God's chosen people are enslaved because of the law to the elementary principles of the world, which is really just saying God's people, because of what the law does to us and the nature of our hearts and the way that the law interacts with our inability to keep it, leaves us enslaved to demonic powers that are parasites of the law's work. We're enslaved, Paul is saying, just like the Gentiles. Even though the Gentiles don't have the law that Moses gives, they're enslaved. And there's this worldview if you're an ancient Israelite and you come into the Promised Land, and here you are, God's people living in the Promised Land. When you look out over your neighbors, you see people living in idolatry and living in oppression. They're living and worshiping false gods. Paul says a startling thing here. He says the same thing is true of Israel under the law. What the law does because of sin places you under those same powers. So being under the law is not just to be subject to sin, it's to be enslaved to demonic powers that utilize sin like a slaver would utilize iron shackles. There's an active demonic character to the evil that living under the law promotes, and Israel's history bears this out, right? They cannot live the way that God calls them to live. Although the law is perfect and good, all it does is stir up disobedience within the people of Israel. Paul makes this exact connection in 4:8: Formerly, when you did not know God, you were enslaved to those that by nature are not gods.
Now, here's how the enslavement happens. The law demands, but it makes no provision for enabling obedience. So the law says, "Do this," and it gives no power to actually do it. The law creates despair because it diagnoses the disease of our hearts, and it gives evil ammunition and provides no cure to the disease. The law produces sorrow. The law creates a brokenness over the sin that it exposes in our hearts. It shows us the enslavement of our bondage, but the law offers no comfort. And so because of all these things, the law leaves us in a state of captivity. The law sets up the rules that lead to enslavement and plunges everyone who fails to obey under the dominance of the demonic and under the bondage of our own sin. And then the law reports that the only way you can find redemption, the only way you can be delivered, is if you're perfect. Perform and produce and never miss a beat. And that's the only way you can free yourself from this bondage of the law. Bob Dylan maybe puts it a little poetically for us: "I bargained for salvation and they gave me a lethal dose." That's what the law does. I want to bargain for salvation with the law and it becomes lethal because you can't do it. It captures you underneath it.
Now, here's the thing. Paul doesn't have a low view of the law. In this text. It can kind of seem like he's kind of ragging on it. What's your beef, Paul? Why do you hate on the law all the way through Galatians? He doesn't have a low view of the law though. When he says it enslaves us, he's not knocking the law. Paul sees something very perceptively here. He sees that a high view of the law, which he has, actually drives a person towards grace. That's what I mean. In other words, if you really consider the law in a high way, if you esteem it highly, it will force you to your knees and force you to the grace that is Jesus Christ. This is how Paul puts it in Romans 7. Remember, it's that classic chapter where he's just agonizing over what the law does to him. So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. The law shows me what I should do right, but I sense the evil that it's stirring up in my heart. For I delight in the law of God in my inner being, but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells within. It captures him. The law, Paul says earlier in Romans 7, actually killed him. He says it crushes him. Here's the deal. If we're left all alone and there's no law, we might think we're doing pretty well. Remember the illustration I used earlier in the series? The guy at the gym who said his son was 80% good? That's a guy who doesn't have any perspective of the law. It leaves this sense that I can get by. But when the law comes in, it reveals the disease of our depravity and it plunges us into a God-ordained bondage. The law comes to knock us off the pedestal of our legalism. Here's something you may have never thought of before. You can only be a legalist, you can only be a legalistic person if you have a low view of the law and to loathe you of the holiness it contains. Rightly understood, the law destroys us. The law will beat you to a bloody pulp every single time. That's what Paul is saying in Romans 7. The law just crushes me. I see what it's pointing me to do and I want to do it, and then the evil that's inside of me just overwhelms me. In the words of Galatians, it enslaves us. It enslaves us to sin and demonic powers of this world that feed off of our captivity. So if you're struggling with legalism, part of your problem is you have a low regard for the law. You don't really understand how holy the law is calling you to be. And here's what Paul says at the end of Romans 7 as he's in this agony about what the law does. "Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord." That's the next point this morning.
