This is the continuation of the discussion of slaves versus sons. We saw that when God made the covenant with the Jews from Mount Sinai, that this covenant was made between God, as party number one, and the Jews, as party number two. Because God could be counted upon to keep his covenant, and the Jews could not, indebtedness would be created. The question is: why did God—knowing that—why did he do that? Well it was always the habit of the enemy of God and man to bring accusations against people. The enemy knows that God intended to have sons. The enemy knew, for example, that God did not choose angels to be his heirs, but instead He chose humans. We’ve had that discussion in a multi-part series, previously.
So the enemy knew that God had sworn on oath to himself to make humans his heirs. He [Satan] didn’t quite know how this would happen because God had hidden, in himself, this plan for endless ages until in the fullness of time Jesus would be born. But the enemy was always looking for how this plan would be brought forth by God in human time. Once he saw a way that God would do it then he would move to bring an accusation against the people through whom God was doing this—revealing this plan and working this plan so that he could destroy them—because it was always, and always has been the enemy’s plan to destroy the humans who are the subjects of God’s plan. If he could bring an accusation against them that would result in God having to annihilate them, then he would be able to successfully thwart God’s plan for having sons.
By establishing a law, and knowing that the law would make slaves out of them, God gave prescripted results for each transgression and elected to treat the nation as one entity and to treat humans as another. So when sin was a national sin, the nation would have to pay for its sins. When the sin was a personal sin, then the person would have to pay for his sins. For example, the nation was under the obligation of observing the Sabbath year. That was the seventh year when they would not work and their land would be idle. (Inserted – actual verse—“ ‘For six years you are to sow your fields and harvest the crops, but during the seventh year let the land lie unplowed and unused. Then the poor among your people may get food from it, and the wild animals may eat what they leave. Do the same with your vineyard and your olive grove.’” – Exodus 23:10,11)
By the way, for those who want to go back under the law there are all kinds of problems with that. For example: do they stay out the seventh year? If, under the law, the land had to be idle for the seventh year, then the comparable posture would be: whatever business you are in would have to remain untended in the seventh year. How do you go from the implications of this in an agrarian society to a business-oriented society? Nobody would stand for that, but that is the insincerity of the law-keepers. But the point being: when Israel, for 490 years, neglected to keep the law of letting the land lie idle every seventh year, 70 Sabbath years became owed—under the law.
God then took Israel into Babylonian captivity for 70 years. We know that from the specific writings of Daniel. Daniel said, in Daniel 9, “According to the word of the Lord spoken by the prophet Jeremiah, I knew that the captivity of Israel would last for 70 years.” (Inserted – “In the first year of his reign, I, Daniel, understood from the Scriptures, according to the word of the Lord given to Jeremiah the prophet, that the desolation of Jerusalem would last seventy years.” – Daniel 9:2) Where did the number come from? Well there are 70 Sabbath years in a period of 490 years, and when they had neglected to keep the Sabbath law—the law of the seventh year—for 490 years they owed 70. Now God had a plan for that. You owed 70. If you were taken into slavery for 70 years you satisfied the requirement.
If there were no such law then God would have to somehow extract payment from the Jews for the law and that might have resulted in his casting away the nation of Israel. God has never cast away Israel and there will come a time when He will save Israel in the same way everyone else is saved—through the Son of God—because the intention of God is more than to keep people from going to hell. That is important of course, but the purpose of God for saving anyone is to conform them to sonship because that is what God created the world and created man to accomplish: that He would have sons. All creation is waiting for the revelation of the sons of God. (Inserted – actual verse—“The creation waits in eager expectation for the sons of God to be revealed.” – Romans 8:19)
So by establishing this framework of law, there was punishment for infractions without the need to destroy a people. Now the law was clearly righteous. The law was righteous because even though the Jews refused to keep the law, the law was not about the righteousness of the Jews nor did the law make anybody righteous. The law was about the righteousness of God who—although the Jews would violate the law—God would be faithful anyway. God would keep his part of the bargain and in the fullness of time God would have his sons.
