Baptized Into Christ

Good morning. We're, as Courtney said, going to be moving into this passage. It is a wonderful passage. But guess what? The wonderful passages aren't done. So this is one of many great passages we'll be stepping into here. Let's first take a look at those first couple of verses here in Galatians 3, 24 and 25.

And before I get into the details there, I just want to kind of give this preface, if you will. One of the things that I try to do, since there are those who learn best by hearing, there are those who learn best by seeing, and most people have some combination of those.

There's a reinforcement of the two. If you're someone who is driven to distraction by what I put on the screen or is on the handout, don't worry about it. Just set it aside and listen to what I have to say. If you're someone who does a whole lot better with what you see, then go ahead and focus on that. Probably a number of you find that some combination helps. Great. Use whatever you can, OK? Use whatever works best for you.

Let's take a look here. God's giving of the law of Moses to the nation of Israel had its purposes. And I made it silly. You know, people will tell me, Vern, you tell such groaners. Well, OK. The law of Moses did have its purposes. You can read that later in Numbers chapter 4. But anyway, the law of Moses did have its purposes for the nation of Israel. And we talked about some of those purposes previously.

Paul in this passage is going to give us some additional purposes or reasons or what's the big picture about the law of Moses. What did God have in mind? Where is it leading to? That's what he's going to address here. A key and central point in those purposes here is that the law of Moses served to lead people to Christ, to take them to Christ, to lead them to faith. Here is how Paul put that picture together. Here's how he illustrated his point. He used the picture of a tutor. And let's take a closer look at that, of course.

Our English translations have selected different English words. The King James has used the word schoolmaster, and New American Standard, and the New King James, which is, I believe, the Bible in most of your PRACs, have tutor. And New International has put in charge. We're going to be looking at that because Paul had a particular word that he chose, and there's value in our kind of getting some insight. What was that word? Why did he use that word? It was a special word.

In the pagan culture of the day, primarily centered in the Greek culture, but even the Romans had a version of it. And while I give the date of AD 49 here, which is when Paul wrote the book of Galatians, in truth this practice had been around for at least five centuries prior to the time Paul wrote this. A long-standing practice. To give you some comparison, it would be like something that had been practiced in our own culture since about the 1500s. Very long-standing practice, well entrenched in the culture. Paul used this word that's pronounced pay to go gas. It sounds something like paid to go get gas.

It referred to a slave who did everything else, everything else that the school teacher didn't do. He did it for one specific student and this slave tutor would do everything that had to do with training and teaching that one pupil. except for what the school teacher did. And even that, this slave tutor was involved. Let's talk about what that means.

The slave tutor would, of course, see to it that the student got to and back from school. Take the hand, make sure the student gets there. Now, the slave tutor would not take that as a good time to go out and get a frappe or something of that sort. but instead would stay there and listen to the lesson as well, be taught if necessary, or say, yeah, I know that. But either way, the slave tutor would then have learned and heard exactly and seen exactly what the schoolteacher taught, and then be able to underscore that very same lesson with that student the rest of the day and on the way to school the next day. The slave tutor would carry a wax tablet. The slave tutor would carry a writing stylus.

We'll talk about those in a minute. and written references, anything you have to look up, and musical instruments. The slave tutor would do all that. Let me take a look at some examples here. Here you see that here's the slave tutor walking behind the student carrying a musical instrument. In this case, it's like this, and it's a lyre, L-Y-R-E. So the slave tutor would carry the musical instrument that the student is learning at school.

Here you see an ancient Greek plate, and you see him there writing on his laptop. No. This is not a laptop. This is his wax tablet, OK? And with the wax tablet, I mean, real interesting, that was a way where they could write something and then erase it, right? How do you erase it? You get it hot. You leave it out in the sun, or you put it in some place next to a fire, get it hot, let it melt down, and now you're ready to go again. So they would have a wax tablet. They would inscribe in the wax with a stylus.

And so the slave tutor would be carrying the wax tablet, the stylus, this musical instrument, in this case we pictured a lyre, and any other references and any other things that the student might need for that day. Now, in addition to getting the student back and forth and carrying all the supplies and instruments and everything else, The slave tutor would stay at the school, listen to the schoolmaster, and pick up everything that the student needed to have.