While the law makes heirs to be slaves, the Son, the true Son, God delivers the enslaved. Read along in verse 4. But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth His Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law. Paul's point is this: freedom, the freedom that comes from the captivity we experience, it doesn't originate from within us, it comes from the outside. The nature of our bondage means that we are helpless to liberate ourselves. It's exactly what the law does. It shows us what to do and then condemns us when we fail to do it. And it provides no ability, no power within us to actually obey. The liberator, however, from the law's captivity, from the law's tyranny, is none other than Jesus.
Now, when Paul says Jesus came in the fullness of time, have you ever been tempted to ask, why then? Why was the fullness of time at that point in history? Why wasn't it 600 years earlier? Why wasn't it 1,000 years earlier? Why didn't God wait another 500 years? Why is that the fullness of time? Well, to ask these questions, and I've asked them, is really the idolatry of human wisdom. It's to play God and presume, "Maybe I could have figured out a wiser time." The thing is, only God knows when the fullness of time was. We are called to accept that humbly by faith, not that we fully understand it, but rather we accept that God's wisdom is greater than ours.
Now here's a little piece of application from that. If God knows perceptively and in perfect wisdom when He needs to enter in redemptively in the most significant way He will in the entire timeline of salvation history, so He knows in His wisdom and He has perfectly discerned this time right here, this is the time when I'm going to send my Son, I'm going to enflesh Him and enter Him into human history. He's figured out among the timeline of history when to act in the most strategic way. What do you think that has to say about the little details of our lives? Right? Maybe you can sit there and think, "You know, I accept God and His wisdom was right about when to send Jesus." You see the Pax Romana, the Roman peace that covers the Mediterranean world. There's Roman roads, there's all these things established for free commerce and trade for the gospel to spread. "Oh, I see Your wisdom, Lord." But I do not understand why I can't get this promotion. I do not understand why you haven't saved my spouse, why my child still walks in disobedience. When are you going to act? When are you going to do the things that I call upon you to do, that I plead with you to do? God knew in His perfect wisdom when it was the fullness of time to send Christ. The most strategic event in all of history. He knows in His perfect time exactly when to bless, exactly when to deliver, exactly when to discipline, exactly when to comfort. Paul is showing us here in this text, if we can entrust ourselves to God with the timing of sending the Christ, we can entrust ourselves to God with every little detail of our lives. Everything.
6 · Expands the argument by showing from Ephesians that Christ's coming at the fullness of time is the hinge event for all of history, which means God's perfect timing in the macro-scale guarantees His perfect care in the micro-scale
Ephesians 1:7, he says, in Him, in Jesus, we have redemption through His blood. The forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace which He lavished upon us in all wisdom and insight, making known to us the mystery of His will, according to the Scriptures, which He set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in Him, things in heaven and things on earth. The implication is, I'm sending Jesus in the fullness of time, and the reason for it is, on that event hinges everything else I'm doing in the details of history. So because I'm perfectly correct in my wisdom of the fullness of time of when to send Jesus, I'm perfectly correct and perfectly caring for you in every detail of your life. So even if it feels like you're waiting and you're so tired of waiting, God isn't tardy. I encourage you to read the Psalms. David struggled. In these ways, and he shows us how to turn those struggles into faith at the hands of God. God always works at the right time. He sends his Son at the most opportune moment in history, and the cross is the redemptive key for this. Jesus, Paul says, redeems us through his blood. He secures the forgiveness of trespasses. He sends Jesus to free those born under the bondage and dominion of the law.
7 · Unpacks the manner of redemption by highlighting the paradox of the incarnation: the preexistent, fully divine Son takes on flesh and enters time, placing Himself under the same law that enslaves us
What makes this redemption so incredible isn't simply the wisdom of God and the timing of redemption. It's the manner in which God ordains and sends his Son to procure our liberation. God sent forth his Son, Paul says, born of a woman. He's describing here the preeminence of Jesus, the fact that Jesus existed before history started. That Jesus has always been. He's always been fully God. And yet this preeminent one, this one who exists and lives outside the timeline of history, was before time began, before the sun shined for the first time. This one has now been born of a woman. The preeminent Son has taken on flesh. The Eternal One has entered into time. The Son of Light has entered into the kingdom of darkness and all the vulnerability of Adam's race. And Paul says he's born under the law. It means he lives under the same demands of holiness that we do.
