you. You can find today's text in Galatians 4. If you don't have a Bible, you can find the text in your order of worship. So from Galatians 4, I say to you, hear the word of God. I mean that the heir, as long as he is a child, is no different from a slave, though he is the owner of everything. But he is under guardians and managers until the date set by his father. In the same way, we also, when we were children, were enslaved to the elementary principles of the world. But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who are under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. And because your sons, God has sent the spirit of His Son into our hearts crying, Abba, Father. So you are no longer a slave but a son. And if a son, then an heir through God, let us pray. Father, I pray now that you would come and open the eyes of the blind and the ears of the death. I pray for those in here who struggle with what it means for you to be their father, that you would give them insight, that you would give them comfort and grace and mercy. I pray for myself that you be in my head and in my thinking and my heart, and in my understanding, and in my mouth, and in my speaking. In Christ's name, we pray these things, amen, amen. You know, over the years, when you have been a ministry for a while for me, that has been, I don't know, 15 or 20 years now, you do lots of funerals and lots of weddings and memorial services and this and that. And it is always great to hear people's stories. And over the years, one of the things I have noticed and all the literature bears this out as well, is just the tremendous influence that fathers have in the lives of their children. I mean, it's unbelievable. Even compared to the mother. And why is that so important? Well, it's because throughout the Bible, what does God call himself? God, the father. And so whatever your father was like, you tend to bring that into your relationship with God. So for example, with me, you know, many of you know, my story, oftentimes when people ask me, you know, why did you, why did you join a range of Italian? And I almost never tell the truth, at least not all of the truth. You see, part of the truth is I just thought it would be a cool thing to do. And I wanted to be Chuck Norris when I was a little boy. But the other part of it is I was driven, frankly, by a hatred of the man who raised me. He abused my family for 15 years. And I thought no one is ever going to treat my family like that. And so I'm going to become the kind of person that does that. And so when you've got a father like that, you could see how it would skew your view of God, the father. Can you trust them or not? Is he going to be there for you or not? You see, our view of our earthly fathers ultimately affects positively or negatively our view of God, the father. You know, another story, my biological father to show you how much influence he had and he was never even there. You know, my whole, since I was a kid, I can remember being interested in furniture making and woodworking and how things went together. And at some point, I think someone told me, well, you don't have a dad to teach you that stuff. I just give it up. And so I never did it. And I always thought, well, gosh, I never had a dad. And it's probably in my, it's probably 10 years ago, eight years ago, we spent some time with my biological father, who's a painter. He speaks several language, all these things. And at that time, I was just dabbling. I thought, man, I really like to learn how to do woodworking. But I can't do it. And I asked my dad, we're walking on a beach one day and out of the blue, I said, that kind of question. And he said, sure, what is it? I said, do you ever do any woodworking? He said, what? I said, woodworking. He said, no, I never even thought about doing woodworking. And I said, you're kidding me. And he said, why? And I said, I'm never mind. In other words, I didn't do it because I thought I didn't have him, he wasn't there to teach me. So my whole life, the fact that he wasn't there affected something I wanted to do. And he wasn't there. And if he had been there, he wouldn't have been able to help me anyway. So after that, I was pretty freed up. And so I started to teach myself. The point is, as look at the influence he had, and he wasn't even there, it's huge. And so as we look Paul, the apostle Paul, in the book of Galatians, most people, when you teach Galatians, you constantly, and over and over again, he talks about the doctrine of justification. And that's true. And he talks about the doctrine of sanctification. And that's true. But the culmination of the gospel and the writings of the apostle Paul is neither justification or sanctification. In fact, it is the doctrine of adoption. I started talking about that a few weeks ago today. It sort of culminates. You see, if you remember, the doctrine of justification is basically this, that God counts us righteous, not because of the works that we do, but because of the work of Jesus. And we put our faith in that, and God declares us legally righteous. He sees us as being as righteous as Jesus. So another way to look at it is the doctrine of justification gives you a new reputation. Doesn't matter what your old reputation was, if you trust in Jesus and the eyes of God, you have a new reputation, and that reputation is the reputation of Jesus. And we talked about the doctrine of sanctification. How God's spirit helps us to become more and more like Jesus. And so if justification gives us a new reputation, sanctification gives us a new direction. In other words, we're now following Jesus and we're seeking to be more and more like Him. Now what does adoption do? If justification gives us a new reputation and sanctification gives us a new direction, the doctrine of adoption gives us a new family. It gives us a new family and it gives us a new father. That's