And so while the slave tutor was taking the student to school, drilling them, I don't know if you had that experience where somebody takes you to school and drills you on everything and was there during the whole day. Can you imagine what this is starting to feel like? Drilling you on all the stuff that you'd had that day and you get up the next morning and while you're going to school the slave tutor is drilling you on all the stuff that you've had. You starting to get the idea what this is like? This is the slave tutor.

They're making absolutely certain you've got it down very well. Believe it or not, I don't know how they got away with this, this is ancient doodling. Somehow a student got away with that and some archaeologists found it. This is on a piece of wood from approximately New Testament times and somebody was doodling I guess, unless it was an art project.

Now this, see now there is the slave tutor giving the student computer lessons and they have the frappe and I'm completely joking. Now, what's the next thing? The next thing, the slave tutor stayed with the student basically almost every waking hour. They would have some family time and things of that sort, but during that time of education, whatever time that was, and it was a minimum of a few years, but often with these slave tutors, it would go up to about 10 years of schooling. The slave tutor would have this intensive time with the student basically almost every waking hour. of every day. Those students who had about 10 years of schooling would, under normal circumstances, stay with that same slave tutor one-on-one all the time for 10 years. Constantly drilling and pushing. You're going to school. You're coming back. You're learning some more. On and on and drilling. constantly, for however long you were through the schooling.

That's the word picture that Paul gave them. They said, oh, I know what that means. This isn't just having a little tutoring. This isn't just somebody to carry your instruments. Yeah, they do that, but there's a whole lot more involved. They're going to drill, and they're going to know exactly what the teacher assigned. No sliding by on anything. They're going to know exactly what the teacher taught.

Now, how is the law of Moses like a slave tutor, the slave tutor that we just described here? Looks like this. The slave tutor was with you all the time continually, just like the law, continually ruling the character of your life. Your life is typified by the relationship with this tutor. It's the tutor and you. That's the relationship. That's what life is all about. The same thing with the law. With the law, it's going to live by you. You're going to live by it. And it's with you all the time. Your life is characterized and typified by the law.

As much as the slave tutor would rule your life, I won't say ruin, but rule, ultimately the slave tutor was to prepare you for something else. And that's Paul's point here, isn't it? The slave tutor was not there to be there with you the rest of your life, although sometimes I'm sure they wondered. But the slave tutor was to prepare them for what's next, whether they were going off into business or merchant activity or even to go about teaching someone else or philosophizing, being one of the schoolmasters possibly.

Whatever the next step was, the slave tutor was there to get people prepared for that next step. That's Paul's picture. That's his illustration for us here. So to put it here in graphical terms, as graphically as possible, the slave tutor was to prepare you for adult life, for what's next. When you grow up, you'd be away from the slave tutor. Because why? The slave tutor is to get you ready. In the same way, the law was to prepare the Jews, if they would see and if they would listen, if they would understand, to prepare them for Christ. To prepare them for Christ. That's Paul's point.

So, is it the place to remain or just a stepping stone? Is the law a place to stay or just a place on the way to something else? Some things in life we certainly understand to be temporary, right? There are temporary measures, other things we clearly understand to be permanent. Sometimes in the process of life it can be a little frightening to ponder things that are temporary being permanent. Switching between things that are temporary and permanent can be a little, Anything from a cause of concern to disturbing to maybe even a little unsettling.

For example, here's a beautiful set of stepping stones across this creek, a bridge behind it. The stepping stones, I'm sure, are very nice to step across. Wonderful thing as a transition from one side of the creek to the other. I don't think, however, you'd want to pick one of those, like the one with the arrow, and move in. It's not a place to live, especially when a creek rises.

Here's a guy with a cast on his arm, and at the moment he seems to be smiling, at least for the picture. It's temporary, but can you imagine if it's permanent? When you mix those things up, it doesn't work quite so well. The law was never intended to be the ultimate goal, an end in itself, the place where you stop, the place where it all ends. That was never what God had in mind.

The law of Moses was intended to point to, to lead to, and show the need for Christ. Point to, lead to, and show the need for Christ. That's what Paul is saying here. That's what the law is for. The need for salvation by faith in Christ by grace, as Paul has underscored the point here. Many of the Jews didn't understand that that's what the law was for. They said the law is the law and there just doesn't get any better than that. They didn't understand that the law was pointing to, leading to, and showing the need for Christ.