8 · Develops the theological logic of how Christ's incarnation enables substitutionary redemption
But here is precisely where the deliverance gets interesting. When the preeminent Son takes on flesh, He becomes the one truly free being in the entire universe. The one truly free being. He becomes fully man where He was prior fully God. Does that make sense? Well, becoming fully man means He's now taken into His person a createdness, which is just remarkable to think about. But in doing so, he's the only truly free being that still exists in the universe. Adam originally is created with freedom, right? He's placed in the garden and there's no mar, no stain of sin. He has absolute freedom to do and to choose and to obey in exactly the way God's called him to. But when Adam rebels, he rebels against the Creator. And Adam is fully creature. And so freedom becomes marred. And all of Adam's descendants are stripped of that liberty. That liberty becomes bound with the chains of trespass, you could say. Well, when Jesus delivers, when he redeems the enslaved, he does something remarkable. The preeminent Son of God, the one enjoying all God's His sovereign freedom from all eternity takes on our enslavement.
9 · Uses two gospel narratives—the foot washing and the crucifixion—to illustrate Christ's substitutionary enslavement
That's what happens at the cross. And Jesus shows us this symbolically in two actions. The first is the upper room during Holy Week on Maundy Thursday. Remember, Jesus picks up a towel and a water basin. And the only human in history to live free from enslavement under the law through sin takes up the position and the role of a slave. Remember, Peter just royally freaks out in that moment. What are you doing? He wants to rip the towel, wants to rip the basin away. What are you— are you crazy? We got scum in the corner over there that are supposed to do this. You're the Messiah! Peter loves his hyperbole, so Jesus says, "If I don't wash you, you have no part of me." "Then not my feet only, but all of me!" Peter still doesn't get it. Jesus is showing the disciples something. The foot washer is a job that's occupied by the lowest slave in the household. So low that a Jewish slave would refuse the task. It was that unclean, and part of it is you're living in a society where you walk down the same streets that the donkeys and the horses and the camels walk down, and you've only got sandals. So your feet are going to get nasty. You don't walk into somebody's house without cleaning those feet, and so this is not an enviable task. And it's given not just to a slave, but to the lowest slave in the household, a Gentile slave, not even to a Jewish slave. And so as Jesus picks up this towel and this basin, He is symbolically showing the disciples, "I am becoming the lowest form of slave you can imagine." His followers will become servants because the Son of God will liberate his people by becoming enslaved in their place. And then when he is pinned to the cross the following afternoon, The preeminent Son of God is executed in the shameful fashion of a slave. Crucifixion, we kind of have in our minds as a shameful death. Most of us have sort of a category for that. Historically, it's a death that Rome used to keep the slaves in line. It was a horrible, painful way to die, and one of the things that Rome would do with their their stratified class system, is you got these people on the bottom, these slaves, you gotta make sure that they have fear looming over them for what it would be like to rise up and throw off their chains. So Spartacus, you know Spartacus, right? The slave who rebels against Rome, and he gets all these slaves to rebel with him, the former gladiator, and he's got this huge revolt, and they're beating Roman armies. How does Rome, once they defeat Spartacus, set the tone to remind all the slaves You won't ever do this again. They crucify 6,000 slaves, and they put these slaves on the main highway that goes right through the artery of the Roman Empire, and 6,000 crosses line that highway, and everyone remembers: crucifixion happens to slaves who rebel. That's the penalty. The scandal of the cross is that the Messiah dies the shameful death of a disobedient, rebellious slave. Jesus washes feet like a slave because he will die the death of a slave in order to make those enslaved under the law free. Luke 4:18, He says this. He stands in the synagogue and He opens the scrolls. Remember, He's kind of the guest preacher for that day in Luke's Gospel. He pulls open the scroll of Isaiah and He reads this: The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because He has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed. To proclaim the year of the Lord's favor. And then he looks at the audience and he says, "This is fulfilled in your sight." Rolls up the scroll. Sermon done.
