Galatians chapter four. Paul's
continuing to simplify his message as if it's not simple enough.
And he takes us back to Father Abraham. Scripture calls him
the father of the faithful. He's the first one that the covenant
came to, the covenant of grace was revealed to as Abraham. And
what Paul is doing is he is has drawn a line in the sand. He
said this is, there is no gray area with God. It's either by
the law or it's by grace. And what he's doing in this remainder
part is he's making that line a little bit deeper. He's making
sure he's setting forth a deep parameter so it can't be confused
whatsoever. However, This truth cannot be
seen or understood without the Lord being our teacher, without
him sending his spirit, without him revealing his truth, without
him making himself known unto us. How many times were the Lord
with people and they didn't even know who he was until he made
himself known unto them? Even after his resurrection,
weren't some of the disciples talking to the Lord? They didn't
know who he was. Didn't Peter say, did our hearts not burn
within us whenever we spoke to him? So we can't see him unless
he reveals himself to us. My prayer this hour is that the
Lord would cause us to see his face, see his glorious truth. Let's read this together. Galatians
4 verse 21, tell me ye that desire to be under the law, do you not
hear the law? For it is written that Abraham had two sons, the
one by a bondmaid, the other by a free woman. But he who is
of the bondwoman was born after the flesh, but he of the free
woman was a promise. Which things are an allegory,
for these are the two covenants, the one from the Mount Sinai,
which gendereth the bondage, which is Agar. For this Agar
is Mount Sinai in Arabia, and answereth to Jerusalem, which
now is and is in bondage with her children. But Jerusalem,
which is above, is free, which is the mother of us all." Here
we have God's gospel simplified. We have the bond made and the
free woman. the covenant of works and the
covenant of grace, Mount Sinai and Jerusalem, which is Zion,
the city of God. This is the simple truth. I've
titled this message, The Bondmaid and the Free Woman. This is giving
us the origin of the promise that came to Abraham, that it's
not a flesh, nor by the will of the flesh, nor by the will
of man, but it was of God. God chose to give this promise
unto Abraham. Don't you love also, don't you
love that he's given us an allegory and he says this is an allegory
just so you understand what's happening. I love the Lord simplifying
his message. This isn't a complicated message.
It's impossible to believe without faith, but it's not complicated. It's salvations of the Lord,
salvations of the Lord. That's the message. That's the
message. Hagar is Sinai. which equals
bondage. Jerusalem is Sarah, Sarah is
Jerusalem, which is freedom and life eternal. It's that simple,
it's that simple. Now, I remember being in false
religion, a lot of people would say that you should live your
life this way, you should live, I wish we could live more like
Abraham, they would say that. I'm gonna remind you of something.
When you look at the men of the Scripture, they were just men.
When you look at the women of Scripture, they were just women.
They were kept by the power of God and the miraculous things
that they did was by His power alone. It was by His grace alone. There was nothing special in
Peter. Nothing special in Abraham. Abraham
was an idolater that the Lord appears to in Genesis chapter
12 and says, Abraham, get thee up out of here, go to the country,
I'll show you. God made a covenant with him.
That was the difference. It wasn't Abraham decided to
do anything. God did it. God did it. But Abraham, like
so many, thought God needed a hand. God needed a hand. God needed
help. What does that mean? Well, obviously he didn't believe
what the Lord said. The Lord said, you're gonna have
a son. And it couldn't have been misconstrued because the Lord
told him very clearly, Sarah is going to give you a son. But
he, her and Abraham said, yeah, that's not gonna happen. I'm
90 and you're 100. That's impossible, can't happen. And yet the promise
of the Lord had came in chapter 12, chapter 15, you go to chapter
16, 17, they had Ishmael around that time. He gave his handmaid,
Sarah's handmaid to Abraham. And she has a son by the handmaid. He has a son by the handmaid.
And the Lord appears unto Abraham again in, so that was chapter 16. Verse
17, God reiterates the covenant to Abraham. And the amazing part
is that Abraham looks to the Lord, the Lord's revealed himself
to him, has manifested before him. He looks to him and he says,
Lord, I would that you would pick Ishmael. Lord, you should
choose Ishmael. He literally was saying, this
son is good enough, pick him, he could be my heir. And he said,
no, he is the child of the bond slave, the bond woman, the bond
maid. And it was by the works of the
flesh, not by the promise of God, but by the works of the
flesh. That's why the Lord would not
accept Ishmael. The Lord said, no, you did this.