Think of here the Passover, 1500 years approximately before the time that Paul wrote this letter. Here is the Passover. Exodus 12 there it is in one of the early books of the law one of the five books of Moses the second one The Passover and what was it? You put the blood of the Lamb on the top and on the sides of the doorpost to save the firstborn of the family and the Jews were to observe that Passover every year and not just to look back on the time the Lord redeemed them from Egypt, but to look forward to Christ the Lamb, the one whose blood would save and preserve.

In the law, the Jews were told in the book of Numbers to look upon this serpent held up in front of them all and to be healed by looking upon the serpent. when Jesus meets with fellow rabbi Nicodemus. He says to him in John 3, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness. The law was there to point to Christ, wasn't it? And Christ himself pointed out where the law was pointing to him.

Here is Christ on the road to Emmaus, and I am constantly fascinated by that event. Thinking about that, here's two people walking away. Jesus is resurrected. And He's walking next to them. And they don't realize they're walking next to the resurrected Lord of all. They don't recognize it. So as they walk along the road, he begins explaining to them, because they're baffled about the things that have happened. They just, they can't figure it out.

And so one of the things he tells them, he says, then beginning with Moses, he begins to tell them how the law was pointing to him. We could go on, but the law repeatedly pointed to, and led to, and showed the need for Christ. After some Jews even did come to believe, and did come to believe the gospel, and were even certainly a part of the church, some of them felt a need to draw back and fall back upon the law. The very letter that we're studying this morning, the book of Galatians, is one of those places where it's clear that people were being at least called to fall back upon the law. And Paul's saying, no way, you've missed the point. What was intended to be temporary, and that for which God had good temporary purpose, you're now wanting to fall back on that instead of what it was pointing to. In the book of Hebrews, that some of you have been studying of late, the book of Hebrews, you've seen a similar pattern there.

The Jews to whom it was written, after coming to salvation in Christ, were being tempted to fall all back into the system of law, not understanding. what God had in mind with the law. Even in Christendom, and I use that as a word that includes both true saving Christianity as well as a number of things where it is called Christianity by the world, but it's in true not saving. Even in Christendom, there are many who after knowing Christ or knowing of Him, still want a law principal live by there are a great many and they show up at your door two by two who feel that unless they show up at your door two by two that some part of their salvation uh... will not be in place they've got to come to you to do that i sat with uh... with one pair of them were at my front door and i said do you mean to tell me that you come in front of me here and If you don't stand in front of me two by two, that you're afraid you'll lose your salvation?"

And they say, yeah. I say, I feel really, really sorry for you. Terribly, terribly sorry. And I even kind of ham it up a little bit. Because I want them to realize that they're really, really missing something. They could do something at the last moment. that would make them lose all the effort that they've done before, instead of realizing the marvelous grace that the Lord has shown to us. So that we may be justified by faith. That's a message that Paul's been giving, hasn't he? We are justified, and that means declared righteous. Not really good excuses. Declared righteous. Who does the declaring? God does the declaring. Alright?

The law is intended to point to, lead to, and show the need for Christ so that. so that God had a purpose in this. This but now is a pair of words in the New Testament. It's used a number of places in the New Testament to mark off, but this is the way it was. But now, with Christ having come, but now with Christ having died on the cross, been buried, been resurrected, but now big changes have taken place. It's a sharp contrast to the pattern of the past to the pattern of now and the future. The law did have a good and valid and particularly temporary purpose. The but now marks off the end of the old purpose, what it was there for in the start of the new pattern.

Continuing the old pattern after the start of the new would be absurd. Here's an example. A number of you have seen things like this on your windshields This time of year, it's especially popular. Put that in there. I hear different numbers, but you can have a cooler car and certainly a cooler dashboard with that thing in there. Nancy and I even have one that's like this that fits inside and we just draw it across. Those are really great.

I do not, listen to me, I do not recommend you drive with those in. It's really lousy. They have a great temporary purpose, don't they? But they're not good there for the long term. As much as I would be glad to have you have one of those while it's in the parking lot right now, I would not want to see any of you have it while you're driving. Okay? Alright. Now for the driving lesson, let's take a look at verse 26. For you are all sons of God, through faith in Christ. So, does this mean that he's going to turn every one of us here in the body of Christ, here in Holy Hills, male? Is that what God's going to do?

