there. They're
all the time in upheaval, they're all the time at war with other
people, their neighbors, everybody that's around them. And they
live in a wild way. I mean, even though they have
modern advancements over in their areas, I mean, they still live
in such a way that's not as advanced as other places and things. And
you can see that God's destiny for that group of people, and
this is just, this isn't a racial thing. I don't mean this to be
a racial thing. This is just truth of the scriptures, that
God has made people the way that he desires for them to be made.
He's the potter and we're the clay. And he has proclaimed that
this is going to be the lot of these people, and it has been. Even to this day, as a matter
of fact, I was reading through a couple of things this week.
I was reading John Gill, and John Gill was speaking on this,
and he even mentioned the same thing that in his day, back in
the 1800s, that he said that the Arabs was at war with everybody
around them. was all the time, you know, trying
to attack or to steal. If somebody came into their areas,
that they were plundering them. I mean, it was just an upheaval.
So we see that that really hasn't changed even from back in these
days. He says, And she called the name
of the Lord that spake unto her, Thou God seest me. For she said,
Have I also here looked after him that seeth me? Wherefore,
the well was called Be'er-le-Hi-Roi, Behold, it is between Kadesh
and Bered. And Hagar bare Abram a son, and
Abram called his son's name, which Hagar bare Ishmael. And
Abraham was fourscore and six years old. You know how old that
is? Fourscore and six years? That'd be 86 years old. 86 years old. When Hagar bare Ishmael to Abram,
Now when Abram was 90 years old, 90 years old and nine, the Lord
appeared to Abram and said unto him, I am the almighty God, walk
before me and be thou perfect. And I will make the covenant
between me and thee and will multiply thee exceedingly. And
Abraham fell on his face and God talked with him. Now remember,
this is after God had already talked to him in chapter 15 about
the covenant speaking of Christ in the covenant speaking of the
eternal things as far as righteousness is concerned. Now he's talking
to him about this. And I will make a covenant between
me and thee, and will multiply thy seed exceedingly. And Abraham
fell on his face, and God talked with him, saying, As for me,
behold, my covenant is with thee, and thou shalt be a father of
many nations. Neither shall thy name any more
be called Abram, but thy name shall be Abraham, for a father
of many nations have I made thee. And I will make thee exceeding
fruitful, and I will make nations of thee, and kings shall come
out of thee. And I will establish my covenant between me and thee,
and thy seed after thee, in their generations for an everlasting
covenant, to be a God unto thee, and to thy seed after thee. And I will give unto thee, and
to thy seed after thee, the land wherein thou art a stranger,
all the land of Canaan for an everlasting possession, and I
will be their God. And God said unto Abram, thou
shalt keep my covenant therefore, thou and thy seed and thee and
their generations. This is my covenant which you
shall keep between me and you and thy seed after thee. Every
man, child among you shall be circumcised. You shall circumcise
the flesh of your foreskin and it shall be a token of the covenant
between me and you. And he that is eight days old
shall be circumcised among you. Every man, child in your generation,
He that is born in the house or bought with money of any stranger
which is not of thy seed. He that is born in the house
and he that is bought with thy money must need to be circumcised. And my covenant shall be in your
flesh for an everlasting covenant. And the uncircumcised man-child
whose flesh of his foreskin is not circumcised, that soul shall
be cut off from his people. He hath broken my covenant. And
God said unto Abraham, as for Sarai thy wife, thou shalt not
call her name Sarai, but Sarah shall her name be. And I will
bless her and give thee a son also of her. Yea, I will bless
her and she shall be a mother of nations. Kings of people shall
be of her. Then Abraham fell upon his face
and laughed and said in his heart, shall a child be born unto him
that is a hundred years old and shall Sarah that is 90 years
old, bare. And Abraham said unto God, O
that Ishmael might live before thee. I want you to pay close
attention to that verse, and we'll come back to that here in just a minute.
And God said, Sarah thy wife shall bear thee a son, indeed,
and thou shalt call his name Isaac. And I will establish my
covenant with him for an everlasting covenant, and with his seed after
him. Now this is the seed that's speaking
of Christ right here, okay? This is the seed of promise,
the child of promise, and this is talking about the spiritual
seed. There is a fleshly seed, there is a spiritual seed, okay? It's not this fleshly seed that
is the children of Abraham, but it's the spiritual seed. We learned
that also by the writings of Paul, that it isn't the fleshly
seed that was accounted for the promise of the everlasting, eternal
covenant, okay? as far as salvation is concerned.