It's not good enough because you did it. Same with Cain. When Cain brought the works of
his hands to the Lord, the Lord said to Cain and his sacrifice,
the Lord had no respect. Why? Because it's the works of
the hands. Aren't you thankful that everything
God requires for His people, He provides? And He provides
good works in His people. He sees the blood upon us, and
we can't see it in ourself, can't see the things that we do in
ourself, but the Lord causes us to bear the fruit of the Spirit
in this body. Don't go looking for it, because
as soon as you do, we'll start justifying ourselves, saying,
well, that must be, now I know that I am saved, or I know that
I'm one of His, or that, no, don't do it. Don't do it, look
to Christ. Don't be like Abraham, don't
look to the flesh, look to Christ. That's the most important. He tells God, you should accept
Ishmael. The Lord said, no, Sarah is going to bear you a son. And
Sarah laughs in her heart. And the Lord said, why did Sarah
laugh? And Sarah said, I didn't laugh.
And he said, nay, you laughed. Is there anything too hard for
God? Can you imagine the Lord saying
that to you? Boy, that'd shut us up, wouldn't it? You hear
that? If you hear the Lord say unto us, Lord, I'm afraid, Lord,
I'm concerned, I'm overwhelmed, I'm overburdened, I'm this, I'm
that, I'm scared, I'm frightened. I have this issue or that issue
that I can't fix. Lord, I don't see a way out. Lord said, is there anything
too hard for God? Is there anything too hard for
God? No. No. Isaac's born in chapter 21, and
I want to turn, hold your place, because I'm only going to read
three or four verses. But once we see this there, then we're going
to come right back to Galatians and read this again. And it's
going to shed a lot of light on it. So turn to Genesis chapter
21. We're gonna read verse nine through
13, so just four verses. Now, at this point, Isaac had
been born. The very first, it says, the
Lord visited Sarah, as he said, and she had a son, named him
Isaac. Now in verse number nine, it says, and Sarah saw the son
of Hagar, the Egyptian, which she had born unto Abraham, mocking. Wherefore she said unto Abraham,
cast out this bond woman and her son, for the son of this
bond woman 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 bond woman. 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 did you
know they're still over there in the Middle East fighting over
whose land that is? That's a true story. That's a true story. The
Lord blessed Ishmael and made 12 princes. As you have the 12
tribes of Israel, you have 12 princes of Ishmael. So what is
the Lord showing us here? Well, he's telling us that the
bond woman and the free woman could not coexist with their
offspring together. The inheritance couldn't come
of the flesh. It couldn't come of the works
of the flesh. It came by the promise of God.
It was all of grace, completely of grace. This is the allegory
of God's salvation is what it is. It's not by the works of
righteousness, which we have done, but according to his mercy,
hath he saved us. Paul calls this an allegory in
our text. And I want to read that. I said, we're going to
turn right back. So Galatians chapter four, let's read that
in this light now. Verse 21, tell me ye that desire
to be under the law, do ye not hear the law? For it is written
that Abraham had two sons, the one by a bondmaid, 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. Which things are an allegory,
for these are the two covenants, the covenants of works, the covenant
of grace. The one from the Mount Sinai, which gendereth to bondage,
that's the covenant of works, which is Agar. For this Agar
is Mount Sinai in Arabia, and answereth to Jerusalem, which
now is and is in bondage with her children. But Jerusalem,
which is above, is free, which is the mother of us all." These
represent the two covenants, the two covenants, the one being
a flesh and the one being a promise. the one being of works and the
one being of grace. And I might add that this is
the only two covenants that's ever been given to man. There's
not a third one. It's either by works and it's not longer
by grace or it's by grace and it's no longer works. That's
it. Men, these Galatians are trying to get to God by what
they're doing in the flesh. And the Lord says, no, cast out
the bond woman. The offspring of the law is death.