10 · Establishes that Christ's death alone would not accomplish deliverance—resurrection is essential
What isn't understood during that sermon or in the upper room or even as he's dying on the cross is that Jesus will bring liberty to the captives only by taking on the ultimate form of our enslavement. Death itself. Had He stayed dead, however, there would be no release from the law's captivity. What Paul talks about in verses 1-7, this idea that Jesus redeems us from the enslavement under the law, he doesn't explicitly say anything about resurrection in that text, does he? Well, not explicitly, but the entire text rests upon the reality that Jesus was raised from the dead. Paul strategically begins this entire letter in Galatians. Remember the first verses way back at the very beginning of the series? We read from Galatians 1. And I said Paul here establishes who he is, establishes his apostleship, and then he lays out his Gospel. And he's going to spend the entire letter building off of this foundation. So this little phrase he puts out there is his Gospel written really succinctly, and it hangs as a banner over everything he's explaining in this letter. This is what Paul said, that Paul is writing this, an apostle, not from men nor through man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father who raised Him from the dead. Now listen, grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for our sins to deliver us from the present evil age. This whole language of deliverance and freedom from enslavement hinges upon the reality that Paul has proclaimed, and he reminds us: God raised Jesus from the dead. Our deliverance from sin, from the law, and this present age's tyranny over us is impossible without Christ. But it's specifically impossible without Christ being raised from the dead. Resurrection is the Father's work through the Spirit, and it's the divine seal of approval on the atonement. Christ's obedience under the law was perfect. He, He was born under the law, and He lived perfectly like we couldn't. His fully divine and fully human nature has made Him suitable to be the sacrifice. The punishment of God's wrath at the cross and the penalty of death was sufficient to pay the price. And in all of this, God looked upon Jesus and said, "Redemption paid in full." And because he says that, the Son doesn't just deliver us, but delivered now become sons and heirs.
11 · Provides a commercial analogy to clarify the relationship between cross and resurrection: the cross purchases redemption, the resurrection is God's receipt certifying the transaction is complete
If the cross is the purchase price of our redemption, then the resurrection is the receipt that establishes payment in full.
12 · Unpacks the implications of Christ's resurrection for believers: union with Christ by the Spirit means we share in His resurrection power, we are adopted as sons, the fear of death is abolished, and the Spirit seals this adoption by testifying 'Abba, Father' in our hearts
And by raising Jesus from the dead, By raising Jesus from death to life, the Father announced that there was now a pathway to deliverance, that Christ isn't killed in vain, that he's raised from the grave, and God is demonstrating that there is no bondage powerful enough to contain the Son, and there's also no bondage powerful enough to contain those who hide themselves in the Son. All those who trust in the Son will now experience the same power that delivered Jesus from the grave. That same power is now theirs. His resurrection is a restoration from curse bearer as He was on the cross to reigning Son of God raised into glory. And Paul's point— remember how he finished chapter 3? That by faith we are now sons of God in Christ, united in Him? By faith we are united to the Son by the Spirit and because of this, we become adopted. We are adoptive sons ourselves, which means the fear of death is gone. Here, the gospel is utterly unlike the law. Rather than provoking terror of conscience, bondage under sin, and the dread of condemnation— remember those things we talked about in point 1? The gospel instills— excuse me, the gospel stills every voice of accusation. And it stills those accusations with the unimpeachable words of the Spirit of Christ. The Spirit conveys peace and joy and guarantees that by the blood of the cross and by the empty tomb, we are united with him. The Spirit seals this adoption with its infallible testimony of "Abba, Father" that rings in our hearts. Look with me in verse 4. God sent forth his Son to redeem those who were under the law so that we might receive adoption as sons. And because you are 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, than an heir through God.