what we talked about last week. How important? If we're united with Christ and we're sons and daughters of God and Jesus is a son and daughter of God, then we're all united to each other. That means we're all siblings. Now interestingly enough, your church family is just as dysfunctional as your home family. Trust me. The difference is that our father and elder brother is not. You see, when you've got a dysfunctional family with a dysfunctional father, which we all are, it never ends out perfectly. And yet, our hope is that we have the kind of father that many of us long to have our whole lives. I didn't have the kind of father that I hoped I would have had. And yet when I became a Christian, I found that father. That's what Paul is going to talk about. You see, you can talk doctrine all day long and you can talk about forgiveness and you can talk about sanctification and everything. But at the end of the day, the question I have for you is, do you really believe that God is your father? What does that mean? Is it just something you use? And when you pray, you know, father, it's sort of like the way you start your prayers. Or when you think of God, do you genuinely think of a father with all of the good that comes along with that? With all of the compassion and all of the longing, all the encouragement, even the discipline that your own father maybe should have given you. Because in God, the Father, you have it through Jesus. We're going to look at three things this morning that Paul sort of points out. And if you're a note-taker, the three things are just this. The first thing he gives us is an illustration. Number one is an illustration. The second thing he's going to talk about is a quotation. Quotation, that's number two. And the third thing he's going to talk about is an application of the doctrine of adoption. So that's an illustration, a quotation, and an application. Got it? So let's look first to the illustration. How does Paul open this up? How does he sort of get things rolling when he's going to talk about our relationship to God, the Father? Look at verses one and two. He says, I mean that the heir, as long as he is a child, is no different from a slave, though he is the owner of everything. But he is under guardians and managers until the date set by his father. In the same way, we also, when we were children, we're enslaved to the elementary principles of the world. So what is Paul saying here? If you remember, the last time we talked about the doctrine of adoption, we talked about the fact that Paul said that the law was a pedagogue or a school master that takes us to Christ. And that's sort of from a Greek understanding of the world. And a pedagogue was basically, if you remember, a pedagogue, a picture of a pedagogue and Greek art, he always has a big stick with him because the job of a pedagogue is not to teach necessarily. It's to make sure the child gets from point A to point B. And anytime the child steps off of the narrow path the pedagogue is there with the stick to hit him and discipline him and make sure he's back on. So the main job of a pedagogue is simply to discipline. And as Paul transitions in chapter four and he talks about, he says, I mean what I mean is this. He's still talking about adoption and he's still talking about us as God's children, but he gives a different illustration. And the illustration he gives this time is from the Roman world. He says that the heir, as long as he is a child, is no different than a slave. Now the sort of the picture he's painting here is you've got a 13 or 14-year-old child, male child, and his father passes away. It's a very wealthy man. And so here's the child, the dad has passed away. And now the child, in fact, is the owner of everything. He's the heir on one hand. On the other hand, he's no different than a slave. Why? Anyone who's under 18 in this room, I'm guessing can tell you why. If you're a child, if you're a teenager, what are teenagers feeling? Everyone's just telling me what to do. Why are you telling me what to do? Or you tell me what to do and you watch over your shoulder, you know, you tell someone to cut the grass like, hey, I do. And you look out the window. No, different than a slave. Because what does a slave do? A slave does what he is told and a slave moves in the path that is projected for him or her. Same thing with the heir. The child does what he is told and the child is constantly shepherded from place to place, without any freedom, relatively speaking. And Paul says, until the time set by the father, notice he says, as long as he's child, he's no different from the slave, though he's owner of everything. And verse two, but he is under guardians and managers until the date set by his father. So the picture is this, it, a child that has a very wealthy father with the biggest state, he's 14 years old and he dies, the father dies. It's now the child's owner of everything. And from in Roman, the Roman world, from the age of 14 to 25, by law, the child would have a guardian and a manager, or a guardian who was a manager. The guardian is the person that would be responsible for the child's moral education and making sure that all of that was taken care of and went to school and things. And the manager or steward would be responsible for the estate. He would take care of the financial business until the child was old enough to take it. According to law, the child was eligible to receive the estate at the age of 25 unless the father set a different date. What's that mean? Well, it means that if your father didn't like you, he could set the date to be the age 65. Because at the end of the day, the father, even if it is the one who determines the time that, in fact, you will get the estate. But either way, until the time set by the father, you are waiting and you have no freedom. You're wondering, when am I going to receive all this? And