It's not life. The offspring of the law is death,
but the offspring of the free woman is by promise. It's unto
eternal life. It's unto eternal life. He's
telling us where there's bondage, there can be no freedom. Likewise,
where there's freedom, there can be no bondage. You can't
be free and in bondage at the same time. You can't be, well,
I said that right, can't be free and in bondage at the same time.
It just doesn't, it's impossible. There can be no bondage. The one says, And this is important. The one says you have to help
God out. Abraham and Sarah, whether they were impatient, whether
they were full of unbelief, maybe all the above, they said, let's
take matters into our own hands. This is all a false religion.
This is all a false religion. Unable to believe the promise
of God. Unable to believe that they could,
that she could conceive at 90 years old. And he was a hundred.
Unable to believe what God hath said. And unless God gives us
faith to believe, we won't believe either. We're totally, completely,
entirely dependent upon His grace and mercy, giving us that which
He requires of us to perform, which is faith. If He wants us
to look under Him by faith, He's gotta give it to us. He's got
to give it to us. Covenant of work says death.
Now the other says we must be entirely, completely dependent
upon His word. Entirely, completely upon his
work for salvation. Entirely and completely dependent
upon his promise. His promise. Same as the promise
unto Sarah. This is the freedom of God's
gospel. If you choose to try to be accepted
of God based upon what you do, you will be rejected. of God. If I choose to be accepted or
attempt to be accepted of God based upon what I do, I will
be completely and utterly rejected by God. God accepts one, and
that is the Lord Jesus Christ. He accepts one covenant for salvation,
and that is the covenant of grace, the everlasting covenant. This
is the covenant I must have and you must have, or we have no
salvation. We have no salvation. If you're
approaching God by saying, if anyone approaches God by saying,
I've done this, so I've obligated God to save me. What you're saying
is, is the blood did not accomplish that which God said it did accomplish. That's scary. That's dangerous
ground, isn't it? That's what we say whenever we
say that I choose him or I let him be Lord. We're saying the
blood didn't really accomplish anything. I have to do something
to make it effectual. I have to do something to make it work.
accomplished everything it was supposed to. This covenant of
grace it was between God the Father, God the Son, and God
the Holy Spirit and they accomplished salvation. On the cross of Calvary
salvation for God's elect were, they were redeemed. They were
saved from their sin. I gave this story last message,
but it was for this one. Remember what I said about trusting
the law and a court of law? If you actually break a law and
you get sentenced to death, thinking how you live or how you act or
how you treat others is going to let you out or let you off
the hook, so to speak, that the judge will say, no, now you're
justified because you did these good deeds. No, if the court
says you're guilty and death is the consequence, what's going
to happen? You're going to die. Trusting
the law is just the same. If you're trusting the law for
redemption, the law can't redeem. It can simply say, guilty, as
we heard the first hour. It's Hagar, it's bondage, it's
Mount Sinai. It reveals the holiness of God. There's no peace and rest for
the believer on Mount Sinai. Our only rest is in Christ alone.
That he was able to touch Mount Sinai and not be destroyed. And
that he was able to touch you and I and not be defiled. That's
the glorious part about the gospel is that he fully and successfully
completed salvation for his people. It's important to remember, brethren,
that the law cannot, cannot remove one sin, can only reveal sin. And by the works of the law shall
no flesh be justified, as we heard the first hour. So how do we cast out the bond
woman? Well, we don't. The Lord did
that on the cross of Calvary. Christ is the end of the law
for righteousness because it was accomplished. Christ is the
justification of his people right now. This is the good news. We
don't have to look to the bond woman any longer, the bond maid.
She doesn't have anything to offer. We've been made free by
the promise of God, by his finished work on the cross of Calvary.
Why would you seek bondage and why would I seek bondage when
freedom has been promised? Why would we seek death when
life has been given? Why would we seek separation
when the Lord said, come unto me and I will give you rest? Why would we, why would we seek
eternal darkness when we can have eternal light? Well, because
that's what the flesh would do if left to itself. But the Lord's
people love the light. They love, they hate the bondage
of the law, the curse of the law. They hate the bondage of
false religion. They desire to have the free
woman and the promise of God, which is found in the Lord Jesus
Christ. Here in our text, Hagar is Sinai,
Sarah is Jerusalem, which is also Zion. And what are we told
about that? Well, we're told that Jesus Christ
is the chief cornerstone. It all was built upon him, all
built upon his finished work. Sinai represents judgment, represents
death, represents no mercy, no grace, Zion's the exact opposite. Jerusalem's the exact opposite.