13 · Expands the theological foundation by bringing in Romans 8 to show that the Spirit's testimony of adoption is the sine qua non of being a Christian
Paul expands upon this idea in Romans 8: "For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God." Remember, that's the sine qua non of being a Christian for Paul, is one who has the Spirit. "For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, But you received the Spirit— how? What was it? The Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, "Abba, Father!" The same thought is in his mind here. And then he teases it out more. The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs. Heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him. In order that we may also be glorified with him. This is the heart and soul and texture of what it means to be a Christian. If you are in Christ, you are now a son, you are now a daughter of God. The Spirit finds joy in experientially assuring the believer of their sonship by testifying to God's fatherly affection in their soul. That's what Paul is saying the Spirit does here. The Spirit loves to glorify Jesus by testifying in your soul as a believer in Christ, "The Father loves you. You're no slave anymore, child. You're my son. You're my daughter. The Maker and Ruler of all things is your Father, and I rejoice over you.
14 · Establishes the implications of adoption: full membership in God's family means full inheritance rights
Through the redemption of the cross and resurrection, Christ purchased and the Father certified that we are now fully members of the family of God. And if we're full members, we're also full heirs. That's how the opening words of Hebrews begin. Remember, Christ is now The heir of all things. That's what Paul is pointing us to. If you are an heir with Christ through the adoption we have in Christ, you now share with him in his inheritance. And the inheritance Christ receives is everything.
15 · Brief pastoral aside recommending J
Think of it this way. I love how J.I. Packer puts it. If you don't have his book Knowing God, Buy one. That's a command. Buy it. It will benefit your soul.
16 · Extended quotation from J
He writes this about adoption in the book Knowing God: Our understanding of Christianity cannot be better than our grasp of adoption. If you want to judge how well a person understands Christianity, find out how much he makes of the thought of being God's child. And having God as his Father. If this is not the thought that prompts and controls his worship and prayers and whole outlook on life, it means that he does not understand Christianity very well at all. Pretty big deal, what Paul is writing to us at the end of chapter 3 and the beginning of chapter 4.
17 · Establishes the theological relationship between justification and adoption: justification is the foundational cornerstone, but adoption is the higher blessing—the steeple of the building
Packer goes on to argue correctly that while justification is the primary and fundamental blessing of salvation— what Paul writes about in chapters 2 and 3, that we're justified by faith and not by works of the law— that all the other blessings of salvation build upon justification and rest upon it. Packer says this: That's true, and yet adoption is the higher blessing. There's no adoption without justification. You can't be adopted without being justified. So justification is foundational. That's the cornerstone that salvation is built upon. But if we want to talk about the steeple and the most glorious point of the building of salvation, it's that we are adopted as sons of God.
18 · Contrasts justification and adoption using a powerful spatial metaphor: justification gets us out of God's courtroom with a favorable verdict, but adoption takes us into God's living room
You see, where justification removes the curse and provides forgiveness of sin and appropriates the righteousness of Christ, adoption is a richer inheritance. Justification deals with God as judge and ensures that we will get a favorable verdict. Adoption effectively takes us out of God's courtroom and ushers us into God's living room. I'm no longer your judge. I'm now your Father. We become members of his family. We enjoy his fellowship. We enjoy relationship with him, and we enjoy the generous affection of the most perfectly benevolent Father who's ever lived.
19 · Addresses potential pastoral objection: those with abusive fathers may struggle to embrace God's fatherhood
If you have bad experiences with your father, it doesn't mean you downplay the fatherhood of God. It's tragic if anyone in this room experienced abuse or neglect or harshness at the hands of a father. But if you turn to the Father of all things in Jesus Christ, you will never hear a harsh word. You will never know the flinch of thinking you'll be struck. You will only know the kindness of His embrace. He will send His Spirit eternally to testify in your hearts, "You are Mine, child, and I love you with all My omnipotent power because of Jesus, My true Son."
