(Notes Taken of Lectures.)
Chap. 3:21-29; 4:1-20.
WE left off the last time at an important point, showing that there was no second party to the covenant into which God entered with Abraham. It was a covenant of promise, of the same character as that which God had established with Noah and “his seed, and every living creature;” a covenant absolute and unconditional, and under which we now sow and reap. The question then arises, “Is the law against the promises of God?” No, says the Apostle, “for if there had been a law given which could have given life, verily righteousness should have been by the law. But the Scripture hath concluded all under sin, that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe.” Righteousness and life are inseparably connected, both in the law and in the gospel. The law pointed to righteousness as the way to life, but it could not give life. Such was man, that the law, instead of being to him the ministry of righteousness, became the ministry of condemnation; instead of the ministry of life, it was the ministry of death. All that the law could do was to show man his impotence, and to force him out of the position of a doer into that of a receiver. “The law was given by Moses,” but it could not give; “but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.” It is a hard lesson to learn that from beginning to end we are only receivers. We become Christians by what we receive, not by anything that we do. We receive righteousness, eternal life, forgiveness of sins, Christ Himself. Let the uppermost thought in the heart of one Christian be, what have I received? and in that of another, what must I do? surely the one with his heart set at liberty will run the way of God’s commandments, and have more true and blessed thoughts of God than the other.
How strong is the language of the Apostle as to the hopeless misery of man had he been left under the law, “the Scripture hath concluded all under sin,” shut up as it were in hopelessness, “that the promise faithwise in Christ Jesus, might be given to them that believe.” The blessing comes in the way of faith, not in the way of works. The law might serve to make a man conscious of his need, but the gospel meets his actual need in the way of deliverance from it. There is all the difference between being “shut up” and set at liberty.
Ver. 23. “But before faith came we were kept under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterward be revealed.” This verse remarkably shows the necessary spirit of one quickened by the Spirit, yet in his conscience under the law; his spirit was the spirit of bondage. He was a “prisoner of hope,” craving liberty, yet knowing not how to get it. “Before faith came,” is evidently that new and wondrous way of righteousness in the way of faith, and not in the way of works, now so clearly and fully manifested. The law kept the saints who were under it as it were in jail. Look at Hezekiah. He was in bondage under fear, of death, shut up in prison unto the faith that was afterward to be revealed. With regard to him and to others, the Lord says to His disciples, “Blessed are your eyes for they see, and your ears for they hear; for verily I say unto you, that many prophets and righteous men have desired to see those things which ye see, and have not seen them, and to hear those things which ye hear, and have not heard them.”
Ver. 24-26. “Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith. But after that faith is come we are no longer under a schoolmaster. For ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus.”
The Apostle had before regarded the law in the light of a jailer, imprisoning those who were under it; he now changes the figure and presents the law as a schoolmaster, or rather as the confidential servant of the house, who conducted the youths to and from school, and watched over them in their games; and this too till they were emancipated from school, and were able themselves to take the place of men. This place the law had till Christ. It so strictly controlled those who were real saints, that they had no more liberty than the youth under the vigilant and strict care of a tutor. Just in proportion as saints under the law rose above the law looking to the faith, or the Object of faith to be revealed, did they know liberty. Such there were even in the worst times: those who “fearing the Lord spake often one to another, and thought upon His name.” Such there were, a faithful remnant, when “the fullness of time was come, and God sent forth His Son”―a Simeon or Anna, waiting for the consolation of Israel, looking for redemption in Jerusalem. But we find in the Lord’s own personal disciples, that they never stood in conscious liberty till fully emancipated from the law. How different the state of the same disciples before and after Pentecost. When the Holy Ghost came down from heaven as the witness of Jesus in glory, and of the preciousness of His blood as known in heaven, then they were free, they acted as those who were not servants but sons. Then were they justified by faith in the finished work of the Lord Jesus; and were no longer under the rigid or even suspecting care of the tutor. They were grown up, come to man’s estate, had attained their majority, and could enter into the enjoyment of their rich heritage. It would have been more forcible, and in keeping with the illustration, had the word rendered “children” (ver. 26) been rendered sons; not infants but sons, those who had come into possession, and not merely into the title of all their privileges. Now, after attaining to this standing and condition, to turn to the law, would it be to turn from the liberty of sons who have access to the Father through Jesus, to be under the rigorous and irritating control of a tutor. How clearly does this illustration apply to the condition of many real Christians; still in their conscience they are under law, they are not standing and acting in the liberty of the sons of God. They make salvation a future object, instead of enjoying it at present. And while this is the case there will ever be the tendency to serve God and Mammon, instead of walking in the happy consciousness of an emancipated people.
Verses 27-29. “For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus. And if ye be Christ’s, then are ye Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to promise.” How important is the, true doctrine of baptism, and how little understood. It is only those taught of the Spirit who can regard baptism as God regards it, even that the believer in Christ is regarded by God to have died in Christ, to have been buried with Christ, to be raised up with Christ, and to have put on Christ. Surely, if we have put on Christ, we need neither our works nor service to commend us to God. The believer appears before God in that which he has put on, even Christ. All differences between one believer and another are merged in this one essential difference between all believers and all others, that they have put on Christ, and therefore are all one in Christ Jesus. This doctrine is full of comfort, the weak believer appears before God as the strong, the one who tremblingly touched the hem of the garment of Jesus, as the Apostle Paul himself. They have alike put un Christ.