No, that's not what he has in mind. What he does have in mind is this. In Scripture, and you're going to be able to see application for this in a number of places, that is, if you understand the principle, you will see it in a lot of places and be able to understand what's being said.

It's this. Son of, or sometimes children of, in biblical usage meant to have a close relationship to and to be like in character. Got those two aspects? Because of the close relationship, like in character. And that's the kind of the basis of the terminology. For example, in Colossians and Ephesians, unbelievers are called sons of disobedience. Sons of disobedience. What does that mean? To have a close relationship to disobedience. and to be like in character because of that close relationship.

Here we have an example where the Lord Himself was asked with the definite articles in there, and they all said while the Lord was on trial, this was when He was on trial at the house of Caiaphas, they all said, Are you the Son of God then? And he said to them, yes, I am. And this is, he used the I am like is in the Old Testament, where Moses asked God, you know, who will I say has sent me? He used those words, okay?

And of course, they just were delighted at that, right? No, not so much. But the point there is Christ is the unique son of the God, is the way it comes across. What does that mean? He has a close relationship to the Father, and he is like in character because of that relationship. This means for us, however, sons of God, means that everyone who has put their trust in Christ, everyone who believes, has a close relationship to God and has a character in their position like His.

This is a statement of our eternal position in Christ, and it is true for every single believer here this morning. Every single one. Now, one of the other things that comes out of this, this position that we have here isn't because of some earthly genealogy, personal connection, self-effort, the work that I did, the particular background that I have. because of who I was born from, connections I've made. None of those things, none of those things put us in this position. It is through faith in Jesus Christ, through faith alone.

Keep in mind, too, that these believers, these writing to, are maximum two years old in the Lord. And one would look at it as their spiritual toddlers are younger, okay? Their spiritual toddlers are young. They are young in the Lord. This isn't some accomplishment, and in fact, many of them may be brand new in the Lord.

But his point here is being a son of God, having that close relationship to and being like in character to the Lord is through faith in Christ, not by having spent some time or doing certain things or having the right background. So what about this faith in Christ that Paul was writing about? What's he talking about there? What he is boiling it down to is the gospel.

Faith means, and we've laid this out, but I just want to make it ultimately clear, faith means believing that Christ died for your sins, that He was buried and that He rose again on the third day. That's the basics of the gospel. If you believe that, you believe the gospel, that's the basis of salvation. It's as simple as that.

There's a whole lot more that we could say, and certainly we gather here every Sunday morning and at other times to study God's Word. Why? Because there's much to grow on. There's much to learn about. And even as we're doing here this morning, there are things that once we believe are true of us, that unless we look at it, we won't know.

But the bottom line, the Gospel, the basics of the Gospel are spelled out, and that's what he's referring to. Faith in Christ, the one who died for your sins. Faith in Christ, the one who was buried. Faith in Christ, the one who was raised to life, who was resurrected. That's the Gospel. That's what he's talking about, faith in Christ.

Let's look at verse 27 here. We're stepping into a new verse and we've got a question here. You see this verse here, all of you who are baptized into Christ. I want you to think about this. Is there any water in this verse? Is there any water in the verse? I would propose to you it's dry as a bone. No water in it.

Let's talk about that. In a church context, when we hear the word baptized, and certainly scripture does talk about water baptism, so I'm not sidestepping that at all, we tend to think of water baptism. And I have a picture here aside from when Brad was baptized here behind the screen. Here's an instance. There's a soldier in Iraq. What they did is they put down plastic in a hole filled with water and had a baptism right out there in the desert.

We tend to think of water baptism, but while that's true, this Greek word had a basic meaning that most people understood, especially coming out of a secular context. They understood it with this idea. The Greek word meant to immerse, with the idea of being changed or changing the character of whatever was immersed. Here's an instance. Cloth was baptized into the vadda dye to color it purple or red. They would baptize the cloth. That's the way that they would think of that. All right, I'm going to baptize. I'm going to place the cloth into the dye.

One of the dyes that they would use was made from a shell that grew on the eastern end of the Mediterranean there. In this particular shell, they would go and collect a great many of them, thousands of them, in order to make a little bit of the dye. It was so time-consuming, and not everybody knew how to do it, to the point that the cost of the powdered dye was five to ten times, ounce per ounce, that of gold. Really, really expensive. So they didn't do this sloppily. They did it very carefully because the dye was very expensive. Another thing that they used was a worm that in this stage was very red and it was crimson and so they would get dye from the crimson worm as well. Nonetheless, what they would do is they would take whatever cloth that they were wanting to dye and put it in these vats with the dye material in there. They'd very carefully wring it out, because you don't want to just drip this dye all over the place. It costs too much. But very clearly, they also would baptize it with the idea we want it fully changed, fully immersed. Here's another instance.