Paul says, that's exactly how we were. That's exactly how we were until the time set by the father, until the coming of Jesus. Look at verse three, he says, in the same way, we also, when we were children, were enslaved to the elementary principles of the world. Now, that verse three is one of the most controversial verses in the New Testament. And the reason is that phrase, elementary spirits of the world are elements, elements, elementary principles of the world. And the reason is, is because it depends on what your ethnicity is, will drive how you read it. Because at the end of the day, it means it's the word stokia. It just means basic things. And if you came from a Jewish background, they would tend to read it more educationally. So stokia would mean like your ABCs. Do you know your ABCs? Just the grammar. Do you know your time tables? Do you know the basic things in life, whereas from a Greek point of view, it would mean elemental things, right? Earth, wind, fire, and water. And maybe the spirits that were behind Earth, wind, fire, water. And I think the controversy is a little bit overhyped because you remember in Galicia, you had a mixed race congregation, a congregation that was multiple ethnicities. And so interestingly enough, Paul could use one word. And the Jews would hear it one way. And the Gentiles might hear it another way, but they both should have gotten the point. In other words, until the time set by the Father, we were enslaved to the elemental things. For the Jews, it was you were enslaved to your ABCs. You were enslaved to the law. Just the basic things. Are you following the law? ABC, DE, FG? Are you or not? And to the Gentiles, are you enslaved to those things that you hold to be idols? Until the time set by the Father, Paul says you were. No matter who you are, whether you're religious or irreligious, whether you're a Pharisee or not a Pharisee, you are all struggle with and will always be under slavery to things unless somehow you're able to be set free. Unless at the proper time, the Father has set you free. And the question is, if you've been set free, why do you still live like a slave? That's what Paul asks over and over in this letter. Later on, he's going to ask that very question. He's going to say, whatever happened to your joy, if you're freed by the Father, why are you living like a slave? If you're freed by the Father, why are you still insistent on making sure everyone knows their ABCs? When you're free of that, how are we freed from that? You see, the illustration is that we're enslaved to the elemental things of the world, whether it's the law or whether it's something else. And Paul gives us the answer to that as a quotation, which he used that he starts with the word but. Remember but it's the greatest word in the Bible. Whenever you hear it, get rid of everything that came before. And what is the quotation, Paul gives us? It's verses four and five. Now, why am I calling that a quotation? The answer is just that most scholars, almost everyone that I read, agreed that verses four and five are actually quotation from the ancient church's worship service style. The ancient church, if you read throughout the New Testament, you'll see oftentimes when things are set apart, that the ancient church was developing a liturgy at the time. And that was part of their liturgy. And really what it is, it's nothing more or less than a six-point gospel outline. If you want to know how to tell someone about Jesus, you can use verses four and five here. And I'll show you right now. Look at verse four and Paul says, but when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his son, born of a woman, born under the law to redeem those who are under the law so that we might receive adoption as sons. So what's the answer to our enslavement? We're enslaved until the time set by the Father. And Paul's first point is this, but when the fullness of time, what does he mean by that and the fullness of time? And here's the honest answer, no one really knows. But what we do know, whether we know what the fullness of time means, what we do know is that it was the perfect time. In other words, that Jesus came at the very time in human history when the known world at that time had a common language and that was Cornet Greek or House Greek. And it also, he came at the time in the world when the Romans had created a network of roads throughout the whole known world. So throughout the whole known world, there was a system of roads and there was a common language and then Jesus appears on the scene. That coincidence? I don't think so. So in the fullness of time, when it was just the right time, number one, number two, God sent forth his son. Now the very fact that it says that God sent forth his son implies something and what it implies is just this. It implies the divinity of Jesus. That before Jesus was incarnate as a man, he was with God the Father in heaven and God had to send him. God sent his son. So Jesus was fully divine. At the fullness of time, God sent his son. That's two. And number three, how did he send his son? He was born of a woman. Why was he born of a woman? Because he was human and he would share our humanity and be just as we are. Did you ever wonder why God sent Jesus through a woman? Like, he could have done anything else. He's God. Like, have you ever seen Terminator movies? Remember in Terminator how Arnold shows up? Right off in the distance, you see the lightning and you see the big bubble and all of a sudden out of nowhere stands up this big naked guy. Why didn't God do that? Why didn't Jesus just appear on the scene as a mighty warrior? Now, he came humble, born of a woman. So he would experience everything that you and I have experienced. And not only that, it says next, but before he's born under the law. In other words, he's born Jewish. If Jesus was going to be the savior of the world