The Jews needed to be made into a nation so God made them into a nation. They needed to be preserved from their enemies so God covenanted to preserve them. The Jews needed to be guaranteed their economy and God guaranteed their economy. The Jews needed good health, like anyone else, and God guaranteed their good health. None of the diseases of Egypt would come upon them. In exchange for which, they would be preserved under the law by keeping the law so that God would not have to discard them as a nation. Then in the fullness of time, God would bring his son—born under the law—He would bring him forth at the appointed time. And that’s what the Scriptures said. (Inserted – Galatians 4:4,5)
So let’s review this passage of Scripture that runs through Galatians, the 3rd chapter. We’ve read part of it before, but I would like to go back now and read all of it in conjunction with this distinction between how the law made you a slave but God’s intention was to make people sons. “Brothers, let me take an example from everyday life. Just as no one can set aside or add to a human covenant that has been duly established, so it is in this case. The promises were spoken to Abraham and to his seed. The Scripture does not say ‘and to seeds,’ meaning many people, but ‘and to your seed,’ meaning one person, who is Christ.” (Inserted – Galatians 3:15,16)
So there was a covenant that God had set up with himself and now He made Abraham the beneficiary of the covenant and He did so 430 years before the law at Mount Sinai. My point is: There was an existing covenant of sonship that predated the covenant at Mount Sinai by 430 years and so when—in the 3rd chapter of Galatians where it speaks of the two covenants—he is speaking about the covenant of sonship that predates the covenant of the law and the covenant of law. These are the two covenants—the two ways in which God has extended himself to human beings.
“What I mean,” verse 17, “What I mean is this: The law, introduced 430 years later,”—the law meaning the Mosaic Law from Mount Sinai contained in the Torah. There is no question that that’s what he is talking about. “The law, introduced 430 years later, does not set aside the covenant previously established by God”—the word “previous” means it was established before the fact; 430 years before the fact. “For if the inheritance,”—that law, you see does not do away with the promise. The promise is still standing and so the question will become: What was the purpose of the law? If the law did not deliver the promise, what was the purpose of the law? And he will tell us that.
“For if the inheritance depends on the law, then it no longer depends on a promise;” In other words, if you could—by keeping the law—“earn” the promise, then it is not a promise; it’s your wages. So the law was never given to produce what was otherwise to be produced by a promise. Sonship is by a promise. What did the law do then? “What, then, was the purpose of the law? It was added because of transgressions.” ((Inserted – actual verse—“What I mean is this: The law, introduced 430 years later, does not set aside the covenant previously established by God and thus do away with the promise. For if the inheritance depends on the law, then it no longer depends on a promise; but God in his grace gave it to Abraham through a promise. What, then was the purpose of the law? It was added because of transgressions until the Seed to whom the promise referred had come.” –Galatians 3:17-19a) “Transgressions” means “sins.” The law was added because of the sinful condition of the Jews. God had a choice. He could have eradicated the Jews or He could have assigned specific punishments for specific infractions and that’s what He did.
Therefore the law was a way of God saving the Jews from the law of sin and death. If you sin, you die. The law was added because of transgression. The fact is that by that time human beings were routinely sinners and therefore were subject to annihilation because the wages of sin is death. (Inserted – actual verse—“For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” – Romans 6:23) The law was added because of transgression, that is: to specify punishments for infractions so that if you did certain things, certain punishments would follow but not necessarily death. In that sense, the law made you a slave but it at least saved your life.