When they made swords in those days, and they made them of various lengths, They would first heat treat the sword. They'd get the sword very hot in the fire and then they would plunge it into a vat of water and rapidly cool it. That would heat treat the sword surface. And then in the end, they'd be able to shape it and get a hard surface and not the first sword fight, it's all full of dings. So this they would also call baptizing. What would they do? They would take that white hot sword, shove it quickly into the water, baptize the sword. Immerse it so that it would be like the cloth going into the dive vat, changed radically by that immersion. That's the word that Paul used here.

So baptized into Christ, immersed into Christ himself, not just a little dipping and or splashing, okay? Immersed into Christ himself and changed permanently as a result. By the way, once you dyed the cloth and the red dye, there was, in the technology of that day, no way to make it un-red or un-purple.

It was a permanent change. So those who have believed in Christ and therefore saved have been spiritually immersed into Christ. They are permanently and substantially changed by that one immersion. That change radically alters the character of the believer. The one who believes is immersed into Christ, changed forever because of it.

That's why Paul could write to the believers in Corinth, Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature. The old things are passed away. Behold, new things have come. And by the way, the word for new there means things new and kind, not just sequentially new, new and kind.

Scripture then connects that baptism, as we see here, with being united or identified with Christ. Specifically, Romans makes a connection in his death, burial, and resurrection. For all of you who are baptized into Christ, we have been identified with Christ in his death, his burial, his resurrection, his ascension, and his seating. Those truths are repeatedly brought out in several of Paul's letters. And even Peter, as we studied in our first and second Peter elective, even Peter, You have died unto sins and are alive to righteousness. We who believe now have Christ's history.

Nancy and I often do counseling together, occasionally independently, but together. But one of the marvelous privileges that we have to share with people is obviously quite true. Many of us, humanly speaking, have very difficult things in our history. We have things that were done to us, so we look back and we say, that shouldn't have been done. We have had things that we have done. And we say, boy, I sure wish I hadn't done that. Or the reverse of that. This didn't happen to me, and therefore I'm hurting. Or this did happen to me. Or I could have done this and I should have and didn't. And boy, probably if you think a little bit, you can think of all those things we could and things we should have and things that were done and things we've done ourselves. All those things are possible, aren't they?

But what is wonderful news, what is marvelous news, is to be able to share with people, do you know that you now have Christ's history. I'm not stuck with trying to rearrange and fiddle with and try to get some perspective, earthly perspective, on my history. And that's wonderful news. That is marvelous news.

Because as we sit down with people, we can say, look, because of what God's done, you have Christ's history. And because you've been baptized into Christ, Your personal history is eternally changed. And what will matter 1,000 years from now, 2,000 years from now, 10,000, is not the history of this and that, the things we did, the things we didn't, the things that were done to us, the things that weren't, but this history. That's what's going to matter. Every step of it is marvelous. It is marvelous good news. It is precious news.

It's not, oh, whoa, what has happened to me. It's not, oh, awful. Oh, dread what I've done. Oh, gasp what I should have done. What I could have done and didn't. No. Look what He's done. Look who I am in Him. that marvelous hope that we have. Marvelous hope. Sometimes in our lives, awful things have happened. The things, the nightmares are made of. Sometimes we can look back at things we have done ourselves, or haven't done, and we, oh, oh that I had, or oh that I hadn't, It would be desperate. It would be depressing.

Were it not that we have this marvelous hope, our new history in Christ, a new kind of history that takes care of who I was and all the things that I've done and didn't do, and the things that have happened to me or didn't happen, but instead leaves me in these five essential steps, leaves me seated with Christ, no matter what my personal history is.

You have clothed yourself with Christ, he puts it this way. Is this what Jesus would wear? No. As you've been baptized into Christ, as the first part of the verse says, You have also clothed yourself with Christ. At the time we believed, we have clothed ourselves with the person of Christ, Him. So, the question is, that's great, but what does it mean? What's the significance of that? This is a statement of our eternal position in Christ. We have His righteousness, His holiness.