and it was you doing the thinking, would you have had him to be born Jewish? It seems like he'd be born generic or something. That he'd be born and people say, are you Jewish? And he'd say, I'm now, Aramaic, no, Phil, see, no, what are you? Generic. Generic Jesus, that's who I am. I'm here for everybody. No, he was born a Jew and he was born under the law. And having been born under the law, he obeyed the law perfectly. And he obeyed the Jewish law, but he also obeyed all the law and by that, you know, if you're a Gentile, Paul says in Romans, you might not have had the Torah given to you, but you have the law on your written on your heart. You know the difference between good and bad and Jesus obeyed the law completely on our behalf. Why did he do that? He obeyed the law completely on our half. That's the next thing. Number five, to redeem those who are under the law. And the word redemption here is important because redemption connotes something that forgiveness doesn't or justification doesn't. Redemption is very specific and what redemption refers to is buying a slave at a price. In other words, someone is enslaved to something and you want to redeem them. You want to free them from slavery and so someone has to pay a price. Either the slave pays the price or someone else pays the price. And God sent his son born of a woman born under the law to redeem those, to pay the price of those under the law. And the question is, can you pay that price yourself? Can you pay the price of perfect obedience? Do you have what it takes? Because if you don't have what it takes, I've got great news for you. There's someone else who had what it took. He did it. And the question is whether you will believe it, whether you will embrace it. What's the last thing? How does Paul's gospel in these passages culminate? It culminates differently than it does in the rest of the New Testament. Because if you ask the average Christian, what is the goal of the Christian life? You know, God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten son, so what? So that you could have eternal life. That the goal is eternal life. And the Bible does say that. Don't get me wrong. But I think we've so emphasized that eternal life is just out there. And we live our lives just waiting now, sort of gutting it out until we can get to the point where we won't have to suffer and we won't have to worry anymore. And when Paul talks about the gospel, the culmination for Paul is not eternal life. Do you see what it is? Everything culminates in this, born under the law to redeem those who are under the law in verse 5, so that we might receive adoption as sons. That the culmination for Paul, the coup de gras, the big, the big going, everything culminates in the fact that we would be adopted as sons. And of course, Mary, I keep saying it's not about gender here. It's about status. That the first born son inherited everything in pulses. That's what you are. In other words, what God thinks about Jesus, not only by way of justification, sure, Jesus is righteous. And so God sees you as righteous if you trust him. But God loves Jesus, the son. And because of that, he loves you as a son. Do you believe that? Most of us don't. I mean, we believe it in our heads, but do we believe it on a day-to-day basis? Do you really believe that God is proactively out to do you good? I don't. A lot of times. I'll be honest to you. But when you begin to contemplate adoption, let me ask you this, those of you who've either adopted children or have friends who've adopted children or adopted children less special or more special than natural children, or at least as special as the natural children. Adoption children for some reason are particularly dear to the parents that adopt them. I think in some way, because they cost so much. And I don't mean that financially, although they do often cost a lot financially. I mean, it's one thing, you know, Judy and I, when we had our children, you know, I came home and she was standing in the doorway with one of those white sticks crying, right? We didn't take a lot of effort. But when you adopt a child, you have to go through studies. It takes sometimes years and you go through all this stuff with that child must be pretty dear if you're going to do all of that work. What are you willing to pay, right? And now think about this scenario that there's an orphanage full of spiritual orphans, and God comes up and he says, you know, I like to buy a bunch of those orphans. What's it going to cost me? How crazy would it be if they said, hey, once you give us your natural son? Give us your natural son. We'll give you all the orphans you want. We think that was crazy. And yet that's exactly what the gospel says. That God gave that the only begotten son, the only natural son, if you will, became an orphan so that all of us orphans could come into God's family and be adopted children. Augustine called that whole concept Felix Copa. At least when you look at the fall of Adam and Eve, and we think, oh, it was horrible sin entered the world. Augustine says, the greatest thing that ever happened. Why? Because before the fall, we were just creatures. We were created in God's image, holy and happy with God. The children's catechism says, but we were not sons and daughters, and no way to become sons and daughters. And yet through the work of the gospel, through the work of Jesus, through the doctor of justification, sanctification, and now adoption, we are now adopted into God's family and become his children. What's next then? What could be any better than that? Well, what could be better than that is the fact that God actually sends his spirit to bear that witness in your heart. You see, Jesus was, there's two sendings here. It says that God sent the son and God sent the Holy Spirit. The son is sent to accomplish our redemption. The Holy Spirit is sent so that we can