It's only the spiritual seed. And with him for an everlasting
covenant and with his seed after him. And as for Ishmael, I have
heard thee. Behold, I have blessed him and
will make him fruitful and will multiply him exceedingly. Twelve
princes shall he beget and I will make him a great nation. But
my covenant will I establish with Isaac. Okay, so if you'll
notice here, The covenant, the spiritual covenant, the everlasting
covenant, the covenant of righteousness, is not made with Ishmael, the
child of the flesh, it's made with Isaac, the child of promise. Okay? Ishmael came from a handmaiden
who wasn't barren. Isaac came from a woman and a
man who was barren. They were past their age of having
children. It was a miraculous pregnancy
as much as Jesus. Well, I don't want to say as
much as Jesus. Jesus was different because he was God. But here
you have a woman who was barren who could not have kids who had
a child. That was a miraculous thing.
God did that. God opened up that woman and gave it life again
to be able to conceive a child. So Isaac was the child of promise. Ishmael was the child of the
flesh. Isaac was the child that was to come as they looked in
faith to that. Ishmael was the product of their
own hand workings. Ishmael was a symbol of works. Isaac was a symbol of faith.
Isaac is a symbol of trusting in the promise of God where Ishmael
is trying to accomplish God's work by your own hands. You see
that? Now, look at verse 18. I told
you to pay close attention to that. And Abraham said unto God,
O that Ishmael might live before thee. Brethren, I posted this
on Facebook this morning. You can go back and read it.
It's in the church site and on my thing. I posted a little thing
about this this morning as I was contemplating this verse. That,
in our flesh, as children of Adam, that is always our cry. Oh, that Ishmael might live.
I want to do the works of God. That's what they ask Jesus. What
must we do to do the works of God? The flesh always wants to
be religious and is zealous to do something to earn its own
righteousness. The flesh is always wanting to
produce a righteousness of its own before God, whether to get
saved or to stay saved or to stay in fellowship with God.
The flesh wants to be able to do works for righteousness. And the desire of the flesh is
that it might be something before God, but God has already destined
the flesh to die. He has destined the flesh to
not gain anything. The flesh is just flesh and it
cannot profit or gain anything. The Bible says that the flesh
cannot please God. The Bible says that flesh and
blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God. So nothing that we do
in the flesh can please God, can gain salvation, can keep
salvation, can be anything pleasing before a holy and righteous God
because the flesh is a byproduct or the works are byproducts of
the flesh. The flesh wants to do its own
works to gain salvation and God has already determined that Ishmael
is not going to be anything but a wild man. Do you see that in
whenever he talked about Ishmael? Back in verse 12, chapter 16,
and he will be a wild man. Israel is a wild man, and that's
all it can be. The flesh is just that, it's
flesh. It was made out of dust, and
to dust it's going to return. It's not going to enter the kingdom
of heaven. God has another body that is suited for the perfection,
which is the life and the everlasting life, the spirit of Christ that's
in us, that life, has a body fit for that waiting for us,
that we will receive at the resurrection. But brethren, don't believe anything
that the flesh can do anything. But here, just like Abraham,
oh, that Ishmael might live before thee. There is that desire that
for our flesh to produce something for God. And that's where we
come into the spiritual warfare. That's where we see the flesh
lust against the spirit, the spirit lust against the flesh.
And if we go on down forward, we see eventually that Ishmael
longed against Isaac and Isaac against Ishmael. Ishmael didn't
like it that Isaac was the one who was the preferred child.
Hagar didn't like it that Sarah was preferred over her. So let's
move forward, verse 20. For as for Ishmael, I have heard
thee, behold, I have blessed him. But look at verse 21. But my covenant will I establish
with Isaac, which Sarah shall bear unto thee at the set time
in the next year. And he left off talking with
him, and God went up from Abram, And Abram took Ishmael, his son,
and all that were born in his house, and all that were bought
with his money, every male among the men of Abram's house, and
circumcised the flesh of their foreskins in the selfsame day
as God had said unto him." Now, let's cross over to chapter 21. It says, verse one, and the Lord
visited Sarah and he said, as he had said, and the Lord did
unto Sarah as he had spoken. So you see here, she conceived
because of the Lord. Okay. For Sarah conceived and bare
Abraham, a son in his old age, at the set time of which God
had spoken to him. And Abraham 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 would have given children suck?
