February 10 we will study Galatians 3:26-4:31. Discussion questions are:

Would you describe yourself as closer to God now than the day you were baptized?

2.  What would have happened to the Galatians if the Judiazers had succeeded?

3.  What does the metaphor of “putting on” in Galatians 3:27 teach about baptism?

4.  Why does the Bible use the term “adoption” to describe our salvation?

5.  What is the significance of the Holy Spirit crying out in our hearts “abba”?

6.  If you are and heir of God, what does that imply? (4:7)

7.  Agree/disagree: “The foremost symptom of legalism is lack of joy.”

a.  Is there any passage in Galatians 4 that comments on this? (4:15)

8.  What is Paul’s point in the analogy of Sarah and Hagar?

a.  What would cause a freed slave to want to return to slavery?

b.  What would cause a freed Christian to want to return to a system of lawkeeping?

Sermon: The Feeling of Freedom

Do you remember the Iran hostage crisis? How long ago would you say that was? Would you believe 28 years? Those of you who were old enough to watch television news shows back then remember that for 444 days beginning November 4, 1979 and ending January 20, 1981, every night there was a scroll across the bottom of the TV screen announcing how many days the hostages had been in captivity.

When the hostages were finally released the entire country went into a celebration mode. New York City had a ticker-tape parade of welcome. Los Angeles rekindled its Olympic

Flame. Chicago released 10,000 yellow balloons. Washington finally lit its national Christmas tree.

Can you imagine one of those former hostages, free now for 28 years announcing, “I miss the blindfold and the handcuffs. I’d like to be sitting in that old cellar in Iran wondering if I’d ever see my loved ones again. I long to be a captive again and give up all this freedom.”

Somebody asked one of the hostages just a couple of weeks after they had been set free, “Would you ever go back?” He replied, “Only in a B-52!”

Long ago in a place called Galatia, several hundred Christians in Lystra, Derbe, Antioch of Pisidia and Iconium were set free from the shackles of law. Those that were of Jewish background were set free from the Law of Moses. Those that were of Gentile background were set free from the moral law which restricts all men. They had found freedom in Christ - freedom from guilt and freedom from trying to follow a list of rules. Those who were of Jewish background had been captive not for 444 days but for 1500 years. That is a long time to be shackled to a code.

But something horrible is happening to these Galatian Christians. Someone has come along following the message of freedom in Christ and taught these young Christians, “It will enhance your Christianity if you will put the shackles back on. If you will become a hostage to law again, then and only then, will you feel really secure about your eternal salvation. If you would find security in Christ you must add law to grace. The message was “Grace plus law makes a great marriage.” The truth was “Grace plus law makes a schizophrenic Christian.”

Chapters 3 and 4 of Galatians deals with the Law of Moses versus the grace of Christ. Paul introduces and closes this discussion with a couple of unforgettable statements:

You foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? Before your very eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified. – Galatians 3:1

It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery. – Galatians 5:1

This rather long and involved discussion of law verses grace begins with, “Who has bewitched you?” and concludes with, “It is for freedom the Christ has set us free.”

Paul uses lots of metaphors to help us understand the role of law in our lives. In chapter 3 he said the law was like the slave who took the children to school every day, disciplined them, and saw to it they applied themselves to their schoolwork. This pedagogue, or “schoolmaster” was pictured in Roman art carrying a whip. The schoolmaster was despised by Roman children because he made them go to school and made them learn. Paul says the Law of Moses was something like those schoolmasters. It gave us a whipping when we needed it, to get us to Christ. But now that we have come to Christ we don’t need a schoolmaster to get us there. In chapter 4 he says, “You have come of age.” Listen again to the first 4 verses of Galatians 4:

Think of it this way. If a father dies and leaves an inheritance for his young children, those children are not much better off than slaves until they grow up, even though they actually own everything their father had. They have to obey their guardians until they reach whatever age their father set. And that’s the way it was with us before Christ came. We were like children; we were slaves to the basic spiritual principles of this world. But when the right time came, God sent his Son…. – Galatians 4:1-4

That’s the beginning of the message that says, “You have come of age.” You are no longer minors. You are no longer children needing to be paddled for not doing your homework.

The Roman custom was that the father decided when a boy became a man and when a girl became a woman. The father would just decide it and announce it. Paul alludes to that in verse 2 when he says “They have to obey their guardians until they reach whatever age their father set.” So there was this moment in time, selected by God, when those who were minors would become mature. And that moment was when God sent his son.

There was a ceremony held in Roman families to indicate that the father had decided that you are no longer a child but you are now considered mature. A Roman boy would bring his toys and lay them on the altar of whatever god they worshipped. A Roman girl would bring her dolls and lay them on the altar. The toys would be sacrificed and they would never see them again. What a great moment that must have been in the life of a Roman child.

I will never forget 2 joys that came into my life when I was baptized. One was this overwhelming sense that my sins were forgiven. The other was a serendipity. I didn’t know I would receive it when I was baptized. My dad took me aside the next day and affirmed how significant it was for me to be baptized. Then he said, “I want you to know that I will never spank you again. If you are old enough to become a Christian, you are old enough to know right from wrong.” (If I had known my dad was going to do that I would have been baptized years earlier!) I will never forget the feeling I had when he told me that. I did not feel like going out and seeing how much mischief I could get in. I felt honored and a sense that I had entered a new phase of my life that called on me to be responsible for my actions. I remember feeling, “In my father’s eyes I am a man!” And I will tell you something else I did beginning that day. I began keeping my father’s laws much more than I ever had before! I felt I needed to live up to my calling.