But that was never the intention of God—either just to save your life or to make you a slave—but the law was added because of transgression until the Seed to whom the promise referred had come. The Seed was the reference to God’s promise in the 12th chapter of Genesis when God said to Abraham, “And in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed.” The Seed would be Christ. (Inserted – actual verse—“ ‘I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.’” – Genesis 12:3)
“The law was put into effect through angels by a mediator. A mediator, however, does not represent just one party; but God is one. Is the law, therefore, opposed to the promises of God?” (Inserted – Galatians 3:19b-21a) Do you have a conflict between the law and the purposes of God? The law would make you into a slave but you were supposed to be made into a son. Is there a conflict? Not at all, not if you understand what the law was for. “For if a law had been given that could impart life”—if you could become a son through the law “then righteousness would certainly have come by the law. But the Scripture declares that the whole world is a prisoner of sin, so that what was promised, being given through faith in Jesus Christ, might be given to those who believe. Before this faith came, we were held prisoners by the law, locked up until faith should be revealed. So the law was put in charge to lead us to Christ that we might be justified by faith.” (Inserted – Galatians 3:21b-24)
In short, the law preserved your life by specifying what the punishment was for the infraction and did not result in a blanket annihilation of people for infractions under the rule of sin. “Now that faith has come, we are no longer under the supervision of the law.”(Because by faith we are born into sonship.) (Inserted – Galatians 3:25) This raises a very important question: If people cannot be disciplined by the law when they are the sons of God, how do you discipline them? Does it mean that it is now okay to kill, steal, commit adultery and so on—as forbidden by the law? The answer is: of course not. But there is an alternative to the law to the raising of the sons of God and I will devote at least one program to that question. The answer is called: the Holy Spirit. Simple, isn’t it? But we will get into how the Spirit of God disciplines the character of the sons of God in a way that the law never could.
The law cannot make you a better believer. The law robs you of the right of being led by the Spirit because you cannot, at the same time, walk in the Spirit and keep the law. But again, I am ahead of myself. So because of all of that, you are sons of God, verse 26, “You are sons of God,”—not by the law, you are sons of God as a result of promise. The promise is, “through faith in Christ Jesus, for all of you who are baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ.” And then the famous verses, “Neither Jew nor Greek, slave or free, male or female, because you are all one in Christ.” Because He is the Father of your spirit. It is in our spirits that we become the sons of God and not in our flesh. “If you belong to Christ, then are you Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.” (Inserted – actual verse—“You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.” – Galatians 3:26-29)
This promise, you see, existed 430 years before the Jews come out of Egyptian slavery. If you belong to Christ, you have benefited from that promise—the same promise that God made to Abraham when He walked with him under the night stars because God created man to be the sons of God and therefore whoever ends up being a son of God is the actual fulfillment of that which God promised to Abraham. So when it refers to, “Then are you Abraham’s seed,” he is not saying that you are descended from Abraham in the flesh. But to whoever benefits from this covenant that God made with himself and made Abraham the beneficiary, then that person is part of the promise that God made and that’s the fulfillment of what God promised to Abraham.
What God promised to Abraham was that sons of God would come through the Seed of Abraham—meaning Christ, not the Jews, and not Judaism, and not the Torah and not the observations. Whoever will lead you back to that has either knowingly, or unknowingly bewitched you. (Inserted – actual verse—“You foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? Before your very eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified. I would like to learn just one thing from you: Did you receive the Spirit by observing the law, or by believing what you heard? Are you so foolish? After beginning with the Spirit, are you now trying to attain your goal by human effort? Have you suffered so much for nothing—if it really was for nothing? Does God give you his Spirit and work miracles among you because you observe the law, or because you believe what you heard?” Galatians 3:1-5)
Now you may not have known this before, but now that you know it you are accountable for it. Let it be understood: if you have abandoned your faith in Jesus Christ, and you do so by going back under the law, you cannot say, “No, I still believe in Jesus.” If you go back to keeping the Mosaic Law, you have walked away from your faith in Jesus Christ. You have fallen from grace. You have fallen from the grace of sonship and you have become a slave. Now, why would you want to support anything that would take your liberty from you and make you a slave? Why would you want to restore the temple in Jerusalem, which is coincident with slavery? Why would you want to be identified with the nation of Israel that has yet to accept Jesus as the Lord?