What's really cool, John pictures, and here is John writing, as far as we have any record, the last apostle alive. The last one who had walked with the Lord and had been chosen to be among the disciples. Here is John writing in Revelation. He's writing the words of our Lord as a message to one of the seven churches.

He who overcomes will thus be clothed in white garments. White. White garments. There's a song, White as Snow, and I'd just like to disturb your sitting and ask you to stand for a minute here. Let's sing it together, would you? White as snow, white as snow, though my sins were as scarlet, Lord, I know, Lord, I know that I'm clean and forgiven through the power of your blood, through the wonder of your love. Through faith in you I know I've come to be white as snow, white as snow, white as snow. Though my sins were as scarlet, Lord, I know, Lord, I know that I'm clean and forgiven. Through the power of your blood, through the wonder of your love, through faith in you I know I've come to be white as snow.

Be seated. What a marvelous thing to have in my position put on Christ. But one of the things, while both of these talk about our position, this is not intended to be hypothetical. It isn't, oh, that's great, that's nice Christian theory. No. These are told us so that they might be lived out day to day, moment by moment, real life, real time. They are not hypothetical at all.

Next two slides have it, and you have it also on page 3 of your handout. Romans 6, 3, and then I've jumped ahead for the sake of getting to the point. Verses 11 through 14. Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized, remember, immersed spiritually into His death. He goes on in the next several verses to underscore the death and the burial and resurrection that we have had with Christ. co-crucified, co-buried, and co-resurrected with Him. Verse 11, what's the impact? Even so, consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus.

That's just a mental process? Nope. Here's what it does. Therefore, do not let sin reign in your mortal body. These things. Sin's no longer calling the shots. Sin is a deposed monarch. The sin nature is a deposed monarch. Do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its lusts.

He goes on to talk about real, true life application of these truths. It is not something we say, that's wonderful and that's great, but what good does it do when I walk out the door? No, it is intended to be lived out as lived out truth and it is intended to have eternal impact as well. That's marvelous good news.

Verse 14, for sin shall not be master over you, for you are not under law, but under grace. Isn't that something? Because you're under grace, under grace, under grace, under grace, under grace. Romans 13, 14, I think they've already passed this up in the Romans elective, so they've been there, but put on.

Here is, we already have in our position, we have put on Christ. Here is the same word. How in our daily condition does this get applied? To us here, living out that eternal position, unchangeable and untouchable in the heavenlies, living out that, putting on that character of Christ in our daily condition, how we live today, every day, every moment, right now. Now, 328. Paul made a statement.

This is, again, about the believers' eternal position. It is about who we are, having been immersed into Christ, having put on Christ's righteousness and His holiness. It's the same for every single believer here this morning. It is true from the day that the church began in Acts 2 until the Lord calls us home, the day of the rapture. earthly distinctions don't have an impact on our position in Christ. In Christ we are, as he puts it, all one in Christ Jesus.

Jew nor Greek is an expression that would be kind of an idiom equal to Jew or Gentile. The Greeks were the prominent Gentile group. They were the ones all around the Jews there in the eastern Mediterranean. Slave nor free man was a major legal distinction in the Roman Empire. What's interesting is while there were a great number of slaves, every year they needed about a half million new slaves. People were enslaved in great numbers and also some were released. But it was a huge distinction.

As big a distinction as it was in the Roman Empire, Paul says, doesn't matter one bit when it comes to your position in Christ. Imagine, here is this master who has put his trust in Christ, and here is the slave owned by the master. They may be in an entirely and strikingly different position in earthly terms. They both have the same position in Christ forever. Exactly the same. The slave, who doesn't get to say what he does every moment of every day, but is told what to do, is seated with Christ. The slave is a son of God. The slave has put on Christ Jesus.

Male nor females, in reference to gender distinction, is saying that doesn't matter. None of these earthly distinctions will matter. You know, when we walk through heaven's gates, When we walk through heaven's gates, none of these differences are going to matter. They're not going to matter one bit. It is who we are in Christ. That's what will matter. That's what will make a difference. Even Christ himself said that in heaven, there will even be no male and female. That distinction will be wiped away. Slave or free? Of course not. Okay?

