Living in the New Way of Faith, Part 2: Privilege, Plea, and Promise (Galatians 3:23–4:31)

I delivered this message at Spring Creek Bible Church on October 27, 2019, as part of the Galatians series.

Prefer what I actually said? Read the transcript (lightly edited for readability).

Prayer

Let’s pray together:

Father, thank you again for this opportunity to look into this amazing letter of Paul to the Galatians. Please help us as we consider this important section of Scripture and the truths it teaches us about you, your character, your plan, your promises, your gospel, what you’re doing in the world, and how we fit into it all.

We need your help. Our time here is in vain unless you meet with us and bless the teaching, reading, hearing, and application of your inspired and relevant Word. So please meet with us tonight by your gracious Spirit, who is the downpayment of our future inheritance. We ask in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Introduction

Last week we considered Galatians 3:1–22 together and saw how Paul exhorted the Galatians not to turn back to the old way of the works of the law and the flesh but to continue on in the new way of faith and the Spirit. He gave several reasons not to turn back, and then he educated the Galatians on the biblical covenants, particularly the Abrahamic and Mosaic covenants, and how they relate to each other.

I argued that the way these two points hang together is that a proper understanding of the biblical covenants can help insulate us from false teaching that would turn us away from the gospel, from the new way of faith.

Earlier this week Shanna saw a recent interview with prosperity false-preacher and multi-millionaire Kenneth Copeland on “Inside Edition,” and it caught her attention because of the way he defended his prosperity preaching and lifestyle by appealing to Galatians 3 and the Abrahamic Covenant.

Here’s what he said,

If you go into the Old Covenant, do you think the Jewish people believe you should be broke? . . . They believe in wealth. . . . The blessing of Abraham. Abraham was extremely wealthy, and he had a covenant with God. It’s not the Jewish blessing, it’s the Abrahamic blessing. . . . It is biblical. . . . Abraham was a very, very wealthy man. Galatians chapter three [says], if you belong to Christ, then are you Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to his promise, and his promise was great wealth.

This illustrates perfectly how dangerous a misunderstanding of God’s covenants and his covenant promises and blessings can be. How many people who don’t know their Bibles—and don’t know how God’s plan of redemption works out throughout history and hangs together, progresses, and climaxes in Christ—are susceptible to this kind of false teaching?

Kenneth Copeland is absolutely right that we are Abraham’s seed and heirs according to the promise, as we’ll see tonight, but he’s absolutely wrong that this promise to Abraham and his seed was the blessing of great physical wealth.

Tonight we’re going to continue on through the end of chapter 4 and cover 39 verses. We’re not going to go back over the introductory matters that we covered last week. If you missed it and want a little more context for tonight’s message, I’d encourage you to go back and listen to it. Or I’d be happy to share my notes and slides with you.

Much of what we cover tonight will assume the foundation we laid there in terms of

• the letter’s structure and argument,
• the background, context, and situation,
• the eschatological undercurrent,
• the key themes and repeated vocabulary, and
• the false dichotomies that plague many interpretations of the book.

My aim, however, is to make tonight’s message helpful whether you were here last week or not.

Context

Let’s talk about the context for our passage, the verses immediately preceding our text for tonight (3:15–22).

I’m not going to read them for the sake of time.

Brothers and sisters, let me take an example from everyday life. Just as no one can set aside or add to a human covenant that has been duly established, so it is in this case. 16 The promises were spoken to Abraham and to his seed. Scripture does not say “and to seeds,” meaning many people, but “and to your seed,” meaning one person, who is Christ.

17 What I mean is this: The law, introduced 430 years later, does not set aside the covenant previously established by God and thus do away with the promise. 18 For if the inheritance depends on the law, then it no longer depends on the promise; but God in his grace gave it to Abraham through a promise.

19 Why, then, was the law given at all? It was added because of transgressions until the Seed to whom the promise referred had come. The law was given through angels and entrusted to a mediator. 20 A mediator, however, implies more than one party; but God is one.

21 Is the law, therefore, opposed to the promises of God? Absolutely not! For if a law had been given that could impart life, then righteousness would certainly have come by the law. 22 But Scripture has locked up everything under the control of sin, so that what was promised, being given through faith in Jesus Christ, might be given to those who believe.

But please look at them in your own Bible while I will briefly summarize them.

Paul was talking about how the Mosaic Law didn’t set aside the promises that God made to Abraham (3:15–17). They’re still in full effect. Neither did they take over as the new way of receiving the promised inheritance. Rather, faith in God’s promises was still the way to receive the inheritance (3:18, 21).

The reason this is true is that the gracious character of God’s promises required that faith alone be the path to the promised inheritance (3:18). If law keeping were to replace faith in the promise, then the inheritance wouldn’t be a gift of grace but the just wages of the worker deserving his reward, as Paul also argues in Romans 11:5.

But Paul says that such a scenario wasn’t even possible. No one could receive the inheritance, if it were dependent on law keeping (3:21). To view that as the purpose of the law is to miss the main point for why the law was given.

The law was given for many reasons, but the one that Paul wants to focus on for the purposes of this discussion is its role in “locking up” everything under the control of sin (3:22)—of shining a light on sin to make sin more sinful (3:19, 22) and point to the inability of the law to deal with the problem and the need for a better, more permanent solution.

The goal of locking up everything under the control of sin was to give the promise to those who believe in Jesus (3:22).

And that’s where we pick up with this week’s text.

Scripture Reading

Let’s read Galatians 3:23–4:31 together.

As we read, listen for the key repeated words and themes we talked about last week, and listen for the temporal words as well.

Before [Πρὸ] the coming of this faith, we were held in custody under the law, locked up until [εἰς] the faith that was to come would be revealed. 24 So the law was our guardian until [εἰς] Christ came that we might be justified by faith. 25 Now [δὲ] that this faith has come, we are no longer [οὐκέτι] under a guardian.

26 So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith, 27 for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. 28 There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. 29 If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.

1 What I am saying is that as long as an heir is underage, he is no different from a slave, although he owns the whole estate. 2 The heir is subject to guardians and trustees until [ἄχρι] the time set by his father. 3 So also, when [ὅτε] we were underage, we were in slavery under the elemental spiritual forces of the world.

4 But when [ὅτε] the set time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, 5 to redeem those under the law, that we might receive adoption to sonship. 6 Because you are his sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, “Abba, Father.” 7 So you are no longer a slave, but God’s child; and since you are his child, God has made you also an heir.

8 Formerly, when [τότε] you did not know God, you were slaves to those who by nature are not gods. 9 But now [νῦν] that you know God—or rather are known by God—how is it that you are turning back to those weak and miserable forces? Do you wish to be enslaved by them all over again? 10 You are observing special days and months and seasons and years! 11 I fear for you, that somehow I have wasted my efforts on you.