20 · Applies the doctrine of adoption to Christian life and motivation
To be right with God the Judge, Packer writes, is a great thing. But to be loved and cared for by God the Father is greater. And this is where the gospel motivates where the law is powerless to do so. Condemnation doesn't change a person, right? It just breaks you. Justification leading to adoption, seeing ourselves as sons and daughters of God, arrests our heart and soul to God in a way that changes the tone of our entire life. If you understand and comprehend the reality that you're justified by faith, that you've been freed from the judgment of God, that you're free from His courtroom, and that you're now part of His family, that you will dwell for eternity as a rightful member of His living room, knowing His fatherly affection, you can't live the same way. Evangelism flows naturally from somebody who understands what it means to be a child of God, if you grasp what it means to be adopted by God, then evangelism will be like breathing. How can I not just ooze gratitude? How can I not just ooze a joy and a hope that people want to know about?
21 · Develops the application further by showing that adoption produces unshakable hope even in the face of loss (house, life itself)
There's nothing that can assault the fact that my Daddy is the ruler of the world. You can take my house and my hope is unassaulted. Because my Daddy is preparing a home for me in heaven that will stand for all eternity. You can take my life and like Paul, "Oh, that's just gain. I'm going home." That's what understanding sonship does. Knowing God as Father through the redeeming cross and the power of the resurrection should unite and addict our soul to God. Jesus has conquered sin and death and the devil, and that means there is no threat that should distract us from enjoying and reflecting the benefits of being God's child. The radical life of a believer that Paul's going to start to unpack for us later in Galatians stems from remembering, recalling to mind the radical way in which Jesus has made us new. Members of God's family and anticipating that not for one moment as a member of that family will God's fatherly affection ever waver. The merest knowledge of the Father's affection strips the world of its addictive trappings. Nothing can compare to being loved by the Father, so no sacrifice is too costly No act of devotion is too radical if we're viewing it in light of the eternal love that God has for his children.
22 · Concludes the application by showing that the Spirit's testimony of adoption both assures believers personally and testifies to the world through changed lives
The Spirit doesn't just testify to us that we are sons. If we understand that we are sons, the Spirit will testify to us and to the world. By making us alive to Christ and sealing us as sons, the world fades. Not that we don't care for the world, not that we don't have a heart to see the alleviation of suffering and to see those who are perishing be transferred into life, but our life in Christ and the promise of resurrected life and inheritance with Him abolishes earthly temporal treasures for the greater relish of eternity. The Spirit cries, the assurance of our adoption. It cries out, "Abba, Father," for the purpose of diminishing the trappings of the world, to showing us the enticements of our old bondage for exactly what they are, and so that it can affix our eyes again on the resurrected Christ, crowned and reigning and to help us see all the inheritance that awaits those who delight in the Son by faith.
23 · Closing prayer asking God to pour out the Spirit on unbelievers for salvation and on believers for fresh life, confidence in adoption, and witness to the world
Would you bow your heads? Lord, I pray, Lord, that you would pour out your Spirit in this room. Lord, that if there are those here who have never known You as their Father, that they've never tasted the benefits of salvation in Christ. Lord, that You would pour out Your Spirit in full measure, that You would save them, God, that You would bring them from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of light, that You would cause them to be born again to a living hope. Lord, that You would secure them, that You would open their eyes that they might see the glory of Jesus, the beauty that He is, the treasure that is matchless in everything the world has to offer, that you would do that through your Spirit, and in doing so, you would help them to understand and rest in the reality that you are now their Father. God, send your Spirit and grant that kind of life now. And Lord, in the same way you sent your Spirit to grant life to the dead body of Jesus and to raise him from the grave as a testimony, as your signature of the truthfulness of all he did as your Messiah, in the same way would you Send the Spirit to blow fresh life into the hearts and minds and the lives of your saints, that all those who trust in Jesus this morning, as we sing and rejoice and celebrate all that you have done for us because of the resurrected Christ, that we would leave here longing to treasure him more. Lord, that we would leave here filled with your Spirit, more confident than we've ever been that you are our Father, that you have adopted us and made us sons and daughters of the living God. And that we would leave this place infecting the world with a desire for that same sort of adoption. God, would you do all this for the glory of your true Son, Jesus Christ. Amen.