This is the city of God, of peace, of joy, of mercy, of grace, purchased
with the blood of Christ for his elected bride. That's where
we have to get to. How do we get there? Well, he
has to put us there. We can't get there. He's got to do it.
And he did on the cross of Calvary whenever he bowed his mighty
head and gave up the ghost unto his father. The veil in the temple
was rent entwined from top to bottom. The city had been built.
by his own work, his own finished work. Sinai can only rumble with
doom for the lost, touching at certain death. But in Zion, there's
a table spread that has the precious blood of the Lord Jesus Christ
in the body that was broken for his people, the wine and the
bread of life. And the Lord said, whosoever
will, let him come, take up the water of life freely and live.
Don't go to Sinai thinking that it's gonna have mercy, that the
Lord's gonna have mercy upon you based upon Sinai. Sinai just
says guilty, death, judgment, wrath. Mankind believe, and I said this
the first hour too, so I kinda did go preach a little more on
the first hour than I meant to. If God didn't spare his son,
what makes us think he's gonna spare us when we stand before
him? What does he tell us is gonna happen in Revelation? When
the Lord was on the earth, he said this, that many shall come
to me in that day saying, Lord, Lord, I've done these wonderful
works in thy name. I've cast out demons. I've done
this, I've done that. You can fill in the blank and
it's sad. It's sad because men really believe in what they do
that God's going to accept them as they are. And what does the
Lord say to them? Depart from me ye that work iniquity.
I never knew you. I never knew you. No, you chose
Hagar. You chose what the flesh chose.
I left you to yourself. And I said, thy will be done.
But to the Lord's people, he makes us say, Lord, thy will
be done. That's the difference. He's the
difference in that. He's no respecter of person.
He's sovereign. He's just. He's holy. His nature does not
allow sin into his presence. It has to be destroyed. Has to
be destroyed. Here's the good news. God hath
made Christ sin for us who knew no sin that we might be made
the righteousness of God in him. What happened to that sin? It's
gone. It's gone. Therefore Sinai doesn't rumble.
It doesn't have lightning flashes and fire shooting out of it towards
the child of God. It's silent. It's silent. because of the finished work
of the Lord Jesus Christ. And now we hear the Lord saying,
come, whosoever will, let him come, take of the water of life
freely. And his people, for lack of better term, they run to him.
They just run, flee to him, don't we? By faith, flee to him. When the Lord was made to bear
our sin, our guilt, our shame, that he put all of that away,
and in doing so, silenced Sinai. We're no longer under bondage.
We're no longer a prisoner. We're no longer under the curse
of the law. Somebody said, well, you make
it sound like we should hate the law. No, we love the Lord's law, and
I'll tell you why. The law revealed what we are as sinners, And it
revealed who God is as holy and as righteous and as just and
as true. You know, the only thing the
Lord had to do for every single person that was ever upon this
earth to go to hell, you know, all you have to do, just leave
us to ourself. That's it. But he chose in mercy to give
his law to show us I am God. Thou shalt have no other gods
before me. Well, we can't keep that, because we're idolators,
or we're idol factories. We're our own idol. We latch
on to idols all the time. Can't keep any of them. We won't
go down through all of them. You understand what I'm saying? The Lord's ways
are not our ways. You go, well, thou shalt not kill. I've never
killed anyone. Well, the scripture says, you hate your brother,
you're a murderer. It shows us that we are not capable of keeping
God's law, that we're not holy, that we're not just, that he's
other than we are. That's why we love his law. Furthermore,
we love it because Christ is the end of the law for righteousness.