Now, pray for the Jews…but pray for the Arabs also. Do not find yourself from one camp to the other. You are after all, the light of the world and God is bringing the Arabs to himself in this season. If you will be on God’s side then, in this season, be praying for the Arabs also. Don’t let people bewitch you with the prejudice purely in favor of the Jews and against the Arabs because they are both the sons of Abraham, and they are both subject to redemption. Now let’s go on for a moment. “What I am saying is that as long as the heir is a child, he is no different from a slave, although he owns the whole estate. He is subject to guardians and trustees until the time set by his father.” (Inserted – Galatians 4:1,2)
This is not saying that when you are a new believer that you are subject to pastors and teachers and others to raise you up. No. The governors and trustees referred to here is the law. Look at it, “He is subject to guardians and trustees until the time set by his father. So also, when we were children, we were in slavery under the basic principles of the world. But when the time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under law, to redeem those under law,”—note that word: “to redeem those under the law. (Inserted – Galatians 4:2-5a) If you go back under the law now, even though you were never under the law, if you go back under it you have gone back into a need to be redeemed again. And if you go back in that respect then you have emptied the cross of its power and you have made Jesus subject to an open shame.
The cross has been made of non-effect to whoever goes back under the law because you have left your salvation and now you have to be saved all over again because Jesus came to redeem those under the law. If you have left your redemption and gone back under the law you are needing to be redeemed all over again and you have left the cross and become a slave—to redeem those under the law that we might receive the full rights of sonship. The alternative to being under the law is to having the full rights of sonship. If you have done that, or even flirted with that idea, repent, and come back to your first love, who is the Lord Jesus Christ. Reject your status as a slave and let your eyes be opened to the fact that there are those who have made you into a slave by their teachings.
This is not the gospel; this is another gospel and I will say, as Paul said here in Galatians, “Whoever draws you away, knowingly, let him be accursed.” (Inserted – actual verse—“But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let him be eternally condemned! As we have already said, so now I say again: If anybody is preaching to you a gospel other than what you accepted, let him be eternally condemned!” – Galatians 1:8,9) He said it twice.
“So you are no longer,” here it is, verse 6, “Because you are sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, ‘Abba, Father.’ So you are no longer a slave, but a son; and since you are a son, God has made you also an heir. Formerly, when you did not know God, you were slaves to those who by nature are not gods. But now that you know God—or rather are known by God—how is it that you are turning back to those weak and miserable principles? Do you wish to be enslaved by them all over again? You are observing special days (Sabbath days) and months and seasons and years! I fear for you, that somehow I have wasted my efforts on you.” (Inserted – Galatians 4:6-11)
Paul is speaking here. There is no way to get around this. I know that there are people who teach you the benefits of the law, especially in dietary habits. There are no benefits to the law. The law makes you a slave. Well then, how do you actually discipline a child of God if you don’t do it by the law? I will devote an entire program to that consideration. You hear people saying today, “I do the things I do to serve God so that my household is protected, my finances are protected, my health is protected, that God blesses America.” You have people who are saying, “I give to Israel and I support Israel so that God will bless me.” That’s the mentality of a slave. That is someone who does not understand that he is a son. You are still bargaining for God to extend goodness to you. If you are a son you would have known that you have an inheritance as a son because not only are you a son, you are also an heir. Now this is explosive stuff, so I hope that you will join me as I continue to discuss this. This is critically important to your life and your relationship to God. I’m Sam Soleyn; God bless you and I’ll see you again.
Scripture References:
Exodus 23:10,11
Daniel 9:2
Romans 8:19
Galatians 3:15-19a
Romans 6:23
Genesis 12:3
Galatians 3:19b-29
Galatians 3:1-5
Galatians 4:1-5a
Galatians 1:8,9
Galatians 4:6-11