For I have borne him a 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, mocking." Okay,
so here we see that Isaac was mocking the fact that Abraham
was making a to-do out of Isaac and not him. Wherefore
she 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. And God said unto Abraham,
Let it not be grievous in thy sight because of the lad, and
because of thy bondwoman. And in 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 to Hagar, put it in on her shoulder, and the child,
and sent her away. And she departed, and wandered
in the wilderness of Beersheba." So here God called for the son
of the bondwoman to be cast out, okay? That's the story that Paul
is using here. Now, let's go back, and I know
there's been a lot of reading, but let's go back to Galatians
chapter 4. Even though these were real events,
real people, real happenings, okay, it was all for an allegory. Now, right there, just a side
note, that tells you God so controls the lives of people that he even
uses their everyday lives and how he orchestrates by his providence,
by his sovereign control over everything, so that even their
very lives, hundreds of years later, thousands of years later,
become an allegory of something that he has to teach spiritually
to us. I mean, we even see that in the
lives of the Israelites when they came out of Egypt. The whole
story of them coming out of Egypt and crossing the Red Sea and
going into the Promised Land is all a picture and a type and
foreshadow of our salvation. But they really happen. Listen,
if people don't think that God is controlling everything and
has determined everything, it's crazy. There is no way by chance
these things happen. And if everybody has free choice,
then how in the world did everybody's free choices happen to so line
up to accomplish God's purposes? It's because God controls all
things. The end from the beginning. He
has already predestinated everything to its accomplished end. So back in Galatians chapter
4, let's continue on in where we left off. It says, For it is written that
Abraham had two sons, one by a bondmaid and the other by a
free woman. But he who was of the bondwoman
was born after the flesh. But he of the free woman was
by promise." That's what I was mentioning a while ago. Okay?
Ishmael was born by the hands of Abraham and Sarah and the
bondwoman trying to provide, you know, this work of God on
their own. Isaac was the child of promise.
It didn't come by Abraham and Sarah naturally being able to
accomplish the conceiving and the birthing. They couldn't do
it. But yet the promise was made
that that child, that seed would come. And that seed would be
given to them and that they would bear forth fruit. But they were
called on to trust Christ. To trust that this is the truth,
that this is the promise, that this is going to happen. Right? And just like Abraham, we too
want to try to do things in our flesh. We want to try to do things
in our flesh instead of trusting Christ for all that He's done
and the promise that He has made. His promise is that I have given
you full righteousness. I have accomplished everything
for you. All your obedience to the law, I've accomplished it
for you. All the wages of your sin has been dealt with in my
death. and you have been glorified before
God, you've been justified, you've been sanctified, you're going
to be glorified whenever this body is put down, we have the
promises of Christ, and I will give you faith that you might
even trust in these things, because without giving you that faith,
you'll never trust in them. And so he's given us those things.
And just like Abraham, we toy back and forth. We want to trust
God, but yet we want to have Ishmael produce something for
God. Now, look what he says here.
But he who was of the bondwoman was after the flesh, and we know
that the flesh profits nothing. Which things are an allegory?
For these are the two covenants, the one from the Mount Sinai,
which gendereth to bondage, which is Agar, or Hagar. For this Agar
is Mount Sinai in Arabia, and answereth to Jerusalem, which
now is, and is in bondage with her children. So he's saying,
look, that happening back in Genesis, that was an allegory.