12 I plead with you, brothers and sisters, become like me, for I became like you. You did me no wrong. 13 As you know, it was because of an illness that I first preached the gospel to you, 14 and even though my illness was a trial to you, you did not treat me with contempt or scorn.

Instead, you welcomed me as if I were an angel of God, as if I were Christ Jesus himself. 15 Where, then, is your blessing of me now? I can testify that, if you could have done so, you would have torn out your eyes and given them to me. 16 Have I now become your enemy by telling you the truth?

17 Those people are zealous to win you over, but for no good. What they want is to alienate you from us, so that you may have zeal for them. 18 It is fine to be zealous, provided the purpose is good, and to be so always, not just when I am with you. 19 My dear children, for whom I am again in the pains of childbirth until Christ is formed in you, 20 how I wish I could be with you now and change my tone, because I am perplexed about you!

21 Tell me, you who want to be under the law, are you not aware of what the law says? 22 For it is written that Abraham had two sons, one by the slave woman and the other by the free woman. 23 His son by the slave woman was born according to the flesh, but his son by the free woman was born as the result of a divine promise.

24 These things are being taken figuratively: The women represent two covenants. One covenant is from Mount Sinai and bears children who are to be slaves: This is Hagar. 25 Now Hagar stands for Mount Sinai in Arabia and corresponds to the present city of Jerusalem, because she is in slavery with her children.

26 But the Jerusalem that is above is free, and she is our mother. 27 For it is written: “Be glad, barren woman, you who never bore a child; shout for joy and cry aloud, you who were never in labor; because more are the children of the desolate woman than of her who has a husband.”

28 Now you, brothers and sisters, like Isaac, are children of promise. 29 At that time [ὥσπερ τότε] the son born according to the flesh persecuted the son born by the power of the Spirit. It is the same now [νῦν]. 30 But what does Scripture say? “Get rid of the slave woman and her son, for the slave woman’s son will never share in the inheritance with the free woman’s son.” 31 Therefore, brothers and sisters, we are not children of the slave woman, but of the free woman.

Outline

I’d like to work through this passage in three section tonight and see three more points that Paul makes about “living in this new way of faith.”

1. You must embrace your new identity in this new age (3:23–4:7).
2. You must understand and feel the consequences of turning back (4:8–20).
3. You must see how the Law teaches the superiority of the promise (4:21–31).

Transition: Let’s dig in with our first point.

1. You must embrace your new identity in this new age (3:23–4:7).

Before [Πρὸ] the coming of this faith, we were held in custody under the law, locked up until [εἰς] the faith that was to come would be revealed. 24 So the law was our guardian until [εἰς] Christ came that we might be justified by faith. 25 Now [δὲ] that this faith has come, we are no longer [οὐκέτι] under a guardian.

26 So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith, 27 for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. 28 There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. 29 If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.

1 What I am saying is that as long as an heir is underage, he is no different from a slave, although he owns the whole estate. 2 The heir is subject to guardians and trustees until [ἄχρι] the time set by his father. 3 So also, when [ὅτε] we were underage, we were in slavery under the elemental spiritual forces of the world.

4 But when [ὅτε] the set time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, 5 to redeem those under the law, that we might receive adoption to sonship. 6 Because you are his sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, “Abba, Father.” 7 So you are no longer a slave, but God’s child; and since you are his child, God has made you also an heir.

In these verses Paul contrasts the old age with the new age, alternating from the old in 3:23–25 to the new in 3:26–29 and then back to the old in 4:1–3 and then the new again in 4:4–7.

Notice all of the temporal words here in these verses: before, until, until, now, no longer, until, when, when, no longer.

Paul is stressing this theme of the old age passing away and the new age dawning in Christ.

The coming of Christ was the major turning point in both redemptive history and all of human history.

I’m going to group these sections in pairs and treat them together.

Transition: The first reason Paul gives for embracing your new identity is that . . .

1.1. Because the old age is gone and the new age has come (3:23–25, 4:1–3).

Before [Πρὸ] the coming of this faith, we were held in custody under the law, locked up until [εἰς] the faith that was to come would be revealed. 24 So the law was our guardian [παιδαγωγὸς] until [εἰς] Christ came that we might be justified by faith. 25 Now [δὲ] that this faith has come, we are no longer [οὐκέτι] under a guardian [παιδαγωγόν].

. . .

1 What I am saying is that as long as an heir is underage, he is no different from a slave, although he owns the whole estate. 2 The heir is subject to guardians and trustees until [ἄχρι] the time set by his father. 3 So also, when [ὅτε] we were underage, we were in slavery under the elemental spiritual forces of the world.

You can see in these verses where I got the title of these two messages: “Living in the New Way of Faith.” This text presents faith as something that came on the scene when Christ came, which put an end to the old age.

• “Before the coming of this faith” (3:23)
• “Until the faith that was to come would be revealed” (3:23)
• “Until Christ came” (3:24)
• “Now that this faith has come” (3:25)
• “We are no longer under a guardian” (3:25)

Faith here is shorthand for Christ, for the gospel, for the New Covenant.

1.1.1. The Law is temporary.

Paul continues to explain the role of the law in the old age and what’s become of it in this new age of faith, a thought he begin in 3:19 when he said that the law was “added because of transgressions until the Seed to whom the promise referred had come.”

He continues in 3:23 with the locking up metaphor that he started in 3:22 and expands it to talk about being in custody, in prison, until this faith would be revealed.

The law here is personified as

• a guide [παιδαγωγός] (3:24, 25)
• a guardian [ἐπιτρόπους] (4:2), and
• an administrator [οἰκονόμος] (4:2)

as one who

• held us in custody (3:23; cf. 3:22)
• locked us up (3:23)
• subjected us to itself (4:2)

The law was put in charge of us while we were underage, until we came of age and entered into the privileges determined by the father to be received at the appointed time.

Before this time, they were underaged heirs. Even though they were to inherit the whole estate, yet they weren’t functionally any different from slaves (4:1–3).

The Law as a Parenthesis

Some believe that this new age of faith, the church age, should be viewed as a parenthesis, a temporary sidetrack in God’s main plan.

But Paul argues that the parenthesis is not this new age of faith, the fullness of time, this dawning of the age of fulfillment of the Old Testament covenants in Christ, the beginning of the already but not yet.

Rather, it was the Mosaic Covenant, the Old Covenant, that was a sort of parenthesis, a temporary but providentially planned detour or indirect route in God’s one unfolding plan of redemption.

New Testament scholar D. A. Carson, commenting on our text, says,

. . . the law-covenant is no longer the high point, the culmination and control of all that is meant by true religion. Instead, it has almost become a parenthesis (Gal 3:15–4:7).¹

He goes on,

Paul assesses the significance of Israel and the Sinai covenant within the larger biblical narrative. It is this essentially salvation-historical reading of Genesis that enables him to come within a whisker of treating the Sinai covenant as a parenthesis: the law’s most important function is to bring Israel, across time, to Christ—and to bring others, too, insofar as the “law” is found among those “without the law.”²

1.1.2. Redemptive history is a picture of personal salvation.

One other point we must consider is how we’re to understand who and when Paul is talking about in these verses.