I think I know how a Roman child felt when his father pronounced him a man. Remember Paul’s words in I Corinthians 13, “When I was a child I thought as a child, I spoke as a child, but now that I have become a man I have put away…(my toys).” In Galatians 4:3, Paul’s expression for the childish things we put away is “basic spiritual principles”.

In vs. 8-9 he comments on the tendency of the Galatian Christians to return to their childhood, their period of enslavement. “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?” Why would anyone want to return to slavery? Why would anyone want to return to a time when a schoolmaster stood over you with a whip and forced you to do your homework?

Then Paul changes the illustration from negative to positive. In verse 5 he encourages the Galatians to think of their salvation as an adoption. Listen to Galatians 4:5 – “God sent him to buy freedom for us who were slaves to the law, so that he could adopt us as his very own children. One of the joys of being adopted is your freedom has been bought. That’s slave language. We have been redeemed from slavery. In verse 10 he lists some of the things the Galatians have been redeemed from like the observance of special days and months and seasons and years, which were all laid on people in the Law of Moses.

I’ve been redeemed and I’ve been adopted! I have an adopted child, my oldest son, Jody. A lot of us non-adopted folks were accidents. I don’t want to hurt your self-esteem but most of us weren’t planned, we just happened. But not so with adopted children. Every adopted child was intentionally adopted. Two adults looked at a child and said, “We want you! We choose you!” I will never forget sitting in the Holiday Inn in Abilene, Texas as we waited for a representative from Christian Homes of Abilene to bring us our baby. The lady gave him to Judy first and I just sort of stood there thinking, “Yep, that’s a baby.” Then Judy handed him to me and I cradled him in my arm, his head just an inch away from my heart. At that moment, everything changed. Everything changed because this little baby had position! At that moment he became my son. Instantly he had position with me, position he can never lose. There is nothing he could ever do to make me stop loving him.

God looked at you and me and He picked us up and held us in his arms and said, “I choose you to be my child. I adopt you. I have one son who is my begotten son but you will be my adopted son, my adopted daughter, my chosen child.”

When you were baptized into Christ did you feel safe in the arms of your Father? Grace does that! I love the metaphor Paul uses in Galatians 3:27 to describe how we contacted the grace of God. He says, “For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. – Galatians 3:27 To Paul, baptism is like putting on a coat. The coat is what protects you from the cold and all you are asked to do is put it on. You don’t have to make the coat. You don’t have to buy the coat. You don’t have to earn the coat. Just put on the coat! That’s grace and that’s why baptism is so important – it’s the way you accept grace. It’s the way you put on Christ.

Along with adoption there is something you might call the spirit of sonship. Its referenced in verse 6, “Because you are sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, “Abba, Father.”.” – Galatians 4:6 You may be aware that the word “abba” was the affectionate word a little Jewish child used for his father. The idea is that when God adopted us He wanted to make us feel secure so he sent the Holy Spirit into our hearts teaching us to feel about God like a small child feels about his daddy. That is the spirit of sonship. It comes from having position with God. Law does not give you the feeling of position but grace does.

After the Civil War there were a few former slaves who had lived for generations in slavery. They found themselves set free by the Emancipation Proclamation and virtually overnight they are told, “O.K. you are not a slave anymore. You are free. Go do what you choose to do.” Those few former slaves tried freedom and weren’t comfortable with it and chose to continue living like slaves. Can you imagine a greater tragedy than to reject freedom because it just doesn’t feel right? “What feels right is someone making me get up before dawn and go pick cotton all day and treating me without any respect. That just feels right to me.” Freedom in Christ can intimidate you. It takes a little while to get used to it.

Paul gives one more illustration about being adopted. It’s in vs. 7, “Now you are no longer a slave but God’s own child. And since you are his child, God has made you his heir.” – Galatians 4:7 An heir! Think about your inheritance. Its described in I Corinthians - “No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him” – I Corinthians 2:9 No one has ever envisioned it. No artist has ever painted it. No poet has ever described it. No philosopher has ever had a concept of what it is like. Oh, the things God has prepared for those who love Him! Even Revelation does not come close to picturing it. Streets of gold and gates of pearl are woefully inadequate previews of the inheritance God has in mind for you.

Incredibly those believers in Galatia are considering going back to a system of law keeping that has no inheritance. So Paul bemoans their loss in vs. 15, “Where is that joyful and grateful spirit you felt then?” – Galatians 4:15 That’s the question I would ask you today. When you were baptized how did you feel? Do you still feel that way? If not, what happened to your joy? A couple who had been married for several years were driving down the highway when the wife, who was sitting close to the passenger door said, “I feel like the intimacy is going out of our marriage. I remember when we used to sit shoulder to shoulder and held hands when we rode in the car.” The husband replied, “I’m not the one who moved.” If your relationship with God isn’t what it once was – who moved?

As Paul concludes this discussion he drives his point home with an interesting question. You know how the Jewish people were so proud of having Abraham as their ancestral father. Paul challenges them with a question they have never asked themselves before. He asks, “Who is your mother?” He reminds them of Abraham having children by two women – Sarah and Hagar. One was a child of promise and the other was a child of human ingenuity. One of the boys was born free; the other was born a slave. The children of Hagar are those who quit trusting in the grace of God to provide and decide it’s up to them to make things work. The children of Sarah just trust God to provide.

What is your plan of salvation? Are you going to be saved because you have kept the rules good enough or are you going to be saved because you have a God whose word is good enough?