Even though it was real, that was a picture for us today, a
spiritual picture. That that bondwoman is the picture
of Mount Sinai and the works of the law and all that has to
do with that. And it is a picture or a gender
to bondage. That's why Paul said back in
in Galatians 4 and 9. Why do you desire to be in bondage
again? If you go back under the law, you're going back under
Mount Sinai. You're going back under Hagar. You're wanting to
go from being Isaac to Ishmael. And Ishmael was not the child
of promise. Ishmael was not the child of
the covenant. Ishmael was cast out. It says, but Jerusalem, which
is above, that's the New Jerusalem, which is above, is free, which
is the mother of us all. For it is written, Rejoice thou,
barren, that bearest not. Break forth and cry thou that
travailest not. For the desolate hath more children
than she which hath a husband. Now we, brethren, as Isaac was,
are the children of promise." See, we have been born, we have
been brought forth as a generation of spiritual people Not fleshly
people. We have been brought forth as
a spiritual seed, not the fleshly seed or the natural seed. We've
been brought forth to not look to Sinai, but to look to the
New Jerusalem, to look to Sarah, not to Hagar. I know that might
be confusing if you're not familiar with the allegory or if you're
not seeing the tie between the story and the spiritual aspect
of it. But what this is saying is we
have been born to live by faith, to walk by faith in what Christ
has done, not by works of the law. That's what the purpose
of this allegory. That's why Paul brought in the
story of Hagar. Matter of fact, that's why God
controlled all that proceedings with Hagar and Abraham and Sarah
and Isaac and Ishmael, all that happened so that it would be
a perfect picture of the child of grace today. We are to live
in faith of the promise, not in the works of our hands. Now as 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." Listen, I can tell you right now, those who
are under the law and desire to be under the law and want
to put you under the law, they hate it when we preach like this.
They hate when you preach that we're not under the law. Remember,
I told you the story of the pastor in Kansas City that was telling
everybody not to come to our church because I was an antinomian,
meaning without law. That's what antinomian means,
someone who is without law. That we believe that we are not
under the law, but under grace and that we don't need to obey
the laws in the Old Testament anymore or anything like that.
Listen, people get irate about that. They get irate whenever
you preach these things. It hasn't changed today. Just
like back then, Ishmael hated Isaac. Isaac didn't do anything. Sarah didn't do anything. Abraham
didn't do anything. But the promise fell there. Just like today, we still have
people that do not like the fact that there are some that are
chosen. and some that are not chosen. I have friends on Facebook
that do not believe in sovereign grace, and they all the time,
they come on my posts and things, and they want to argue about,
you know, salvation. You mean God just chose some
and not others? Oh, so God's a respecter of persons when the
Bible says He's not a respecter of persons. By the way, that's
not a contradiction. God choosing some and not others
is not a contradiction of the Bible saying that God is not
a respecter of persons. Whenever it says that God is
not a respecter of persons, that's talking about that He doesn't
respect rich or poor, free or bond, black or white or brown
or green or yellow or purple, whatever color you are, whatever
nationality you are. It doesn't matter. Because the
Bible says that He has the elect out of every nation, out of every
tribe, out of every tongue. Okay? So He's not a respecter
of persons in that regard. But he surely is a respecter
of persons in the fact that he is elected for himself a people.
That he has the elect, that he is chosen. He is a respecter
of persons in that regard, because only those persons are the ones
he has set his love upon. The Bible says that he has loved
them with an everlasting love. So, it says, now we brethren,
as Isaac was, are children of the 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?" See, even though there's this struggle, even though
that the flesh continues to want its way, the flesh wants to be
religious. It wants to be a good church
guy. It wants to be a good social person, helping all those that's
out there that's needy. It wants to be philanthropic. It wants to give money. It wants
to do all these things. It wants to be a preacher. It
wants to be a teacher. It wants to be a hymn singer
or whatever you want to be. The flesh wants to do all those
religious things, okay? Again, I will remind you of the
saying my grandpa used to always say, the flesh will do anything
to get its way even if it means be religious. And it will. It
will be religious all day long. It wants to be religious. Because
through religion it gets what? The attention, right? It gets
the attention. I was in a conversation this
week with some men in some sovereign grace circles and they were applauding
themselves for the men that they had that they had tutored in
the gospel and that they had brought up and how they had caused
their conversion and how that they had was doing really well
in bringing them up in the knowledge of Christ and all of this. And I've seen people make statements
on their Facebook about how many people they've won to the Lord.
and how much their ministry has done and all the stuff that they
have accomplished and all these things. And the flesh likes to
be patted on the back. It's proud. It likes that. But
what does it say here? Look, verse 30. Nevertheless,
what saith the scripture? Cast out the bondwoman and her
son. For the son of the bondwoman
shall not be heir with the son of the free woman. Cast it out. Get it out of your
mind. Don't think that you're going
to gain a righteousness by law keeping. Don't think you're going
to gain righteousness by doing things through works. You're
never going to accomplish that. It's cast out. God has casted
that out. It's not going to regard it.