This is another one of those occasions where interpreters can be led into a false dichotomy: of choosing either-or instead of both-and.

The who that Paul is talking about is in some sense both Jews and Gentiles, a point I’ll come back to in the next section.

The when that Paul is talking about is first and foremost the periods of time before and after Christ came, BC and AD, if you will. But Paul intends for us to see these verses at both the macro level and the micro level, at both the corporate level and the individual level.

In other words, we have in this macro, corporate level of redemptive history a picture of what happens in each individual’s life at a micro level before and after conversion. The historia salutis illustrates the ordo salutis.

Historia salutis	Ordo salutis
History of salvation	Order of salvation
Macro	Micro
Corporate	Individual
Redemptive history	Personal salvation

To put it in English, what we see happening in the broad sweeping history of God’s salvation of his people is in some way an illustration of what happens when a person is saved.

It’s both-and.

Transition: Let’s turn now to our new identity.

1.2. Because in Christ we are the sons and children of God, one in Christ, Abraham’s seed, and heirs of the promise (3:26–29; 4:4–7).

26 So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith, 27 for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. 28 There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. 29 If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.

. . .

4 But when [ὅτε] the set time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, 5 to redeem those under the law, that we might receive adoption to sonship. 6 Because you are his sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, “Abba, Father.” 7 So you are no longer a slave, but God’s child; and since you are his child, God has made you also an heir.

This next pair of sections is rich with our identity, who we are:

• children (3:26; 4:7) and sons (4:5, 6) of God
• one (3:28)
• Abraham’s seed (3:29)
• heirs according to the promise (3:29; 4:7)

How did this become our identity? In short, by being united to Christ:

• in Christ Jesus (3:26, 28)
• baptized into Christ (3:27)
• clothed yourselves with Christ (3:27)
• belong to Christ (3:29)

And how were we united to Christ?

• through faith (3:26)

I charted this out like this:

What glorious truths are here for us to meditate on!

We’re so used to some of these, that we almost read right over them without a second thought. But ponder with me for a moment how shocking these words are.

We are members of God’s family—the God of the universe against who we rebelled. This isn’t just spiritual talk. This is objective reality. This is more real than the building we’re in right now.

We are his very sons and daughters, his dear children whom he loves deeply.

We are by extension the brothers and sisters of Jesus—a thought developed more fully in Romans 8:29 (“that he might be the firstborn among many brothers”) and Hebrews 2:11 (“not ashamed to call them brothers”).

We are on equal footing with God’s special, chosen, Old Covenant people.

We have been grafted in to God’s people in Christ and have become co-heirs with him of all the rich promises that belong to him—a thought developed more fully in Romans 8:17 (“heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ”).

The inheritance of the heirs of the richest people in the world—Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, Mark Zuckerberg, Larry Page, Steve Ballmer—isn’t even a drop in the ocean compared to the inheritance that belongs to us by virtue of our adoption into God’s family by union with Christ.

Do you believe that tonight?

If you get nothing else from the message tonight, don’t miss the chance to let that sink in and enthrall your heart. Talk about this on the ride home, over meals, and relish the glory of your identity in Christ.

Transition: Some of what we just read may raise some questions for you about what it means for us to be Abraham’s seed and heirs of the promises God made to Abraham and his seed. I’d like to spend a few minutes pondering this together.

1.2.1. The Mystery of the Gospel

Although we don’t see there word for mystery here in our passage, we do see the concept of mystery as discussed elsewhere in the New Testament.³ This theme of mystery was used to refer to something that was concealed in the Old Testament and revealed in the New Testament—something that was there in seed form, progressively became clearer over time, and came into greater clarity after the death and resurrection of Jesus through the divine illumination and revelation of the mystery to the apostles.

A seed that sprouts into a seedling, then a sampling, then a young tree, and then grows into a full tree is a common picture to understand progressive revelation in general and this concept of mystery in particular.

Illustration

Another picture that may help is turning an old piece of wood on a lathe and making something beautiful out of it. I remember the first time I worked on a lathe with my grandpa. We walked out to one of his barns where he kept all his firewood, and he grabbed an old gnarly piece of that looked well suited for the fire. I remember the skepticism I had as we carried that piece of wood in and got it mounted on the lathe. It wasn’t long before I started to see something beautiful begin to take shape as pieces of wood were chipped off. Before long, I was making a bowl, one I still have to this day and treasure as a special memory of spending time with my grandpa. I made many more bowls, cups, salt and pepper shakers, but I never got over the transformation that happened between the old piece of wood on the wood pile to a beautiful piece of art at the end.

While it’s not a perfect analogy, I think it does illustrate how something can be there all along and yet be missed until someone comes along and reveals it.

What is this mystery?

Here’s what the NT teaches was only hinted at and could only be seen clearly as we look back at the OT with Christian eyes:

Summarizing all this data, we see something like this:

Verses	Concealed	Revealed	Content
Mt 13:11	not to them	given to you	kingdom of heaven
Mk 4:11	everything is said in parables	given to you	kingdom of God
Lk 8:10	I speak in parables; they may not see; they may not understand	given to you	kingdom of God
Rom 11:25–26	–	–	Israel has experienced a hardening in part until the full number of the Gentiles has come in, and in this way all Israel will be saved
Rom 16:25–27	hidden for long ages past	now revealed and made known through the prophetic writings	–
1 Cor 2:7	has been hidden	–	–
1 Cor 4:1	–	revealed	–
Eph 1:7–10	–	–	to bring unity to all things in heaven and on earth under Christ
Eph 3:2–12	was not made known to people in other generations; for ages past was kept hidden in God	by revelation; has now been revealed by the Spirit to God’s holy apostles and prophets; the manifold wisdom of God should be made known	through the gospel the Gentiles are heirs together with Israel, members together of one body, and sharers together in the promise in Christ Jesus
Eph 5:32	–	–	Christ and the church
Eph 6:19–20	–	–	gospel
Col 1:24–27	has been kept hidden for ages and generations	now disclosed to the Lord’s people; God has chosen to make known among the Gentiles the glorious riches	Christ in you, the hope of glory
Col 2:2–3	–	know	Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge
Col 4:3	–	–	Christ

This mystery is about

• the kingdom of heaven (Mt 13:11) / God (Mk 4:11; Lk 8:10)
• Christ and the church (Eph 5:32)
• gospel (Eph 6:19–20)
• Christ (Col 4:3), in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge (Col 2:2–3)

and the essence of this mystery is

• that
  • Israel has experienced a hardening in part (Ro 11:25)
  • until the full number of Gentiles has come in (Ro 11:25)
  • and in this way all Israel will be saved (Ro 11:26)
• to bring unity to all things in heaven and on earth under Christ (Eph 1:10)
• that through the gospel the Gentiles are heirs together with Israel, members together of one body, and sharers together in the promise in Christ Jesus (Eph 3:6)
• Christ in you [Gentiles], the hope of glory (Col 1:27)

It was there but concealed in the Old Testament and is still concealed from unbelieving Jews today, who have a veil over their eyes (2 Cor 3:14), who have been given a spirit of stupor, eyes not to see, nor ears to hear (Rom 11:8).