experience redemption. And the problem with Presbyterians sometimes, I say, because I am one, is we're all about redemption accomplished. But how much time do you spend talking about redemption experienced? You really believe that God loves you, honestly, or are you just going through the motions? Paul says, because your sons God did something, and here's the application. He didn't say because you have the Holy Spirit, you are sons. He says, because you are sons, God sent the spirit of his son into our hearts to do what? To pray? No. Notice what he says. He says, and because you are sons, God has sent the spirit of his son into our hearts crying Abba Father. In other words, the Holy Spirit is sent into our heart not to pray, Abba Father, but to cry Abba Father. Why would God, it says, because we are sons, God sent his spirit, why would God send his spirit because we are sons? And I think Luther is right on this. He sends his spirit because we are sons because even as sons we are weak in faith. Even though we know we are sons in our head, we don't know where sons and daughters in our heart. And if we didn't have the spirit, we'd never be sure of that. In other words, the assurance of your salvation, the assurance of God's love for you does not come from you. It doesn't come by you looking and saying that I do everything right this week. The assurance of your salvation comes from two things. It comes from God's word regarding you, and it comes with the spirits witness being born out in your heart. And you know your son or daughter when you begin to cry out to God the Father because you really believe he's there. I read an incredibly compelling article this past week. It's actually a blog post from July 2nd. Christianity today again in Russell Moore. And the title of the blog post was Abba changes everything. And the whole point was he's basically talking about the doctrine of adoption, but he was using his experience in Russia with his wife adopting two orphans in order to make a lot of his points. And as he describes the orphanage, it was interesting because he said the thing that shocked him most when they got to this orphanage in Russia was not the squalor. It was not the smell. It was nothing. What shocked him most was the creepy funeral parlour at night silence of the place. That's his language.
And he said they were told that the reason it's so quiet is because the children cry when they first get there and after a while they realize that no one is ever going to answer their call and they just stop. They quit. So the orphanage he expected to go in and just see this bustling place with kids, and it just be crazy. And he said it was funeral parlour quiet in that place. Creepy. Which as a side note, you young parents, you might want to think about that because it does work. I don't want your kids to be orphans, but you might want to let them cry right now and then.
So they go and it sounds like the experience sounds horrible to me. You know, I tend to be a little bit emotional. And you basically go meet the children. You're going to adopt. You get to play with them for the day and then you have to go home to the United States until they finish the paperwork and come back and get them at some other time. And so they played with their children Timothy and Benjamin, their names would become. And they had a great time during the day playing with them. And it was time to go and they got up and they said their gabbys and started to walk out. And he said right before they got to the exit of the orphanage, they heard a blood-curdling scream. And it was the youngest of the two boys they were going to adopt named Benjamin. And he said on that day, Benjamin became a son and I became a father. Because all of a sudden this little boy who had no hope in life, no father, no anything, realized that there was someone who loved him, someone who cared about him. And what he needed to do was get his attention and so he cried out. And you'll know when you begin to really understand that God is your father, when instead of stifling all these little issues that you have in your life and stifling all the big issues and hiding all of your family problems and your family secrets, you'll know when you begin crying out, Abba, Father, that you're starting to understand the gospel. And I'll close with this. It came in and I was just, I thought yeah, I should read a little Martin Luther this morning. And I was reading this and here's hope for you. I tell you to cry out and you know you're getting it. Here's what Martin Luther has to say about this passage and I'll end with this. Martin Luther says no matter how great and terrible the cries of the law, sin and the devil let loose against us. Even though they seem to fill heaven and earth and to overcome the size of our heart completely, still they cannot do us any harm. For the more these enemies press in upon us, accusing and vexing us with their cries, the more do we sigh and take hold of Christ with heart and lips we call upon him, cling to him and believe that he was born under the law for us in order that he might redeem us from the curse of the law and destroy sin and death. When we have taken hold of Christ by faith this way, we cry through him, Abba Father and here's the great line. And this cry of ours, far exceeds the cry of the devil.
When you cry, Abba Father, it doesn't matter how loud the things coming in at you are. The cry of Abba Father is louder because God always, always hears because of what Jesus has done. Think about that. Let's pray. Father, I pray that is we sit in this room by definition, statistically, every imaginable issue is here. And yet you as our Father care about every one of them. And I pray that you bring grace and comfort and your Fatherly love and even discipline where it is needed, help us to understand this. And Christ's name would pray these things, amen and amen.