The Book of Galatians #16
Galatians 4:6-7
Last week we moved into chapter four to study Paul’s continued defense of being saved through faith in Jesus Christ versus trying to keep the Law of God. His illustration beginning at the close of chapter 3 is that of the privilege of being a child of God and as such a full heir to the things of God.
I shared two things from the first five verses last week. One of those was “The Preparation for Sonship” which he describes in verses 1-3 and the other is “The Realization of Sonship” in verses 4-5.
Next comes
3. The Confirmation of Sonship.
I suppose all of us have problems with faith. We say we believe God, and God says, "You're free from the law. You're a son, you have the status of a son, which means all that I have is yours. You're blessed with all spiritual blessings in the heavenly places. It's all yours."
And we agree with the in theology but it can be a little foggy in practice. I’m afraid that many of us are a little insecure in our relationship with God, especially at the first. We know God loves us and makes all these promises, but He it might not last or He might take it all away from us. So notice what Paul says in verse 6.
Now watch. The spirit of His Son is who? The Holy Spirit. Here’s what that means: God, because you are sons, gives you the Spirit. What is the prerequisite to having the Holy Spirit? Sonship, that's all.
"Because you are sons, God has sent forth the spirit of his son into your hearts." Why? To make it real. This is the practical side of the theological truth of salvation. You're saved when you believe in Christ. That's objective fact. The subjective experience that goes with it is that the Spirit enters into you and testifies to you that it is true.
And the evidence of that is we are now entitle to address God as “Abba, Father”. That's a term of endearment, it's a tender term. Like saying 'papa' or 'daddy.' In other words, the very fact that you feel intimate with God, that you can cry out to God with a sense of intimacy as a father who loves you, is proof positive that you're a son.
Think about that. The world stands at arm's length from God. They don't approach God like that. They are scared of God if they believe in God at all. That is their impression of God. He is to be avoided and kept at a distance.
But not so for the child of God. We are close to God. We have His attention. He loves us. We enjoy the relationship. And all of that is a confirmation of being a son. In Ephesians 1:13-14, Paul said that the Father has given unto us the seal of the Spirit. The word 'seal' has to do with authentication, with security; we're sealed and secure. It also has to do with a guarantee.
In the next verse, he says, "He is the security, or earnest, or engagement ring, or down payment, or guarantee." The Spirit is the guarantee of our sonship. We cry, "Abba, father."
If we didn't have the Spirit, we would have absolutely no guarantee that we were the sons of God.
But look at verse 6.
What a beautiful thought! Just think about the fact that the Spirit lives in you.
Do you see the difference between this and the law? A person under the law, a Jew in the Old Testament, the only thing he had was an external relationship with God. He had no internal power or peace. All he had was external rules that couldn't change his heart. The demands were to do this or that, but he could do neither.
That is life under the law. But when you became a son, all of a sudden, all the externals ceased to exist and everything became internal. The Spirit penetrates the heart and transforms it. So living God’s way is not just performing a certain way on the outside, but rather it is now a life that is lived from the inside out.
That's the difference. The life which I live, I live not in the flesh, but by the faith of the Son of God who loved me and gave Himself for me. It's Him, Christ lives in me. No longer is it a fleshly effort without inward power, but it's an inward power with no necessity for fleshly effort. That's because I have the Spirit in me.
Listen, I'd rather be a son than a servant any day of the week! I'd rather have the liberty and power of sonship than the bondage and slavery and impotence of a servant. Hang onto that thought, because Paul's really going to clear off a spot and have a fit about that in a minute.
So there is preparation, realization, confirmation of sonship. Next there is
4. The Consummation of Sonship
Verse 7
When it's all said and done, what does sonship mean? That’s what this verse is all about. Notice, it's always through Christ, because He is the one who receives everything. We only receive it as we're in Christ.
Once Christ came, everything changed. Slaves were freed, not just to roam, but free to become sons of God! Their status was instantly changed. “You're no more a servant but a son." What does that mean? It means you're an heir of God. In fact, Romans 8 says, "You are joint heirs with Christ."
I'm telling you, folks, if we could ever get a grip on that, I don't think we could stay here; we’d just rapture on out of here! Do you realize that everything God has given to Christ, He's given to you?
Here were men were locked up, historically, in bondage to the law. They were enslaved to self-righteousness, enslaved to fleshly efforts, to secure their salvation.