Before we leave Galatians 3.28, before we walk out the door, there are those in our day who like to refer to Galatians 3.28 and attempt to show that among Christians, God intends there be no distinctions in gender roles. Nancy, while we were down in Texas, worked at the seminary office to pay my tuition. And she even got a phone call from one of these people trying to enlist support for the organization here.

But Galatians 3.28 isn't about that subject. It's about our eternal position in Christ.

That's what Galatians 3.28 is about.

Paul addressed the other distinctions in other passages. For example, slaves and masters, the beginning part of Ephesians chapter 6. He talked about relationships between Jews and the Gentiles and laid that out. He even talked about the husband and wife roles and how that should be carried out. He addressed those things. Here he's talking about our position in Christ, and that's his focal point.

There is a paper that's in a blue folder out there that my brother wrote, and it is big. It's about 50 pages long. It is academic. So it's uphill reading, okay? But if you're into that sort of thing and you'd like to take a look at it, feel free to do so. If you put your name on there, I'll either send you a link or if you really need to have it on paper, I can print you out a copy. You might want to take a look at it before you decide to sign up though. Okay. Now, that's it. Verse 29.

Paul is continuing here in his listing of the believer's position. That's what he's been doing here in today's passage, isn't it? He's listing the believer's position. He's laying out who you are in Christ. That's his point here. This one included. As Paul wrote to the Ephesians, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us, past tense, with a few blessings here and there. No. With every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, where in Christ? Every. Where? Heavenly. Done deal. No ifs in there. Done deal. There's no maybe in that if. If you belong to Christ.

In the Greek grammar, this is written in such a way that if is assumed to be true. And the only reason that the if is there is to have you think through the logical process. That's why some places you'll see, the New Testament especially, they'll write if and then there'll be some other thing and you'll say, why do you put if? The reason is, the yes answer is built into in many cases, but it's to invite you to think through the process.

That's why. And that's the same case here. Everyone who believes belongs to Christ, no exceptions. Period. You believe here this morning? You believe that Christ died for your sins, that he was buried, that he rose again? If you believe that, then you belong to Christ. Furthermore, what does he say? We are also spiritual descendants of Abraham by faith.

Any of you do genealogical studies? I enjoy doing that. I enjoy looking up different things. And boy, it's just fascinating stuff. You can spend a lot of time doing it. But what is really cool is we've just been given the genealogical chart here, all of us, every one of us who believes. Here's what I'm talking about. In recent months, we've made this chart available. I've shown it on the screen and made it available as a handout at several different weeks.

And what this shows with the red line is the lineage from Abraham to Isaac to Jacob on through Judah, one of the sons of Jacob, through David to Jesus Christ. But guess what? When we put our trust in Christ, we were made to be in Christ, as we've seen in this passage.

In 1 Corinthians 1.30, it says, God made us to be in Christ. That chart puts us right here. There you are. There's your genealogy. How about that? Faith in Christ puts you in Christ. There's your descendancy. Abraham was really concerned about having an heir. And guess what? There's a whole bunch of his heirs here in this room here this morning. A great number of them.

Galatians 3, 6, and 7, even so Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him, considered by God as righteousness. Therefore, be sure it is those who are of faith who are sons of Abraham. The son of, remember, is to be in close relationship to and like in character. That's the promise that God gave to Abraham.

Heirs according to promise. The promise also is one way. God made the promise and He didn't say, you've got to do this and this and this just to make sure it all comes out. No. It's one way. It's God's promise to Abraham. We couldn't do anything to merit it. As a matter of fact, we can't do anything to blow it. All you can do is believe God and He counts that as righteousness. It's as simple as that. We'll forego the expanded and explained. You have it on page four of your handout towards the bottom of the page. I'll let you read it at your leisure.

But the point is we've looked at our position in Christ here this morning, being justified by Christ by faith, God's promises to Abraham, being made a descendant and heir of Abraham, being a son of God and a son of Abraham. All those things, baptized, immersed into Christ, placed in Him to be changed, clothed with Him, given His righteousness and character. We've been made one as believers, one in Christ. We belong to Him. All that, all of our salvation, all of our position is by faith, all by God's grace, 100%. Let's thank Him for that. Lord, we do give you praise.

You have done marvelous things. These truths are so deep that it won't be a matter of soaking them up for another minute or a day or a week or even a month. But the impact of these truths will take eternity for us to absorb. Thank you for your marvelous truths and what you have done and accomplished. All we can do is thank you. In Jesus' name, amen.