But there is a difficulty to be met; the promises were to Abraham and his seed, how then shall a sinner of the Gentiles get connected with Abraham? Here the Judaizer was on strong ground, and might use it to teach the disciples, “except ye be circumcised and keep the law of Moses, ye cannot be saved.” It is very natural to insist on any hereditary title to which we can lay claim. On this the Jews insisted in their controversy with the Lord. (John 8) The Lord allows they were the seed of Abraham, but He denied them the title of children of Abraham, because unlike Abraham, they had no faith. The Lord struck at the root of their confidence, not denying anything they truthfully claimed, but chewing them the state of their own hearts in the rejection of Him. The Lord allowed that they were the children of the kingdom, but only to be cast out. (See Matthew 8:1212But the children of the kingdom shall be cast out into outer darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth. (Matthew 8:12).) Peter addresses them as “the children of the prophets, and of the covenant which God made with Abraham.” (Acts 3:2525Ye are the children of the prophets, and of the covenant which God made with our fathers, saying unto Abraham, And in thy seed shall all the kindreds of the earth be blessed. (Acts 3:25).) Paul gave the Jews the place of hereditary title. “It was necessary that the word of God should first have been spoken to you; but seeing ye put it from you, and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, lo, we turn to the Gentiles.” They rested in their hereditary privileges― “much every way”―and despised and rejected Him who was Abraham’s Seed, the sum and substance of all promises; the Gentile, sinner of the Gentiles, who had no hereditary claim on God, received Christ, Abraham’s Seed, and thus became connected, through his Seed, with Abraham himself. He had the faith of Abraham, by having put on Christ, and thus he became, not through proselytism and the law connected with Abraham, but through Christ. He did not reach Christ through Abraham, but Abraham through Christ; and thus became Abraham’s seed, not in the legal but in the promise order― “Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to promise.”
Chap. 4:1-5. “Now I say, That the heir, as long as he is a child, differeth nothing from a servant, though he be lord of all; but is under tutors and governors, until the time appointed of the father. Even so we, when we were children, were in bondage under the elements of the world: but when the fullness of time was come, God sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons.” Having mentioned “heirs according to promise,” he contrasts that condition with that of heirs under the law. The heir under the law is like an infant under guardians, until either, according to the law of the country, or the arbitrary will of his father, he is of age and competent to act himself. Now all this while he differs nothing from a servant, though he is in title possessor of all the estate, he cannot act even on his own property without the permission of his guardians. This, says the Apostle, aptly represents the condition of those who were heirs under the law. The elements of the world, their much boasted ritual and ordinances, acted the same part towards them as the guardian towards the minor. The ordinances of the law kept the very heirs of God in a state of pupilage and bondage, until God’s set time came for sending forth His Son, the promised Seed of the woman, to which the eye of faith had been directed from the moment of the fall; yet, “made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law.” “Fullness of time” is a remarkable expression, many preparatory steps were needed, to show to man that he could only stand in blessing in redemption. Redemption, so to speak, was the original thought of God; but it did not come forth in strong relief till Pentecost. Man stood not in innocence; highly favored, he stood not under law, and those who being under law were quickened by the Spirit were waiting for redemption. At last the time came, and God sent forth His Son, made under the law, magnifying it by implicit obedience, He magnified it further by bearing its curse, and thus redeeming from under it even the very heirs, that they might come into their proper place as sons, which they could not do so long as they were under the law, for the law kept them in the position of servants, and they could only have the spirit of servants.
Ver. 6, 7. “And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father. Wherefore thou art no more a servant, but a son; and if a son, then an heir of God through Christ.” The Apostle here contrasts the state of the Gentile believer standing in the full liberty of the gospel, with that of the saint under the law; and thus points out to the Gentile believer the folly of putting himself into the state of the saint of old by going back to the law, when that very saint needed the work of Christ on the Cross to redeem him from under the law, in order to take the place and have the spirit of a son. They were sons, not servants, heirs, they had attained their majority, and had liberty of access, with all confidence, to the Father; would they again go back to a state of pupilage, and only think and act as a child in that state? The argument is very cogent; there is an intended contrast between, “that we might receive the adoption of sons,” (Ver. 5,) and “because ye are sons.” (Ver. 6.) The Spirit of adoption was not the portion of Old Testament saints, it is the blessed fruit of accomplished redemption, for which even the disciples of the Lord Jesus had to wait till after His ascension. (See Acts 1:4, 84And, being assembled together with them, commanded them that they should not depart from Jerusalem, but wait for the promise of the Father, which, saith he, ye have heard of me. (Acts 1:4)
8But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth. (Acts 1:8).) The Gentile had never been under law, but had received the promise of the spirit of faith. The Spirit of adoption may not be realized by Gentile Christians, because of their Galatian state; but when realized, it makes the believe say, “The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places, yea, I have a goodly heritage.” And this is the portion of him who knows the Father, and has the Spirit of adoption. Little cares, little trials, little perplexities, make up the sum and substance of our little lives; to meet these we need the Spirit of adoption, for we need a parent’s care and a parent’s heart, and it sufficeth us to be shown “the Father.” We lose much holy joy, because we so little know the Father. How would the thought, My heavenly Father knoweth what things I have need of, deliver us from being cumbered with many things! Rarely do we find Christians going as children to their Father, telling Him the little things that try and vex them, sure of a Father’s heart. Many are strict and busy in public acts of worship, but it is in the closet where we specially have to do with the Father, and to tell Him our own private necessities in secret. Legality obscures the sense of the relationship of God, as the Father. It makes us think of legal adoption, instead of real relationship. Legal adoption must needs be accompanied with the spirit of a servant, such was Israel, and yet turned out; but if the Son makes free, then are we free indeed. It is well to dwell on the confidential nearness to the Father into which grace brings us through Jesus. Through Jesus we have access by the Sprit unto the Father. Legalism effectually bars this access. No wonder, therefore, at the strength of the Apostle’s language, when he saw God’s own children debasing themselves as the Galatians were, by putting themselves under law.