If you keep it here, it will not be part of the promise. If
Ishmael, if Abraham would not have cast out Ishmael and Hagar
and let them stay there and live amongst their family and their
people all that time, the promise would not have been to them.
Whenever it came time for them to start dealing out the families
as they came out of Egypt and went into the promised land and
Joshua began to divide out the land among the tribes of Israel,
guess what? All of Ishmael's clan would not
have got a part of that. They would not have got a part
of that. And they certainly was not going to get a part in the
kingdom of God because of that. Okay? So, Ishmael, in the eyes
of God, has been cast out It served a purpose. What was
the purpose? It showed Abraham that you cannot
accomplish anything. You cannot fulfill the promise
of God by the works of your own hands. Abraham and Sarah did
not accomplish the work of God by their own hands. The law is
given to us to show us the inability that we have to accomplish the
righteousness that God requires. The law has been given to us
to show us that there is no way that your righteousness is going
to exceed and be able to be profitable or be acceptable to God. That's why Jesus told the Pharisees,
unless your righteousness exceeds theirs, they think they're keeping
the law. They think they're perfect under
the law, but they're not because they're breaking the law every
day. They break the law every day. He says, unless your righteousness
exceeds that of the Pharisees, you're not ever going to gain
the kingdom of God. You'll never see the kingdom of God. You need
a righteousness outside of yourself that is perfect, and there's
only one righteousness that's perfect, brethren, and that's
the Lord Jesus Christ. So that's why Paul here is saying,
cast out the bondwoman. Cast out the notion that your
righteousness comes by works and law keeping. It says in verse
31, So then, brethren, we are not children of the bondwoman,
but children of the free. We are children of the free.
Yes, is this flesh still with us? Yes. Does Ishmael still attack
and hate Isaac? Yes. But Ishmael is not going to going
to be part of the promise. It's not going to be part of
the inheritance. The inheritance that was given to Abraham to
pass on to his generation, Ishmael is not going to have any part
of that. God has something else designed for Ishmael. God has
something designed for the law of God, but that's not going
to get you righteousness and that's not going to get you the
inheritance. Only the righteousness of Christ can do that. And so
we see the importance of grace, the importance of faith, and
not of works and of law keeping. All right, we'll stop right there
and we'll move into chapter five, Lord willing, next week. Does
anybody have any comments or questions? Anything that you'd
like cleared up maybe? I know sometimes I get a little
confusing sometimes bouncing back and forth. You're not going to hear this
kind of teaching, and I'm not saying that about myself, I'm
saying that about God's Word. You're not going to hear a lot
of this type of preaching in modern churches today. Modern
churches today is all about you making the choice and you living
a life. They'll even go so far as to
say, well, it's Christ in you, but He's working through you
and you're still doing those works by choosing to let Him
be God in you. Have you ever heard that statement,
let go and let God? You know, let, oh, I gotta let
God be God in me. Think you can let God do anything? He said that he rules among the
inhabitants of the earth and none can stay his hand. That's
what it says. None other than God are all his
works. And he's been able to accomplish
all the pleasures. But no, we hear all kinds of
preaching. about us, that God will do these
works in us if we will just let Him, if we'll just submit ourselves
to Him, if we'll give Him control of our lives, or make Him Lord
of our lives. Those are not things that we
can do, brethren. He is the Lord, He is God, and
He will do what He wants to do, and He will bear forth fruit
in us. Jesus said, if you abide in Me
and I in you, you will bear much fruit. But one thing we know
is that you don't work to abide, right? Kevin over here is abiding
on my couch. He isn't having to do anything
for that. He's just there, right? He's not doing anything. Those
trees out there, see that tree out there that, what was the
name of that kind of tree out there? Not the dogwood, the other
one. Yeah, the magnolia tree. That
magnolia tree is dropping all kinds of things all over the
ground that could produce fruit from its tree. But those limbs
that is abiding in that stem that comes up, it didn't do no
work to produce that. If you've got a tree, say you've
got an apple tree in the backyard, you've got that tree that's growing
up, and then out of that tree you've got branches that's coming
out, and then out of those branches you'll see these leaves, and
then you'll see this fruit hanging out there. That limb didn't do
no work to do to do that. That fruit came from the life
of the vine inside of it. The life of the tree. The life
of the plant. That's where it came from. All
the limb did was just hang there in the tree and the tree produced
fruit in the limb. See, we don't produce works in
the flesh. The life is inside of us, and
God produces those works in us. The works are not outward works,
they're inward works. And then whenever they're inward
works, yes, can you see evidences of things of that on the outside?