If we didn't have the law, we wouldn't understand the fullness
of what Christ had to endure on the cross of Calvary for us
to be redeemed. Because of that finished work,
because we've been redeemed, We were made not like the righteousness
of God. We were made the very righteousness
of God in Christ. We weren't made sort of holy
or becoming holy or getting better. We were sanctified. We were made
holy in Christ Jesus. We weren't sort of justified. We weren't just as if I had never
sinned. We were justified, meaning we've
never sinned one time in the sight of God, and how he sees
it is how it really is. This is the good news of the
gospel. We're free. We're free to worship our Savior,
free to come to his throne of grace, having obtained mercy,
find grace to help us in the time of need. As a matter of
fact, he says, come unto me. Whosoever will, let him come
unto me. There's a call that goes to his children. I love
the verse in Song of Solomon where he said that she ravished
me with one look of her eye. Can you imagine that? You get
butterflies. Remember, maybe, I hope everybody
is still married that gets butterflies when they look at your spouse.
Sometimes, you know, blame goes out. I get that. But remember,
whenever you're early on, you were married, you got butterflies.
And thankfully, I still have that. That's what he's talking
about there. He says, if you look to him,
ravishes his heart. Me? You? All because of what
Christ accomplished. Isn't that glorious? Oh, don't
go to the bond woman. She can't offer you anything.
She can't help you. She can't make the sin go away.
Christ is the end of the law for righteousness. It's already
gone. He put it away, cast it as far as the east is from the
west, never to be remembered again. Herein, 1 John 4, 17, herein
is our love made perfect that we may have boldness in the day
of judgment because as he is, so are we in this world. What
do you mean? What does that mean? Well, what
is he? He's righteous, He's holy, He's
true, He's just. Everything that He is, as He
is, so are we in this world right this second. And it's never not
right now. When the scripture says there's
now therefore no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus,
it's always now. Right now, the Lord's people,
Just as he is, so are we in this world. This is why we do not
seek righteousness anywhere else but Christ. That's why we seek
no other righteousness but Christ. He has been made our wisdom,
our righteousness, our sanctification, our redemption. The bondwoman had to be cast
out. Because the free woman received
the promise of God. You and I received that promise
as well. The promise of the Redeemer. And it was manifest to us. We
see the promise, but we see the promise fulfilled. We see that
it's not that we're waiting on the promise to be fulfilled.
It's already been fulfilled. But that's our hope, is that promise
that was given to Sarah, that promise that was given to Abraham,
that through their lineage, the Messiah would come. And that's
what the whole picture is here, is that Isaac and Ishmael could
not coexist. You can't have the free woman
and the bondmaid together once the promise has been kept and
the bondmaid's offspring has been born. They can't exist together
because the heir, They can't share, that's what she said,
cast them out. He doesn't, he don't get to be
an heir with my son, with my son. And so it is with the Lord's
people. The father says to the Lord's
people, whenever he gives them repentance and faith, he casts
out that bond woman. He says, no, you can't share,
we're not sharing, you're not sharing with the heir, with the
Lord Jesus Christ. He is the one that gets the inheritance. And you know what the Lord says?
He's already given it all to us. Isn't that glorious? He's
already given his people, we're heirs of God and joint heirs
with Jesus Christ. Joint heirs with Jesus Christ.
He's not gonna share his glory with the bondwoman. In closing, I'll tell us this.
The bondwoman cannot hold the elect of God. in bondage. Christ has set his people free,
free, completely free. For God's people, a remedy has
been found. The blood has been shed, successfully
applied, successfully redeeming his people. Salvation's been
secure. The Lord is satisfied with his
son. The Lord Jesus Christ by himself purged our sin. He says, don't go to the bondwoman,
don't go to the law, don't go to Sinai. Flee to Christ, flee
to the promise, flee to the free woman. That's the picture here. It's all about the Lord Jesus
Christ, the covenant of grace. Turn away from any notion that
we can do anything that would please God and look to Christ
who did please God. Don't go to the law trying to
keep the law to please God. Look to Christ who is the end
of the law because of righteousness. That's the message here. Don't
seek bondage. You've been given freedom in
the Lord Jesus Christ. Your sin has been put away. Returning
back to the law only adds iniquity. That's all it can accomplish.
But he already saved us. He saved us from the curse, He
saved us from Satan, saved us from sin, and saved us from the
world. My favorite is He saved us from
self. He saved us from self. And as
we heard, we're kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation,
ready to be revealed at the last time. Believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ and be saved. Bleed to Him. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for your
word. We ask that you would take it and bless it to our understanding
for your glory. In Christ's name, amen.