Ver. 8-11. “Howbeit then, when ye knew not God, ye did service unto them which by nature are no gods. But now, after that ye have known God, or rather are known of God, how turn ye again to the weak and beggarly elements, whereunto ye desire again to be in bondage? Ye observe days, and months, and times, and years. I am afraid of you, lest I have bestowed upon you labor in vain.” I delight in that turn here, “or rather are known of God.” At the best, our knowledge of God is imperfect, but He thoroughly knows us, and He who knows the worst of us is the very God who has “justified us freely by His grace, through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus.” What strong language! God’s own legal ordinances are here said to be “weak and beggarly elements;” beautiful and excellent in their time and place, but they sink into weakness and beggary before Jesus Christ and Him crucified, the one grand ordinance of God. They are not only profitless, they are hindrances; yea, says the Apostle to these bewitched Galatians, you are going back again to your old idolatrous ways, and dealing with the living God as you did with your dumb idols, by observing days, months, and years. And all my labor in preaching to you the gospel of the grace of God appears to be thrown away. How applicable is all this to the Christianity of the present day. How painful to see many, who once seemed to love evangelical truth, bowed down under a system of ordinances, observing days and months, to the obscuring of their own vision of the one Object which God sets before us, even His blessed Son, in the glory of His humiliation and the glory of His exaltation.
Ver. 12-20. “Brethren, I beseech you, be as I am; for I am as ye are; ye have not injured me at all. Ye know how through the infirmity of the flesh I preached the gospel unto you at the first. And my temptation which was in my flesh ye despised not, nor rejected; but received me as an angel of God, even as Christ Jesus. Where is then the blessedness ye spake of? for I bear you record, that, if it had been possible, ye would have plucked out your own eyes, and have given them to me. Am I therefore become your enemy, because I tell you the truth? They zealously affect you, but not well; yea, they would exclude you, that ye might affect them. But it is good to be zealously affected always in a good thing, and not only when I am present with you. My little children, of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be formed in you, I desire to be present with you now, and to change my voice; for I stand in doubt of you.”
The Apostle here, as at the beginning, argues from his own case. “I am as ye are.” I take no vantage ground over you, because I was, “touching the righteousness in the law, blameless;” no, I come down from that to your level, and take the same ground, as a sinner of the Gentiles. So does Peter. “We (Jews) believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved even as they.” It is not for Gentiles to come on our ground, but for us Jews to take yours. The Apostle reminds them that he held out no attractions to them, but the attractiveness of the Cross of Christ to the really awakened sinner. (See John 12:3232And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me. (John 12:32).) They had overlooked his personal infirmity, in receiving the blessed message of which he was the bearer; and as the bearer of such a message they had received him as “an angel of God, even as Christ Jesus.” But what was the blessedness they spake of? Did it make them happy to hear Paul propound to them the words of law as the ground of their acceptance with God, or a system of ordinances as the ground of their approach to God? No; he had set forth before them the Cross of Christ, and through that the law abolished, “sin made an end of,” and “everlasting righteousness brought in;” and, in consequence, such nearness to God as may be faintly known in the confidence of a child in the love of his father. Other teachers tried to set them against the Apostle and his doctrine; and all their love for the Apostle, and zeal for the truth he had preached, vanished away when the Apostle left them.
Let us not be surprised at seeing a return to ordinances. We may trace it up to that legality which is in all our hearts. The reason that real Christians know so little happiness is that they are legal; and when they are so, they try to make others as miserable as themselves; for legal Christians always try to measure other Christians by themselves; judging alike those who are above and those who are below their standard. The only antidote to legality is to have “Christ formed in us.” This is the special office of the Holy Ghost, who glorifies Christ, taking us away from the law unto its real end and object, even righteousness, ―and “Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believeth.”
‘The more spiritual our occupation is, so much the greater is our danger of resting in it, and stopping short of God Himself.’