Yeah. Do we see love for the brethren? Yeah. Do we see right
doctrine? Yes. Do we see people believing
and trusting Christ? Yes, we see those things. People
who are joyful and long-suffering and gentle and meek? Yeah, do
we see those things? We do see those things. But it isn't something
we produce outwardly. It's something that is a work
on the inside. And so abiding in the vine and
producing much fruit isn't a command that God has told us to do. Abide
in the vine, that way you can bear much fruit. No, abiding
in the vine is just resting in the vine. I just rest in Christ.
And guess what? His Spirit will produce the works
that God has ordained for me in me. But you know, it's hard for Ishmael
to sit aside Trust that. It's hard for Abraham to look
and say, you mean you're going to do it all yourself and we
don't have to do it? What did Abraham and Sarah do?
They laughed. Both of them laughed. They laughed at the whole notion.
You think that we're going to be able to do that? See, it's
a funny thing to a lot of people, but the promises of God, the
Bible says are yea and amen in Christ Jesus. It's funny for
us to say that in the flesh. Matter of fact, every one of
us has someone come to you and said, oh yeah, I keep the whole
law. Can you imagine those disciples,
whenever that one guy, the rich young ruler came to Jesus and
said, what must I do to inherit eternal life? And Jesus, you
know, said, you know, to keep these commands. And that guy
said, I've kept all these laws ever since my youth, I've kept
them. Can you imagine those disciples who had already been taught otherwise?
They probably were snickering at that guy behind his back saying,
yeah, right, yeah. See, that's what happens is we
think that we can do those things, but all the while, it's just an impossibility. All
right, anybody got any questions? All right, well, it's good to
be with everybody today. And Lord willing, we'll see you
again next Sunday. Let's bow and have a word of
prayer. Gracious Father, once again, we are thankful for the
gospel that speaks only of Christ Jesus. Father, I know that in
our flesh, those are things that are hard to understand and hard
to look at, and we need the Spirit to give us clarity and understanding
of those things and teach us those things, reveal them unto
us. And so Father, I pray that those
things that have spoken up today, that they have found place in
the hearts and the minds of these brethren that are here today,
and that they might rejoice in that. Lord, we rejoice in your
gospel. We rejoice in the fact that we, in this broken down
and enabled flesh, don't have to keep a righteousness of our
own to be saved, but that you've given it to us as a free gift
And so Father, we say thank you for that today. We thank you
for all that you've done for us through the Lord Jesus Christ.
Father, we just pray that you might allow us to rejoice in
that every day, and that you might keep our minds fixed upon
what Christ has done. Whenever we preach the gospel,
may we be found to be giving the declaration of a finished
salvation and not an invitation or a command for somebody to
try to do something in their own works. And so Father, Lord,
we lift it up to you today and we ask that you bless today's
worship. I thank you for these brethren
that you have here today. I pray that you'll be with them
this week as they go home and to their workplaces this week,
to wherever they're at. Lord, I pray that you might give
them opportunity to testify in the gospel of Jesus Christ. And
again, Father, I pray that if there's any here this morning
that is not converted of Christ, I pray, Lord, that you would
draw them to yourselves, that you would give them understanding
of their salvation. Father, that they would show
forth that faith in Christ Jesus by submitting themselves to baptism,
Lord, and become a part of the church. And Lord, we just look
forward to every time that you bring another one of your sheep
to behold Christ. And Lord, we just pray for Joplin. We ask, Lord, that you would
gather all your people around this area that desire to hear
the truth and to be part of the fellowship and the worship of
God through the preaching of the gospel. Lord, we just pray
that you gather them together. Lord, again, thank you for all
that you're here. Thank you for your watch care and your healing
over Kevin and his family, Lord, and their sicknesses these last
few weeks or so. And Lord, we just ask that you
just might continue to be with all of us as we're out there
among a lot of sick people and things. Lord, that you would
protect us and keep us from the pestilence that is out there.
Lord, we are grateful for all that you have done and all that
you are for us. And it's in Jesus' name that we pray these things.
Amen.