But it’s now been revealed in the New Testament through the apostles to those who by grace have been given eyes to see and ears to hear.

Where do we see this mystery in Galatians?

• Gentiles have received the promise of the Spirit by faith (3:14).
  • The Spirit was promised to the Jews.
• Gentiles are the children (3:7) and seed of Abraham by faith (3:29).
  • These privileges were thought to be only for Abraham’s physical descendents.
• Gentiles are the sons (4:5, 6) and children of God by faith (3:26).
  • It was Israel who was God’s son and his children.
• Gentiles are heirs of the promises by faith (3:29).
  • The promises and inheritance were thought to be only for the Jews.
• Gentiles are first-class citizens among the people of God, on equal footing with Jews, one in Christ (3:28).
  • The Jews were God’s special people above all other people.
• Gentiles are the children of promise (4:28).
  • Isaac was and his sons were the children of promise, not the Gentiles.
• Gentiles are the new Israel of God (6:16).
  • Israel was the name given only to God’s chosen people. Paul seems to be suggesting that in Christ, the true and faithful son of Abraham, who fulfills what Israel failed to do, those who are in him are now in some sense the new spiritual Israel of God. I know this is debated, but this interpretation seems to fit best with what Paul’s been arguing throughout chapters 3 and 4.

It’s these same themes that are discussed in the mystery passages in Romans, Ephesians, and Colossians, which suggests we should see the concept of mystery here even though the word is absent.

The Essence of the Mystery

The OT revealed that God’s redemptive plan would extend to the Gentiles. That wasn’t a mystery. What it didn’t clearly reveal is how and the extent to which God would include the Gentiles. The Old Testament expectation was that God would save Gentiles by bringing them into Israel as proselytes and second-class citizens, that they’d still need to become Jews in order to be saved and experience some, though not all, of God’s blessings.

That’s why so many Jews were trying to preserve the Mosaic Law even after Christ had come. They missed the fact that the Law was temporary and preparatory for the coming of Christ, at which time it had served its purpose and become obsolete.

Instead of doing what most expected, God in his wisdom saved the Gentiles by bringing them into Christ, who was in a sense the new Israel, fulfilling all that Israel had failed to fulfill. He brought them in through a new spiritual rather than national body called the church, a new spiritual rather than geopolitical kingdom. And he didn’t do this through Israel’s faithfulness but through Christ’s faithfulness and Israel’s unfaithfulness, hardening, and rejection.

Here’s how you might diagram this.

On the top is what God called Israel to do.

Below that is the mystery, what God in his wisdom chose to do.

In union with Christ, the true and ultimate seed of Abraham, Gentiles became the spiritual children and offspring of Abraham and the New Covenant people of God right along with believing Jews.

It’s important that we not miss this mystery. It’s close to the heart of the gospel, the New Testament, and the entire Bible. This is the mystery that the heavenly hosts marvel at. They stood in awe of God’s wisdom when they saw how he pulled off the fulfillment of his promises in spite of Israel’s unfaithfulness.

Not even they understand how God was going to accomplish his purposes of bringing salvation to the ends of the earth and making for himself a people of every tongue and tribe and nation—how he was going to fulfill his promise to Abraham to make him the father of many nations and make his name great.

The Old Testament recounts failure after failure, making it seem as if God’s plans were being thwarted (cf. Rom 9:6). No one anticipated how he’d fulfill them and bring them all together.

This is the mystery that was concealed but has now been revealed, and it’s at the heart of the message of Galatians.

1.2.2. The Promise to Abraham’s Seed

Before we move on, it’s worth pausing for another moment to talk about what it means for us to be heirs according to the promise.

The natural questions that may come to mind are

• How many promises were there?
• Which ones does Paul have in view here?
• Which ones are ours?
• In what sense are they ours?

We don’t have time for a detailed exploration of these questions, but I want to survey them quickly to help us see the main point Paul wants us to walk away with.

Earlier we commented on the repetition of this word promise throughout chapters 3 and 4, where it occurs 11 times.

Verse	Text
3:14	so that by faith we might receive the promise of the Spirit
3:16	The promises were spoken to Abraham and to his seed.
3:17	The law . . . does not . . . do away with the promise.
3:18a	For if the inheritance depends on the law, then it no longer depends on the promise
3:18b	God in his grace gave it to Abraham through a promise.
3:19	[The law] was added . . . until the Seed to whom the promise referred had come.
3:21	Is the law, therefore, opposed to the promises of God?
3:22	so that what was promised . . . might be given to those who believe
3:29	If you belong to Christ, then you are . . . heirs according to the promise.
4:23	his son by the free woman was born as the result of a divine promise.
4:28	Now you, brothers and sisters, like Isaac, are children of promise.

It’s usually singular, where it represents the Abraham Covenant as a whole. But in 3:16 and in 3:21 it’s plural, and seems to be broader than just a single promise.

While we don’t have time to do a deep dive into the promises made to Abraham and his seed, they basically boil down to these:

• Great Nation: Make Abraham a great nation (Gen 12:2)
• Bless Him: Bless him (Gen 12:2)
• Great Name: Make his name great (Gen 12:2)
• Blessing to Others: Make him a blessing (Gen 12:2)
  • Blessing to Some: Bless those who bless Abraham (Gen 12:3)
  • Curse to Some: Curse those who curse Abraham (Gen 12:3)
  • Blessing to All: All people on earth will be blessed through Abraham (Gen 12:3)
• Land: Give the land to him and his offspring forever (Gen 12:7; 13:15, 17; 15:7, 18; 17:8)

• Many Offspring:
  • Multiply his offspring like dust (Gen 13:16; 15:5)
  • Greatly increase his numbers (Gen 17:4)
  • Make him very fruitful (Gen 17:6)
• Covenant with Him: Make his covenant with him (Gen 17:2, 7)
• Covenant with His Seed: (Gen 17:7)
• Many Nations: Father of many nations (Gen 17:4, 5, 6)
• Father of Kings: Kings will come from him (Gen 17:6)
• Be His God: (Gen 17:7)
• Be His Seed’s God: (Gen 17:7, 8)

As we saw last week, there are other implied promises here in seed form, such as the promise of the Holy Spirit and the promise that God would justify the Gentiles through faith in Christ.

Promise or Promises?