But God moved into the world at just the right time and by what He did with the Son of God, He provided freedom. By what He's done with the Spirit of God, He's provided power to receive and respond to all the inheritance that is ours in Christ. That's the consummation of sonship. I'm telling you, I can get excited about being an heir of God, a joint heir with Jesus Christ.
That leads to the last point, in verses 8-11. There we find
5. The Obligation of Sonship
Now, all this blessing carries some responsibility. Paul drives home the point with great potency.
You see what the Galatians have done? They've accepted salvation by grace. They had a scriptural conversion. But these false teachers came along and said, "You've got to do works; you've got to do works to get saved."
So the Galatians just bought it hook, line and sinker. Paul returns and says, "You’re back to living like you do before you got saved. You worshipped those that weren't even gods! But you came to know the true God and you were known by the true God. What are you doing turning backwards? Why are you going back to the weak and beggarly elements?"
What are the weak and beggarly elements? That is the flesh and the law. "Do you want to be in bondage again?
That's a staggering thing to realize. These people had come all the way from false worship of idols to freedom in Christ, all the way from slaves to sin to sons of God, and now they are going to trade it in for a return to slavery.
It just seems impossible. I mean they have "'known God”. There's deep meaning in that. The word 'know' implies an intimate love relationship. And then He takes it even deeper. They are “known by God." God pursued you and you responded and got saved and an intimate love relationship was established.
And now you’re going to forsake it all and go back to bondage? You’re going backward!
Look at Colossians 2 and let me just show you a passage that compares to this before we wrap up.
Colossians 2:16-17
In other words, all that stuff is gone. And yet here they were going back to it in Galatia.
Notice how he continues in verses 18-19
In other words, don't let anyone get you off the track, off the focus of Christ, into worshipping other things.
Verses 20-23
Apparently, the Colossians had gotten into this too. Life is just a list of rules.
But Paul says, "These things are passing. They are fleshly things. "Your religion has deteriorated into nothing more than external formalism."
That's exactly what he says back in Galatians 4:10. The Jews had all kinds of days and months and times and new moons and festivals and Sabbaths and so forth. Paul is disgusted. He wants to get back to the simplicity that is in Christ, and his heart is just breaking as he speaks in
verse 11
What he's saying is this, "Maybe you're not saved to begin with. Maybe all my work was for nothing. He just can’t imagine someone trading in being a child of God to return to slavery.
And yet in churches and religions all over the world today are people who are in bondage to their religion.
Listen to the testimony of John Wesley. In his post-graduate Oxford days, he was the son of a clergyman and already a clergyman himself. Wesley was very orthodox in his belief, religious in his practice, upright in his conduct, and full of good works.
His biographer says, "He and his friends visited the inmates of the prisons and workhouses of Oxford. They took pity on the slum children of the city, providing them with food, clothing, and education. They observed Saturday as the Sabbath, as well as Sunday. They went to church and to Holy Communion. They gave alms, they searched the Scriptures, they fasted and prayed.
But they were bound in the fetters of their own religion, for they were trusting in themselves, that they were righteous, instead of putting their trust in Jesus Christ and Him crucified."
A few years later, John Wesley, in his own words, "Came to trust in Christ and in Christ only for salvation." This is what he said in respect to his own conversion. "I had, even then, the faith of a servant, and not that of a son." Servants are under bondage to a system, sons are free.
You know something, if you're a Christian, you ought to remember your freedom. Remember you're a son, and don't put yourself back under bondage to the law. A good example of this would be John Newton. He was an only child and lost his mother when he was 7 years old. At the age of 11, he became a sailor and went to sea.
In the words of one of his biographers, "In the unspeakable atrocities of the African slave trade he lived. He plumbed the depths of human sin and degradation. When he was 23, on 10 March 1748, when his ship was in imminent peril of foundering in a terrific storm, he cried to God for mercy and found it. He was truly converted and he never forgot how God had had mercy on him, a former blasphemer.
He sought diligently to remember what he had previously been and what God had done for him. In order to imprint it on his memory, he had written in bold letters and fastened across the wall over the mantelpiece of his study the words of Deuteronomy 15:15.
He saw it every day of his life, and this is what it says. 'Thou shalt remember that thou wast a slave in the land of Egypt and the LORD thy God redeemed thee.'"
Beloved, first I say, if you have been trying to earn the favor of God, you're a slave. If you accept the free gift of Christ, you can be a son.
Secondly, I say to those who are sons, remember you're a son. Don't ever let a day go by when you don't thank God that you were a slave, but you're a son.
Let's pray.