So which promise or promises does Paul have in mind when he says,

• “so that what was promised . . . might be given to those who believe” (3:22)
• “If you belong to Christ, then you are . . . heirs according to the promise” (3:29)
• “Now you, brothers and sisters, like Isaac, are children of promise” (4:28)

At minimum he has to have the promises of justification (3:8) and the Spirit in view (3:14):

• “Scripture foresaw that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, and announced the gospel in advance to Abraham: ‘All nations will be blessed through you’” (3:8)
• “so that by faith we might receive the promise of the Spirit” (3:14)

But is that all?

Some would like to say that these passages refer merely to the more general promise of blessing, perhaps including justification and the Spirit.

But that seems insufficient for at least three reasons: (1) Paul’s use of the plural promises, (2) that the promises all belong to Christ, and (3) what the rest of the New Testament teaches about the promises and who they belong to.

Paul’s Use of the Plural

Twice in these verses, Paul uses the plural promises, suggesting that he has more in view than a single promise.

• “The promises were spoken to Abraham and to his seed” (3:16)
• “Is the law, therefore, opposed to the promises of God?” (3:21)

I think it’s best to take the single promise as representative of the Abraham Covenant along with its promises rather than to try to single out one specific promise and figure out how to explain away the plurals.

The Promises belong to Christ

The second reason I think it’s insufficient to consider this a single promise of blessing is that the promises were made to Abraham and his seed, who is Christ.

How many of the Abrahamic promises belonged to Christ? Just one? Or all of them? I think we’d have a difficult time limiting these promises and saying they don’t all belong to Christ.

In 3:16 Paul says,

The promises were spoken to Abraham and to his seed. Scripture does not say “and to seeds,” meaning many people, but “and to your seed,” meaning one person, who is Christ.

While we don’t have time to look at the particulars of Paul’s argument here based on the singular seed vs. the plural seeds, it’s clear that Paul believes that the promises made to Abraham were also made to Christ.

The other important observation for our purposes here is that we get a clue about which promises Paul has in view.

Which part of Scripture is he referring to when he quotes “and to your seed”? That’s not easy to answer, since this exact phrase occurs 9 times in the Greek Old Testament. Eight of those 9 occur in Genesis and are a reference to a promise made to Abraham. The last one is in the context of a promise to the Levites and isn’t relevant.

When you survey these promises, they all have one thing in common:

• Gen 13:15: “all the land”
• Gen 17:8: “the whole land of Canaan”
• Gen 24:7: “this land”
• Gen 26:3: “all these lands”
• Gen 28:4: “the blessing given to Abraham,” “the land where you now reside as a foreigner, the land God gave to Abraham”
• Gen 28:13: “the land on which you are lying”
• Gen 35:12: “the land that I gave to Abraham and Isaac,” “this land”
• Gen 48:4: “make you fruitful and increase your numbers,” “make you a community of peoples,” “this land as an everlasting possession”

They all mention and even focus on the eternal inheritance of the promised land.

So regardless of which one you think Paul is quoting in Galatians 3:16, at minimum Paul seems to be saying that the promises that were made to Abraham were also made to Christ, including but not limited to the promise of eternal inheritance in the land.

Other New Testament Evidence

Finally, if you trace this promise theme throughout the New Testament, you’ll see more evidence for this view that all the promises made to Abraham and to his seed, Christ, in some real and important sense belong to us, his church, his New Covenant people. Regardless of your view on dispensationalism vs. covenant theology or your eschatological position, this much seems hard to escape.

Romans 4:13–17 is a close parallel to what we have here in Galatians:

It was not through the law that Abraham and his offspring received the promise that he would be heir of the world, but through the righteousness that comes by faith. 14 For if those who depend on the law are heirs, faith means nothing and the promise is worthless, 15 because the law brings wrath. And where there is no law there is no transgression. 16 Therefore, the promise comes by faith, so that it may be by grace and may be guaranteed to all Abraham’s offspring—not only to those who are of the law but also to those who have the faith of Abraham. He is the father of us all. 17 As it is written: “I have made you a father of many nations.” He is our father in the sight of God, in whom he believed—the God who gives life to the dead and calls into being things that were not.

Here the promise here seems to be an expansion of the land promise, but there’s no clear indication that it’s plural. But what’s interesting here is how Paul connect the expanded land promise to Abraham’s Gentile offspring.

But Paul drives this broader point home in 2 Corinthians 1:20:

But as surely as God is faithful, our message to you is not “Yes” and “No.” 19 For the Son of God, Jesus Christ, who was preached among you by us—by me and Silas and Timothy—was not “Yes” and “No,” but in him it has always been “Yes.” 20 For no matter how many promises God has made, they are “Yes” in Christ. And so through him the “Amen” is spoken by us to the glory of God. 21 Now it is God who makes both us and you stand firm in Christ. He anointed us, 22 set his seal of ownership on us, and put his Spirit in our hearts as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come.

Notice the connection here with the promise of the Spirit as the deposit or downpayment in the already that guarantees the rest of the promised inheritance to come in the not-yet, a point Paul makes in Ephesians 1:13–14 as well:

And you also were included in Christ when you heard the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation. When you believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, 14 who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession—to the praise of his glory.

Paul’s argument, then, is that through faith we enter into union with Christ and partake of all that belongs to him, including all the promises of the Abraham Covenant. We are heirs of these promises because we are in Christ, the true seed of Abraham.

And as Paul says now in verse 29, because we are “in Christ Jesus” and have been “baptized into Christ” and have “clothed ourselves with Christ” and “belong to Christ,” that we, too, are Abraham’s seed. Faith connects us to Christ. We are united to him and share in all that’s his. He inherited the promises of Abraham, and those same promises now belong to use. We are heirs.

Very closely tied to the discussion of promises is the theme of inheritance. There are two other passages that connect this inheritance theme to promises:

Romans 8:17: Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.

Ephesians 3:6: This mystery is that through the gospel the Gentiles are heirs together with Israel, members together of one body, and sharers together in the promise in Christ Jesus.

We get to share in the promised inheritance with both Christ and Israel.

We know what it means that we inherit the Holy Spirit. But what does it mean that we inherit the land?

As we briefly saw, Paul broadens this promise in Romans 4:13 when he calls Abraham and his offspring “heirs of the world.”

There are already and not yet aspects to our inheritance.

Some think that we are already being to inherit the land, expanded to the world. And that’s possible. But whether you consider this promise to be partially present and partially future or wholly future, what seems unavoidable is that

these promises are ours because they’re Christ’s and we are his.

Transition: Next, let’s look at Paul’s second argument:

2. You must understand and feel the consequences of turning back (4:8–20).

8 Formerly, when [τότε] you did not know God, you were slaves to those who by nature are not gods. 9 But now [νῦν] that you know God—or rather are known by God—how is it that you are turning back to those weak and miserable forces? Do you wish to be enslaved by them all over again? 10 You are observing special days and months and seasons and years! 11 I fear for you, that somehow I have wasted my efforts on you.

12 I plead with you, brothers and sisters, become like me, for I became like you. You did me no wrong. 13 As you know, it was because of an illness that I first preached the gospel to you, 14 and even though my illness was a trial to you, you did not treat me with contempt or scorn.

Instead, you welcomed me as if I were an angel of God, as if I were Christ Jesus himself. 15 Where, then, is your blessing of me now? I can testify that, if you could have done so, you would have torn out your eyes and given them to me. 16 Have I now become your enemy by telling you the truth?

17 Those people are zealous to win you over, but for no good. What they want is to alienate you from us, so that you may have zeal for them. 18 It is fine to be zealous, provided the purpose is good, and to be so always, not just when I am with you. 19 My dear children, for whom I am again in the pains of childbirth until Christ is formed in you, 20 how I wish I could be with you now and change my tone, because I am perplexed about you!

In this next section, Paul reiterates the same point he made in the opening section of chapter 3 about turning back from the new way of faith and the Spirit to the old way of law and the flesh.

We spent the bulk of our time on this last week, so I’m not going to spend a lot of time on it tonight. But there are some important things we should take note of briefly.

Paul continues his temporal contrast between the old age and the old man with the new age and the new man, with the coming of Christ as the pivotal turning point. As I argued above, I think Paul intends us to see both historia salutis and ordo salutis, or the history of salvation and the order of salvation, or to simplify it, both a picture of the old age vs. the new age at historical time periods—BC and AD, if you will—and as a picture of preconversion and postconversion in the experience of believers. In other words, there is something about the time before Christ came under the Old Covenant that is a picture of our preconversion experience and something about the time after Christ came that is a picture of our postconversion experience.

2.1. Because of what it means to turn back

There are some important connections between what Paul says here and what he said in 3:1–5, where he warned them about turning back to the Mosaic Law.

1. In Paul’s mind this alternate path was mutually exclusive with the new way of faith in the gospel.
2. The consequences for turning back are dire. Turning back means slavery, idol/demon worship, and failure to inherit the promises.

The Galatians used to be slaves to “those who by nature are not gods” (4:8), which Paul calls in the next version “weak and inferior forces [στοιχεῖα]” (4:9). Now they’re heading back for slavery.

Notice the word “turning back [ἐπιστρέφετε]” (4:9). This is where they used to be, and Paul says they’re turning back.

What Paul says next is shocking.

Most of these Gentiles had never followed the Mosaic Law before. Instead, they were “under the elemental spiritual forces of the world,” following “those who by nature are not gods,” these “weak and miserable forces.”

Yet Paul seems to be equating their turning to the Law with turning back to their pre-Christian experience of pagan idolatry, that in this new age of fulfillment there’s little difference between pagan idolatry and Mosaic law keeping.

Did you catch that? Where do we see this?

Notice how in verse 10 Paul talks about their “observing special days and months and seasons and years.” This is almost certainly a reference to Jewish ceremonial laws, as required by the Mosaic Law. Somehow observing these aspects of the Mosaic Law wasn’t fundamentally different from returning to their pre-Christian experience of following false gods. Both of these results in slavery, which ties back to the argument Paul just made in 4:1–7.

Going back to their pre-Christian paganism or submitting themselves to the Mosaic Law weren’t very different. They’re both part of the old way that’s been set aside with the coming of faith.

2.2. Because of Paul’s passionate appeal not to turn back

Let’s look now at Paul’s passionate plea.

Paul expresses fear and concern that his gospel ministry among them may have been in vain.

Paul pleads with them to come back to the way of faith. Rather shifts from the logically rigorous argument he’s been making, and he now he’s making an emotional appeal—not unlike the way he appealed to Philemon on behalf of Onesimus. There’s a place for rigorous exegesis and logical argumentation, and there’s also a place for emotion, passion, and heart. Paul models both of these so well for us. He had both a brilliant mind and a passionate pastoral heart.

He reminds them that he became like them. That is, he, a Jew, become like the Gentiles. Now they, Gentiles, were acting like Jews. Paul’s appealing to them to become like Gentiles and come out from under the bondage of the law.

He reminds them of how they first met, of the time they spent together. Paul became ill and had to stop in Galatia for help, which gave Paul an occasion to preach the gospel to them. These unbelievers welcomed Paul in, took care of him at great inconvenience to themselves, and they treated him with great respect. It’s unclear if they were converted before or after they welcome Paul in.

Paul begs them to bless him again like they did then. They would have done anything for Paul, but now he feels like they’ve switched their loyalties to the Judaizers and are treating Paul as an enemy. How hard must that have been for Paul?

Illustration

What if our pastors went away on an extended mission trip and came back to find false teaching had crept in and won over the loyalties of the church. I can’t imagine how hard that would be on our pastors, and how hard it must have been on Paul.

The Judaizers were zealous for the law and zealous to win as many followers over to the law as they could, winning their loyalties over from Paul.

Paul was all in favor of zeal, but passion in the wrong direction is dangerous. Their purpose wasn’t good.

Paul closes this emotional section by calling them his dear children. Notice the tenderness of Paul’s pleas. He felt like a mother who needed to go through childbirth all over again, something no mother wants after the joy of giving birth to a child. He’s using more feminine metaphors to better convey the emotion he has for these whom he loved deeply.

The longing of his heart was to see Christ formed in them. He longed to come visit them in person and speak to them more tenderly and understand what had happened.

Application

The takeaway for me in this is the importance of godly emotion in ministering to each other.

There’s a time to address the mind with truth and rigorous argumentation, but there’s a time to speak to the heart and appeal to the conscience with feeling and compassion and concern.

I’m thankful that we have pastors who both love and faithfully teach the truth and have deep pastoral concern for those entrusted to their care. May God help us to follow their and Paul’s example and be willing to pour out our hearts and appeal to others who are wandering away from the Lord.

Transition: Finally, let’s consider Paul’s final argument, where he sees an analogy of the Old and the New Covenants in the story of Abrhaam’s first two wives and sons.

3. You must see how the Law teaches the superiority of the promise (4:21–31).

21 Tell me, you who want to be under the law, are you not aware of what the law says? 22 For it is written that Abraham had two sons, one by the slave woman and the other by the free woman. 23 His son by the slave woman was born according to the flesh, but his son by the free woman was born as the result of a divine promise.

24 These things are being taken figuratively: The women represent two covenants. One covenant is from Mount Sinai and bears children who are to be slaves: This is Hagar. 25 Now Hagar stands for Mount Sinai in Arabia and corresponds to the present city of Jerusalem, because she is in slavery with her children.

26 But the Jerusalem that is above is free, and she is our mother. 27 For it is written: “Be glad, barren woman, you who never bore a child; shout for joy and cry aloud, you who were never in labor; because more are the children of the desolate woman than of her who has a husband.”

28 Now you, brothers and sisters, like Isaac, are children of promise. 29 At that time [ὥσπερ τότε] the son born according to the flesh persecuted the son born by the power of the Spirit. It is the same now [νῦν]. 30 But what does Scripture say? “Get rid of the slave woman and her son, for the slave woman’s son will never share in the inheritance with the free woman’s son.” 31 Therefore, brothers and sisters, we are not children of the slave woman, but of the free woman.

In this final section, Paul again drives home the point that he’s already touched on a couple of times: the Law itself teaches that in this new age of faith to attempt to be under the Law is to reject the promises and be in slavery.

We saw this last week in 3:19 especially, where Paul argued that the law was additive, temporary, and preparatory:

Why, then, was the law given at all? It was added because of transgressions until the Seed to whom the promise referred had come.

The clear implication was that the law would be subtracted once the Seed had come.

Paul also made this same point in the opening of our passage for tonight:

• We were held in custody, locked up until the faith came (3:23).
• The law was our guardian until Christ came. Now we’re no longer under a guardian (3:24).

Paul now returns to this point again, reenforcing that it’s one of the most important points he wants the Galatians and us to understand.

Paul drives this point home with an extended discussion of Abraham’s two sons, Ishmael and Isaac, and their mothers, Hagar and Sarah. From this Old Testament story, Paul finds compelling proof that living under the law is tantamount to choosing slavery over freedom, a false gospel over the true gospel.

Paul says that this story is intended to be an analogy for the two covenants: the Old Mosaic Covenant and the New Covenant.

It can be tricky to know when Paul is talking about the Abrahamic Covenant or the New Covenant. Even though the two covenants have a lot in common, it’s essential to see this as a reference to the New Covenant. We have no right to the promises of the Abrahamic Covenant. It’s only in Christ in the New Covenant that the Abrahamic promises come to us as Abraham’s seed, those who are by faith his children. And that happens in the fullness of time when God begins to fulfill the New Covenant promises of giving the Spirit and writing his law on our hearts.

It’s helpful to trace the contrast between these two covenants. As we do, we’ll see some very similar vocabulary that we’ve seen earlier in chapter 3 and 4 and that we’ll continue to see as we move into chapter 5 and 6.

3.1. Hagar and Ishmael

On the one hand we have Ismael and his mother Hagar, who is a slave woman. Ismael was born according to the flesh, that is, by human effort rather than trust in the promises of God. Hagar stands for Mount Sinai in Arabia, where God made a covenant with Israel and gave them the Law through angels and Moses. Those who live under this covenant, the inhabitants of Jerusalem who haven’t turned from the old way to the new way of faith in Christ, are slaves.

3.2. Sarah and Isaac

On the other hand we have Isaac and his mother Sarah, who is a free woman. Isaac was born as the result of a divine promise and by the power of the Spirit. Sarah represents Mt. Zion and the heavenly Jerusalem, who gives birth to children of promise by faith and results in freedom with our mother Sarah, the heavenly Jerusalem.

Let’s look at these two covenants and their differences:

Old Covenant	New Covenant
Ismael	Isaac
slave woman (Hagar)	free woman (Sarah)
born according to the flesh	born as the result of a divine promise / born by the power of the Spirit
Mount Sinai in Arabia	[Mount Zion]
bears children who are to be slaves	children of promise
the present city of Jerusalem	Jerusalem that is above
in slavery with her children	[in] free[dom] [with] our mother
–	barren/desolate woman
[fewer children]	more children

We should read the contrasts Paul has been making throughout chapter 3 and 4 along with these.

• the false gospel with the true gospel,
• the law with the promise,
• the works of the law with faith,
• the flesh with the Spirit,
• curse with blessing

Paul is arguing that if we read the story of Abraham and his sons and wives properly, we’ll see that being under the law was never God’s ongoing plan for his people. It was temporary and preparatory for the fulfillment of the law and the promises in Christ. Attempting to be under the law now in the age of fulfillment in Christ is to become slaves and children of Hagar and cut yourselves off from the promises.

3.3. Reading the Old Testament through the New

Before we conclude, I want to ask and answer two common questions that come up as we read this passage.

3.3.1. Was this meaning really there in the Old Testament?

We’re forced by our commitment to the inspiration and authority of the Bible to conclude that it was. Paul’s not making this up. If he was, his argument would have no weight. Look again at how he opens this section: “Are you not aware of what the law says?”

But it was there only there in seed form. It is with Christian eyes on this side of the death and resurrection of Jesus that we can see it, through the help of the divinely inspired apostle to the Gentiles, who had been entrusted the mystery of the gospel, which he received by divine revelation, enabling him to see what had been there all along, though mysteriously veiled, and now clearly revealed in the New Testament.

The application here is powerful. We mustn’t in any way hold on to the obsolete Old Covenant and its Law along with any of its fleshly ways that bring slavery. No. We must get rid of the slave woman and her son, that is Jerusalem and her unbelieving children, the Judaizers. They’ve been cut off and will not receive the promised inheritance along with the believing Jews and Gentiles.

In great irony, the unbelieving Jewish people are no longer grouped with Abraham’s special seed through Isaac, Jacob, and the twelve tribes. They’re now, due to their unbelief, viewed as part of Abraham’s purely biological seed. They’re now Ishmael, cut off from the promised inheritance. It’s the believing Gentiles (and Jews) who are now Isaac, the children of promise, born by the power of the Spirit, and recipients of the promised inheritance.

Paul develops a similar point in Romans 9:6–8.

It is not as though God’s word had failed. For not all who are descended from Israel are Israel. 7 Nor because they are his descendants are they all Abraham’s children. On the contrary, “It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned.” 8 In other words, it is not the children by physical descent who are God’s children, but it is the children of the promise who are regarded as Abraham’s offspring.

We won’t develop that thought, but you can see the obvious parallels with our text in Galatians. I’ll leave it with you for your own study.

3.3.2. Should we read the Old Testament this way?

Some take this analogy as approval to read the Bible allegorically, especially since Paul uses the Greek word ἀλληγορέω, which you can hear is where we get our word allegory. Many Bible translations even translate this word allegorically in our passage.

NASB: This is allegorically speaking . . .

ESV: Now this may be interpreted allegorically . . .

NET: These things may be treated as an allegory . . .

That’s not a bad translation, but it might suggest something Paul didn’t intend.

D. A. Carson’s comment here is helpful:

The two sons and the two mothers, representing the two covenants, the two mountains, and the two Jerusalems of Galatians 4:21–31 . . . do not establish an allegorical interpretation . . . . On the whole, it is easier to think of typology.

He goes on to say that typology differs from allegory in that in typology

(a) there is a repeated correspondence of events, of historical relationships . . . ; and (b) the key to the interpretation depends merely on the repetition of the relationship, not on some extra-textual key.⁴

In other words, in allegorical interpretation the key point of interpretation is completely foreign to the text and must be supplied by the interpreter. This is textbook eisegesis, reading one’s own meaning into the Bible. Typology, the study of types and their fulfillments, is exegesis, that is, drawing out the meaning that is there, where the key to interpretation is contained within the text itself.

So we shouldn’t use this passage as encouragement to find hidden meaning all throughout the Bible, where it was never intended to be seen, as some interpreters in the early church did.

But we should be on the lookout for typological connections that God does intend us to see, and we should rely heavily on Jesus and the apostles and their own inspired interpretation of the Old Testament.

The apostles regularly interpret the Old Testament looking back through the death and resurrection of Jesus with Christian eyes and by the divine revelation of the mystery of the gospel and see things that couldn’t clearly be seen on the other side of the cross.

While we haven’t been given the same ability to see in the Old Testament what Paul saw by divine revelation and therefore shouldn’t carelessly go searching for hidden meaning in the Old Testament, neither should we attempt to read the Old Testament in a non-Christian way, pretending the cross never happened and that the concealed mystery there in the Old Testament in seed form had never been revealed by divine revelation through the apostles.

To do so is to run the risk of missing the point of the Old Testament, of misunderstanding God’s covenant promises, and of distorting the gospel of Jesus Christ, this new way of faith in these last days, this age of fulfillment in Christ.

There are spiritual realities at play in the Old Testament types and promises that we must interpret through the lens of the new age in Christ, the ultimate seed of Abraham, and the heir of all the promises, in whom we, too, have become Abraham’s seed and heirs of those promises.

Jesus and the apostles must be our guides as we seek to read and understand the Old Testament in the light of this mystery, once concealed, though there in seed form, and now revealed through the divine revelation of Christ.

There are, to be sure, already and not-yet dimensions to this inheritance. God is working out his plans to provoke the Jews to jealousy and graft them back into his one olive tree, this new creation, this one new man, where Jews and Gentiles live together as God’s new covenant people, indwelled by the Spirit, and coheirs of the promises.

Conclusion

In these last days, in the fullness of time, this new age of faith and the Spirit, of the gospel and the fulfilment of the promises, in the already before the not-yet, God calls all people, languages, tribes, and nations to faith in the gospel of Jesus Christ. He invites all to become children of Abraham, children and sons of God, and heirs of the promises he made to the patriarchs and the Messiah. These promised blessings, this inheritance, belongs to all who are united to Christ, and this union happens freely for all who by faith cling to the good news of Jesus Christ. To inherit the promised blessings, we mustn’t turn back to our pre-Christian ways or to the pre-Christian times when the law governed how the people of God related to him.

All that God was doing in the Old Covenant was designed to lead us to the fulfillment in Christ. The law served its purpose, and to hang on to it as a way of relating to God is to reject the gospel of Christ, to testify that he died in vain, and to put yourself under a curse and in slavery.

Let us believe afresh this glorious gospel message. Let us persevere in it and never move beyond it. Let us make it the heart of our Christian experience, our parenting, our relationships. Let us see God’s plan of redemption unfolding, progressing, and climaxing in Christ.

Let us joyfully join what God is doing in building his global, multiracial, multiethnic church by praying, giving, supporting, and going—by welcoming everyone into this new way of faith regardless of race, social status, gender, language, or any other distinction.

Let us join Christ, our head, in his fulfillment of the promises to bring the nations into God’s one new people, the seed of Abrham, and heirs of the promised inheritance, while in the already we wait in hope by the Spirit for the ultimate fulfillment in the not-yet.

Prayer

Let’s pray.

Father, thank you for this chance we’ve had to study these rich chapters in Galatians together. There’s so much here for our minds, our hearts, and our hands.

Help us to ponder and study these truths and understand your covenants and what you’re up to in this grand and glorious plan of redemption.

Help us to apply these rich truths of faith, the Spirit, freedom, being sons and daughters of God, heirs of the promises to our hearts. Cause us to soak in them and live in them this week. Comfort our hearts with them when we’re weak and discouraged and downcast. Fill us with confident hope in your future plans, that are far greater than we can even begin to comprehend.

Convict us of the ways in which we’re living out of sync with your gospel and what you’re up to in the world. Align us by your Spirit, so that we may fulfil your purposes for us as your people, your body in these last days, in this new way of faith.

And most of all, help us not to tire of this glorious gospel or move beyond it to other things, to our own effort, to the ways of the flesh, the ways of slavery.

In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.

You are dismissed.

Notes

1. D. A. Carson, “Mystery and Fulfillment: Toward a More Comprehensive Paradigm of Paul’s Understanding of the Old and the New,” in Justification and Variegated Nomism: The Paradoxes of Paul, ed. Peter T. O’Brien and Mark A. Seifrid, 181st ed., vol. 2, Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen Zum Neuen Testament (Grand Rapids, MI; Tübingen: Baker Academic; Mohr Siebeck, 2004), 411–412. ↩

2. D. A. Carson, “Mystery and Fulfillment: Toward a More Comprehensive Paradigm of Paul’s Understanding of the Old and the New,” in Justification and Variegated Nomism: The Paradoxes of Paul, ed. Peter T. O’Brien and Mark A. Seifrid, 181st ed., vol. 2, Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen Zum Neuen Testament (Grand Rapids, MI; Tübingen: Baker Academic; Mohr Siebeck, 2004), 427. ↩

3. C. Marvin Pate says, “Although Paul does not use the word ‘mystery’ in Galatians, that concept seems to be operative.” Cf. Philip Kramer, “Mystery without Mystery in Galatians: An Examination of the Relationship Between Revelatory Language in Gal. 1:11–17 and Scriptural References in Gal. 3:6–18; 4:21–31.” Carson: “Kramer focuses on only a selection of Paul’s uses of μυστήριον (viz. Rom 11:25–27; 16:25–27; 1 Cor 2:6–16) to establish a tight pattern that he finds duplicated even when the word is not present: (1) the referent of the μυστήριον is the gospel or some part of it; (2) the disclosure of this mystery may be traced, at least in part, to the Christophany Paul experienced on the Damascus road; (3) the text makes it clear that this μυστήριον was once hidden but is now revealed; (4) the Old Testament Scriptures constitute the medium in which the μυστήριον was hidden and by which it is revealed.” D. A. Carson, Peter T. O’Brien, and Mark A. Seifrid, eds., Justification and Variegated Nomism: The Paradoxes of Paul, 181st ed., vol. 2, Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen Zum Neuen Testament (Grand Rapids, MI; Tübingen: Baker Academic; Mohr Siebeck, 2004). ↩

4. D. A. Carson, “Mystery and Fulfillment: Toward a More Comprehensive Paradigm of Paul’s Understanding of the Old and the New,” in Justification and Variegated Nomism: The Paradoxes of Paul, ed. Peter T. O’Brien and Mark A. Seifrid, 181st ed., vol. 2, Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen Zum Neuen Testament (Grand Rapids, MI; Tübingen: Baker Academic; Mohr Siebeck, 2004), 405. ↩